The Business of Successful Speaking

The Business of

Successful Speaking

Proven Secrets to Becoming a

Million-Dollar Speaker

Andrea H. Gold

Gary K. Yamamoto

Cypress Mountain Books

An Imprint of Dynamic Pathways, Inc.

Tucson, Arizona

THE BUSINESS OF SUCCESSFUL SPEAKING

Copyright © 2021 Andrea H. Gold and Gary K. Yamamoto

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

ISBN: 9781878182029 (eBook)

ISBN: 9781878182036 (paperback)

ISBN: 9781878182234 (hardcover)

Contents

Acknowledgement

Testimonials from Professional Speakers

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1 - The Speaking Business

Chapter 2 - Becoming a Professional Speaker

Chapter 3 - The Business of Speaking

Chapter 4 - How to Set Up Your Office

Chapter 5 - How the Economy Affects Your Business

Chapter 6 - Type of Professional Speakers

Chapter 7 - Types of Presentations

Chapter 8 - Accessories and Props

Chapter 9 - Setting Your Fees

Chapter 10 - Practice and Free Speeches

Chapter 11 - How Speakers Bureaus Rate Speakers

Chapter 12 - Sales and Marketing

Chapter 13 - Working with Speakers Bureaus

Chapter 14 - Marketing to Speakers Bureaus

Chapter 15 - Client Expectations

Chapter 16 - Creating Effective Marketing Material

Chapter 17 - Your Booking Contract

Chapter 18 - Important Booking Considerations

Chapter 19 - Travel Arrangements

Chapter 20 - Payments and Travel Expenses

Chapter 21- Creating Products from Your Speech

Chapter 22 - Best Practices of Professional Speakers

Chapter 23 - The Successful Speaker’s Life

Chapter 24 - Summary

Supplement A - National Speakers Association

Supplement B - Marketing Checklist

Supplement C - Sample Contract

Supplement D - Questionnaire

Supplement E - Speaker Evaluation Form

Supplement F - Proposal

About the Authors

Glossary

Dedication

We dedicate this book to all the speakers we have had the privilege of working with over the past 30 years. We appreciate all of your support, advice, and insights. We also thank you for being some of the best people to work with; you have enriched our lives by knowing you.

We also dedicate this book to all of our clients who have made our business possible. We know how hard you work at coordinating and putting on your meetings, conventions, and in-house training sessions. We appreciate everything you have done to make our jobs easier and we enjoy working with you.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank all the speakers who have generously contributed their insights and best practices to enhance this book. They are in alphabetical order:

Jim Bearden, Dianna Booher, Joe Calloway, Frank Candy, Jim Cathcart, Eric Chester, Jarik Conrad, Pegine Echevarria, Chip Eichelberger, David Goldsmith, Marshall Goldsmith. T. Scott Gross, Mike Hourigan, Don Hutson, Shep Hyken, Larry Johnson, Willie Jolley, Eileen McDargh, Connie Podesta, Jim Pan cero, Vince Poscente, Lorna Riley, Steve Rizzo, Sheryl Roush, Mark Sanborn, Barbara Sanfilippo, Ross Shafer, Marsha Petrie Sue, Bryan Townsend, Barry Wishner

We would like to give special thanks to William Blades, Tom Faranda, Frank Candy, Mel Kleiman, and Barry Wishner for their advice and guidance over the years.

Joan Gold, Andrea’s mom, for suggesting we do this a long time ago.

Registered Trademarks Used

Adobe®

Acrobat®

Dynamic Pathways™

Gold Stars Speakers Bureau®

Google™

InDesign®

LinkedIn®

Microsoft®

QuickBooks®

Sennheiser®

The Salesman’s Guide™

Twitter™

Yahoo®

Testimonials from Professional Speakers

If you think you’re going to be successful just because you’ve got a ‘good speech’ - think again. Unless you master the business aspects of speaking, you’ve just got a hobby, not a career. Andrea and Gary cut your learning curve and give you a head start with ‘The Business of Speaking.’ Hey, the speaking business is just that - a business. The speech is only the beginning. — Joe Calloway, CSP, CPAE, Author: Becoming a Category of One.

This is the most detailed, up-to-date text book for beginning or seasoned professional speakers. Everything I’ve learned the hard way over 30+ years of being in the business is in one easy to use document. If only I would have had this when I started out! — Mike McKinley, CSP, CPAE, 2008 Cavett Winner and NSA Past President.

Many speakers have wonderful platform skills, fantastic content and absolutely no marketing savvy. This book can help great speakers become well-known speakers!

The Business of Successful Speaking should be required reading for anyone entering the speaking business! Your fantastic message and wonderful delivery really don’t matter, if not one is listening. The Business of Successful Speaking will help ensure that you have an audience! — Marshall Goldsmith, Author: What Got You Here Won’t Get You There.

This is the most comprehensive flight plan for the business of speaking I have ever seen, written by two experienced and successful industry experts. A must read for speakers plotting their career. — Howard Putnam, Former CEO Southwest Airlines, Author: The Winds of Turbulence.

A freaking bargain!!!! New speakers will pay $99.00 for it without a problem. And they should invest a hundred bucks to learn what they DON’T know. — Ross Shafer, Professional Speaker and Author.

When you want to know the speaking business, Andrea is the ‘go-to’ person. — Randy Gage, Speaker and Author.

On a scale of 0-10 the book, The Business of Successful Speaking, is an 11. Whether you are a new speaker or a veteran this book is guaranteed to provide you with the tools to take your career to the next level. It’s a must have book for your library and contains everything you wanted to know about the speaking profession but were afraid to ask. — Barry Wishner, Professional Speaker and Author.

Andrea and Gary are two of the best in the business and for them to share all of this information in one book is amazing! This book will help you to Grow and Go to the next level! I highly recommend this book! — Willie Jolley, MA, CSP, CPAE, Author: A Setback Is A Setup For A Comeback.

Andrea and Gary truly understand that success as a professional speaker has less to do with your ability to give a great speech. They have outlined the path to help you focus your business, intensify your selling efforts and to run your speaking business as a business. I wish this book had been available when I began my professional speaking career in 1982! It would have saved me thousands of dollars and years of trial and error. — Jim Pancero, CSP, CPAE,

Professional Speaker, Consultant & Trainer for over 27 yrs.

I have said this for years: The job is not doing the speech, it is getting the speech. Andrea Gold teaches you how to get the speech, as well as how to run your speaking business. Throughout this book she reveals secret after secret on how to get into the business and be successful as a professional speaker. Where was this book when I was first getting started? — Shep Hyken, CSP, CPAE, Author: The Cult of the Customer.

While addressed to the newer speaker, even seasoned pros will find nuggets of Gold (and a touch of Yamamoto) in this timely and important book. Combining the talents and experiences of this bureau-speaker partnership, you will learn much from their proven expertise in the business of speaking. So, whether you’re just starting out or have been around for a bit, you will find this book a valuable and exciting learning tool as you begin or continue your journey. — Edward E. Scannell, CMP, CSP, Past National President, National Speakers Assn.

Gold and Yamamoto have poured years of experience onto these pages. This book provides the fundamentals for newbies in the industry and several key secrets for seasoned speakers. Times change; demands change; etiquette changes. This book prevents a mistake that can cost a career, and puts you on the path to quick success. It’s easily worth ten times the price! — Dianna Booher, MA, CSP, CPAE, Author: The Voice of Authority & more than 40 other books.

Andrea Gold is one of the good guys in the bureau business. I have always valued and appreciated her council. She and Gary have captured the essence of what it takes to be successful in their new book. For the emerging professional speaker, this will be an effective roadmap for success. For the experienced professional speaker, this book will be a much needed tune up. Wherever you are in your speaking career, you need this book, NOW! — Ed Rigsbee, CSP.

Let’s get to the point. If you want to become a successful speaker then you have to read this book. It’s simple, it’s informative and it’s invaluable. I wish it was available when I got started. — Steve Rizzo, CPAE.

Andrea Gold’s new book is insightful, impactful, and invaluable to anyone who is serious about the speaking business. The profession has needed a good book on "The Business of Successful Speaking’, and this is it! Read it and you will get a powerful overview of what this business is all about and how to prosper in it. — Don Hutson, CSP, CPAE, Author: The One Minute Entrepreneur.

You will shorten your learning curve and increase your learning curve by reading and applying this book’s messages. Andrea Gold and Gary Yamamoto have written a vital guide for anyone who is building a practice as a speaker. I know how valuable this book can be for you because as the co-creator of The Professional Speaking Institute I have spent hundreds of hours isolating the steps and skills necessary for success as a professional speaker. All of those business skills are covered in this book. Use it as your handbook. Keep it filled with tabs and highlights to recall the best ideas and tips. Use the forms and checklists, don’t just read it, devour it. — Jim Cathcart, CSP, CPAE, Author: Relationship Selling & 13 other books.

If only I could go back and undo some of the mistakes... many of them expensive mistakes... I made early in my speaking career! Andrea Gold’s book The Business of Speaking would have saved me thousands of dollars, hours of frustration and years of making less money than I should have made.

Each time I get a booking from Andrea’s bureau, I still learn more from her. If you want to jump-start your career, Andrea’s information and ideas will help you make it happen. — Larry Mersereau, CTC, Author: Stand Out & 3 other books on sales & marketing.

Preface

When author Gary Yamamoto became a full-time speaker, he had no idea how to go about doing it. He had sold his publishing business and started offering seminars. The seminar business was an expensive and terrible idea.

Andrea Gold had just left her position in publishing. Upon meeting Gary, she decided to help him. They were struggling when providence stepped in. Guy Atchley, a Tucson television anchorman, was interviewing someone on his television show. He asked Andrea if she would help by arranging radio and newspaper interviews. Andrea agreed.

They met Dottie Walters, a speakers bureau owner from California. With Dottie’s suggestion, they started Gold Stars Speakers Bureau. Even with the help of a few speakers, they were quickly losing money. With limited booking success, it didn’t take long to spend through their earning and personal savings of nearly a hundred thousand dollars.

In need of real help, they paid half of their savings and hired a consultant. With the guidance of Somers White, they created and mailed 6,000 marketing letters. On New Year’s Day, they realized that when they paid their next mortgage payment, they would have to get a real job. But with their mailing and a powerful prayer, the booking came pouring in. The authors have owned and successfully operated Gold Stars Speakers Bureau for over 30 years.

Over the years, the number of phone calls asking questions on the speaking business became overwhelming. Andrea and Gary would love to help speakers, but when the owners and salespeople are not marketing, business stops. So Andrea and Gary wrote this book. It’s a compilation of the critical information a person would need to become a successful professional speaker. It incorporates the insights of a speakers bureau owner along with the experience of a professional speaker. This book reveals the secrets that enable speakers to chart their careers and become million-dollar speakers.

Besides the experience and wisdom of the authors, they have tapped the knowledge of the best speakers in the business. Included are these professionals’ best insights, experiences, and suggestions. So you will receive insights from the best on how to become one of them Even seasoned speakers have found the information valuable.

This book will not teach you how to give a speech or presentation. Instead, it focuses on the business aspect of being a speaker. Professional speaking is a business. If you’re not making money at it, you don’t have a business—you have a hobby! We’ll show you it is possible, with the right knowledge and hard work, to become a million-dollar speaker.

Introduction

We created this book to answer the pressing questions that both new and seasoned speakers have regarding the business end of speaking. At Gold Stars Speakers Bureau, as it is with so many other bureaus, we constantly receive many questions and requests for information from aspiring and established speakers. To help all speakers to answer their most common questions and to provide even more help than a speaker could hope for, we wrote this book. It is long overdue.

This book will give you:

How easy to become a speaker and how difficult it is to succeed.

How to set up your office for success.

The different type of speakers, and we have seen them all.

What kinds of presentations you can give.

How to set your fees and what clients expect from you.

Sales and marketing methods that have worked for us.

What goes into a booking contract and how to get paid?

How to set your fees and handle travel expenses.

How to create products from your speeches for additional income.

A day’s consultation will cost you thousands. We created The Business of Speaking to provide speakers with a reasonably priced way to disseminate valuable information.

The Unique Perspective of the Authors

We wrote the contents of this book from the point of view of both a speaker and a speakers bureau. How valuable is this information? In a word, priceless!

Andrea H. Gold is the president and co-founder of Gold Stars Speakers Bureau. She has 30-plus years of experience in running the bureau and also takes part in the role of a salesperson. She and her team have booked thousands of speakers through the years for a collective value worth tens of millions of dollars. Gold Stars Speakers Bureau works with corporations, trade associations, nonprofits, schools, universities, and government agencies worldwide. The bureau has booked a wide spectrum of speakers, including business speakers, motivational speakers, trainers, seminar leaders, celebrities, entertainers, emcees, humorists, facilitators, moderators, and consultants.

Gary K. Yamamoto is an electrical engineer and has been speaking professionally for over 35 years. He is the author of many books. Along with Andrea, he is also the co-founder of Gold Stars Speakers Bureau and serves as its vice president. Besides giving keynotes, breakouts, and seminars, he has taught classes as a member of the faculty at the University of Arizona. During his speaking career, his bookings also came from other speakers bureaus.

We Cover a Good Many of the Angles Out There

What this book contains is our experience of over 3 decades. We have worked with speakers who earn six figures for a single speaking keynote and also with others who have contributed their expertise at no cost. We have booked celebrities, subject-matter experts, and business executives. Our clients range from the little organizations to the multi-national corporations. We have included examples and true stories from speakers we have booked to give you a better understanding of the speaking business. You will learn the hard lessons we gained through years of handling hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and a pandemic.

We wish you a profitable, pleasurable, and fulfilling career in following your passion to speak!

Chapter 1

The Speaking Business

There is a definite art to the speaking business, and it also involves true focus and discipline. It’s a glorious, wonderful, and unique business. But anyone who ever tells you that becoming a speaker is easy... well, check their bank account and their level of experience. We structure this book to give newer speakers an insight into what they need to become a thriving professional speaker. It provides a tremendous amount of practical, useable information. Also, this book suggests some reminders and extra possibilities for the more seasoned speaker to help him or her increase his or her income.

Once you understand the various elements involved, we pull it all together in Chapter 24, The Successful Speaker’s Life. IF YOU ARE A READER WHO LOVES TO SKIP AROUND, DO NOT MISS READING THAT CHAPTER! In Chapter 24, we dive into the details of bringing this information into one cohesive message so you can lay a solid foundation to become a successful professional speaker (emphasis on successful!). We do not pull any punches. Instead, we reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly of the actual business of speaking. It is a colorful and rewarding business, both emotionally and financially. However, it is a business and you need to run your speaking business as a business! And that, dear speaker, is the secret to long-term success!

They estimate the speaking business to be a 1½ billion-dollar business. While it’s a relatively large business, the money is not equally distributed among speakers. If you are just beginning, it is probably best not to quit your present-day job until you have proven to yourself that you can make it.

That being said, most speakers’ successes are because of reasons other than simply their knowledge and presentation skills. Over the years we have been in business, we have had a lot of really talented and not so talented speakers come to us and simply say,

I’m a wonderful speaker. Many people who have heard me say how great I am. I want you to book me through your bureau!

Some are not so blatant and end their short dissertation by asking, ...so what do I have to do to have you book me?

To answer these types of questions, we created this book. It contains just about everything you need to succeed in the business of speaking, both on your own and also with speakers bureaus. This book does not contain information on the presentation skills aspect of speaking. We’ll be focusing on the business side of the speaking business.

The Business of Successful Speaking assumes that your presentation skills are already very good. If otherwise, we can provide resources to improve your presentation skills. Go to the following web address:

http://www.goldstars.com.

Statistics on the Speaking Profession

The National Speakers Association is the largest association of speakers in the world with thousands of members. The following is a collection of statistics about their members in 2007 based on a special survey regarding business activity in 2006. We reprint here it with their permission. We understand that these statistics will change over time, so take this as a general overview.

Age:

20% — below 45

74% — between 45 and 65

All — 52, the average age of the member

Sex:

53% — male

47% — female

Education:

Most — college degrees

30% — master’s degree

14% — doctorate degree

Years of Professional Speaking:

1.2% — Less than 1 year

3.4% — 1-2 years

14.1% — 3-5 years

20.3% — 6-10 years

38.1% — 11-20 years

22.8% — 21 or more years

Publishing:

70% — have published a book

51% — exclusively self-published

17% — exclusively used commercial publishers

31% — both self-published and used commercial publisher

Types of Engagements (in order of frequency):

Seminar

Training

Breakout session

Keynote

Consulting

Coaching

Facilitating

Retreat

Entertainment

Virtual teleseminars

Virtual webinars

Keynote Fees:

1.4% — $500 or less

2.0% — $501 - $1,000

9.4% — $1,001 - $2,000

47.4% — $2,001 - $5,000

34.7% — $5,001 - $10,000

5.2% — more than $10,000

$5,000 — average fee

Income:

14.8% — less than $25,000

10.6% — $25,000 - $50,000

12.4% — $50,001 - $75,000

12.8% — $75,001 - $100,000

23.8% — $100,001 - $200,000

15.8% — $200,001 - $500,000

9.9% — more than $500,001

$177,000 — average income

Business Operation:

82.4% — home office

15.9% — outside home leased office space

1.7% — outside home virtual/shared office space

Outsourced Services:

73.2% — Printing

72.9% — Website Work

70.0% — Graphic Design

51.9% — CD Production

46.8% — Accounting

26.3% — PR/Marketing

21.5% — Administrative

17.1% — Travel Arrangements

14.3% — Writing

8.6% — Product Sales & Distribution

8.4% — Sales of Speaking Services

7.0% — Research

You can see the wide diversity of speaking expertise, income, and outsourced services used by speakers. Naturally, some speakers are making a lot of money. We work with speakers who have claimed to have turned down one hundred bookings (or more) in a year because they were already booked on the dates requested. Other speakers struggle to get more than a few low-fee bookings a year.

If you are interested in joining the National Speakers Association (NSA) to jump-start your career, you can go to their website at www.nsaspeaker.org. You aren’t required to join this group to become a professional speaker. However, we have heard from many, many speakers that they took a quantum leap in growing their skills and knowledge by joining and taking part in the various NSA workshops and conferences. And it’s wise to support one’s industry association, if you can join. For information on the different chapters of NSA, please refer to Supplement A of this book.

The Big Speaker Difference

Why do some speakers get booked while others don’t? The difference is not in the speaker’s ability to give a well-crafted, insightful, and humorous speech. There are so many really fine speakers with a wonderful message who can’t get themselves booked as much as they would like. And it is not for lack of trying to get booked. What we have found is that many speakers can’t successfully market themselves to prospects. Meanwhile, others are not nearly as talented, who book themselves, and sometimes at high fees, no less. So, the big difference is this: these successful speakers have mastered the ability to communicate what they do and to market themselves effectively, and to provide a program that meets the needs of the meeting planner or the decision maker.

Of course, this does not mean that you can ignore or downplay the development of the skills necessary to be an excellent speaker. Nor does it mean that you can get away with a disorganized presentation. And it does not mean that you do not have to have a reasonable sense of humor. These are standard expectations of a professional speaker. Even the best speakers won’t be booked if they don’t have the right marketing strategy and marketing materials.

Since you are reading this book to grow a speaking business, we know that you are most likely at least a decent speaker or that you have a sense that you are a pretty fair presenter. We assume that your presentation skills are very good, if not absolutely wonderful. We expect you to know your subject and can convey your message coherently and efficiently. Unfortunately, these qualities alone do not guarantee an abundance of bookings. Decision-makers are usually looking for much more.

Why Would Someone Want to Listen to You?

People want to listen to you because your topic interests or moves them in some fashion. OK, we’ll allow for the rare speaker who is just so incredible on the platform, that you don’t care what he/she says—you just want to watch and listen to the voice and gestures. However, in most cases, the topic you choose to speak on is probably the most important choice you make in the early stages of your speaking career. In choosing your topic, you have only two basic choices. Your topic is your expertise, or it’s the most popular hot topic that is being booked at present.

As a speakers bureau, we get calls from new speakers who ask us to share with them the latest hot topic that we are currently booking. They want us to educate them on what decision-makers are booking so they can create a presentation on that topic. What do you think will happen if we tell the speaker that the hot topics of the day are change and leadership? They will then gather the latest books on those topics and craft their presentations based on that information! We would do them a great disservice by answering their question. This is not the ideal way to position oneself!

There are a few downsides to doing this. You may have very limited knowledge of the hot topic. When someone in the audience asks you a question, you may not have an answer. If you’re asked to give an example, you may not remember what you read. When asked if you offer training or consultations on the topic, you must decline. In a training session or a one-to-one consultation, you lack the in-depth knowledge to provide the information being sought by the client. We have heard speakers refer to this type of speaker who gathers just enough quickie data to plan a basic keynote presentation as a book reporter.

The other possibility is to choose your topic based on your expertise. For instance, if you were in several leadership positions, perhaps the CEO of a corporation, you are qualified to speak on leadership. If you were a salesperson who was the top salesperson for a company and quickly promoted to vice president of sales, you would be an expert on sales.

Of course, once you have picked your topic, you can then give several presentation choices based on your expertise. For instance, if your topic were sales, you could speak on marketing, sales presentations, customer service, innovative sales approaches,