Becoming a referable speaker is a trade-off. Instead of spending all those hours marketing yourself and building your personal brand, you’re going to reinvest much of that time in your speech. Because, remember, until you’re famous, your speech is your product.

being a part of someone’s transformation is what I find most rewarding.

These three speaking business fundamentals—stageside leads, compounding gigs, and the referral tree—are the keys to your success.

hot stageside leads.

No matter how you slice the data, the top three

find their speakers are: See the speaker elsewhere. Word of mouth from other meeting professionals. Word of mouth from other people in their organization who are not meeting professionals.

Stageside leads are a clear indicator of future success.

Event organizers love to deliver an experience. They dream of surprising and delighting their audience, and their CEO, with an unexpected home run.

wanted to be famous because I knew it would make marketing my speaking business so much easier.”