PLACES TO GET SPEAKING ENGAGEMENT

PLACES TO GET SPEAKING ENGAGEMENT

After learning and practicing to overcome your fear of public speaking, you have to search for speaking opportunities to help you reach out to more audience in order for you to be able to market yourself and progress as a professional speaker. In this chapter, we will take you through some of the possible places that you can search for speaking engagements in order to market yourself and ideas.

Conferences, Trade Shows, and Expos

You can get speaking engagements at conferences, trade shows and business expos. You have to constantly check newspapers, signposts and conference websites in the industries you want to operate in, to see if they are looking for speakers’ or organizing conference events. e.g. Eventbrite.com. You can also subscribe to newsletters that have different speaking opportunity lists. You can find different trade shows and conferences with a little detective work and your favorite search engine. First, check to see if there are any trade associations or groups for your chosen industry or profession. Many trade associations will have a national conference, and you can usually find that information on their website. Some will even have regional conferences or local chapters, and you might find some opportunities there too.

Your own creative events

You can organize conferences, seminars, workshops, birthday parties or sporting activities for youth groups, friends and religious bodies where you can get the opportunity to speak as a main speaker or be the Master of Ceremony for the program. I use this technique to organize career development training for schools and religious institutions.

Colleges and Universities – if you need to get some speaking experience, volunteer your time to speak at a local college or university. Most schools encourage professionals from the community to give guest lectures. You can team up with student representative councils or administrations to organize seminars on campus where staff and students will get the opportunity to attend and listen to you. This is also a great way to accumulate speaking experience you can put in your biography.

Groups and Associations – what groups and associations do you currently belong to? There are usually regional and national events for these groups, and often instructions for submitting speaker proposals. Examples of groups and associations that you can reach out to are the Rotary Club, Lions Club, Catholic Youth, pensioners etc. these are groups that have weekly or annual meetings and can give you the opportunity to speak to their members.

Business networking groups - these lead exchange or facilitated networking groups are designed to be a tightly knit group of individuals from diverse businesses who meet regularly for the purpose of bringing business opportunities to the other members. Popular groups are Le Tip, Business Networking International (BNI), and Local Business Network (LBN). Join your preferred group and let the members know that you’re interested in speaking opportunities.

Toastmasters International- A non-profit club, devoted to helping its members improve their public speaking skills in a supportive environment, Toastmasters also has its own speaking bureau.

Social Media – use social networks like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google Hangout, Skype or Whatsapp groups to find events in your area that focus on the topics you want to speak about. Once you find a group you’d like to speak at, reach out to the officers to see how you can get involved.

Google -You can search for the types of events you want to speak at by using Google. With Google search, you can get a lot of speaking opportunities but you just have to know how to search and also you need to develop an online presence so that conference organizers can also search for you.

Radio and Television Programs -You can market yourself by networking and persuading media men to invite you to speak on their media platforms or you can watch or listen to their platforms to get speaking opportunities that they advertise.

 Companies or Organizations- You can get an opportunity to speak to staff or sales representatives of companies or organizations in your local community on any topic that will interest them.

Ask for referrals-You can ask family and friends to refer you to their networks, organizations, religious bodies etc. who will need your service.

Local or national venues - Search for popular venues that host events and conferences and get their upcoming schedule of events so that you can network your way to speak.

Coaching and Mentoring - You can coach and mentor young people to give you an opportunity to reach out and use them as Audience

Your Own website

A website is your business card. If you’re serious about speaking, you must have a website. If someone is considering hiring you to speak, they will want to do their homework on you and your website is where they will do it.