Why Public Speaking Moves Businesses Into The Millions

Hi, welcome to Ally and you, the Business Success and lifestyle show. My name is Allison Maslin. My friends call me Ally and and I am here to give you direct business advice. Week after week, sometimes I'll be interviewing a very inspiring guest, an entrepreneur, a champion that's dedicated their life to reaching their dreams. And sometimes I'm just here answering your questions. And my goal is to help you remove any roadblocks so that you can break through and and create a successful business and a prosperous life and a happy life. So I've gotten some questions in today and what I want to start with is talking about the number one phobia. Do you know what that number one phobia is of all humanity? Public speaking. Yes. Getting in front of an audience and sharing your message. Now, some of you may not believe this, but I used to be terrified to get up in front of a group of people. I mean, I've had all kinds of crazy experiences. In fact, I remember when I was, I was dating this guy and I had to give a speech and this is when I was full on practicing in my homeopathic practice, one of my past businesses. And I was doing this introductory talk and I was so nervous and I used to laugh when I would be nervous. So I told him if he was going to come watch my talk, which he wanted to do, he had to turn around and face his back to me because if I saw him I would start laughing. I've had other times where I was just like in the cold sweats or practicing my speech for months and months, you know, to do the very best. So I know what it's like to have that fear. So I want to talk to you about how to overcome that. And I also want to talk to you of the value of public speaking and how you can utilize that in your business in so many ways. So I am so happy that I broke through that fear. I didn't give up. And I've really used public speaking in every business that I've had. I've been had an advertising agency, I've had a scuba diving business, a chain of beauty salons, homeopathic business, software company. And now I work with entrepreneurs and help them grow their businesses and help you grow your business. So I use public speaking in every single one of those businesses. And the reason is, is that there is no better way to get your message out to a bunch of decision makers all at once. Now you can do this on social media, of course you can, you know, send out e blasts and all kinds of things. To broadcast your message and your wisdom. But there's nothing like face to face, real live connection for people to get to see you get to know you understand that you like walk your talk and that you get it. So they can sit there and go, huh, I could see myself working with this person. And you know, you give them an opportunity to step forward and work with you. If you tried to get all those people on the telephone, it would take you probably years to actually book appointments and get into people. Some people you would never even get in to see them. Right? So I cannot say enough about the value of growing your business through speaking. And when you're building leads and you know, building up your database, which is so valuable in your business, someone that you met at a speaking engagement is going to be a much higher qualified, deeper connected lead than someone that comes in from possibly a Facebook ad. Now I'm not saying that the other isn't valid. I've worked with many people through clients that I've gotten on, on through social media. It's just a deeper relationship, faster when you meet them through public speaking. So here are the ways that you can grow your business through speaking. One is that you, you get out and you find out where your target market is hanging out. If your target market is moms, if your target market is business owners, and if your target market are realtors, find out where their conferences are, find out where they come together and support one another, their associations and meetup groups, whatever. People are always looking for someone to share their wisdom. But just like with sales and reaching your clients and you have to do follow up, right? It takes time to build that relationship. It's the same thing with booking speaking engagements. So you might have your list of groups that you would like to present to and present your great talk, but you're going to have to follow up because it takes time. People book their speaking engagements way ahead, sometimes a year ahead, and they'll say to you, you know, we're interested, but we've got a board of directors meeting in three months, so call us back then. So you really need to stay on top of that and follow up. And then, you know, if they are interested and you have that connection, you want to send them what we call a one sheet. And that has all the information about the talk that you're giving and you, your bio, a testimonial. You don't necessarily have to have a video of you speaking to start with. You know, in the very beginning. You know, if you're going to speak at a Rotary Club or something like that. As you begin to do the bigger talks, then that's something that you need. But just to get your feet wet, it's fine. Again, the persistence is what's going to get you in the door. And so then you. What I recommend doing is this. A lot of people get stuck in the piece of. I have to create a talk, I've got to get it perfect before I try to book a talk. Well, no, you have it backwards. Okay, book the talk and then I tell you when you are on a deadline, you will get that talk done. Nothing like a deadline to get your butt in gear. I know when I wrote my book Blast off and I published it, I booked six talks right away and I didn't have any of my talk put together yet. But you know, you better believe I got it done. And the first few talks they were okay, nothing great. But as I got more comfortable, I did it more and more and I tweaked it. Then it went really, really well. So how do you get over the fear of public speaking? Well, let's see, I suppose you could take some anti anxiety medication, but I don't recommend that at all. Right. We need your wits about you. And actually adrenaline is a good thing. When you do public speaking, you want to harness that. You don't want to be too relaxed because then you're going to kind of be like this and your audience is going to fall asleep. So harness that adrenaline and just know that the people in the audience want you to do well. They want you to succeed. If you're. I mean, I've seen people on stage that were struggling, kind of lost their voice and nobody was throwing tomatoes, nobody was laughing, everybody was cheering them on to let them know that they really support them. So know that the audience is actually on your side. And the thing is you just kind of have to do it. And that's how you get over your fear. That's how you get better at anything. You've got to face your fear. When you're growing a business, it's important that you do scary things all the time. I've been in business over 30 years and I'll tell you what, I do scary things every single, single week. I stretch myself right. So you can do this. I know you can. So you can use public speaking to sell your services. You can learn public speaking to go after investors, to lead your team in an important meeting. Having these skills will help you in so many ways. To do a show like this, I couldn't have done this you know, without all of the years and years of practice that I've had to get it where I want to be so that I feel comfortable. And, you know, wherever you are at right now, you can always improve. Okay. I mean, they say that even if you have a bad singing voice, well, some people might not agree with this, that you can actually improve it with practice. So no matter where you're at, I promise you can be a superstar speaker. So get out there, get on stage, show your stuff, share your gifts, share your passion, and then just see all the opportunities open up for you. All right? Get out there, make it happen, and we'll see you next time on Allie. And you, Ram.