Fall in Love with Speaking

Last week I sent out an email about how I have grown my business using speaking as my main marketing and sales conversion strategy and that got me thinking about what a perfect vehicle for business growth speaking has been for me – and how lucky I was that I embraced it so early, before getting caught up in other, more complicated strategies that may have been out of my flow.

So I thought I’d share with you some of my musings on:

Why I love Speaking so much

1.   I get to “hide” at the front of the room
Yes, this might sound like a contradiction, but as a natural introvert (yes, I really am) I am far more comfortable at the front of the room than I am mingling in the crowd.  There is no need to struggle to make small talk or wonder what the next best thing to say is. Instead I get to stand up and talk for a period of time on a topic that is my expertise, where I’ve planned in advance what I’m going to say, and where I feel entirely comfortable and in my flow. I call it hiding at the front of the room!

2.   No awkward small talk
Instead of making awkward small talk when I’m  the speaker I get to interact with people by answering their questions – direct practical questions that I get to answer by drawing on my 20+ years of experience and expertise – no struggling for what to say next, or fending off the pushy networker who doesn’t know how to take no for an answer – just me in my element talking about about my favourite topic

3.   You get to meet and impact a lot of people at once
Compare speaking with networking. Imagine you are the speaker at a small 50 person event.   You get to “meet”, “speak to” and impact all 50 people at one time. That’s powerful!  Now imagine that instead of being the speaker you are in the audience – even if you are a confident and consummate networker you are likely to meet and really connect with a handful of that audience – at best.

And this is why I have always loved speaking and why it’s been such a powerful way for me personally to grow my business.

So if you are starting to feel the same way and that maybe you should give this speaking thing a fair shot I want to share with you 4 tips for selling your services and products from speaking – without feeling as if you are being pushy and without the “hard pitch”.

4 Tips for Non-Pushy Sales from Speaking

1.  No Surprises
Always let your audience know what is coming.   This means telling them at the beginning of the talk, as part of your agenda, that if they like what they hear you will be telling them how they can take this further and do more work with you.   This completely removes that awkward moment when you swing into “sales pitch” mode and your audience start to get huffy because you’ve had the audacity to sell to them.  They know it’s coming and they give you permission.

2.  Give Amazing Value
This is my core belief at the centre of my selling approach and it creates a huge amount of congruence for me around making my offer from the front of the room.   Aim to give your audience such great value that irrespective of whether they decide to buy from you they leave going “Wow, that was amazing, I’m so glad I came”.   If you give your audience great value they will happily “allow” you the space to make your offer – I see it as a sort of unspoken deal.      So avoid at all costs those trainings that teach you how to spend an hour telling your audience what they don’t know in order that you can then sell it to them – that’s really not my style at all.

3.  Be clear who it’s NOT for
When you tell your audience clearly who your offer is not for, it has an effect of reassuring the people who it IS for.  They like the fact that you don’t try to serve everyone, and that you are not going to be trying to persuade everyone to join you just for the sake of your bottom line profit.   By telling people clearly who it’s not for this helps the people who it IS for feel even more certain that it’s for them.

4.  Have a No-Brainer offer
And I don’t mean to encourage your audience to join you – although of course that is important too!   But if you feel genuinely excited about your offer, you think it’s an amazing deal and that people would be crazy not to take you up on it (in fact you are bordering on feeling you are a little bit crazy to offer it) – this is when you make your offer with a conviction and a level of excitement that is genuinely infectious to your audience – and that’s really irresistible!

Want to learn more?
What I’ve shared with you here only scratches the surface of all there is to learn about how to create a deep connection with your audience, teach them great content, make a no-brainer offer and inspire them to make a decision there and then to buy your service or product.  So if you want to learn even more then make sure you grab this opportunity to spend a day learning from my own speaking mentor Joanna Martin.

Joanna Martin is running her 1 day training Presentation Secrets on a choice of 3 dates  31st May, 1st June or 15th July

You can click on the below link to find out more and book your place now:

Click here to read more and book your place

Note:  The Early Bird pricing finishes today – so make sure you grab your ticket now for the “no-brainer” price of just £47.

Working with Joanna has been hugely impactful for me and my business and I doubt I’d be doing what I do today if it wasn’t for her.   

So if you haven’t met her yet grab your ticket and enjoy!

PS: Joanna announced this week that she won’t be running any of these 1 day events in 2017 so if learning from her is on your wishlist make sure you book your ticket now!  (last time Joanna took a break from teaching this stuff it was for 3 years – you’ve been warned!)