The Joy and Pain of Speaking by Amy Cutler

If you've ever thought about becoming a professional speaker, now is the time.

In most surveys the speaking industry doesn’t rank very high so that means more opportunities. However, there is still competition. To rise to the top, aspiring speakers need to be prepared to face some serious challenges.

Ask speaker and author Marsha Petrie Sue (www.marshapetriesue.com) what difficulties she faces and she does not hesitate: “My two biggest challenges are managing the back office of my business. Contracts, client interface, speakers bureaus, invoicing, needs analysis and tailoring every presentation to the client and finding ethical speaker bureaus. A third challenge would be dealing with speakers who steal my material!”

Vickie Sullivan of Sullivan Speaker Services in Tempe, AZ, agrees. She’s found that finding the needs and objectives of the meeting is the key to getting the invitation.

In this increasingly crowded field, marketing yourself and your uniqueness is crucial. Tim Richardson, author and inspirational speaker adds, “ What I believe to be the biggest problem of professional speakers - sameness. There are so many speakers now. Clients don't remember us because we look alike, sound alike, speak alike, etc. If you don't stand out, you don't stand a chance.”

The Body Language Expert Patti Wood has also found a way to deal with marketing challenges. She says, “Personally, I have been able to survive for two reason my business is built on referrals from past clients, audience members and other speakers and I am the “go to” expert on my topic. But I have had some very hard years in my career. There were times I ate a lot of peanut butter and prayed that my next speech would give me lots of leads. The trick is to strive for excellence and speak with passion.“

However, as sales master Rod McKinnis of www.salesissimple.com explains, “ I am discovering that the sales category is filled with popular speakers who are good at tapping emotions and getting everyone fired up but they lack a proven track record on making sales organizations better. Our system is proven to turn around multi-million dollar sales organizations in 6 months."

David Nour, managing partner of The Nour Group, agrees. Nour says, “I've found that more and more clients are complaining about "pull-string" speakers - those who show up and present the same, generic, canned speech over and over and over again! As such, my number #1 challenge is the continued personal and professional development required to stay ahead with both the subject matter expertise and delivery style and to continue to deliver credible, compelling, and action-oriented content for clients.”

Most speakers choose this career because they have something positive they want to share with the world. Yet the desire to contribute their knowledge and experience to help others often gets in the way of a speaker’s ability to make a living.

Debbie Christofferson, who left a position at Intel to become a speaker in 2001, says,” Our market often expects us to speak free. So you need to leverage the platform with other forms of revenue-generating options, and combine speaking as a marketing opportunity. I am competing in the speaking business with paid experts from big organizations and product companies who use speaking as a marketing platform. They have bigger budgets and slicker web sites, collateral and offerings, with more money behind it. We have to prioritize our time and spending, and make it really count. It's easier said than done. It looks like a fun easy way to make a living, but it's a lot harder as a business than it looks.”

Humorist Jana Ruth adds a related challenge which is learning the art of self promotion. “ Even though I have been presenting workshops and presentations for over 20 years most of them have been in Government organizations. Just in the last year I joined the National Speaker Association and am building up my speaking business, on the side, as I still have my position in Maricopa County. I believe that one of the reasons I have challenges with self promotion is a lack of my confidence in doing this.”

Waldo Waldman said,“ My biggest challenge is finding balance running my business. I work 12-15 hours a day, travel 5-8 times a month, and have to be involved in every aspect of the business. I leave very little room in my life for social activities. I finally hired a sales assistant to handle my contracts and follow-up. She has been a great help. I need to outsource more to her! Another huge challenge is keeping up with the ever changing marketing demands...In particular when it comes to internet marketing. From Blogs, video and audio on the web, e-newsletters, building my list, etc., it's nearly impossible to keep up with the changes and spend time developing them.”

According to Naomi Rhode,” Travel is an increasing challenge for speaking professionals. Airport Security, long lines, unexpected delays, baggage delays because of bags being checked and over booking of airlines are just a few problems we deal with. I’m also dealing with the constant challenges of educating organizations about the value of outside professional speakers instead of only using industry speakers.”

Traveling challenges has helped Liah Kraft-Kristaine expand her company. She says,“ The challenges for me have actually lessened since I stopped traveling 95% of the time, which I did for nine years and visiting 400 cities on four continents. I've turned to creating video training, aiming for television, doing group coaching via tele-conference and traveling less to give keynotes and trainings. Still, life on the road as a speaker is always challenging.”

We are in the Post 9/11 Recovery period for the speaking industry. After 9/11 the industry tanked: fewer meetings and many of those had fewer - or no - speakers. The challenge was to try and find a way to repurpose our messages. Meeting planners no longer wanted "motivation", they wanted practical, how-to ideas to help the people in their audiences do whatever they did better. As a sales specialist, I had to dissect the market and determine what my new approach would be. As a result I now combine the presentation with online reinforcement and my goal is to excite those people in the audience who are most interested in my topic - realizing that not everyone thinks I'm God's gift to the speaking industry as my mother and I do. The Chief Sales Officer (CSO) concept is a outcome of that process and it is gaining traction. I speak to CEO audiences, convince them that they are the CSO and then suggest that they bring someone in to help them with sales strategy. They often choose me,“ said Chuck Reaves

Jim Hennig of Hennig Associates explains,“ Often I ask for names of participants that I might call weeks prior to the program to be sure I understand the participants' challenges. You, as an outside expert, quickly get the feel of the problems within the organization. More often than not, you could do a lot more good for the organization by addressing management about the 50% of the problems that are of their doing, than talking to the troops about the 50% of the problems that are the troops doing.”

Consultant and speaker Bill Blades said,“ Educating clients to be more exacting when sharing the message they want from the speaker and educating clients on how to pay for what they want/need? If they just want me to "come in and motivate my troops", they should under-pay . If they want meaningful content that can change behaviors, boost revenues, etc, they should often over-pay. Putting newly learned skills into practice enables top speakers to be viewed as an investment that pays great dividends. I also believe that no follow-up with the attendees means the speaker was a cost.”