From Stage Fright to Visibility: My Speaking Journey

Visibility Book: 15 Chapters to Marketing Made Easy. And today we are going to talk about speaking and podcasting, two things that you may have passion around or you may hide from. Initially, I was the hide from person for that. Business owners usually say they're not public speakers, and I can attest to that. I am not a public speaker. Yet speaking is a great way to establish yourself as an industry expert. I'm sure you probably realize that. Speaking doesn't always mean standing on a stage in front of hundreds of people. Here are some places that you can speak at. Uh, and I have spoken at all of these places that are less than hundreds of people. Small in-person networking events, and you could extend this actually to online networking events at this point. Um, association meetings and chamber meetings. Have— are you a member of your local Chamber of Commerce? Do you ever attend any of those meetings?. That's a great place to practice your speaking. Speaking at these events are very low-key, a great opportunity to showcase your expertise and stand out from the crowd of all of the people who won't speak at these events. Um, these can be in-person or online events and If it's an online event, it's usually pretty easy to record your talk, which you can then repurpose and use in various different ways. Recording your speaking events provides content that can be used in different ways. You can publish the recording on your website. I've done that many times. The recorded video can be added to your YouTube account. You can find almost all of mine on my YouTube account. And the video can be added to different social media profiles, which you will also find that I have done. Facebook, however, now only holds those recordings for 30 days, so just be aware of that. Before I move on to podcasting, I really want to take a few moments here and just share my journey of speaking. So I started business about 20 years ago, and I knew no one. I had just moved to a town, uh, that I had not grown up in, had not lived in for very long, and I decided to start a business, and I had no contacts at all. So I connected up with a local networking, um, group similar to BNI, but on a much smaller scale and just local to my area. And my group had roughly 6 to 10 people that would attend every week for the meeting. And we were supposed to take 10 to 15 minutes and just tell everybody what we're about, what, what we're doing, what our job is. What our business is and who is a great referral for us. I was there probably 6 months before I got the courage to speak in front of these 10 people. And when I stood up, my voice quivered. I was sweating profusely. It was a very unpleasant experience. But I did realize it was very important for growing my business. So this local company, they're called I Take the Lead. Um, they're here in Portland and Seattle, and I think a few other places, uh, small little places. And they would allow you to go to any meeting as long as you were a member and there wasn't somebody else in your industry in the meetings that you're attending. So as a web designer, there was nobody else in any meetings, at least when I started. And so I literally went to a meeting every single week— I should say every single day of the week— to different ones so that I could start meeting people, getting connections, and all of that. And then I graduated to being one of their speakers that would go around to different meetings and speak to a larger group of people, and they would use these speaking events for recruitment for the group. The first time, again, there was probably maybe 20 people. Maybe, maybe 20. And I stood up and I was just like, I just have to know a little bit more than everybody else. And since I was talking about websites and online marketing, I knew a ton more than everybody else in the group because there wasn't anybody else that did what I did. Even though I logically knew that, it was still terrifying. Like, my voice would quiver. I would, you know, I would hang on to a piece of paper and it was probably shaking like this. But I eventually got over that, and it was just doing the same thing over and over and over. And I would always have a handout, and it had an outline of what I was going to say so that I would not get lost. Other people would write whatever notes they wanted on the handout and could take it with them. And it was great because then they could contact me with their questions. And, uh, but I did get clients from that. It was the perfect way for me to get local clients. Uh, and it took me a long time. I will say a very long time to get over the fear of just standing up in front of a small group of people. If I can do it, you can do it. And if you're already there, fabulous. Start scheduling appointments to speak in groups. I then graduated to like their, I think they called it a quarterly event, something like that, where all of the groups would come together in one location and they would have a speaker. And I was on a panel. And I couldn't even tell you what the panel was about. I was just like, I, I invited my friends to this just to give me support for sitting on a panel of about 6 people. So I wasn't even speaking myself. And I got through it. I got through it. Every thing that came up, I got through it. It still is not my favorite thing in the world to do. Now, on all these videos you've been watching, you might think, "Oh, you're not bad. You can talk. You can whatever." However, it still is not my favorite thing to do. This last fall, I was invited to speak at a conference the very first time and I could sell something from the stage again for the very first time I've ever done that. I got through it. That's all I can say. I got through it. I think I did pretty well. I certainly did better than myself 20 years ago. So if speaking's not a favorite thing of yours, figure out a way to work through that anxiety because it really has paid off tremendously for me in my business over the last 20 years. So let's move on to podcasting. And podcasting is interesting. It's been around for a very long time. However, it seems to have morphed what its meaning is in the last few years. Originally, podcasting was like radio. It was audio only and it would go up on various different podcasting platforms like Apple and Spotify and it was all audio. You would subscribe to it, you would be delivered the new episodes as they came out and you could listen to it and you could repeat listen to it, you can binge listen to it, however you wanna do it. So that's traditionally. What podcasting, at least how it started out to be. So what I've written in the book here: In its purest form, podcasting is an audio recording that is published on a podcasting platform. There are usually several episodes that people can listen to. Uh, I want to say to that, when you initially start a podcast, it's best to have at least 10 episodes prerecorded and ready to go when you release it. This does a few things, and, and I would release at least 3 or 4 of them all at once because people are used to binge listening. If you only have one to listen to, then you may not get the results that you want. People might wanna listen to 2 or 3 or 4 episodes to see if they really wanna follow you and, and learn from you. So it's a marketing thing for that. Um, recently, like in the last few years, this definition has been relaxed greatly. Now it can be audio or video, and people can attend live broadcasts on social media, and a lot of those are called podcasting. In fact, I could say that what you're listening to right now is a podcast. Even though it's not, but lots of people would call it that. And for marketing purposes, either will work. Um, but here's, uh, here's what podcasting can do for you. And I'm gonna add to this list. If done regularly, people will see you as an expert. And that is true. It's true of blogging as well. You may gain followers interested in your topic who may become clients in the future. And that is also true. I have become clients of some of the podcasts that I listen to. I said that wrong. Some of the podcasts I listen to, the people that run those, I have become clients of theirs. A good example is Social Media Examiner. I go to their conference every year because I listen to their podcast and Thoughts on podcasting. A podcast episode may feature you speaking on a specific topic, so just be one person just talking about whatever. Um, you can conduct interviews with various experts in businesses. Uh, in other areas of topical interest. Most of what I listen to are interview-type podcasts. I enjoy those best. Uh, you might invite a panel of professionals to discuss a specific topic. And podcasts are typically educational in nature, although there are some that are entertainment. I personally choose to listen to the educational ones. Here are some other things that I know about podcasts, and I've learned this recently— well, no, I've learned this over the years of listening to podcasts. A lot of times the people that are putting on the podcast, so the host, will advertise something that they offer, which is how I learned about some of the conferences that I go to, is through podcasts. They will also advertise other podcasts and other things that the audience that they attract would be interested in. So that's how I've learned about a lot of different AI programs out there, uh, uh, different educational programs out there that I have purchased and have learned a great deal from. These people, the hosts of the podcasts, get paid to advertise. So either if they're advertising for themselves, their payment's gonna come through either enrollments or people using their services. If they're advertising other podcasts and other tools and other things, then those companies are paying them something to run it on their podcast. Very similar to radio advertisement, to TV advertisement in concept anyway. So a podcast is a way that you can make money directly from advertisements, but in the beginning you have to prove you have an audience. And this is where people get confused about making money with podcasts. Most podcasts are not charging a guest to be on the podcast. They're getting paid in other means. Now, there are some out there that do charge their guests, and the guests gladly pay because the audience could be huge, and it's an audience that's interested in whatever it is that they have to offer. It's also a great way to build your list. So when you are a guest on a podcast or you're running your own podcast, you can offer things through opt-ins, lead magnets, this various types of things that you can then get people again off the podcast into your world of email. So you're getting their email and possibly phone number for text messaging so that you can market to them directly. Very similar to social media as far as podcasts goes is you want the audience to become part of your environment, not staying with whoever's podcast it is. Well, unless it's your, you are the host of the podcast. So if you're wondering if this would work for you, I would try being a guest on other people's podcasts first and see how it works for you. Before you ever jump in and do your own. So that's just a little bit advice on that. If you want to get your own copy of, um, the 15 Chapter— Chapters to Marketing Made Easy, I will put the link to Amazon in the show notes and in the comments. And tomorrow we are going to be talking about content marketing. I will see