My advice for both emerging and experienced professional speakers is to "invest in the relationship" with meeting planners and conference producers. What do I mean by that and why is it important for your success?

Invest in the relationship with meeting planners means it’s not always about the money. Most good conference producers and meeting planners consider themselves in the speaker marketing business, the speaker visibility business, the speaker credibility business. When I spent a year working "on the other side of the desk," I was thrilled to work with some incredibly accomplished and successful speakers – CSP’s, CPAE’s – because they SAW that fact.

The company I worked with had 350,000 subscribers and sent out over 10 million emails a month. If you were one of my speakers, that’s the scope and scale of reach you got from us. Your topic, your credentials, your website. 700,000 eyeballs. Do the math. (And see my note at the end of this post if you'd like to get in on this yourself!)

Today, as a speaker marketing coach, many of my professional speaker clients ask me "How do I establish visibility and credibility with my target market?" THIS is precisely one of the best ways!!

Don’t get me wrong – our speakers got paid – but it was a lot less than you might get for a corporate keynote. I know that and you know that. Put your ego in the back seat for a minute. Be willing to invest in the relationship Because if you do a great job the first time, meeting planners and association executives are often in a position to…

a. Raise your base fee

b. Revenue share with you

c. Publish your articles in hardcopy publications, websites, and blogs

d. Publish and distribute your manuals, training guides and e-learning tools

e. Promote you any way they can

For example, I had speakers start doing audio conferences for $500, and then gradually, as the relationship evolved, move up to getting over $40,000 in royalties and revenue share in a single year from our various projects together. On the other hand, if as speakers we ask for all that up front, we won’t get it.

My advice to you at the beginning of any relationship with a meeting planner or event producer is Recognize the marketing/PR value, and let the relationship develop. To adapt a favorite saying, “Do what their audience loves and the money will follow.”

NOTE: You can find a whole lot more of these "information publishing companies" that produce audio conferences, webinars, live events, and niche hardcopy and online newsletters by visiting their professional association, the Specialty Information Publishers Association (SIPA). Perhaps one or more of these companies would make the perfect partner for YOU to expand your thought leadership platform - and get known, get booked, and get slightly famous!

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If you're an emerging or established professional speaker and it's time raise your marketing game, it's not too late to join the Speaker Profit Blueprint program...  everything has been recorded and transcribed for you and our live sessions continue through May 4, 2010. Contact me to see if joining this program might be a fit for your speaking/consulting/coaching business and your specific goals.

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