The Speakers Life

Today I’m in the San Francisco Bay Area and this episode is about how to overcome price objections as a professional speaker. In this episode I share some simple but powerful tips on ensuring you are paid what you are worth.

 

Artificial Intelligence Generated Transcript

Below is a machine-generated transcript and therefore the transcript may contain errors.

Hi it’s James Taylor here founder of SpeakersU and you’re watching The Speakers Life. In today’s episode I’m going to talk to you about how to deal with price objections how to deal with that situation where you may be considered to speak at an event but the organizer of the event doesn’t quite want to pay your fee, maybe your fee is a little bit higher than they were thinking about. And let’s add another little difficulty to it. Maybe they’re considering you compared to another speaker. So they can you look into have them compare apples with oranges, really. So what you would look to do in this situation is you want to really separate yourself out from your competition. And the way that we do that is by showing how we’re going to provide additional value for their attendees at their event.

So let me give you an example here. And I’m asked to go and speak at a conference, I see an association event and the same that we can’t quite make your fee, there’s this other speaker, we’re considering their fee is a little bit lower than yours. So I would say is what I can do. In addition to me coming, giving the keynote, I’ll give all of the attendees at your event access to my online course which accompanies my keynote. And in my case, I have an online course, which contains my keynote, it’s about, you know, $200 worth of value for each member of each of those courses, there’s like $100,000 worth of additional value that I’m gonna be able to give you if you book me.

It’s about separating yourself from the competition. So they can, you know, comparing apples and oranges, you’re providing that additional value. And that something as simple as that. So you’d have to reduce your fee can just going to get you over there. And that’s it, you know, we’re going to go go ahead with you and book you. If you don’t have an online course, don’t worry, a lot of associations will be doing regular monthly online trainings, online webinars, continual professional development for their members. So what you might say is, okay, in addition to my fee, this is my feet. In addition to giving the keynote, how about, you know, a month after the the the event, I’ll do a online webinar. So all of your your members can attend this webinar. And we’ll go a little bit deeper into something maybe I’m going to be talking about on the on the keynote, or you can even do it beforehand, and you could do it maybe two months before the event and just say is a little bit of a lead in to what you’re going to be talking about the keynotes and another way also promote helping them promote their their event.

So it’s about providing that additional value. I mean, it’s what does it cost you to do is to do webinars and error at your day to to do a webinar, what does it cost you to create an online course at the 10 video or 20 video online course not much time. And it’s zero cost of distribution. But it can often be the reason that someone books you as opposed to another speaker because you’re providing this different value. And so it’s for them as an organizer is like being able to compare apples to oranges, they’re just two different things. You’re providing that additional value there. I wish you all the best with your speaking this week and live here from sunny California where I’m speaking today. Have a wonderful week.

 

Ever wanted to know the secrets of top speakers bureaus? In this new episode I speak with legendary speaker bureau owner and agent Maria Franzoni of MFL about how keynote speakers can work with speaker bureaus.

 

 

In this episode:

• Scoping the event
• Scoping the event
• Leadership speakers and motivational speakers
• The rise of Futurist speakers
• How to work with speaker bureaus
• Speaker showreel tips and common mistakes
• Connecting diverse audiences

Show Links:
Dropbox
Salesforce
Deviate by Beau Lotto
Spandau Ballet
Maria Franzoni Ltd
Maria Franzoni on Facebook

 

Artificial Intelligence Generated Transcript

Below is a machine-generated transcript and therefore the transcript may contain errors.

Hey there’s James Taylor and I’m delighted today to welcome onto the show Maria friends only Maria friends only is the founder and CEO of Maria friends only limited, a UK based speaker and advisory bureau with a global reputation working with some of the most renowned thinkers and practitioners in the world. Today, Maria and her team provide expert speakers and advisors, the companies who want to inspire, educate, and entertain that people in clients and help them adapt to change. She is also the host of the speaking business podcast and co chair of the European Association of speaker bureaus. It’s my great pleasure to have Maria with us today. So welcome, Maria.

Thank you, James. Thank you for having me.

So share with our listeners. What’s happening in your world just now.

You know, we’re in silly season. Actually,

this is a high conference season. So lots of events going on. Lots of people planning lots of inquiries. So I’m pulling my hair out at the moment, take a step back and have a little chat with you. Good. Well, thank you so much for coming on.

So how did you get started in this business, you probably should explain, you know what, obviously, we have lots of listeners and attendees on the watch this podcast and this this show who are on the speaker side, there may be just getting a speaker. But we also have a lot that are more on the client side who who are booking speakers bring speakers to talk at their events, their conferences. So let’s explain the role that you have, as a speaker view, where were you sitting all this? And how did you get started into this business?

Okay, so two questions there. Let me start with how I got started. And, and actually, it was completely by accident. So certainly, I mean, many, many years ago, when I was at school, nobody would have known what to speak of your awards. I don’t know if they even existed. And I had a couple of careers before I went into this business and the career more or less before that was I was a management consultant. So you know, what management results like, we think we know everything, and we know the answers. And when we talked to anybody at their level, what have a senior they are. So I saw this cryptic have that said, if you can negotiate that senior level or not fazed by talking to very senior people. And I thought, well, you know, I’ll be sitting in front seat iOS and telling them what’s wrong with their business. So I can do that I had no idea what it was about. But I knew I wanted to change, I wanted to do something different. I wanted to stop traveling.

And so I met this amazing guy who was running a fantastic bureau who’s, who’s the company, still one of my big competitors. And he explained the business of the speaker’s bureau, which is, in fact, a wonderful resource for clients who are looking for experts to go and assist them with their business. And it might be in the form of a speech at a conference, it might be to go and do some training might be going to sit on an executive board, but it’s basically bringing expertise from around the globe to your business to help you with whatever’s going on in that business.

So there’s someone who’s organizing a, whether it’s external facing conference, or an internal client event, or internal events themselves, that person is organizing that event, there’s a lot of risk for them in terms of brand reputation, they probably have their C suite there as well, how does working with a camera like you, how does that help them decrease that that risk?

Well, I suppose if you’re going just going out on Google to find a speaker, it’s very difficult, because you have no sort of yardstick of how good they are. And you have gotten that we’ve got nothing to compare it to, I come into Bureau, all of the people that we work with, we will either have seen them that you recommended somebody in the mirror and seeing them or that have been recommended by another client that they’ve gone through a bit of a process. It’s not hugely difficult, but we are quite selective about who we have. So you don’t have everybody on your books. So there’s that part. But the other part is that we will have an understanding of what they can do and what they can’t do. Many clients will come to you with a fixated idea of the kind of speaker they want, as anyone they speak to the viewer, they think will actually we can actually expand that and maybe look at a different profile or different times.

So all we do day in, day out is that deal with speakers. So our knowledge is quite, quite wide.

And when a client comes to you, do they ever come to your saying, Listen, I don’t know really what we need what we want. I know I’ve been asked to do this event we’ve gotten my overall remit is to inspire people that say, but I’ve no idea where to go. Where does that conversation began, if a client comes to you like that, we have

a lot of that she. And more often than not, they think they know what they want, but they don’t really know what they want, because they can’t articulate it. And I suppose you have to take a few steps back with that client and say, Well, what are you trying to achieve? What is the objective that you’ve got here, either with the event or with the internal meeting? Or where the board is? What do you what is the outcome you’re looking for? And to really understand, where are they at in their business? What are they dealing with? What are the problems, what are the issues and understand also the level of the audience because the audience will dictate a lot of the time where you can go with your speaker, because you have to really be either at that level or higher, so that you’re stretching that audience. So there’s a lot of our weekly scoping that are the questions you want to ask the client about what they’re trying to achieve. You want to know what’s happened in the past, what’s worked for them in the past, what hasn’t worked for them. But the really important one is, you know, what’s the outcome? What does success look like for you what’s going to make if you’re the organizer what’s gonna make you look great in your boards I so that you’ve succeeded in your business succeeds in the audience succeeds, and you don’t always get to have to have that conversation. And that makes it difficult for you.

What about when you’re contacted by let’s say, it’s the person that has been charged with doing this event, but they’re not the end decision maker, they’re not the personal make the final call and write the check. How do you deal with that the difference between the consumer and the customer,

that happens a lot that has more often than not, there isn’t one decision maker Anyway, there’s usually more than one. So you are not always dealing with all of the decision makers. So it depends how far down the line it’s gone, I prefer it if somebody brings us in the tour more senior level, because you can have a better discussion. But you, you start with where you’re at, and you have to ask the questions of them. And they might need to go away and come back. And sometimes you’re dealing with people who are very new to running events, or you to booking speakers, and you have to educate them, you have to teach them, you have to help them

what happens when you get that that the call happens. We get the email that comes in saying, we’re running this event and we, we, we, we want a celebrity we want that that high profile spy sports person or politician or we want Richard Branson is we want to do an event want people to be more entrepreneurial, and our company so we won’t bring Richard Branson, but they haven’t quite got the perhaps the Richard Branson budget.

How do you steal that conversation

that happens a lot as well that people got, I call it champagne taste, and beer money. Because I have I have that in my life. I am

and

Sam, why’d you want the celebrity and if they wanted to put bums on seats, and to attract people, then they need to find the money if they want to do that, if that’s what the purpose is. But if it’s because they want the glitz and the glamour, whatever, again, it goes back to we know what is that you want to achieve by having that person there. And that I mean, there is only one Richard Branson for a start. So, you know, and and he’s a busy man. So, you know, you might have to sort of stepping back and say, Well, actually, let’s see what realistic human can do. And why you want to celebrity

when someone a client comes to you, and they have Okay, this is the event this is the topic theme that we’re wanting for this a you normally coming in providing, is it one or two suggestions or you’re giving them maybe a little bit more than that. And, you know, suggesting, like, go away, have have a have a conversation. see which one you think maybe there’s one or two and then we’ll we’ll go in detail around those two

very good questions. James. It’s like you’ve actually thought about this.

I’ve been I’ve been on both sides, especially having this group has been on both sides of actually having books, speakers, events. And also obviously we want to get me as Speaker as well. So I’m always fascinated as much from the other side from the person who’s booking as I am from the speaker side.

Yeah, I forgot the question.

So when you get that, that that remit, it comes in, and they’re saying, okay, we know, we know our theme. Our theme this year is on x topic, we this is our budget, and it’s okay. budget, and the event is happening in, say, in Berlin, would you give them like, maybe just one or two suggestions? Like, okay, this is exactly the person that you should have for this? Or do you give them maybe five or six? And once they do, then you really can go in depth on those, and especially on the content side of what they’re going to be doing for the event?

Yeah, and it’s still a great question.

So it really depends in terms of time scale. So I mean, occasionally you will have a client come to you with a really, really tight time scale. And therefore, you can only recommend a couple because you have to check their available before you recommend them. Personally, I like to have a longer lead times I can give people a selection, I like to give about five, ideally, if I can. And at that point, I won’t have gone to the speakers to talk to them about the event or to have check their availability out of respect for the client. Because if the client doesn’t like James Taylor and I put forward there’s actually that is not the appropriate person isn’t very embarrassing. If I’ve spoken to James and said, Listen, James, I’m talking to you about this particular event. Actually, you’ve gone the wrong way we’ve made and it’s not quite with now that we’ve thought about it. And now that you’ve given us the answer going to rethink it. So you have to respect to both the speaker and the client. So I will try to give them four or five and say to them, Listen, if we’re on the right track with that, but usually we are giving your first choice and your second choice in case your first choice isn’t available. And or in case your first choice doesn’t think it’s the right fit for them. Because sometimes there is a conflict of interest as well that, you know, you don’t want to work with the client, because actually, you’re working with that competitor, and I might not have that information available to me. So I like to get four or five, I think more than that can be too many. But there are some clients who want to follow ideas.

I was having a conversation the other week with someone very senior from the advertising industry in Spain, and we were talking about some of their clients and they work with very large energy companies, oil companies, and this is actually it’s a bit of a challenge because some of our more millennial workers coming into the business or refuse say, we will not work I do not want to work with that particular client. Even if it’s let’s say, if it’s a oil company, and they’re doing a wind, you know, farm or something like that. They just say we want to, do you ever find that is there is the equivalent with Speaker some speakers will say, Listen, I will not work with tobacco not work with certain compensated companies.

Yeah, speakers who weren’t with work with arms, obviously, tobacco, some gaming, something went what, we’re gaming companies, and you have to know about that. So yes, there are speakers who won’t work with certain industries, and it’s absolutely that property.

And then when you’re you get the mentors, because you’ve you’ve had for years and years, you’ve been getting all these briefs coming in daily, you know, where people they’re doing their events, what themes what topics have you noticed, have become more in favor in recent years, you’re getting asked for more and more and one of those ones where, frankly, you’re just not getting asked as much.

He’s too That’s a good question. That’s interesting. I suppose that there’s one area that it has always been there and will always be that and will continue to be there. And that’s anything to do with people. So people leadership, motivation, you know, team and all that kind of always there what’s come up a lot more over the last decade has been certainly security cyber technology AI future future is have become very hot in the last 10 years.

And what have we lost? I’m trying to think I’m not sure you will, the Millennium Park we don’t talk about

Do you ever get clients I just don’t come to with saying we just want someone to motivate you know, it doesn’t write the code but we just want we just want motivation because I’m because my mind is saying that that was slightly started to fall out of favor it wasn’t being requested so in North America quite as much what what you find a lot of your of your clients internationally, you have a lot of clients based in Europe,

we do have that you do aren’t get asked for motivational. But usually there’s a topic that we want somebody who’s motivation on the speaker to talk on that topic. So it’s slightly change, rather than sort of just come in and do the rah rah,

you do get people asking, we’d like to be inspired. Like to be surprised. We like to have big thinking out the box, we want to have a different angle exception.

So as you’ve been building now, you’re in your own business, you’ve been building your own business, I’m interested when you previously what these other companies you were, you’re you’re going in there, you like an employee, then you went in faith can senior in those organizations, how things different now that you’re the boss,

and it’s your name is on the front?

I suppose I’m Basia.

Um,

gosh, has it changed. I mean, I chose to become my own boss, because I wanted to sort of do things differently and change things and shake things up. And I think once you become your own boss, and I don’t if you found this too. But after you’ve been doing it for a while, you’ve probably met yourself with unemployable because you just want to do things your way and you want to have control. And I love that I probably worked harder now than I ever have done. And it’s a I feel, in many ways, I feel very responsible for my team and the people who have come with me. So the staff that I have with me, and I feel, you know, they’ve taken a risk with me, really, and they will be with me for a very long time. And it’s wonderful. And so I feel very maternal towards them, and very nurturing. And that’s a big responsibility, which you don’t have if you’re working for somebody else. They have that headache in a way, I suppose. So, but I do I don’t think I could work with it for anybody else. Separate, again, realistic, honest with you,

was there something in particular, when you decided to go out on your own that you said, I don’t want to be doing this type of, you know, in terms of how maybe the usual way that speaker bureaus work, you know, I, I’m actually going to be against that. And that’s just not the way that I want to build a business I want to build a slightly different was a was anything you can like fighting against that maybe is a is a current norm in this business.

Yeah, there’s lots of things actually, that’s really interesting. That’s very perceptive. And yes, there is, and I was working within a bureau and I have such a good relationship with that Bureau, I still have a great relationship that we would appear as the London speaker Bureau. And so I wanted to do things differently. But I didn’t want to break that relationship. So although I have my own Bureau, my friends only limited, I’m still part of that network. I’m part of the recording the elders and one of the, of the people that have been there the longest, and, and I’m involved in a password work, if you like, as a non executive, like with with, I’ve kept the relationship. But what I wanted to do, and I think it comes from having been a management consultant, I want to change things all the time, it drives my team nuts. But for me, nothing is ever quite right. You have to keep improving and improving and changing it and not change for the sake of change. But if I see something that can be done better or differently, that is a benefit then to the speakers, the client, I want to be able to do that. And I got to the point with on the speaker Bureau, that they got too big to be able to do that to do quickly, because I’m not getting any younger. And if I was 20 years younger, I would be patient say, okay, we can do it all together. But I thought, No, I want to do these things differently. And you’re working with me now. And you know, that we do several things that are quite different from other bureaus and some of the things that I don’t want to do that a lot of us do, and not just yours, will the businesses do? I don’t want to do AdWords, I wanted to work

to come to math. I want speakers to recommend me our clients to recommend me, I don’t want to be paying for adverts. Because I think it’s more about people coming to you because they’ve had a referral. And because you don’t have a business, I don’t want to compete. So if a client comes to me, and they’ve said, we’ve already gone to other viewers with this inquiry. My question to them is, well, why are you not allowing them to do that work? What Why do you come to me to what are they not doing for your mother doing great, I just want to I don’t want to compete on price. I think that’s incredibly unfair for my speakers, is incredibly unfair to the viewers, you’ve got two or three years battling for one inquiry for one booking, what are they doing, they’re battling on price. And then I think that ruins the industry, I think that’s really terrible. So I won’t I always step out and say, guys, you go stay with the first Bureau, they will do a great job for you let them do that job for you. If they don’t do a good job for you, for whatever reason, then you come to me. But nine times out of 10, they’re not going to I hope other viewers do that. That kind of stuff. I don’t want to be doing that. I think that’s a waste of time. It actually ruins the industry, when you’ve got everybody fighting for one inquiry. That’s crazy.

I guess from your perspective, it means that you’re not obviously you’re getting inquiries in all the time. But they’re not those those inquiries, which have a lower chance of going to completion or alert chance to budget, you’re, you’re you’re building relationships with people over a longer period of time, they know you, they trust you, they trust your judgment on things. And I’m wondering how you in especially in your case, it started to be affected by a conversation I had last week with a with another conference organizer in the Middle East. And he was asking you what the trends are noticing. And one of the things he said, Well, we’re seeing a lot more internal event going on. And he was explained to me, one of the reasons was that because of anti bribery, and all kinds of things like that companies have to the same to really invest a lot more in their cars, their clients, their customers, their best customers, best partner, let’s say, and they’re doing a lot more internal events as well. So So when you’re working, I mean, have you if you are you find that in Europe, are you starting to see an increase in what we make classes that can internal events, as opposed to kind of outward public facing events

balance for us, as always being more internal events than outward facing public events. That’s really interesting. And I don’t know if that’s because of how, you know, the kind of speakers that we work with, and the kind of clients that we attract. But it has mainly it’s been a bigger intelligence, which for me, are much more satisfying, because you can really get into sort of what we were talking about earlier, understanding what’s going on in the company, what they need, how we can help them with an external event, it’s, you know, these huge shift customers or prospects. And so the client isn’t really interested so much in talking about, you know, what’s going on in their particular business, they were talking about what’s going on in their industry, and they want to be seen as leaders, and they want to be innovative in that respect. But it’s difficult, so much more difficult, brief and in a way, and a much harder relationship, because you’re constantly just trying to raise the bar on the last day. And that’s tough. That’s really tough.

Now, if we flip it around slightly, I know we have a lot of people listen, watch this, who are either professional speakers or the aspiring speakers me to the authors and got a new book coming out, and they’re looking to get out and spread the word via keynotes and speaking, how do you you know, is there a stage in a speaker’s Korea which actually really makes sense to work with the Bureau and it doesn’t? That’s, that’s my first question when, when is when, you know, if it’s right, as a speaker to work with a bureau and in the second question is, how do you like them to connect with you and reach out to you.

So I can’t speak for yourself, they’re all different, I suppose. But for me, and that sort of my peers and sort of viewers that I work with, and no, we’re not interested really in speakers that are just starting out unless that speaker has done something amazing. So we tend to work mainly with experts or people who have another job if you like. So as you mentioned, sports people. So if you’re if you just want to do for Olympic gold, then you may not have spoken before that kind of person. Yes, we are actually because that person has a level of profile. But if you’re somebody who’s coming on because I get as a speaker and you you’re just starting out and you’re expecting a bureau to get your gigs and to market you that’s not what we’re about. We really although we call the speaker Bureau has reclined are reacting to clients inquiries. And we’re responding to what their needs are. So we tend to go out and reach out to speak as if we’ve got a gap. The best way for me to take on a speaker is a speaker that has been recommended by another client, because that tells me that somebody else has paid money for this person there are good or if I see them, I mean, when I met you, I saw you and I thought, oh, love this, this is different. This is unique. I’ve never seen this approach taken. And I’m immediately I wanted to connect with you. I mean, that, for me is great, because then I’ve seen you, I love it, and I’m enthusiastic about it. And it resonated. And I needed to get, you know, this could go somewhere. So that’s the best way and the kinds of speakers I particularly like, of those who are too busy to deal with speaking business. Yeah, that they have a full time job, or they have another year, they’re busy doing their stuff, or they’re busy out there speaking or busy out there consulting or busy out there. Being a futurist or being an economist or being a neuroscientist or whatever it is, they do, and they just don’t want to be dealing with the actual the business part of the speaking and it’s like Ripley’s handle it please do with the clock. Please find out if it’s a real inquiry, find out if it’s appropriate for me. If, if it’s if I can add value to it. And if I can add value, can they can they compensate me appropriately. And they can make it happen, do the contract, do the negotiation met, get the money and deal with it all. For me, that’s the best kind of speak of me, because then I’m helping them they can carry on with what they need to do. And I’m doing the bit that I know how to do now, when we met before you spoke very passionately about the role of video for speakers. Yeah, but the rise of video and hours, you’re just every client, you’re you’re you have so such a short period of time in order to make that connection with the with the view and your videos being watched by multiple people in a room.

What what let’s let’s talk about the the common mistakes that you see, I normally don’t like to go negative on things. But let’s just see if we can rid the world of some common mistakes and speak of videos with the world might be a better place Well, I mean, the common mistakes that you see, and and what are the things that you’re seeing amongst the people who are doing video very well as speakers and, and clients reacting very well to those videos.

I suppose the the common mistake is poor quality. And you’ve got to remember that, you know, somebody is watching it on the computer or on their mobile, and they need to be able to hear you properly.

And if they can’t hear you and see your property. There’s just no point just don’t bother having it in. Just don’t do it. So quality is is a conversation. And often people will take video from an event and they are desperate to show how big the audiences and so you’ve got a camera place right at the back. And there’s a time a little person up front on the stage. And when I’m watching it on screen, I can’t connect with you. And yes, you’ve got a huge audience. But is that going to impress me as a book or or not? Probably not. Because I don’t know whether you’ve paid to be on that stage. I don’t know whether you’re doing that gig for free, I have no understanding of why there is such a huge audience or whether you’ve been invited to speak. So it there’s no context and a half of the people in the audience are, you know, reading What’s Next on the agenda, or looking at their mobile phones, or tweeting and not paying attention. That doesn’t do you any good either. So that’s all that’s a huge reset. Everyone’s obsessed with the size of the audience. You know, I think it’s more important for you to speak to really senior audiences rather than very big audiences. Because those people in that big audience could all be, you know, people just bullshit off the street, and then no disrespect to them. But they might not be my, the kind of client folder. So that’s one of the mistakes that I could go on all day about. Instead, just focus on the positives, so things that people do, right. And if you can, we can do a show real, that’s a really good idea. And the reason and yes, you should have longer videos to for when a client wants to go much more in depth. But because most clients have to have a choice and have to give a choice, and even the feeling of choice if you’ve got a short show real around three, four minutes or less. And I’ve got, you know, five speakers and I’ve got five of those rules. I can watch live with those rules. Now, if I bought three speaks of reels, and then two speakers, one with an hour speech, a mom with a 20 minute speech, it’s probably going to be easy for me to get a get a better feel a real you’re going to show your highlights, you’re going to present yourself as you want to present yourself to potential clients. So that’s really good. And the me the best shows are the ones that stand alone. So if I watch your show, real, I know everything I need to know about you to make a decision. I don’t need to look at anything else. Now that that video does that. That is a brilliant real, very few people get that right.

I saw one you show before. It’s one of your client, one of your speakers. And I’ve forgotten her name. Now. She was the founder of one of the big coffee coffee public public. Yeah, and you should be one of our videos. And

obviously some of it is a little bit all some of the actual footage itself is very old. But the thing you overwhelmingly watching that video was how passionate she was what expert she wasn’t her topic. And even though it wasn’t like, I think it was like cutting the segments. That was his music and sitting as a Sam bait. underneath. At the end of it. There was there was a feeling that you will left with like, Okay, this person is like, not only do they know what they’re doing, but they can inspire my audience, they can educate my audience as well. And I thought that was a great show. We’ll that one.

Yeah, it is. And in fact, actually, this is an event where I was asked to deconstruct to really say what needs to be in it and show an example of good on average, the only one I could show which was really sad. And we’ve since gone on to make some real, some speakers. So we’ve done it. And we’ve used the template that I think is the perfect template and what you’re left with that you know exactly who she is what she can bring to the table. You know how credentials she’s introduced by a third party, which I always love, I prefer it when somebody else introduces you in a real rather new saying I am I think it’s much stronger than somebody else saying who you are.

And you come over. And also the music is her personality, the music she had or any shows up personality. So you come away because I think a Gosh, these grades you that really is 15 years old, 14 years old, and it still gets the bookings.

And it’s a reminder that Maya Angelou quote, which says something like people will forget what you say, and the fax numbers you share. But they’ll they’ll they weren’t, didn’t remember the, the shouldn’t forget how you make them feel. And I can still I can, I can still feel that sensation. Now, seeing that that video and that was a few months ago, having seen that video. So that’s gonna, that’s gonna sit in my the back of my mind, if I’m thinking about, you know, thinking about, oh, you know, someone is being asked by client, can you recommend someone because speaking about entrepreneurship nation makes you a woman speaker? Because Because entrepreneurship like that’s sitting right at the back of my ticket to refer refer that speaker as well. And as you built your career, was there a key aha lightbulb moment a time when you went out? Okay, this is the direction I want to go with, with the work that I do. This is where I think I can make make a difference in the world.

Yes, actually, that’s really interesting. In fact, for me, I’ve always had this thing about connecting people who are very diverse, and who perhaps would never meet. So as when I was younger, I used to always put friends together who never would have met, and perhaps, you know, and I still do it, and I still mix it up. And so when I first got into the speaker,

I can do this Connect speakers that perhaps client never thought of booking. And I can do that, and now it’s gone. Other than that, it’s gone a lot further than that. Now, it’s sort of actually not only doing that there’s, there’s that initial, but actually, I can change stuff, I can make a change, and I can change the way people think and feel and act by putting speakers in into their business. And in the same way, now, I’m also doing a lot of work with speakers, what I’m doing training was because I can change how they can make other people think and feel and act by helping them to get their messaging, right, and help them with the speaking business. So it’s all it’s all being Yeah, it’s really, really good place. It’s finally all come together or so make sense.

As you mentioned, I’m thinking of a mutual friend that we have. I know he’s also one of your fellow speakers as well, Frederick car, and there’s a great speaker at his good friend of ours. And I remember Frederick saying he really wants to, he has a real passion to help other speakers as well. Because I think if I can influence them and make an influence those days, and speakers, and each of those thousand speakers are speaking 100 times a year terms of 500 people, there’s a huge leverage that you get from that from being able to, to even just one one cool idea one, something good that you want to put out into the world, it can reverberate through through other people, and they can almost act as as your kind of your voice and on stages that you can’t be on.

Ya know, it’s fantastic. So yes, it certainly makes sense. And then it becomes really satisfying, especially when you get feedback them from a client that, you know, you get some amazing emails to speakers, thanking them and saying how it’s changed them and move them and how will they going to do differently next, and that’s wonderful. That’s the best piece really.

So as we start to finish up here some quickfire questions, I would love to know, are there any tools or apps, things that you find very useful in running your business?

I use Dropbox a lot, I find that fantastic. We also use Salesforce to to manage our relationships. And what else I suppose there’s the two main ones, I would say yes.

And this will be a difficult question for you, because reps and lots of speakers who are also great authors, so you’re probably reading all the time getting those ideas. But if you were to recommend one book to our audience, it could be a book on speaking or it could be just a book on a topic that you’re really interested in just now, what would that book be

Indiana, I’m going to get into trouble now. Because I’m going

to be see now you’re going to get me a lot or probably the book I would recommend is a book called A deviate and it’s a by a neuroscientist called Bo lotto and, but once you’ve read it, you will know less than you did when you first before you read it, because he really makes you rethink how you perceive everything.

And I mean, every time I talk to him, yeah, absolutely blows my mind. And

so in perception, and that he explains why you perceive things the way you do. And if you can ask different questions. You can change change. Everything is just brilliant. Fantastic. We’ll

put that down here on the show notes. We’ll put that link Yes, everyone. People just go to James taylor.me go to type in my dear friend zone. And you’re gonna find all these links that we’re talking about here as well. What about an album or record is or one hour more records that you love more than any other?

Oh, my God, that’s such a difficult question.

Oh, I’ll tell you what I’m going to. I’m going to name a band at the moment rather than an album, because I’ve just been to see them. And they they blew me away. There was so good. They’ve got a new front man. Now, I will see stand up early, which will tell you my age as well. And I saw them recently at the Apollo. And they were so good. They’ve got a new front man, a guy called bras, my heart room. But he’s selling who had to step into the shoes of Tony Hadley. And he was phenomenal. And it was one of the best concerts I’ve been trying not to someone even album going to give you a band, the whole band

and I didn’t even realize the other new front man. So that’s, that’s definitely new news to me as well. And I want you to imagine for a second that you woke up tomorrow morning. And you have to start from scratch. So you have all the knowledge all the skills you’ve acquired over the years, but no one knows you, you know, no one you have no contacts, what would you do? How would you restart?

I know nobody and I have no contacts. Oh, my goodness. And I probably would try to do a lot of research I think I do a lot of research to find out you know about the industry about the business about other players and I’d start networking modal socks off. I think

I like to meet people and if people want to talk about meeting if you want to connect with you reach out to you. Maybe they have an event coming up and they’re looking for a speaker or maybe there are there are speaker and they just want they want to reach out and connect that way where’s the best place to go and do that

LinkedIn or Facebook are probably the two best places and we can put links in your in your notes.

That’s great. And we’ll put all the links also to Maria’s website for the for the bureau here as well. We thank you so much for coming on today. Really looking forward to you and I working together obviously, and then seeing your business go from strength to strength.

Thank you, James.

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