Woman Founder On a Mission? Here’s How to Start Speaking to Spread the Message
I won’t lie, I love speaking. Especially in front of live groups, because I love an audience. I’m eager to share my mission of bringing more joy to business owners without sacrificing their profits to as many founders as possible! I typically work with entrepreneurs who also have a mission in mind, and speaking is an excellent way to get your message to more people.
But I find there aren’t as many people who actually enjoy it. Fear of public speaking is widespread and can stop people in their tracks so they’re not able to get their message out as widely as possible. August 7 is Professional Speakers Day, but you don’t have to be a professional speaker to get your message out there.
Use your time management skills for your speaking plan
Block some time on your calendar to come up with a few topics that you enjoy talking about and outline the key messages. If you have topics that you can’t talk about for hours, don’t use them as speaking topics. You want something that gets you excited as well as the audience.
You won’t actually be talking about things for hours. In fact, you’ll probably struggle a little bit to cut your message down so it can be given in the allotted time. But that will help you get clear on the value of your talk and how to give it in a way that people will enjoy and really hear.
One thing that all audiences (and their bookers) want is at least one takeaway that they can put into place immediately. Make sure there’s something very obvious in your talk that your listeners can use right away, not for a special occasion or some weeks from now. Giving value is critical.
Block time for finding venues to speak
Most of my clients are very clear about who they serve, so you will likely be able to find venues pretty easily that cater to your audience. When you’re starting out, you might want to speak to local organizations. That can help build your confidence in what you’re doing.
Rotary clubs and similar local organizations looking for speakers are sometimes a good launch pad. You’ll get some experience under your belt, and you can probably get a friend to video your talk (which you can use later when pitching other groups.) But unless your business is hyperlocal, you’ll need to explore a little further.
As an example, my Profit Velocity program serves (primarily women-founded) professional service businesses like legal, accounting, architecture, marketing, and RIAs. Therefore, I look at conferences and organizations that they belong to, such as:
Small Business Development Centers (I’m speaking at their conference in Nashville in September)
Women’s entrepreneurial networking groups
Accounting organizations and conferences
Legal organizations and conferences
Financial advisory organizations and conferences
Etc.
You get the idea
Who’s your audience? Where do they go? What groups do they belong to? See if those conferences and groups accept outside speakers, since not all of them do. Better yet, have your assistant explore these for you.
Most online forms ask for your bio, your topic, how the audience will benefit from it, the takeaways people can expect, and often a video of you speaking. You can easily create a document with all this information and have your assistant fill in the form blanks with it.
I have a document for each topic I speak on with the summary and the key takeaways, the length, etc. Then when an opportunity presents itself, I have all the info ready to go. (Book a call if you’d like to learn more about my topics.)
Developing your talk in the most productive way
One thing I personally can’t stand is the presenter reading off the slide deck. I can read, thanks, I don’t need you to do it for me. It also makes the presenter seem like they don’t really know their topic.
When you’re starting out, you may want to outline everything in a slide deck as you brainstorm. After that, you’ll need to go back and streamline it. Because a lot of organizations ask for decks, and people like to have them as a reminder of what you discussed, you don’t want to be too vague either.
Key points are the, well, key. Have some graphics and don’t make it too text-heavy. Just enough to remind you (and the audience) what you’re talking about.
One thing that I admit I struggle with a little bit is putting too much in the presentation. Five different ideas is way too many, and people can’t remember that much. Have no more than three, and elaborating on just one idea actually helps it stick better.
For beginning speakers, if you try to memorize your speech, you might get frozen if you forget a part and don’t know where to go from there. Keep your outline with you, or work from your slide deck. I don’t have my speeches memorized.
I know what I’m talking about, so the words change a little bit, though the message doesn’t. That’s also why you need to love what you're talking about, so speaking on it is second nature and you won’t get stuck.
Recap (tl;dr):
If you’re a woman founder on a mission, speaking can help you spread your message far and wide. Time management skills are your friends here, and you can delegate out a lot of the administrative work. If you need a deck, don’t read from it, but use it as a springboard.
If you book speakers for an organization I can serve, book a call with me.