350: Speaker Contracts with The Legal Paige

Hey movers, it's Sally Z with Be Moved. Let's go create some talks that will move this world. We're gonna talk with amazing speakers, share tips, tricks, resources, and we are going to be moved so that our audience can be moved.

This moved me.

What is moving We are going to talk contracts. And if you're like, contracts, oh, I don't know about contracts, Sally. I just speak, or I'm sending out something and I don't know if it's good enough. Oh my goodness, people, your contract is so important as a speaker. And yet it's kind of a tricky business, right? I'm not a lawyer. Most of our speakers and you're, you, unless you're a lawyer, you may not know exactly what you need for your contracts, for your speaking business. That is in a moment, the legal Paige, Paige from The Legal Paige is gonna be joining us. And she's gonna be talking with us about contracts, all of the legal things that we need that are so, so important for us in our speaking business. And she's here. So without further ado, let's bring her in. Here she is. Hello, Paige.

Hello.

How are you?

Good.

How are you?

I'm doing super well. Happy Wednesday. Thank you.

It is so great to meet you.

I know. It's good to meet you virtually. Hello to everyone else too.

You know what? We have a mutual friend.

Who? I'm sure we do, but who? Diane Wei.

I'm trying to remember. She has two last names. I'm trying to remember which one. Wei Feng.

Oh yeah. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Oh my gosh. So, so crazy. I feel like in the virtual world too, there is like two degrees of separation, but oftentimes one degree of separation. Yeah.

We all know each other. We just don't know exactly how we know each other. So it is really fun to actually meet you. I have been following along and I'm so excited because this, this topic is so, so important for us as speakers.

I appreciate you having me jump on. I'm excited to talk to everyone. Like, I'm a speaker myself too. It's nice to talk to somebody about speaking contracts because it's just one of those things that I think a lot of times as speakers in particular, we expect the company to present to us and like, what do we do? One, if the company presents it to us, like what are our negotiation like tactics we can pursue? And then also like if they donate, what do we do? Like what we need to give them and be prepared for. So yeah, just from speaker to speaker too, and everybody else that's interested in speaking, there's, there's just things you really need to prepare for those what-ifs. Because you just always think speaking events, we all have the best of intentions. Yeah. That speaking events are gonna go exactly as planned, but usually there's hiccups along the way.

Oh my gosh. And my contract, my speaking contract has, it has saved me like more than one time. Good.

And I'm excited to talk about that. I think that'll really help people too, to be like, you know, from experience, this clause is like super necessary because I had to invoke it at this situation. Like in this instance.

Yep.

And especially right now, I feel like, you know, nobody knows what's happening with flights. Yeah.

The cancellation clause perhaps. Really important.

Yeah. Especially, yeah. Anyway, I'm just glad we're talking about this too, because in, in terms of like what's happening now with conferences and events too, we can get into that with your listeners. It's just different now since everything happened in 2020, like conferences and events are coming back on and on, but it's, there's just like a little bit more of a cautious tone and like underlying feelings surrounding all of them. I don't think they have as many attendees, like, but I think it's going to just grow and grow and grow in '23 and '24 as I can. I'm foreseeing that.

I don't know if you are, Sally, but I, no, but I for sure am. All of a sudden. It was kind of like this flood, but it's a, it's a flood of in-person intention and in-person hopes. But everybody's got this like backup plan and backup plan and a lot of hybrid stuff, which makes so much sense, right? Because it's like, we cannot predict the future. We really learned that lesson the hard way.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Oh my gosh. I'm excited to get into this. I could like I, I feel like I've, I have 15 things I wanna talk about right now.

It's so exciting. Okay. But let's start with this, Paige. Tell us about, if you are new to folks here, obviously you talk about contracts, but you've got more history than that. Would you give us a brief history of how you got into doing this work with entrepreneurs?

Absolutely. So everyone, my name is Paige. I'm the owner and lead attorney behind the business, The Legal Paige. It is a play on words. So my face is the brand. Yes. But we have a whole team of women behind business as well. I have employees that help me across the United States. I have associate attorneys. We have a Canadian attorney or lawyer now because they call themselves lawyers in Canada. And I am so used to saying the word attorney. So we have a Canadian lawyer, Courtney. She's on board. So now we have contracts for Canadian business owners. And I started out in the entrepreneurial world about 8 or 9 years ago. And I started a photography business when I was in law school. I was like sick of reading and writing the law all day long and just needed that creative outlet, you know, like you're just so in academia that you just need something else to like release those endorphins and excitement in your life. So I started a photography business. Long story short, really loved being a business owner, grew that business, and then I found like there was this void, particularly in the photography world and wedding and event industry world that I was so consumed in. There wasn't just access to good legal information. People were going down like Google rabbit holes. Nobody really like could pair the two together. And that's what I was able to do was marry my love for the law and contract law and small business law and helping people in their entrepreneurial journeys with understanding the knowledge of like running a business online and marketing on social media and sending contracts online and You know, going to conferences and events, and that's where The Legal Paige was born. So it started in 2018 after I had clerked for a federal judge. I'll never forget, he sat down with me across from the table in chambers and just said, Paige, I think you're gonna do something a little bit different with your law degree. It was like this permission slip that I didn't know I needed. It was awesome. I love that it was this catalyst and just game-changing moment in my life. And I was able to kind of just take on the legal page with everything that I had. And so, you know, we grew slowly over the, the course of the next 2 years and then 2020 hit. And I just feel like I was at the right place at the right time with the right resources. And I was already online. And then the whole small business world all needed legal help all at the same time. And so we were able to just really help business owners, particularly in conference and event world. And wedding world, like big events, which we're all used to. And I'm sure Sally and I are gonna get into here with contracts that nobody knew what to do and everybody was rescheduling and canceling.

Yeah.

So what do you do in those scenarios? And I was able to like assist people in that respect. And then just since then, I can't believe it's been 2 and a half years. Like I'm still looking at the clock being like, where did that go?

Yeah.

And we've just grown. So now we have, we have a podcast, we have blogs, we have a YouTube channel, so you can learn for free at your desired, like, education, you know, listening, reading, or watching pleasure. And then we also have a contract template shop. So we sell the speaker contracts that we'll be talking about here today. We also sell like every type of business owner's like main client service agreement and then additional legal documents that you may need in your legal toolkit as well. So long-winded answer, long-winded introduction, but I just wanted to give you guys like Everything that you need to know about TLP.

Oh my gosh. So whatever you need, legal-wise, without having to go hire your own attorney, which is huge.

Yeah. And I feel like, you know, there's just, that's the gap. That's the access to like legal information that, and just like base knowledge that people don't have because they don't have the ability to hire an attorney and pay a massive retainer. And a lot of those attorneys still just don't understand as a whole what they do. They understand a little bit, but not all of the nuances of their business. So that's what we try to bridge that gap a little bit. And I, I just love helping people and getting people started, getting that base template ready to go. And then as they, you know, grow and as you scale and expand, like maybe you will hire an attorney down the road, but until then we're here to help.

Yeah. Yeah. And I so appreciate that. That closing the gap that you're doing, because for myself, I started out, I was like, my first speaking gig that was on my own. I spent years speaking on behalf of another organization, so I didn't have to think about the contract stuff. And suddenly as a small business owner, I was like, oh, I need a contract. And I threw something together. You know, my brother's a lawyer. I was like, will you look at this? We, you know. But I didn't know what I didn't know. And until you rub up against the contract, and that's just my way of like, until something goes wrong or until there's a question, right? It's just like, it's, it's, it's really an afterthought for most people and hopefully you never have to use it. But let me just tell you, this morning I was doing a keynote and it was in person and I they asked me about recording my keynote because it was hybrid. Half people were there online, half the people were in the room. And I was like, this is in my contract. And if we haven't come to an agreement on this before, I don't, I, I can't agree to recording this right now. I was like, if you want to talk about a digital license or something, we can do that, but Right. You know, the bad thing was I couldn't remember. I was like, did we talk about this before?

Have we agreed to this already? I was like, that's on me.

But I was, I was so glad to be able to lean on the contract that they've signed and the language is in there. So I could say, if we haven't agreed to this already, then we, we either need to have a new conversation about it or stick to what was there. So yeah, it was helpful and so needed right now in this virtual world.

Um, you're protecting your IP is like priority number one that I think people don't understand that their keynotes and every, their slides, like everything they've worked so hard on is into like in a massive intangible asset to them. And like be giving a digital license for that and you have, and also like a limited digital license for that as well. Well, yeah, it, it's, I've had this issue pop up as well. All to say, contracts are like that base foundation for you. And it's a way, as Sally was saying, that she could have some solid ground to at least stand on and like in person when they're like asking for it and she's like ready to get on stage. And at least then she can say, I'm, you know, I think we need to go back to the contract. Let's talk about this. Just shoot me an email and if it's not in there, we'll talk about, you know, negotiating a digital license. Boom, like open-ended, let's talk about this later, but also preparing them mentally for the fact that you're probably gonna send some type of amendment or addendum to the contract.

Totally. And the good news is like when, when I have that contract language and I'm familiar with it, like I feel like that's an important aspect of this is being familiar enough with it that I know what's in it. And I can lean on it. I can really use it as a helpful tool for me in those conversations because it's almost like, well, Dad says I can't, you know, like you, you don't have to have the burden of the decision in the moment. You can, you can lean on the like strict parent. Well, the contract says this. Eh, sorry. You know, if, if that's not something you wanna do, so. I, I wanted to like put it into real time. And so Paige, here's what I'm thinking about. There are two big areas for speakers, right? That I would love to talk about. One is that IP thing we were just talking about, how important it is to protect, and then the cancellation.

Let's do it.

Can you talk about where, how things have shifted? In both of those arenas thanks to this new digital world and pandemic, like post-pandemic world.

Yeah. Let's stay with kind of the intangible intellectual property asset just for a sec, 'cause we've already been talking about it, so we can just briefly summarize it here. Essentially, you guys need to have like a recording clause, or if they intend to use like portions of your keynote or anything along those lines for digital purposes, even like marketing and advertising purposes, if they're using like snippets of your talk, you need to one, agree to that, or two, if they're recording the whole thing and using it for X purpose, that they're also not using it for Y and Z purposes without additional compensation to you. The main thing also is in your intellectual property clause, it's probably a copyright clause, but you might own trademarks. To, I just wanna disclaim that, that there are speakers that own very like specific phrases, like sub-brand trademarks, anything along those lines. If you're selling like books or like tangible products that relate to your brand at the conference, those type of things, then you would have an intellectual property clause that talks about both trademarks and copyright. But what Sally and I are mainly discussing here, you all, is Copyrights. So copyright ownership over your talk and over your slides, and that needs to be owned by you, maintained by you. And then I would say base contract as a speaker, if you're sending it to a company, is probably no licenses to use. Wait until they come back to you, unless you guys have agreed on this prior to you keynoting or doing a breakout session on what that type of recording or digital what your keynote set is going to look like, then of course you can put that in the contract and send it over to them. But I wouldn't like open the door to that unless the company asks for it because as a base contract, then it's a good negotiation tactic for you to acquire bigger monetary compensation for that type of thing. Yeah.

Keynote.

Huge. Absolutely. Like your keynote is one price and then them using that keynote over and over and over again is another price. And just be very cautious of that. So that needs to be in a copyright clause and then just recording language either in that clause or sometimes it's separate. I've seen it separate in speaker contracts as well, where I own the copyright. Do you have a limited license to use? Usually it's not there and it's something that's negotiated later on. And then a recording clause as well, because like Sally said, sometimes it can just happen without you knowing it. And the recording needs to be explained in your contract for the entire length of your talk or snippets of it. And people forget that now in this digital age, like conferences and events, they are using your snippets for promotion purposes. So can they use it but without audio? Probably. That would be fair. And you'd be cool with that. Nothing longer than say 30 seconds. Like those are the things, that's how nuanced you need to get because you don't want to be in a situation where I don't know, they post a Reel or a TikTok and they get 100,000 views and you're not linked. Like you're not, you didn't sell that to them. I'm just off the top of my head thinking about worst case scenario there. So that would be my answer to just your intellectual property that you need to be aware of and include in your speaker agreement.

Okay. I just wanna say before we move on to the next thing, I so appreciate your worst case scenario thinking. I'm the best lawyer.

It's bad. We're like, we're not assessment agents.

No, it's so helpful. Like, this is what I need. Cause I was like, oh, I hadn't even thought about that. And I've developed lots of contracts with my speakers based on, you know, with some, you know, attorney help and, and there's, there's legal thought behind it. But as the world keeps changing, TikTok and video, like video content, those snippets are so valuable. That snippet goes on YouTube and now they've taken like the best part of your talk is free on YouTube. And now suddenly people know exactly what they're getting when they hire you. And if you've taken some element of the in-live experience and devalued it in some way, so.

Yeah. And think if you have to like change that entire portion of your keynote, like we all have like our, you know, at least one, if not two main keynotes that we do and we've spent lots of time and That's all, that's money. That's money for you to like take time out of your day to like rewrite that portion of the keynote. If, yeah, if it's like that's your catalyst and they use it, that's, you're like, oh crap.

Whoa. Yeah, totally.

And then be careful there. And, um, yeah, I mean, within reason, right? Like we, we want the promotion to us as well. Like, yeah, they could utilize it and tag us. Like maybe if the, we scratch their back, they scratch ours as well. So everything is negotiable. Oh, I do remember what I was going I'm trying to say here. As you're like thinking worst case scenarios, the one thing I want to remind people of is contracts are living documents. So like Sally mentioned, she's experienced things. The speakers she's worked with have experienced things that you may not have thought about to put in your contract. It's okay. You can change your contract. You can amend one that you've already put out and say like, we recently updated it. Here's my new version. Or, you know, you need to like do a DIY contract. Audit on your speaker contract that you've used in 2022. Look back at what has occurred, talk to your other speaking buddies and be like, hey, has something weird happened at all that like would benefit me to put in my contract? Like share information with your colleagues and then edit it. And that's the new revised version that you can use in 2023. Like it's a living, breathing thing, just like your business is a living, breathing thing.

We talk about iteration a lot. In my world with my—

oh, okay.

Like we're just always iterating. You're iterating your speaker page, you're iterating your reel, you're iterating your contract, all the same thing because it, like the, it has to reflect the world as it is now, not as it was even a year and a half ago. It's a different world.

It totally is. Yeah. It's different than even a year ago, like 2021. I think we were all still being like, what's gonna happen in 2022? And now it's like, I would say evened out quite a bit, especially in the US. So good thoughts moving forward, everybody. Yeah. Okay.

So can we talk about cancellations? Because it is a doozy of a, it's a big chunk of the contract and it can be really fraught and complicated. Like if this, if that, if that. So what are your thoughts on the best way for us to approach our cancellation clause in our contract.

Yes. The one thing I wanna tell people is it's not just your cancellation clause because people are laser beam focused on force majeure clauses right now. Yeah. We've heard that word. We've heard act of God, like what is this and why are people constantly trying to invoke it? So just as much as we are looking at our contracts now, our clients are, the companies we work for are too. So if they're trying to find a way out, and here we're talking about cancellations, It's like, it doesn't totally fall under your cancellation clause. Lots of times they're beelining to the force majeure clause. So my biggest suggestion for you all is to make sure these two line up with one another. Your force majeure clause for things are, are for things that are unpredictable, unforeseeable, and then make it impossible for you to perform, either impacted party of the contract. COVID. Is not a force majeure event because it's not unpredictable and it's not unforeseeable. So like, do not let anybody walk all over you and say something happened with COVID and now, you know, we can't host this event and force majeure. Like, no, that is not force majeure. It's just like, they're throwing it out. They're like, sprinkle, sprinkle.

Yeah.

It's raining force majeure. No, it's not. That is for like, Just the, like, massive unpredictability things. Think Hurricane Ida that went through that decimated, like, an event space. And now that event space no longer is there. And yes, you can't host the event, therefore force majeure. Like, that's how extreme it has to be. Something of superior strength that all parties to the contract had no knowledge about and could not foresee at the time of contracting. So, okay. Be very careful with force majeure. And then the last thing I'll say there is make sure your force majeure language at the bottom explains what happens to fees paid in the event a force majeure event occurs. Usually it's like you, you're keeping fees paid on as credit. So you're telling somebody like my retainer or my booking fee or reservation fee for me being a keynote or, you know, breakout speaker or, you know, roundtable panel speaker, whatever is non-refundable, but it is transferable in these oh situations where you are agreeing that we're still at least going to have this event happen. It's just going to be postponed and delayed. And that, you know, if you aren't able to postpone and delay it, like you lose out on that. Like that is what you are agreeing to when you book with me because you guys, the, your time and you saying no to other events and things that are occurring on your calendar as well is just as important as their event. Even though we, we want to try to help, of course you're gonna work with the company as best as possible and the organizers of the event. So that needs to be in your force majeure language as well as your cancellation clause. So I'm just gonna swing back to cancellation clause here because it should be similar. There should be a notice provision, however, in your cancellation clause. Like if they were to cancel the event or reschedule the event, how far in advance do they need to notify you of that? And are you going to allow a refund in that situation, say within 30 days of contracting? Like it's gonna be probably pretty quick there. Or is it the same situation as no refunds of the reservation or booking fee, but you can transfer that to a new date within, you know, to be rescheduled within 12 months of the original date. So those are the That is like how specific you have to get in these clauses. And that's what's changed the most since 2020 is you have to be super clear on what your business policies are. And then you guys, your contract is only as good as your willingness to enforce it. So, like you have to be willing to enforce that.

Yeah.

Because otherwise you're waiving provisions and the company's probably gonna take advantage of that and ask for a refund. So just be, just be careful there.

Oh, that's such a really important reminder because I pride myself on being adaptable and flexible and I'll make it work and we'll figure it out. And I, I think there's something really powerful with that too, because for instance, if there was, uh, you know, you know, it's 2020 and COVID hits, like that company is also totally screwed. I am like, It, and so I think knowing that there, you can have some flex room, but that contract is there to back you up. It's like there's a, there's a bottom line piece here and you can lean on that and use that to, to strengthen your sign a little bit.

Yeah. Like your negotiation there could be, okay, well it says 12 months. Okay. Rescheduling that I'll, you know, I'll hold that amount you paid me on as credit for you to utilize me for speaking services in the next 12 months. Let's make it 24. Like, I know this next year might be tough. So that's what you compromise on, not any type of partial or full refund.

Right.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Finding the way to be flexible that doesn't really hurt your business. I so appreciate that. Yeah, Paige, you have been amazing. And part of the reason we're here is because of course, besides the fact that we as entrepreneurs, small business owners, speakers, and I know many of my speakers also have courses, they have memberships, they have all kinds of other things. All of that needs legal backup, legal contracts, all the things. So tell us about what's happening. For your Black Friday sale.

So starting Monday, November 21st through Cyber Monday, November 28th, we are having the biggest sale ever. We will have discounts on the entire website, all contracts and clauses, legal documents, and then bundles will also be an additional amount off. Bundles are already discounted. And so it, it is a great time to stock up on all these legal documents, a speaker contract for you as the speaker. As Sally said, we have online course contracts, website terms conditions and privacy policies, like subscription membership contracts are becoming a big thing now for the online speaking space and everything and anything in between there as well. We have over 300 products. So it's a really exciting sale. Yeah, we're super excited for the sale. And I always tell people too, it's good to do it at the end of the year. Usually our Black Friday week sale is where people purchase the most, not only because it's discounted, but because it's a good business expense for you. Remember, professional fees and contract templates are included in that, are 100% deductible as a business expense. So if you're looking for something that's like a win-win, like it's gonna give back to you time and time again, protecting your business, but it also is something good to put on, you know, your tax liability at the end of the year too. So we highly recommend you guys look at it. And if you already have a speaker contract, we sell all of our clauses as well. So you can just like boost up your existing one.

Yes. And we've talked about a few really important ones. So if you're like, I, I know how important this is. I kind of get what you're saying, but if you're not a lawyer, don't be, you know, creating that on your own. Don't be like free writing. I think this probably covers it. No, just go right, go to your attorney friend, the legal page, and grab the clause that you need so that you have the wording. That you can work off of.

It's— yeah. And everyone, as you're like scrolling around and kind of like looking through the site, I am an open door policy here. So my team and I are on every customer service platform possible. We're on email, we'll be on DMs, we'll be in our Facebook group. If you have questions like surrounding your unique business, like, hey Paige, this is what I do. What, where do you think I need to go with the legal document that I need? I can point you in the right direction and I can tell you, okay, I actually think this one is better suited for your situation and here's why. Happy, happy to do that with anybody.

I so appreciate it. It's a real service to have this plethora of accessible contracting language because we need it. And this, this, it doesn't, it's not supposed to be my expertise. That's not why I do what I do, right? So to be able to lean into your expertise here is really, really powerful.

So totally worth it.

Totally worth it. Okay, Paige, you are awesome. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you for your expertise.

It's really fun to meet you in person.

Same, same.

And we'll be in touch soon. Love it. Okay, thanks, Paige. Thanks, everybody.

Thanks for being here.