In this solo podcast episode, Sally Z (Be Moved) introduces the "Moving Speakers Roadmap," a five‑step circular framework designed to help purpose‑driven entrepreneurs transform into paid, profitable speakers. She begins by defining a "moving speaker" as someone who prioritizes presence, authenticity, and story‑driven impact over perfection. The roadmap’s five stops are: (1) Signature Story – uncovering one or a handful of core narratives that simultaneously reflect the speaker’s identity, audience needs, and business purpose; (2) Structure – packaging the signature story into a scalable, repeatable, and profitable talk format (the "Signature Talk"), a process taught in her Signature Talk Studio; (3) Skills – continuous skill refinement achieved through deliberate practice and real‑world speaking, emphasizing that skill development is an ongoing loop; (4) Strategy – intentionally positioning talks within the speaker’s broader business, leveraging each speaking engagement to drive deeper audience relationships and revenue opportunities; and (5) Scale – building systems, operations, and an ecosystem that allow the speaker to amplify impact, free up time, and sustain financial growth. Sally stresses that the roadmap is circular, not linear; speakers repeatedly iterate through the steps as their story, audience, and business evolve. She also highlights resources such as the Move Your Audience Facebook group, the Scale Your Speaking Guidebook, and the Signature Talk Studio, encouraging listeners to engage with these tools to accelerate their journey. Throughout, she balances enthusiasm for the financial potential of speaking with a strong ethical stance that speakers should serve their audience authentically.
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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 You. Today we are talking about the path to becoming a paid speaker. That is what we are focused on today. So that is what we are going to do. We are going to look at what I call my moving speakers roadmap. So let's start with that for a moment. What does that even mean to be a moving a speaker. Okay? A moving speaker is somebody who is focused not on doing it perfectly. Not, thank goodness for me, that's probably part of the reason why it's really important to me is because I have yet to ever do this perfectly. Not the point. Moving speaker is focused on really making the most of the moment that they have in front of them. They're focused on being present. They're focused on showing up and loving up their audience. They are focused on sharing who they really are with a story-based, story-driven message. That is our goal as a moving speaker. Can you become a paid, profitable speaker when You're not focused on doing it like everybody else when you're not following the methodologies of people who are a little bit more like, you've got to do it like this and show it like this and da da da da da. Can you become a profitable and paid speaker as a moving speaker? Yes. In fact, what we're trying to do is leverage the power of speaking, the power of having that authority of being seen as an expert and, and really taking advantage of the platform that you get as a speaker. And we want to marry that with your purpose, your intention, your heart, who you are, your story-based message. Those two pieces coming together is what makes you stand out. Out. I am not interested in being a speaker or working with speakers who just want to make money. Now, I say that, and I want you to make money. I want you to make a lot of money. I want you to be able to take advantage of this incredible industry, the platform that you have, and the money that comes with it. I am constantly blown away by, like, the money that you can make with speaking. Constantly. It's exciting. And I want you as a story-driven, purpose-driven, big-hearted entrepreneur and changemaker. I want you to be paid a lot of money for it. So what we are doing is taking the methodology that I've used with my speakers over the last 20+ years about how to craft a message that moves people and craft a message that doesn't just move them, but that also helps earn you good money so you can become a paid and profitable speaker. Both of those things can exist together. Isn't that exciting? I think it's amazing and exciting that you get to, you can stand up on a stage, whether that is free, virtual, real, big, small, doesn't matter. You get to do that. Find joy, serve people, love them, impact 1,000 people at one time in one beautiful, incredible moment. And get paid well to do it. How cool is that? I find that so amazing. So let's look at this roadmap. We're going to talk it through a little bit because this is the pathway to becoming a paid and profitable speaker. Let's take a look. Here it is. The Moving Speaker Roadmap. Now, if you are listening on the podcast right now and you are not with me live in the Move Your Audience Facebook group, That's totally cool. I, I actually love that these trainings that I do in the Move Your Audience Facebook group go out then as audio for you to listen to on your podcast, because I love podcasts. I love taking information from a podcast format. So just know that that is totally great with me. Don't feel like you have to show up in the Facebook group. In order to really take advantage of this. This is just another way for me to serve you in the way that works best for you. And my podcast now has been around forever, not actually forever, but a long time. And so there's so much there for you to dig into, including now this Moving Speaker Roadmap. So let me describe for you listeners what this is. It is a circle. Okay. And there are 5 spots around this circle, essentially stopping points or destinations for you in the circle. And the circle piece is really, really important because what you will find as you do this is that there is not an endpoint. You're like, oh, that sounds terrible, Sally. Why is there no endpoint? Like, when do I get there? When am I done? Guess what? There is no done in speaking. It is just leveling up to the next iteration. Okay, but we start, and it's really important that if you want to be a moving speaker, we start with point 1, which is to find what I call your signature story. Finding one or a handful of stories. That become the core of your message. We really wanna start with a story-driven message. Now, what I do is I take that story that we identify, something that really upholds not just a clear sense of who you are so that you can show up in that moment and be really grounded in your authentic voice and purpose. That's a really important place to start, but we're not just thinking about that. We're also thinking about how does that story then connect with your audience and what they need, and how does this serve your business? It needs to do all three of those things. So once you can find that piece, that is a signature story, and you can take that signature story and move on to step two, which is about structure. Now, in the structure of your message lives the magic of your ability to be able to move your way around this roadmap and become a really well-paid speaker. If you do not put your story into a structure that is scalable, repeatable, and profitable, just like we were talking about. Earlier in the live or last week on the podcast, right? If you do not set it up in the way so that it can be repeatable, scalable, and profitable, you are missing out. It will mean more time for you, more panic, demand for you, for not, not like, oh, come speak. I don't mean that kind of demand. We want that kind of demand. I mean the kind of demanding internal need for you, where your time is crunched, where you feel stressed, where you don't fully feel confident or believe in what you're saying or how you're saying it. That's the kind of demand we wanna tamp down. And instead, we want more ease. We want more flow. We want more confidence. We want more clarity. And the way you do that is through creating it in a specific sort of structure. When you take your story and the structure and you put them together, that's where you have a signature talk. Okay? Now you can create a signature talk, you know, the kind that's out there without the signature story. I don't think it's as good and it will lose out on impact. So if you want to be a moving speaker. And we do. Then you really wanna start with the story and then build that story into a structure, a particular kind of structure. Now we, I teach this structure in the Signature Talk Studio. So if that is something that you're curious about or interested in, reach out to me and I'll send you some info because it's a game-changing approach to your speaking. Okay? So when you can be really intentional about that structure, it isn't just about you having a great talk that you feel good about. It's you being able to take that with you and use it in all kinds of different formats. It's not just about your keynote. It's also about building a whole ecosystem of authority and, and impact for you. Oh, so exciting. Okay. Now, the third stop on the circle is skills. Now you might be surprised. Some people think before they build their signature talk, they really need to work on their skills. The truth is you want to be working on your skills all the time, but the way it actually works in speaking, the way, and we don't talk about this much, is you improve your skills by doing. And so I put the skill step after you build the structure. Now, a lot of you come to me, you already have beautiful skills that you are working from. Awesome. Some maybe natural gifts that you have. Some people, you have a, a good history of speaking already. Awesome. But I will tell you, I have yet to meet a speaker ever in my life who does not have skills to work on, myself included. Skills will always be in this circle. It never goes away. We can always improve. We can always finesse. We can always raise our game to the next place. Okay. So I like having skills as third on this circle, but don't worry, you'll come back around to it. I promise that you will. So The goal there is to put it into practice, to start getting it out into the world and really thoughtful about the way in which you do what you do. Once you're out there and kind of doing things, it's like, okay, I'm seeing this work, I'm seeing it happen, I'm getting some good feedback, I'm getting some testimonials. And as soon as possible, we want to shift into strategy. And strategy is making sure that you who are being not just flippant with this, not just, I speak when people ask me to speak, not I'm crossing my fingers and hoping everybody comes to me. Like, I put speaker in my title and now, yay, I'm a speaker, and where's everybody? That's not how it works. You've got to really be intentional about not, not just the content that you have, but now where does the content live in your business? How are you taking advantage of the moments that you have out front? Are you, for instance, when you're doing some paid speaking, is there an opportunity to sell something on the other end of that engagement? Or if you're doing free speaking, what's next for people? Are you intentionally thinking about how that moment that you have can bring people deeper in with you and into your business, and perhaps then begin to build profit and revenue from those moments. But we have to start with strategy. You might have some wonderful luck drop into your lap, which is great, but when you can be intentional and strategic, what happens is you shift into the fifth spot in the circle, which is scale. And that is where your intention and your strategy starts to really gain momentum. And what we have to do, once your strategy starts to work, we really have to think about scaling. Because if your systems are not working for you, it, you will quickly become disorganized, overwhelmed, frustrated. You'll be missing out on opportunities because you haven't been thinking about, okay, how can I do this more efficiently, more thoughtfully? How can I not be speaking, but how can I think about my entire business ecosystem and do it in a way that really creates the life that you're imagining for yourself? Most of us dream about becoming a paid speaker, not just because we enjoy the speaking, but because of the life that it can create for us. Some travel, perhaps. More financial freedom, larger impact, move beyond the one-on-one, which is beautiful and powerful. I love one-on-ones, but also there's only one you. So how do you scale your impact? And it's by doing all of these pieces together. And what's interesting is after you work on your systems and your approaches, what happens about that time is you go back to wanting to adjust Your signature story again, because in that time the world has changed a little bit. You've changed a little bit. Your business has probably changed a little bit, and now you're back to the first step in that circle. And we're thinking about tweaking your signature story so that it upholds not just you, but your audience and your business. And then we think about the structure again, and then we work on our skills as we're moving it out into the world, and then We're really thoughtful and intentional about the strategy and how it can serve our business and our audience even better. And then we think about ways to scale it and make— do this whole process with more ease. It's iterative. And we keep going around and around and around this circle. Okay. The more you go around the circle. The more you really work all of these elements, the more money you will make. But you can't skip stuff. You can't go to finding your signature story to scaling and just hope that the strategy and the skills and the structure come along. They might over time, perhaps if you're But if you're going to put the time and energy into building your speaking business, I want you to come and join me in this way because it will take you, it'll keep you really grounded in your story, which is so important. It's so important. And we don't get lost in the, I'll speak anywhere for anybody for anything, uh, which can suck up a lot of time and not ultimately feed the dream that you have. That's my, that's my ultimate wish for you is to take this incredible art form that we have, this beautiful connection we get to have with our audience, this privilege that we have as speakers and leaders and changemakers, and to also get paid really well for it. I really want that for you. And if you, if that is something that you want for yourself, and I know it is because that's why you are here, and I'm so delighted that you are here, and you're not sure where to start. If you, like me, are like, okay, that sounds lovely, but where do I start with this? I think the Scale Your Speaking Guidebook is an awesome place to give you a little bit more. It's gonna, all those little dots between all those stops. There's a few more pieces in there. And so the guidebook is gonna show you what those pieces are and really how to walk through these steps. I hope this is helpful. Thank you so much for being here. I hope you're having an amazing day, my friends.
