March 18, 2025 • 24 mins
If you can align yourself with a speakers bureau your public speaking business can grow exponentially. I discuss how to do that in this episode with my guest, Brian Palmer.
Brian is the Senior Vice President of Premiere Speakers Bureau and a respected leader in the speaking industry. With decades of experience, Brian has built a reputation for helping business professionals select the perfect speakers for their events. He does this by delivering engaging, relevant, and high-impact presentations that align with organizational objectives.
Brian’s Journey into The Professional Speaking World
In 1972 when Brian was a freshman in high school his dad started National Speakers Bureau. His dad was a band leader who got tired of traveling all over the country. He decided to do something on the fringes of the entertainment business. The speaking industry seemed like a fit. Brian started with envelope licking and note card sorting. During college Brian worked there during the summers. In 1980 he finished college, and he started working at National Speakers Bureau full time and he’s been around ever since.
For reference for the rest of this post: National Speakers Bureau was eventually purchased by Premiere Speakers Bureau (PSB) and Brian stayed on board as a Vice President.
The Process of Booking Professional Speakers
There’s a variety of ways to book great speakers. PSB has established themselves as a great place to turn to when you need a good speaker. People reach out to them, describe a situation where they need a speaker, give them their criteria and their budget parameters. They make recommendations and provide potential clients with the means with which to plan for an outstanding event. That includes biography, presentation descriptions, video samples and more.
Proposals started out long ago with audio cassette tapes. Now it’s obviously video and it’s a lot easier now through online video. Many buyers are also very interested in testimonials from past speaking engagements. Sometimes people have other questions and PSB tries move the process along and help people make a decision that they’re happy about. Then, once it’s booked, PSB handles all the arrangements in a way that builds the buyer’s confidence. The speaker shows up prepared, ready to go, ready to make a contribution to that organization’s objectives. They speak, they get a lot of applause, the client’s really happy because their boss says “That was a great choice”.
The Process of Vetting and then Working with Professional Speakers
To a certain degree, Brian knows an outstanding speaker when he sees one. He studied speech in college and some of what he learned makes a good speech back then still applies today. Sometimes he prefers to watch full speeches. He watches a speech, watches the stories they tell, how relevant they are to the audience, how personalized the presentation is, and so on. One thing Brian does is study how much time elapses between a laugh or some kind of emotive response. All those things factor together to delineate a good speaker from an excellent speaker.
There are so many people that want to speak, and Brian chooses to recommend people who are excellent.
PSB books over 2,000 engagements a year and their clients rate the speaker, and they rate the speaker as well. They consider things such as how cooperative the speaker is, how good they are at personalizing the presentation, how they work with PSB overall.
All those things combine to drive the recommendations that they make.
Speakers Bureaus: Do They Approach You or do You Approach Them?
When PSB learns about a speaker that they’re not involved with, and they hear the speaker does a great job or PSB loses business to somebody repeatedly that gets their attention. Speakers often refer other speakers that they’ve seen or that they’re friends with. On average PSB hears from 30 people a day interested in PSB booking speeches for them.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the Idea Club Me podcast.
If you can align yourself with the speakers
bureau, your speaking business can grow and thrive.
I discuss how to do that in this
episode with my guest, Brian Palmer.
Brian is a senior vice president of premier
Speakers Bureau and a respected leader in the
speaking
industry. With decades of experience, Brian has built
reputation for helping business professionals select the perfect
(00:23):
speakers for their events,
prioritizing
engaging, relevant, and high impact presentations that align
with organizational objectives.
We dive into topics such as what makes
a professional speaker attractive to speakers bureaus, what
to expect from a speakers bureau when it
comes to marketing your services,
how to stay ahead of the ever changing
market demand curve for speakers and stay relevant,
(00:44):
and more golden nuggets of advice. You're gonna
love this show.
Ryan, thank you for making time to be
here for the idea climbing podcast. I appreciate
it.
Hey, Mark. Good to be here with you.
And we're gonna talk about some strategies, some
tips, some tricks,
(01:05):
ways to get booked as a speaker,
and ways to book a speaker.
Before we get into the strategies, how did
you get into that world? What's your story
in that's in the speaking world?
In 1972,
I was a freshman in high school.
My dad
started
(01:25):
National Speakers Bureau. He was a band leader.
He got tired of traveling all over the
country,
and he decided to do something on the
fringes of the entertainment business.
And the lecture industry is, in many ways,
on the fringes of the entertainment business,
and he started National Speakers Bureau.
I started with,
(01:46):
envelope licking and note card sorting.
And,
after college in 1980, I worked there in
the summers during college.
But in 1980, I I finished college, and
I started here full time, and
I've been around since.
So what's your experience, Ben? Let's start first
(02:07):
with
booking speakers because I think there's a little
bit of a gray area there, a little
bit more than getting booked as a speaker,
which we'll dive into. But as far as
booking speakers, what does that process look like
to do it effectively so everyone's happy? Well,
that's what I started doing when I started
here full time. And it the
(02:28):
a variety of ways to arrive at that.
But generally speaking,
we've established ourselves as a good place to
turn to when you need a good speaker.
People write us, describe a situation for which
they need a speaker, give us their criteria,
their budget parameter.
We make recommendations
and provide them with the means on which
(02:49):
to base a decision.
You know,
biography,
presentation descriptions,
video.
It started out long ago with,
cassette tapes, audio cassette,
but now it it's video and and it
it's a lot easier now through
online video to have a variety of videos
(03:10):
of somebody's presentation
so clients can get a different look. A
lot of buyers are very interested
interested in
testimony, what other people had to say about
about the speaker. So we provide all that.
Sometimes people have other questions, and we try
to marshal the process along and help people
(03:30):
make a decision
that they're really happy about.
And then once it's booked,
to handle all the arrangements in a way
that
builds the the buyer's confidence,
the speaker shows up prepared,
ready to go, ready to make a contribution
to that organization's
objectives,
(03:51):
and they they speak.
They get a lot of applause. The client's
really happy, and their boss said that was
a great choice.
What does that process look like when they
approach you? What is the process how do
you pick a good speaker for that person?
I mean, is it just the topic? Is
it more of a personality thing with them?
You know, the motivational rah rah speech versus
(04:13):
the informational?
What is the process for, say, for vetting
speakers to give to meeting planners look like?
It's to a certain degree,
I know a good one when I when
I when I see one. There's
I studied speech in college, speech and rhetorical
theory,
(04:34):
and
some of the things I learned about what
makes a good speech back then still applies
today.
But we watch speeches,
not so much preview videos, but we watch
a speech. We watch,
the stories they tell, how relevant they are
to the audience,
how personalized the presentation is.
(04:55):
And one of the things we do is
is
time, how much how much time elapses between
a a a laugh or some sort of
emotive response.
And we all those things
factor together
to delineate
a good speaker from a excellent speaker. And
(05:17):
there there's so many people who wanna speak,
and we we choose to recommend people who
are excellent.
And then in over over months and years
of booking somebody and knowing who
is particularly good in certain situations,
all that weighs into
the recommendations that we make.
(05:38):
Also, the the you know, we book over
2,000 engagements a year,
and
our customers rate the speaker,
and we rate the speaker as well. How
cooperative they are, how good they are at
personalizing the presentation,
how how they work with us,
and all those things combined to drive the
(06:00):
recommendations that we make.
And for the speakers in your, stable of
speakers, do they approach you? Do you approach
them? What does that look like as far
as onboarding a speaker? Which does it tend
to lean more towards you find them, you're
amazing, be part of our tribe,
and or
do they approach you? I don't have I
(06:20):
don't have stats to answer that question. Mhmm.
We pay attention. And when we hear about
speaker a speaker that we're not involved with
and we hear they did a great job
or that we lose business to
somebody, repeatedly, that gets that gets our attention.
People that speak
that we know sometimes say, you ought to
(06:42):
take a look at this person because I
saw them,
and
they were really good.
People
often
tell us about somebody that might be a
friend.
I think often to do that do them,
do them a bit of a favor, but
we hear about speakers a variety of ways.
(07:04):
Plus, as I as I mentioned when we
spoke the other day,
on average, we hear
from 30 people a day who are interested
in our booking speeches for them.
And so
there's there's
a veritable flood
of people who wanna speak. I think one
(07:25):
of the factors that drove that drives that
is
after
during COVID, a lot of people with a
lot of good experience,
took a buyout,
were let go, or decided to retire. So
there are a lot of people with a
lot of interesting experience
who now want to speak, and they've been
(07:45):
working on it, practicing it. And it just
seems like now in the last six months,
a lot of people have decided to try
to get the attention of
companies
like mine. And and the people that I
know that do similar work, they
tell stories about the incredible,
(08:05):
number of people that are approaching them. And
it's it's
it's,
it's a lot it's a lot to deal
with,
and we simply don't have the the
the the capacity or the bandwidth to consider
all the good speakers that are that are
that are out out there. But getting getting
back to your I I drifted off here.
(08:26):
Getting back to your question,
Sometime well, my one of my favorite stories
is a speaker invited me to come hear
him,
hear him speak.
And he gave me the wrong time.
So I got there early,
and the person that spoke before them was
fantastic.
(08:47):
And we've been booking this person a whole
bunch. I stayed around and I heard the
guy who invited me to speak,
and he he was good, but it wasn't
nearly as good as as this other person.
And, you know, I and I I don't
I certainly don't wanna be booking people that
are just pretty good. This other person was
great.
(09:07):
I'm glad you know, a happy mistake. And,
we've done a lot of business together.
So with all the people approaching you, what
advice do you have? How what's the right
way to approach a speaker's bureau? Because because
I I would imagine a lot of people
just called, here's a video. Please hire me.
What's the right way to do it?
Well, that that the answer to that question
(09:29):
is it depends.
Different bureau people like to be approached differently.
Sometimes they will give guidance on their website.
Often not,
it's
I don't think it's wise
to
investigate,
you know, what it takes to be a
(09:50):
good speaker by calling
somebody that works at a, at a very
big, very busy
speakers bureau.
I would have
great video of a great speech
Set to go because almost invariably, you're going
to be,
you're going to be asked for that kind
of thing. But if to the degree you
(10:12):
can find out how they, how they might
want to be,
approached Somebody that does business with them, you
might ask them what might be a good
way to
approach them. But that's a question that I
get a lot and
and,
I've I've I've vacillating I mean, I I
(10:34):
don't have a particular way that I like
to get approached. Mhmm.
And I do take a little peekaboo at
everything that comes my way,
But often it's very clear to me that
we're not a good fit. And I used
to feel the need
to respond to everybody,
but
I don't anymore. I simply I simply
(10:56):
I've got I've got a job.
And I've got responsibilities
here and I need to
I I can't give time to you know,
I don't like my life ruled by the
contents of my inbox.
You know, I have to have
I have to be a lot more deliberate
about my work.
When you do bring a speaker on board,
(11:17):
do you do marketing for them, or is
it mostly people come to you?
What does that look like, the dynamics when
you promoting speakers and people just coming to
you and saying, give me
three options for my conference. What does that
look like?
Well, it depend it depends on the speaker,
and it depends on they what they want.
There's some people that simply want an entity
to manage the demand. They have a lot
(11:39):
of people
contacting them, and they want us to to
handle those inquiries in a very professional
manner
and bring them the ones that from the
organizations that fit
the criteria that they, that they have.
We, we do,
(11:59):
email marketing and we do social media marketing
to let people know about speakers,
you know, with some some thought leadership. We
like to use the people that we work
with to write articles and create videos
and share those with people
in ways that might help them,
(12:20):
help people be more effective in their in
their work role. So,
you know, we try to
align ourselves with speakers for whom there's going
to be some
pull into the market
place, not always
pushing
hard out into the
marketplace.
(12:41):
When it comes to speakers, let's say the
ones that they've done the free speaking,
maybe they're still doing it for for promotion
and, you know, awareness, whatever you wanna call
it, visibility.
When is it should speakers start looking for
speakers bureaus?
How do well, let me take it back
one step. What advice do you have for
speakers? Say, look. I've I've done the free
(13:02):
stuff. I've got a couple speeches. I know
I'm at least decent.
Where do you start to get booked as
a speaker? What can they do to start
before they approach a speakers bureau to become
more in demand?
Well, I I I'm gonna probably
overuse
your term decent.
We don't need
and and and take this in the best
(13:23):
way, everybody. We don't need more speakers. We
have
excellent speakers on a wide variety of topics.
We're always looking to
sort of top grade,
maybe bring somebody
in that's even better than somebody that we're
currently booking. People that we represent exclusively
(13:44):
and the much bigger pool of people who,
who we know of and regularly
regularly book.
You got you gotta be really good,
I think, to get a speaker's bureau
to book you. I mean, people look to
us to have a to to to do
(14:05):
the due diligence,
know who's
that excellent speaker, not that that decent
speaker. And a a lot of people
what's that show?
American Idol. You know, when somebody gets dung
and they walk out and they're sobbing and
they say, everybody said I was a great
speaker.
(14:26):
You know, their family and their friends tell
them that they're a great speaker. You know,
I don't know,
to tell people
what it is when you become a great
speaker, what it, what, what, what it, what
it's like,
but, but
I think I know pretty well what makes
a really good speaker. And and, you know,
rookies
regularly call us, say, you know, I got
(14:48):
a standing ovation, and they really liked me.
And I think, I should be represented by
premier speakers bureau.
So what tips do you have for those?
Let's say
better than decent and they're at this stage
of the game, they're not ready for a
speakers bureau yet. What booking advice do you
have for somebody at that level? What should
they be doing to get booked more?
(15:10):
Well, they well, they should be they should
be speaking.
They should,
that's not an answer to your question, but
you they should be getting reps. I mean,
I I
somebody tells me that I've got a brand
new speech and I'm ready to deliver it,
I feel like saying go give it a
hundred times
and then and then come talk to me.
(15:31):
I I like knowing that somebody has
spoken a good deal.
They've they've
had to be a road warrior traveling around.
You know, when you're having a bad day,
when your travel stinks, you know, I feel
sorry tomorrow.
It's supposed to be snowing here in Chicago.
They're gonna be some travel challenges here, and
(15:52):
people are gonna get in at two in
the morning, and then they've got an 08:30
keynote speech before 2,000 people. They need to
be able to shine and sparkle. You're not
you're
a lot of people who work at corporations.
They spoke for groups and they said the
audience loved me. Well, you're the boss. Everybody's
(16:13):
gonna be really polite to you
when you're getting paid.
The expectations
are a lot higher. And so you need
to be deliver
excellent work all the time.
You need to dig. You need to find
people who need speakers.
(16:35):
I mean, there's there's all sorts of organizations
who
have meetings large and small,
discerning where those are.
You know, I
I don't know exact I don't know how
to tell people to do
that,
but it's a lot easier to find engagements
(16:57):
because of the, the, the, the internet,
you know, looking peep speakers that, you know,
and maybe figuring out where they might be
speaking on organizations that if they're interested in
them, they might be interested in me. You
know, speakers often cooperate and they refer
each other in into places.
(17:19):
But it's, it's,
it's, it's tough. It's tough. There there's,
all, all these people wanting to speak.
I think the market has grown
somewhat since COVID,
but I think the growth in the number
of speakers has exceeded the growth in the
number of events.
So with the with the with what you
(17:41):
just said,
speakers referring each other in, collaborating,
as far as you just mentioned tough.
What advice would you have for speakers going
through that tough time where I'm getting some,
I'm not where I want, or I'm having
a bad day? Psychologically, do you have any
tips as to how to keep on keeping
on in those times for speakers?
(18:03):
Well, I
think
a lot of people that speak pay too
much attention to
marketing
and not enough attention to their speech.
Not enough attention
to personalizing their presentation.
Not enough attention to
doing the things that the that the organization
(18:24):
really wants.
That is what the the best marketing tool
that you have is the next speech that
you give.
And if you do a great job
and there are potential buyers in the audience,
then people will see you and they'll wanna
bring you in. And that
that's that's really,
thrilling. It's it's thrilling when we we in
(18:47):
our business, we call it spin off business.
When you get spin off business
from the the speeches that you're giving,
there's there
you know, I I think the the,
there are a lot of people that want
to speak,
and it's
the number of people that actually make a
(19:07):
decent
or a excellent living from it is relatively
small.
So just because you're
a pretty good speaker or you're a good
speaker and you're hustling, that doesn't mean you're
necessarily
going to make it. You need to get
you need to be really good. You need
to be a a little lucky. You need
to be crafty. You need to hustle
(19:29):
because there I'm amazed
at the way
people who speak hustle,
how hard they work
every single day,
how they are reaching out every single day.
It's pretty extraordinary
how, people that speak, even the
(19:50):
even the people that have have have made
it and do very well,
they work hard because they wanna keep that
pipeline full,
and they're
constantly
innovating,
working on new books, evolving their material.
I know a lot of people
that
become successful
(20:11):
and
they don't change. They keep doing the same
old thing. And and eventually,
the market goes in a different direction and
they come to me and say, why aren't
I getting nearly as many invitations anymore?
And that often is the result of they're
not
evolving with the marketplace or they're not getting
better. Every time there's a big downturn,
(20:33):
like, during COVID,
a lot of people get out of the
speaking business because they can't make a living
at it.
And
every time there's a downturn like that,
customer expectations
grow. I need somebody who's
who's
even even better than in the past.
(20:55):
Times have gotten tougher.
My people are unhappy.
People are scared. So they demand more of
speakers. So if you're not constantly getting
better,
the demand isn't going to come. And and
and so
it it it never gets easy.
And and so to to get back to
(21:17):
your your question,
I keep drifting off. To get back to
to your question, I I don't know, but
it
it's a tough job. It's a really tough
job.
And
when it works, it can be
extremely lucrative.
And that attracts a lot of smart people
(21:37):
who want to
have make a great living,
who love the stage. I mean, that's part
of it too, the allure of the of
the stage. People want that. People want the
the adulation of of,
of of audiences.
So it it draws people for a variety
of reasons, and all that combined to to
make it really complicated and competitive.
(22:00):
We have covered a lot of ground in
a short period of time. When it comes
to booking a speaker or getting booked as
a speaker, people listen and watching like, okay.
You know, you said a lot of good
stuff. I get it. Certain things to do
to not do. As far as booking or
getting booked, whether it's reiterating something you said
or maybe something we haven't touched on, if
you were to say at least do this
one thing, at least do this in the
speaking world, what would you tell people to
(22:22):
do?
The number one source of praise
for speakers
is
they did their homework,
they listened, and they helped us
achieve
our objectives. They personalized the presentation.
The number one source of complaint
(22:44):
that I hear is they did the same
old thing. That was exactly the same thing
that I saw
on their their preview video. They're delivering the
same
speech. They asked me to fill out a
preprogram questionnaire,
and they didn't use a bit of that.
People don't hire speakers to hear their stories
(23:04):
nearly as much as they do
to help them achieve some
objective for that session,
for that event, or for that organization.
And the degree
to which you make a clear contribution
to helping that organization achieve some objectives,
you will improve your odds greatly of being
(23:25):
successful.
This has been awesome. If people wanna find
you online, what place or places should they
go to?
Premierespeakers.com.
Premiere
with an e on the end, the French
spelling. I guess when the company got started,
there was somebody
from Canada with with a French orientation, and
(23:48):
he begged if they could spell it the
French way. So it's premierspeakers.com.
I am brian.palmer@premierspeakers.com.
Thank you so much for the time. I
appreciate it, Brian. Alright. See you, Mark.
And seen.
Thank you for joining us today. I hope
you enjoyed the episode. I also hope that
(24:08):
you'll subscribe to the Idea Climbing podcast and
rate us on iTunes.
Visit ideaclimbing.com
to learn more about Idea Climbing and hear
more episodes about mentoring,
marketing, and big ideas.
Welcome to the Idea Club Me podcast.
If you can align yourself with the speakers
bureau, your speaking business can grow and thrive.
I discuss how to do that in this
episode with my guest, Brian Palmer.
Brian is a senior vice president of premier
Speakers Bureau and a respected leader in the
speaking
industry. With decades of experience, Brian has built
reputation for helping business professionals select the perfect
(00:23):
speakers for their events,
prioritizing
engaging, relevant, and high impact presentations that align
with organizational objectives.
We dive into topics such as what makes
a professional speaker attractive to speakers bureaus, what
to expect from a speakers bureau when it
comes to marketing your services,
how to stay ahead of the ever changing
market demand curve for speakers and stay relevant,
(00:44):
and more golden nuggets of advice. You're gonna
love this show.
Ryan, thank you for making time to be
here for the idea climbing podcast. I appreciate
it.
Hey, Mark. Good to be here with you.
And we're gonna talk about some strategies, some
tips, some tricks,
(01:05):
ways to get booked as a speaker,
and ways to book a speaker.
Before we get into the strategies, how did
you get into that world? What's your story
in that's in the speaking world?
In 1972,
I was a freshman in high school.
My dad
started
(01:25):
National Speakers Bureau. He was a band leader.
He got tired of traveling all over the
country,
and he decided to do something on the
fringes of the entertainment business.
And the lecture industry is, in many ways,
on the fringes of the entertainment business,
and he started National Speakers Bureau.
I started with,
(01:46):
envelope licking and note card sorting.
And,
after college in 1980, I worked there in
the summers during college.
But in 1980, I I finished college, and
I started here full time, and
I've been around since.
So what's your experience, Ben? Let's start first
(02:07):
with
booking speakers because I think there's a little
bit of a gray area there, a little
bit more than getting booked as a speaker,
which we'll dive into. But as far as
booking speakers, what does that process look like
to do it effectively so everyone's happy? Well,
that's what I started doing when I started
here full time. And it the
(02:28):
a variety of ways to arrive at that.
But generally speaking,
we've established ourselves as a good place to
turn to when you need a good speaker.
People write us, describe a situation for which
they need a speaker, give us their criteria,
their budget parameter.
We make recommendations
and provide them with the means on which
(02:49):
to base a decision.
You know,
biography,
presentation descriptions,
video.
It started out long ago with,
cassette tapes, audio cassette,
but now it it's video and and it
it's a lot easier now through
online video to have a variety of videos
(03:10):
of somebody's presentation
so clients can get a different look. A
lot of buyers are very interested
interested in
testimony, what other people had to say about
about the speaker. So we provide all that.
Sometimes people have other questions, and we try
to marshal the process along and help people
(03:30):
make a decision
that they're really happy about.
And then once it's booked,
to handle all the arrangements in a way
that
builds the the buyer's confidence,
the speaker shows up prepared,
ready to go, ready to make a contribution
to that organization's
objectives,
(03:51):
and they they speak.
They get a lot of applause. The client's
really happy, and their boss said that was
a great choice.
What does that process look like when they
approach you? What is the process how do
you pick a good speaker for that person?
I mean, is it just the topic? Is
it more of a personality thing with them?
You know, the motivational rah rah speech versus
(04:13):
the informational?
What is the process for, say, for vetting
speakers to give to meeting planners look like?
It's to a certain degree,
I know a good one when I when
I when I see one. There's
I studied speech in college, speech and rhetorical
theory,
(04:34):
and
some of the things I learned about what
makes a good speech back then still applies
today.
But we watch speeches,
not so much preview videos, but we watch
a speech. We watch,
the stories they tell, how relevant they are
to the audience,
how personalized the presentation is.
(04:55):
And one of the things we do is
is
time, how much how much time elapses between
a a a laugh or some sort of
emotive response.
And we all those things
factor together
to delineate
a good speaker from a excellent speaker. And
(05:17):
there there's so many people who wanna speak,
and we we choose to recommend people who
are excellent.
And then in over over months and years
of booking somebody and knowing who
is particularly good in certain situations,
all that weighs into
the recommendations that we make.
(05:38):
Also, the the you know, we book over
2,000 engagements a year,
and
our customers rate the speaker,
and we rate the speaker as well. How
cooperative they are, how good they are at
personalizing the presentation,
how how they work with us,
and all those things combined to drive the
(06:00):
recommendations that we make.
And for the speakers in your, stable of
speakers, do they approach you? Do you approach
them? What does that look like as far
as onboarding a speaker? Which does it tend
to lean more towards you find them, you're
amazing, be part of our tribe,
and or
do they approach you? I don't have I
(06:20):
don't have stats to answer that question. Mhmm.
We pay attention. And when we hear about
speaker a speaker that we're not involved with
and we hear they did a great job
or that we lose business to
somebody, repeatedly, that gets that gets our attention.
People that speak
that we know sometimes say, you ought to
(06:42):
take a look at this person because I
saw them,
and
they were really good.
People
often
tell us about somebody that might be a
friend.
I think often to do that do them,
do them a bit of a favor, but
we hear about speakers a variety of ways.
(07:04):
Plus, as I as I mentioned when we
spoke the other day,
on average, we hear
from 30 people a day who are interested
in our booking speeches for them.
And so
there's there's
a veritable flood
of people who wanna speak. I think one
(07:25):
of the factors that drove that drives that
is
after
during COVID, a lot of people with a
lot of good experience,
took a buyout,
were let go, or decided to retire. So
there are a lot of people with a
lot of interesting experience
who now want to speak, and they've been
(07:45):
working on it, practicing it. And it just
seems like now in the last six months,
a lot of people have decided to try
to get the attention of
companies
like mine. And and the people that I
know that do similar work, they
tell stories about the incredible,
(08:05):
number of people that are approaching them. And
it's it's
it's,
it's a lot it's a lot to deal
with,
and we simply don't have the the
the the capacity or the bandwidth to consider
all the good speakers that are that are
that are out out there. But getting getting
back to your I I drifted off here.
(08:26):
Getting back to your question,
Sometime well, my one of my favorite stories
is a speaker invited me to come hear
him,
hear him speak.
And he gave me the wrong time.
So I got there early,
and the person that spoke before them was
fantastic.
(08:47):
And we've been booking this person a whole
bunch. I stayed around and I heard the
guy who invited me to speak,
and he he was good, but it wasn't
nearly as good as as this other person.
And, you know, I and I I don't
I certainly don't wanna be booking people that
are just pretty good. This other person was
great.
(09:07):
I'm glad you know, a happy mistake. And,
we've done a lot of business together.
So with all the people approaching you, what
advice do you have? How what's the right
way to approach a speaker's bureau? Because because
I I would imagine a lot of people
just called, here's a video. Please hire me.
What's the right way to do it?
Well, that that the answer to that question
(09:29):
is it depends.
Different bureau people like to be approached differently.
Sometimes they will give guidance on their website.
Often not,
it's
I don't think it's wise
to
investigate,
you know, what it takes to be a
(09:50):
good speaker by calling
somebody that works at a, at a very
big, very busy
speakers bureau.
I would have
great video of a great speech
Set to go because almost invariably, you're going
to be,
you're going to be asked for that kind
of thing. But if to the degree you
(10:12):
can find out how they, how they might
want to be,
approached Somebody that does business with them, you
might ask them what might be a good
way to
approach them. But that's a question that I
get a lot and
and,
I've I've I've vacillating I mean, I I
(10:34):
don't have a particular way that I like
to get approached. Mhmm.
And I do take a little peekaboo at
everything that comes my way,
But often it's very clear to me that
we're not a good fit. And I used
to feel the need
to respond to everybody,
but
I don't anymore. I simply I simply
(10:56):
I've got I've got a job.
And I've got responsibilities
here and I need to
I I can't give time to you know,
I don't like my life ruled by the
contents of my inbox.
You know, I have to have
I have to be a lot more deliberate
about my work.
When you do bring a speaker on board,
(11:17):
do you do marketing for them, or is
it mostly people come to you?
What does that look like, the dynamics when
you promoting speakers and people just coming to
you and saying, give me
three options for my conference. What does that
look like?
Well, it depend it depends on the speaker,
and it depends on they what they want.
There's some people that simply want an entity
to manage the demand. They have a lot
(11:39):
of people
contacting them, and they want us to to
handle those inquiries in a very professional
manner
and bring them the ones that from the
organizations that fit
the criteria that they, that they have.
We, we do,
(11:59):
email marketing and we do social media marketing
to let people know about speakers,
you know, with some some thought leadership. We
like to use the people that we work
with to write articles and create videos
and share those with people
in ways that might help them,
(12:20):
help people be more effective in their in
their work role. So,
you know, we try to
align ourselves with speakers for whom there's going
to be some
pull into the market
place, not always
pushing
hard out into the
marketplace.
(12:41):
When it comes to speakers, let's say the
ones that they've done the free speaking,
maybe they're still doing it for for promotion
and, you know, awareness, whatever you wanna call
it, visibility.
When is it should speakers start looking for
speakers bureaus?
How do well, let me take it back
one step. What advice do you have for
speakers? Say, look. I've I've done the free
(13:02):
stuff. I've got a couple speeches. I know
I'm at least decent.
Where do you start to get booked as
a speaker? What can they do to start
before they approach a speakers bureau to become
more in demand?
Well, I I I'm gonna probably
overuse
your term decent.
We don't need
and and and take this in the best
(13:23):
way, everybody. We don't need more speakers. We
have
excellent speakers on a wide variety of topics.
We're always looking to
sort of top grade,
maybe bring somebody
in that's even better than somebody that we're
currently booking. People that we represent exclusively
(13:44):
and the much bigger pool of people who,
who we know of and regularly
regularly book.
You got you gotta be really good,
I think, to get a speaker's bureau
to book you. I mean, people look to
us to have a to to to do
(14:05):
the due diligence,
know who's
that excellent speaker, not that that decent
speaker. And a a lot of people
what's that show?
American Idol. You know, when somebody gets dung
and they walk out and they're sobbing and
they say, everybody said I was a great
speaker.
(14:26):
You know, their family and their friends tell
them that they're a great speaker. You know,
I don't know,
to tell people
what it is when you become a great
speaker, what it, what, what, what it, what
it's like,
but, but
I think I know pretty well what makes
a really good speaker. And and, you know,
rookies
regularly call us, say, you know, I got
(14:48):
a standing ovation, and they really liked me.
And I think, I should be represented by
premier speakers bureau.
So what tips do you have for those?
Let's say
better than decent and they're at this stage
of the game, they're not ready for a
speakers bureau yet. What booking advice do you
have for somebody at that level? What should
they be doing to get booked more?
(15:10):
Well, they well, they should be they should
be speaking.
They should,
that's not an answer to your question, but
you they should be getting reps. I mean,
I I
somebody tells me that I've got a brand
new speech and I'm ready to deliver it,
I feel like saying go give it a
hundred times
and then and then come talk to me.
(15:31):
I I like knowing that somebody has
spoken a good deal.
They've they've
had to be a road warrior traveling around.
You know, when you're having a bad day,
when your travel stinks, you know, I feel
sorry tomorrow.
It's supposed to be snowing here in Chicago.
They're gonna be some travel challenges here, and
(15:52):
people are gonna get in at two in
the morning, and then they've got an 08:30
keynote speech before 2,000 people. They need to
be able to shine and sparkle. You're not
you're
a lot of people who work at corporations.
They spoke for groups and they said the
audience loved me. Well, you're the boss. Everybody's
(16:13):
gonna be really polite to you
when you're getting paid.
The expectations
are a lot higher. And so you need
to be deliver
excellent work all the time.
You need to dig. You need to find
people who need speakers.
(16:35):
I mean, there's there's all sorts of organizations
who
have meetings large and small,
discerning where those are.
You know, I
I don't know exact I don't know how
to tell people to do
that,
but it's a lot easier to find engagements
(16:57):
because of the, the, the, the internet,
you know, looking peep speakers that, you know,
and maybe figuring out where they might be
speaking on organizations that if they're interested in
them, they might be interested in me. You
know, speakers often cooperate and they refer
each other in into places.
(17:19):
But it's, it's,
it's, it's tough. It's tough. There there's,
all, all these people wanting to speak.
I think the market has grown
somewhat since COVID,
but I think the growth in the number
of speakers has exceeded the growth in the
number of events.
So with the with the with what you
(17:41):
just said,
speakers referring each other in, collaborating,
as far as you just mentioned tough.
What advice would you have for speakers going
through that tough time where I'm getting some,
I'm not where I want, or I'm having
a bad day? Psychologically, do you have any
tips as to how to keep on keeping
on in those times for speakers?
(18:03):
Well, I
think
a lot of people that speak pay too
much attention to
marketing
and not enough attention to their speech.
Not enough attention
to personalizing their presentation.
Not enough attention to
doing the things that the that the organization
(18:24):
really wants.
That is what the the best marketing tool
that you have is the next speech that
you give.
And if you do a great job
and there are potential buyers in the audience,
then people will see you and they'll wanna
bring you in. And that
that's that's really,
thrilling. It's it's thrilling when we we in
(18:47):
our business, we call it spin off business.
When you get spin off business
from the the speeches that you're giving,
there's there
you know, I I think the the,
there are a lot of people that want
to speak,
and it's
the number of people that actually make a
(19:07):
decent
or a excellent living from it is relatively
small.
So just because you're
a pretty good speaker or you're a good
speaker and you're hustling, that doesn't mean you're
necessarily
going to make it. You need to get
you need to be really good. You need
to be a a little lucky. You need
to be crafty. You need to hustle
(19:29):
because there I'm amazed
at the way
people who speak hustle,
how hard they work
every single day,
how they are reaching out every single day.
It's pretty extraordinary
how, people that speak, even the
(19:50):
even the people that have have have made
it and do very well,
they work hard because they wanna keep that
pipeline full,
and they're
constantly
innovating,
working on new books, evolving their material.
I know a lot of people
that
become successful
(20:11):
and
they don't change. They keep doing the same
old thing. And and eventually,
the market goes in a different direction and
they come to me and say, why aren't
I getting nearly as many invitations anymore?
And that often is the result of they're
not
evolving with the marketplace or they're not getting
better. Every time there's a big downturn,
(20:33):
like, during COVID,
a lot of people get out of the
speaking business because they can't make a living
at it.
And
every time there's a downturn like that,
customer expectations
grow. I need somebody who's
who's
even even better than in the past.
(20:55):
Times have gotten tougher.
My people are unhappy.
People are scared. So they demand more of
speakers. So if you're not constantly getting
better,
the demand isn't going to come. And and
and so
it it it never gets easy.
And and so to to get back to
(21:17):
your your question,
I keep drifting off. To get back to
to your question, I I don't know, but
it
it's a tough job. It's a really tough
job.
And
when it works, it can be
extremely lucrative.
And that attracts a lot of smart people
(21:37):
who want to
have make a great living,
who love the stage. I mean, that's part
of it too, the allure of the of
the stage. People want that. People want the
the adulation of of,
of of audiences.
So it it draws people for a variety
of reasons, and all that combined to to
make it really complicated and competitive.
(22:00):
We have covered a lot of ground in
a short period of time. When it comes
to booking a speaker or getting booked as
a speaker, people listen and watching like, okay.
You know, you said a lot of good
stuff. I get it. Certain things to do
to not do. As far as booking or
getting booked, whether it's reiterating something you said
or maybe something we haven't touched on, if
you were to say at least do this
one thing, at least do this in the
speaking world, what would you tell people to
(22:22):
do?
The number one source of praise
for speakers
is
they did their homework,
they listened, and they helped us
achieve
our objectives. They personalized the presentation.
The number one source of complaint
(22:44):
that I hear is they did the same
old thing. That was exactly the same thing
that I saw
on their their preview video. They're delivering the
same
speech. They asked me to fill out a
preprogram questionnaire,
and they didn't use a bit of that.
People don't hire speakers to hear their stories
(23:04):
nearly as much as they do
to help them achieve some
objective for that session,
for that event, or for that organization.
And the degree
to which you make a clear contribution
to helping that organization achieve some objectives,
you will improve your odds greatly of being
(23:25):
successful.
This has been awesome. If people wanna find
you online, what place or places should they
go to?
Premierespeakers.com.
Premiere
with an e on the end, the French
spelling. I guess when the company got started,
there was somebody
from Canada with with a French orientation, and
(23:48):
he begged if they could spell it the
French way. So it's premierspeakers.com.
I am brian.palmer@premierspeakers.com.
Thank you so much for the time. I
appreciate it, Brian. Alright. See you, Mark.
And seen.
Thank you for joining us today. I hope
you enjoyed the episode. I also hope that
(24:08):
you'll subscribe to the Idea Climbing podcast and
rate us on iTunes.
Visit ideaclimbing.com
to learn more about Idea Climbing and hear
more episodes about mentoring,
marketing, and big ideas.
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