Note: This blog is all about speaking for profit – about leveraging your book into profitable speaking gigs, or even creating a secondary career where you’ll be speaking profitably while also selling books. As a blog, this is a bit longer than most, but only because it has a lot of ground to cover. In the weeks to come, I will be writing an ongoing series of shorter blogs that address specific elements of securing speaking gigs, but in more detail than you’ll find here. However, as an overview, this blog tells you what you need to know to transform your success as a published author into a successful speaking career.
Introduction: When it comes to writing and publishing books, the most obvious way of making money is by selling books. The formula is simple: the more books you sell, the more money you make. However, there are other ways that authors can make money. Some authors, like me, have consulting businesses; our books help us land new clients, some of whom can be remarkably profitable. Some authors are physicians, wealth managers, lawyers or other licensed professionals who generate new clients through their books. Some authors are entrepreneurs or business executives who can land promotions or new jobs thanks to their books.
However, there is also another way for authors to make money, and this may be the most profitable way of all. As I point out in my forthcoming new book, Write Now! … Writing, Publishing and Selling YOUR Book to Attract New Clients and New Speaking Gigs While Transforming Yourself into a News Media Expert, thanks to the credibility granted to authors by the fact that they have written and published books, those who book speakers for conventions, corporations, non-profits and other groups see authors as authoritative speakers who can add real value to their events. As a result of that respect, speaking gigs are well within most authors’ reach. Even better, they can be very profitable indeed. Depending on the size of the venue – and the “name brand” of the speaker – speaking fees can range from a few hundred dollars to as much as $25,000 or more.
In my own case, my lowest speaker’s fee was $500 – for a half-hour luncheon talk – and my highest fee was $4,000 for a weekend board retreat I conducted for a non-profit hospital. I know speakers who have earned as little as $100 for an after-breakfast talk, and others who have earned as much as $23,000 or more for a 90-minute keynote speech. While you have to be someone really special to earn the astronomic rates of from $250,000 to over a million dollars a talk (fees reserved primarily for ex-Presidents or former Presidential candidates), you can make a healthy income from speaking.
Here are a few tips for authors who want to become speakers.
First, make sure that you’re ready to speak in public. Not everybody is comfortable speaking in public – stage fright can be very real indeed. There are several steps you can take to overcome your fear of addressing an audience. Begin by becoming active in one or more Toastmasters groups, where you can present short speeches before a very supportive audience, even as you learn more about the fine art of public speaking. Every community has these, and they typically meet on different days of the week, and different times of day, allowing you to join as many a your calendar will permit – so if you’re in a hurry to become a polished speaker, join a lot of them and participate regularly. You can find these Toastmasters groups by doing a simple local Google search. In addition, as I did just two weeks ago, you can also attend events where a number of professional speakers – often “motivational” speakers – will be giving short talks. Watch them, listen to them, and be sure to take detailed notes – not so much about “what” they’re talking about, but instead be more focused on “how” they’re giving their talks. Finally, to refine this process, you should practice giving talks – at first alone, in front of your mirror or your cat, and later before small, friendly audiences. Use your video camera or smart phone to capture these talks – beginning with those you give standing in front of your bathroom mirror – then review the videos and critique your presentation until you feel you’ve got it right.
Next, once you feel you’re ready, come up with anywhere from three to a half-dozen standard talks you can give in different forums, to different audiences. If you’re targeting conventions, you’ll want to create a “keynote” talk, a “luncheon” talk (which can also be an after-dinner talk) and a “spouse” talk. The keynote talk should be business-like, reasonably formal and definitely authoritative. The luncheon talk should be a lighter version of the keynote, more entertaining and a bit more relaxed. The third – the spouse talk – is pure entertainment. Once you’ve figured out what you want to say in each of these, record videos ranging from 90 seconds to no more than three minutes. Each of these should be an example of how you’d present each of these talks. These videos are your “proof of concept” documents that, once posted on your website in your speaker’s kit, as well as on your YouTube network, will serve to demonstrate to prospective clients that you really do know how to speak in public. However, if you want to speak before any of a variety of non-convention venues, such as motivational retreats, develop talks for those, too, and once again, record sample videos.
Third, local identify venues – initially including venues where you might not be paid – where you can give talks specific to those audiences. Then, actively work to secure speaking opportunities before these groups. Often, these will be local or state chapters of various kinds of professional societies, often related to the workplace. For example, groups where I’ve spoken include marketing, PR and advertising professional groups – a slam-dunk for me since that’s also my career area – but there have also been a host of others, ranging from a group of professional non-profit fund-raisers to a meeting of human resource executives. Do this for a couple of reasons. First, these are low-threat/low-risk venues for speaking, by which I mean the audience has a lower expectation for speaking professionalism. Second, you can, should and must also arrange for a skilled videographer to capture your talk professionally. Then, edit the talk down to a 90-second sample for your speaker’s kit. However, you’ll also want to put it together as a full talk for those who want more than a 90-second proof-of-concept, and link to them in your speaker’s kit while also including them in your YouTube Network.
Once you have samples of your various events, put together an online “speaker’s kit.” This is part resume, part sales brochure, and all about helping you land new speaking opportunities. Some of the things you’ll want to include in this speaker’s kit are:
- A selling bio, which I address in another blog
- At least one head-and-shoulders photo, as well as a number of more casual photos, including ones taken when you are at a podium (these can be staged, at least until you’ve got some real-world examples)
- At least three different 90-second-to-three-minute presentation samples, but as many more as you can create – each one, however, should cover a different topic
- Links to longer “complete speech” videos
- Video testimonials from event organizers – as well as audience members – who praise your speaking ability and topical expertise … I can’t emphasize how important it is to get video testimonials, in which the persons on camera identify themselves … this kind of testimonial provides unmatched credibility
- Contact information
This speaker’s kit is essential to your ability to effectively pursue speaking gigs.
The last step before you’re ready to take the plunge is to make sure you’re set up to be able to sell books, one-on-one, at events, which means you need a merchant services account and a means of swiping credit and debit cards. This way, you can autograph and sell books after each speaking gig (you can also sell branded merchandise – assuming you’ve also added branded baseball caps, t-shirts, hoodies and coffee mugs to your repertoire, you’ll further enhance the profitability that is a natural feature of public speaking while reinforcing that audience members have become fans, members of your growing platform of supporters. You can start doing this when speaking to local no-fee groups, so you can at least earn cab fare from those events.
Now you’re ready to start seeking out speaking events. Every author will have their own unique built-in venues for their talks, but beyond that, there are also generic speaking opportunities. As an example of a built-in venue, when my late wife and I co-authored a novel – a fictional retelling of a widely-known and remarkably bizarre UFO encounter, known as The Kelly Incident – I wound up giving talks at UFO and paranormal events. Even though our book was a novel, the fact that a member of my co-author’s family had been involved in this very well-documented 26-hour “encounter” gave me all the credibility I needed to give talks and – afterwards – sign books. Another example is how, when I revealed that I had my forthcoming book (Write Now!) in development, I was invited to speak to a state convention of romance writers. It was a nice event, but also a bit frustrating, since I didn’t yet have a book to sell. Still, it was a great way to make connections with writers who became members of my network platform, and who might later also become book-buyers.
However, beyond those topically-appropriate venues, any published author should be able to secure bookings at conventions and other, similar meeting events. In most cities of any size, there is an organization that connects incoming meetings with local vendors. An example is the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, which keeps track of all coming events in this international convention magnet. In addition to listing each new event as it’s scheduled, the LVCVA’s website also includes contact information that allows you to reach out to the convention’s executive responsible for booking speakers. If you use this approach, there are two things you should do.
First, revisit the convention authority’s website at least monthly, looking for newly-listed events, then reach out to those new events with a very brief (i.e., one-to-two paragraph) sizzling-hot email message that includes a link to your speaker’s kit.
Next, look to those conventions that will be occurring in the next few weeks to few months, and reach out to them with a very different message. In this, you’ll tell them, in effect, “as a published author of the book (title), I know that there are three things in life that are absolute certainties: death, taxes and a last-minute speaker cancellation. I can’t help you with death or taxes, but when a speaker cancels out at the last minute, I’m the person here in (name of community) who can help you out. Check out my speaker’s kit to see the kinds of talks I can give – or, if you need something more relevant to your event, I’ll be glad to create a talk that’s laser-focused on your audience’s top concerns.” Begin sending this message to convention bookers three months in advance of the event. Send one (different emails with the same basic message) at three months pre-event, two months, one month, then weekly, right up to the final week before the event. You’ll never know when a speaker does cancel, but when they do, you want to be “top-of-mind” with the speaker-booking decision-maker.
The first time I tried this last-minute approach was on behalf of a literary-agency client of mine who’d just sold a book to Simon & Schuster, “Casino Magazine’s Play Smart and Win.” I pitched an inbound convention and, remarkably, they had an immediate need for a replacement speaker. The very next night, my client was on stage, telling an audience of conventioneers how to win at casino gaming, a very “topical” talk given that the convention was in Las Vegas. That kind of instant-gratification success only happened for me once, but it did happen, and it shows just how effectively this approach can be.
One final note: As mentioned above, you should be set up to sell personally-autographed books from the back of the room after you give your talk. This adds measurably to your profitability. However, there is another way of doing this. As part of your speaker fee, include the price of one copy of your book for each person attending the convention (or at least one for each person expected to attend your talk). These can be placed on the chairs right before your audience assembles. In this way, while you’ll only get a bulk-price volume-purchase discount rate instead of full retail for each book you sell – typically, your “wholesale” rate will be roughly 50 percent of cover price, just as it is with Amazon – you won’t have to go to the trouble of selling books one-on-one. That can be so time-consuming that, if you do sell them individually, be sure to have someone there with you to handle the mechanics of the sales. This “helper” frees you up for signing autographs and turning attendees into new members of your networking platform of fans and supporters. It also guarantees that you sell a lot of books, and in this case, by trading margin for volume, you’re likely to make more money than if you’d sold single copies to individual attendees.
Really, that’s about it. If you want to make a lot of money from your book – and if you want to keep making money, even years after your book is first published, be sure to leverage your book into a speaking career.
Note: This blog is based on information from my forthcoming book, Write Now! … Writing, Publishing and Selling YOUR Book to Attract New Clients and New Speaking Gigs While Transforming Yourself into a News Media Expert. If you’ve ever thought about writing a book – or having a ghost writer produce your book for you – you’ll want to read Write Now!
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