Michael Angelo Caruso<\/a>, who convinced me that I could indeed be a paid speaker and gave me some resources to get started. It was just a matter of hard work, relationships, and some breaks. So here are my top 5 tips, in no particular order.<\/p>\n1. Speak every chance you get<\/strong> – Every time you have the chance to speak in front of others, even if it is just a few people, do it. Raise your hand. Volunteer to give the report. Say the invocation. \u00a0Before you can approach even being comfortable speaking in front of others, you have to just do it. \u00a0You also can’t get any better unless you do it. Even Tiger Woods has to practice.<\/p>\n2. \u00a0Learn from others<\/strong> – One of my favorite things to do is listen to other speakers. \u00a0I have heard some pretty awful ones, and I have seen some amazing speakers. \u00a0And I have learned something from every single one. So go to YouTube and search for ‘motivational speaker’. \u00a0Search for ‘TED Talks’ on Google and watch every one. \u00a0And sit on the front row for every speaker you get the chance to hear. Take notes on how they speak, what tricks did they use, how did they open it… and how did they close it. \u00a0Soak up as much as you can.<\/p>\n3.<\/strong> \u00a0Develop your own talks<\/strong> – I have a handful of topics that I regularly speak about. \u00a0And what has happened is that someone will be in the audience who hears me, and then contacts me later to come to their event and speak about the same thing. \u00a0Get really good at delivering those talks. \u00a0Work on your opening, your key points during the talk, your delivery of that key line or that humorous joke. \u00a0Work on that ending to the talk that really knocks it out of the park.<\/p>\n4. \u00a0Add your personal touch<\/strong> – I still remember the stories that I have heard from my favorite speakers. \u00a0Some of them have quirky personalities and a unique delivery. \u00a0Some of them have signature stories that are from their personal lives. \u00a0There is something about you that is unique. \u00a0It could be your background, it could be something that happened to you or your family, or it could be a specific piece of expertise or knowledge that you have gained. \u00a0Whatever it is, use it. \u00a0Add your personal touch and your personal style to your talks.<\/p>\n5. \u00a0Be willing to speak for free<\/strong> – I didn’t start out making thousands of dollars for a 1-hour keynote address. \u00a0I started out speaking for free. \u00a0And I still do speaking gigs today for free. \u00a0Because you never know when someone in the audience will be looking for a speaker for their event, or a business consultant to help them with whatever it is that you know so much about.<\/p>\nI will never forget the day that a friend asked me to come speak to their employee gathering. \u00a0He had heard me speak before and knew I could deliver some value to his staff. \u00a0Then he asked me, “So how much would you charge to do that?” \u00a0After getting over the initial shock of someone offering me money to do something that I was willing to do for free, I said rather sheepishly… “well, would $50 be ok?” \u00a0He laughed and told me he would probably pay me a little more than that, and I learned something very valuable that day. \u00a0My friend Michael Angelo Caruso says it best… you know something, and it turns out that someone, somewhere is willing to pay for that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Over the past year I have helped some friends of mine get started in the speaking business. Speaking in front of others can be a terrifying experience for most people, but for others it can be a thrilling experience. In fact, for me, it’s one of the things that I love doing the most. So […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,350],"tags":[122,350,186,187,351],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2624"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2624"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2624\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2630,"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2624\/revisions\/2630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steveholt.com\/home\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}