In this instructional talk, the speaker outlines the hierarchy of speaking engagements based on compensation and the speaker’s perceived authority. He begins with the lowest tier—pay‑to‑speak—where a speaker pays the event organizer to get on stage, treating it as a sales pitch rather than a professional performance. The next tier is unpaid exposure gigs, where speakers receive little or no money (perhaps travel costs) but gain video footage and practice to build a speaking reel. He warns that such exposure is only valuable if the speaker has something to sell from the stage. He describes a quid‑pro‑quo model used at his own ProfitCon event, where speakers exchange speaking slots. The third tier pays up to about $7,000 for subject‑matter experts who have solid knowledge but are not yet recognized authorities. The fourth tier ($7,000–$20,000) is for category authorities—individuals with high‑end credentials or elite education who can attract audiences. The highest tier ($20,000–$50,000 or more) is for true category‑defining speakers, often with a compelling story or celebrity status, such as the speaker himself (leveraging the Profit First brand) or Captain Sully after his Hudson River landing. He emphasizes that a defining story or book can elevate a speaker into this top tier. Throughout, he offers practical advice on building a reel, leveraging exposure, and negotiating fees based on one’s authority level.
Chapters
I think today the lowest level of speaking, if you will, is where you pay to speak. I go to an event and say, oh, you have 1,000 people in the audience. I want to get in front of 1,000 people. I'll give you money so I can get in front of them. It's a pitch. It's a sale. When I say the lowest level, meaning I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad speaker. I would argue that's not their profession. It's not a performance for them. It's a sales pitch, but they're paying to get on stage. The next level is where you are speaking for exposure. Often you get very little or nothing. Maybe your travel compensated. That's about it. But you're hoping just to get some traction, some videotape and so forth. Be leery of of this. Many events will say, hey, we want you to speak at our event, we're not gonna pay anything, but imagine all the exposure you're gonna get. There's very little benefit unless you have something to sell from stage of getting that type of exposure. But you can build a speaking reel and get some speaking practice and experience. So I think it's worth it for that. Our own event, ProfitCon, we tell people we want you to speak here, we don't pay anything. So if you wanna build a reel and get tape, we're gonna give that to you. We get some very high-quality speakers because they're doing me a favor. They're like, Mike, I'll speak at your event, but you gotta speak at mine. So we'll do a quid pro quo. The next kind of level is up to about $7,000. What I found is an event will pay up to 7 for a speaker when it is a subject that they're interested in. The speaker has knowledge on the subject but isn't necessarily an authority. So we wanna learn about how to read income statements. You can bring in someone that has expertise in accounting and so forth to translate this, and they're willing to pay for someone with those expertise. The next level is 7 to just under 20, and that is where you are a category authority but not a celebrity necessarily. So like, oh, you're one of the leading experts. Maybe you have high-end credentials. Oh, this is someone that went to this elite school for interesting degree and they can translate financial statements and so forth. So now you bring a degree of authority, which positions the event to be a little bit stronger and, and can be an attraction point. The next level, I'd say $20,000 to $50,000. Now you are the category authority. You have extraordinary credential and you are likely to draw a degree of audience. That's the range I'm in. I'm at the higher range now asking and getting $50,000 because I have Profit First under my belt. The day before Captain Sully landed that plane on the Hudson, if he was asked to keynote, he'd probably get $7,000. He was a pilot and a darn good pilot, but he was a pilot. If someone wants to talk about safety, what to do in safety circumstances, he could have got maybe $7,000 to speak. The day he landed that plane on the Hudson, he got $50,000 to speak or more because now he has such an extraordinary story. So you don't have to have necessarily a category-defining book. That's a great way. You can have a category-defining story, something like that. Or you could be maybe someone that is a celebrity on Instagram or something like that where you're the category authority.
