How many times have you sat in a crowd and secretly wished you were on stage?
After giving a few presentations, you could realize that you are adept at public speaking. You might join Toastmasters and become the club’s leader.
After some time, you begin to believe that you could support yourself by doing this. Imagine earning money by speaking!
You choose to move forward. So, what comes next?
You might begin by following these general steps to enter the field of professional speaking:
- Choose a Lane
- Establishing a Successful Business and Making a Great Promise
- Create a marketing strategy.
1. Choose a Lane
You must “choose a lane” as the first stage in your adventure. Based on your area of expertise, you must select a subject matter for your focus. However, you might object, “How can I choose only one speech when I’m quite good at several of them?”
What do you want your name to be associated with in five years? Continue giving all your presentations if you do not care about getting paid, being recognized for anything, or wanting to be renowned for anything. Pick a lane if you want to be well paid and recognized as an authority on one subject.
2. Be the Authority
Many people make the error of considering themselves only as speakers when beginning a career as a professional speaker. However, in the grand scheme of things, you are the key component in an organization that makes something happen. Your business should have a mission, whether it is to assist clients in time management, leadership, motivation, or economic education.
You should consider speaking as merely one of the mediums through which you share your expertise. You could also run teleseminars, consult, coach, hold retreats, and publish books.
The idea is to envision yourself as the leader of an empire that aids others in your area of expertise rather than just a professional speaker. Do not forget that you cannot fake it. Your knowledge needs to be authentic and dependable. Before going down this road, if you have not developed your expertise yet, go out and do it.
3. Do Well
Winning a speech competition is a positive step toward improving, but it does not guarantee that you will be paid. When someone approaches you after your speech and says, “I’d want to schedule you to speak in six months in Las Vegas,” that is when you will really know your speech has “made it.”
You can stop preparing your speech when spin-off, which is king in our industry, occurs on average 2-3 times after each engagement. Work on the speech while you can. [Ed. note: a “spin-off” speaking engagement is one that results directly from a current engagement]
4. Set Up Shop: Make a Splash into Professional Speaking
Like any business, speaking is a profession. If you lack even the slightest entrepreneurial inclination, you can face difficulties. You require cash flow, or start-up capital, to get going.
It will be more challenging if you are starting off on a tight budget. Nevertheless, given the state of technology today, things are more likely. You may, for instance, create your own website using a blog.
If it appears sufficiently professional, you might be able to avoid paying the thousands of dollars it can cost to set up and maintain a website.
The important thing is to be able to explain your value to visitors within the first 15 seconds of their visit. You do not have much time to make an impression in our ADD online environment. Attention deficit disorder (Ed.) They will leave your website immediately if they cannot find what they are looking for.
5. Making a Magnificent Promise
The promise statement is essential for letting prospects know how valuable you are. It functions as a tagline and would be used in marketing materials and on your website. The promise statement shows prospects what they will obtain by collaborating with you in five to nine words (less is more).
A promise like “Helping Teams Win in a Competitive Field” might be created by a speaker who conducts team-building seminars, for instance. The actual secret to getting that decision maker to lean in and say, “Yes, we need that,” is to demonstrate the consequence and the worth of your promise. You can focus on making your promise cleverer or more indicative of your personality.
6. Create a marketing strategy
Now that your website is up, you will want to generate traffic to it. Obviously, I am simplifying here. Selecting the right industries to target with your message will help you launch a marketing strategy that will establish you as an authority among those audiences.
I frequently advise my clients to develop a 12-month marketing schedule. By getting visitors to sign up for something on your website, the objective is to build a list of followers. After that, stay connected with that list frequently so that you are top of mind when someone needs your skills. Several marketing suggestions are:
- Creating articles for your intended audience
- Postings on post cards
- Email marketing
- Tele classes using social media and direct mail
