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By the way, after this session, if you want to learn more about how to profit from hosting your own event or speaking and sponsoring someone else’s event I can show you everything you need to know here.
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Get ready to rock your brand, your talk, and your biz. I’m Kristin Thompson. Welcome to The Rise Formula.
It’s time for you to step into The Spotlight. That is session five. How do you get highly visible?
Here’s one of the big challenges that a lot of people are struggling with when they first come to me. They’re great at what they do, but they’re kind of the only one who knows it. Oh, ouch! That is a painful place to be, so we want to turn that around because there’s nothing worse than being brilliant at what you do – and a lot of times you’re in a position where you’re watching somebody less qualified who gives less value and who doesn’t really know what they’re doing, and they’re passing you by because they’ve got better marketing and they’ve got better visibility.
Ugh! That will really chap your hide. We’re going to turn that around right now and get you into the spotlight and talk about the different ways that you can stay highly visible all year round so that you know where to take your message.
We’ve talked so far about your brand and standing out. We systematized your knowledge into a program or product that you can become known for, something you can really hang your hat on. We talked about how to create a nice profit plan so that you can make the kind of income you want on your own terms and different ways you could do that. In session three we talked about rocking your talk, and I gave you some getting started tips on that. Now where do you go and how do you get seen?
The first type of platform I want to talk about we’ll call free. Yay! Something for free. It’s always fun. This is where most people want to get started speaking. There are tons of opportunities for you to go share your message for free, which means you can take your talk that you’ve created that’s based on your signature system, the thing you want to be known for, and you can go share it to companies. If you’re a business-to-business provider, a consultant of some kind, a coach, a sales trainer – these are all opportunities for you to go into companies.
I used to work with a lot of businesses in the beginning before I realized I really love working with entrepreneurs. At that time, I would book a lot of talks going to speak to sales and management teams and the leadership of a company and talk about sales and presentation skills and stuff like that. You can, too. You can speak at companies. Lots of companies have retreats, too. You can speak at company retreats, business associations, groups, clubs, networking groups, chambers of commerce, and events based on any of those. Most chambers have big annual events. Associations always have annual events. They’ve got regional associations, national associations, the local groups and associations – it goes on and on and on.
Google is your best friend at finding those opportunities. Here at Speak Serve Grow, we do teach you how to book those opportunities, especially in Command Any Room. But honestly, just start reaching out. I’ll give you one quick tip here. The worst thing you can do, though – do not reach out to groups and say, “Can I come speak to your group?” Offer to help their group.
Say, “I’ve developed a program. It’s called ‘How to Rock Your Talk and Profit,’ and it’s all about helping entrepreneurs understand how to rock their brand, their talk, and their biz into six figures on their own terms. I would love to come share that with your group if you think it would help them get more visible this year.” I’m pitching a solution to their audience, not me asking for something from them. There’s a difference.
The thing I want you to take away from this is that you can get highly visible really quickly by going out and speaking for free. You still make money because at the end of your talk, guess what? There is an offer! There’s always an offer. You learned that in the last session. Always have an offer, and in the Profit Planning session we talked about different offers.
It could be that you’re just offering people into strategy sessions or you might be sending them into your entry level program. But always, always, always have an offer. Even when you speak for free, you can walk out with cash in hand from people buying your coaching or your entry level product or going into a strategy session where you then sell them into your programs and products.
Next is paid. I call this “pay to play.” Pay to play works, but here’s my one caveat. If you have not trained with me or someone like me, don’t pay to play. In other words, you really have to have some training and know how to close the room. You have to be comfortable closing a room, and you need to know your track record before you go spending your hard-earned money to go speak to groups. But I want to explain this because it is a great way to grow your business. One of the main ways that I have grown my business is paying to play.
My goal in sponsoring an event is definitely to double my investment. So if I invest $10,000 to sponsor an event, I want to walk out of there definitely having broken even, and by the end of 30 days between what I sold at the event and what I sell in the follow up, I want to at least have doubled my investment. I’ve been very successful at that. I’ve had $40,000 and $50,000 paydays from sponsoring big events, and I’ve had clients really be able to walk away with a month’s worth of income from one event as well. That’s what we’re looking in to accomplish here.
Here’s how it works. Other people right now already have fans and followers. They’ve got a live event that’s proven. It’s got a track record and they can show you that they’re going to have 200 people in the room or 1,000 people in the room, whatever the number is. If they have already built that audience, a great opportunity for you is for you to go speak. That group has already been formed and gathered. You don’t have to do the heavy lifting.
But in return for that opportunity, you have to pay. It’s very common in the coaching world and consulting world right now – speakers and authors – that people who have proven events are charging sponsorship fees. Why? It gives them a guaranteed amount of money in their pocket, it helps pay for the cost of the event, and because they’ve got value. They’re bringing a targeted audience to you. And you then can go speak after you’ve paid the sponsorship fee. Usually you have to help them promote the event and then you show up. You can rock your talk, make an offer, and walk out with money.
Obviously, there are things you want to watch out for. You’ve got to map out your profitability. We’ve got a whole program on this called Event Profit Machine. There are a lot of ins and outs you want to know before you either host your own event or speak and sponsor at somebody else’s.
Here are a couple of quick tips I can give you right now. You must know your track record. You must know you closing ratio. We don’t want to guess. We want to know that you’re going to be able to convert the room to the best of our ability.
- Is this the first time this person’s ever had this event or is this a proven event with a proven audience?
- Who is the audience? Are they your tribe? Are they going to get your offer?
- How much access will you have to that audience? Do you have a booth?
- Are you able to make an offer directly there in the room?
- What happens after you make the offer? Is there a break so that you can stay and convert sales and connect with people? Or do you make your offer and then a marching band comes out? Because that’s going to bungle your sales.
There are a lot of things that you want to pay attention to before you say yes, but sponsorship is a great way to get seen and get highly visible on a big platform at an event that you might not normally be able to speak at.
The third way is profit share. Another way to get visible is that you could speak at somebody’s event or maybe lead a teleclass or webinar to their list and you would just profit share with them. That’s a great way to go because you only pay if you make money.
In that one example when I spoke to 100 people, I sold 45 people into my entry-level program. There was a certain percentage split on that money that went back to the event host and a certain amount that I kept. So everybody won and made money in that situation. It was great for everyone.
That is another way to get in front of someone else’s audience. Just say, “Whatever I sell, I’ll give you X percentage.” Maybe it’s 50/50; maybe it’s 70/30. You could do a webinar, a teleclass, have them help promote a video series, or you might go speak at their live event. But getting in front of somebody else’s audience, whether you profit share or pay to play, is a great way to get visible.
The key that I want you to take away from this section is that you can stay visible all year round by blending online and offline strategies to rock your talk. Remember that includes webinars, Google hang outs, teleclasses. You could be interviewed on somebody’s podcast or host your own. You can be on video. Offline, you can give live talks.
Again, I shared with you that you could speak in your local market, speak for free at chambers, groups associations, and events. And you can go to bigger platforms nationally and regionally and speak at conferences and events that are targeted just to your audience. Usually with those opportunities, if you’re going to be able to make an offer and make money, you’re either going to profit share or you’re going to pay to play. Find the right blend of off and online strategies so that you can rock your talk and profit big.
P.S. If you want to learn more about how to profit from hosting your own event or speaking and sponsoring someone else’s event I can show you everything you need to know here.
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