Why USPs Don’t Work and What Speakers Should Focus on Instead with Chantal Cornelius - 299

Hello, you're listening to Sarah Archer and episode 299, my goodness, of the Speaking Club podcast. I want to start this show with a quote from J.T. Geisinger. I'm not weird, I'm a limited edition. I started this podcast for 2 reasons: because I want to help people recognise the power of stories and humour in speaking, and because I believe it's your message that counts, not the number of ums and ahs you use. There are some organisations that want to create robot speakers. They want you to sacrifice your personality in order to speak perfectly. I want to let you know that you can be yourself and a sensational speaker. So, if you want to be a speaker that connects and engages authentically through stories, a speaker that gives value as well as a great performance, then welcome home. Hey, welcome to the show. It's great to have you here, whether you're watching on YouTube or listening to the audio. It's wonderful to be with you. How are you doing? Are you getting out there and sharing your message on the stage or thinking about it? You know, one of the things that you need to do as a speaker is stay front of mind for when people need a speaker. It's no different to when you have a product or service. A big part of getting customers and clients is being on their mind when they're ready to take the next step to buy something or even get a freebie or whatever. Now, a lot of people feel resistance to the word marketing. Do you? Can you feel resistance there? You're not alone. So many people do, and it's completely understandable. We've got a lot of hang-ups and beliefs about marketing. The trouble is though, it can get in the way of you achieving success in your business and as a speaker because as I said, you need to be in front of people. I get it though, like, marketing can feel complicated, it can feel overwhelming, it can feel confusing but it doesn't have to be that way. What if it could feel clear and light and simple? Because as I said, marketing is about showing your audience the problem that you can solve for them and making sure you stay front of mind for when they decide they wanna get that problem solved. And that's what I'm hoping that you get a sense of today, that there can be another way of doing it from my straight-talking guest, Chantal Cornelius. Now, Chantal's been helping businesses since 2000 to get more clients, and she's also a speaker. She speaks all around the world, showing audiences how to understand the emotional buying decisions made by their clients and how that translates into a standout strategy for them. Now, Chantal also happens to be National President of the Professional Speaking Association here in the UK at the time we're recording this episode. So not only does she have golden nuggets to share with you about marketing, how to market yourself as a speaker, but also she's got some speaking tips too. So, I know you're gonna get a lot out of this interview. So, let's shift over to my chat with Chantal Cornelius right now. Well, welcome to The Speaking Club, Chantal Cornelius.

Thank you, Sarah. It's lovely to be here with you.

I'm really looking forward to having this chat with you today because you are sort of involved in 2 things that I really love, one which is marketing and one which is speaking. So, uh, it's, it's gonna be a good old chat. Now, the first question that I wanted to ask you is, how did 7-year-old Chantal get you started on your quest to stand out?

Well, I should, I should probably tell your listeners, listeners how, you know, that 7-year-old me got me started on this quest. I am writing a, writing a book all about how to stand out, and it's very nearly, it's very nearly ready. It's due out in October 2024. And when I was, I'd written all the content, and I then realized I needed to write an introduction. And somebody said to me, where did this, this desire to help other people stand out come from? And I work with a lot of coaches. And what happens is you end up, end up doing, you get coached a lot and you do a lot of, a lot of deep work. And, and I went back to my childhood and I remembered being 7 years old. And I'm, I'm kind of one of 5 kids. My, I have one older sister and I have 2 older stepsisters and an older stepbrother. And we joined forces. I think it's called a blended family these days, but it wasn't back then, 40 years ago. We joined forces when I was 5, and up until then there'd just been me and my, and my sister, and all of a sudden there were 5 of us. And my mum, my mum was divorced. The chap we were living with was also divorced. There was a, an agency that, that put them together, not romantically, but my mum needed a job basically, and somewhere for her to live with her 2 little girls. So we got thrown in with this, with this other family, and my mum was working as a live-in housekeeper. We had board and lodging. And I'd spent, up until then, I'd spent 5 years getting all the attention I wanted. And for the next 2 years, I struggled because I was the youngest all of a sudden of 5 instead of the youngest of 2. My, my real sister Caroline, I call her my little sister because I think when I got to about 5 years old, I overtook her in height. And she's, she's still tiny and feisty and wonderful. So I was, for, for a long time, I, I haven't been the smallest, even though I'm the youngest. And I think I started noticing, hang on, I'm not getting the attention that the baby of the family needs. So I used to do silly things like, I, if I fell over in the garden, if all 5 of us were out playing in the garden and we spent hours outside, mum would just chuck us out like, get outside, you lot, go and play outside. So I would regularly fall over. And I would then look around and go, right, where, where, where is Mama? Can she see me? If she could see me, I would start crying and I would get attention from her. If she couldn't see me, if she was nowhere around, I'd get up, dust myself off, and carry on playing with my, with my rabble of brothers and sisters. And my, my eldest stepsister Lucy still teases me about the fact that I used to do this. That, that was the first time that I can remember doing anything to stand out from the crowd, and I've been doing it ever since. So yeah, that's, that's how it started, in a, in a garden somewhere, probably with muddy knees.

And then, and then how did you make the, uh, the sort of, uh, transition into marketing or into what you do today from, from 7-year-old Chantal who was trying to stand out to get some motherly love or more motherly love?

More motherly love. really love. It was, it's been a gradual, a gradual change over quite a few decades. I fell into marketing. I hadn't planned it at all. I did a degree in agriculture.

Oh.

And decided actually partway through that wasn't really what I wanted to do. So when I left university, I went to work with horses. Not a great, great, it's not a good way to earn a living at all. So after about 3 years of that, I thought, okay, I just need to get a job. And I ended up, I somehow fell into a job at a private business college in Oxford. And the boss of the college gave me a job and then said one day, I think you'd, would you like to be my marketing manager? I think you'd be quite good at it. And I was like, what is marketing? Didn't even really know what marketing was, but I'd been temping for him. I'd been writing press releases and posters and bits and pieces. And he said, no, I'll teach you how to do it. So I, I did really fall into marketing and I discovered that I love doing it. And one of the things about marketing, I've always marketed service businesses. So I worked for the college. I then was headhunted to a training company, which I loved. They made me redundant. Boo-hiss to them. I then went, worked for a printing company. So I'd always worked with service businesses and most people will tell you that it's much harder to stand out as a service business and it's much harder to promote the service business because if you're promoting cups like this one, if you can see it, if you're watching the video, it's blue with white spots and you can compare that to a pink cup with white spots. When you've got a service, you can't do that. It's intangible and we're often promoting based on results and reputation. So right from the start of my marketing career, I was looking for ways for businesses to stand out without going, well, it's pink or it's blue. So, and it's just, it's just developed from there. It wasn't really until, oh, about 2015 that I really started digging deeper into the standout strategies and looking at why USPs don't work.

Ah, which is a great segue into my next question, which is around this. Well, I might come back to it. I, what I'm curious about first of all is I, my background, I fell into the marketing side of what I do very, you know, later, much later.

Yeah.

So I, I don't know what it used to be like, but I feel that, that over the years there must have been a huge transition, uh, in marketing, in how marketing's defined, define how people do it. Would you, you must have felt that Because you were in it.

Yeah.

Would you sort of be able to describe how you feel things have moved, what the biggest thing is?

Definitely, definitely. On one hand, nothing has changed, and on the other hand, it's completely different. The, the bit that has changed is the marketing tactics. When I was first in marketing, and your younger listeners won't believe this, but social media did not exist.

No.

There was none of it. We had email, we had websites, we had instant messenger. Email newsletters didn't exist. They didn't come along until I was running my business and I set my business up in 2000. So there was, there was none of that at the, at the business college where I worked. People would pick up the telephone and call the college and say, may I have a prospectus? And we would post it out to them. We'd print out beautiful glossy prospectuses, prospecti, I don't know, brochures. and post them and then I would phone them and say, would you like to come for a visit? That's how we got students to enroll. So from that point of view, the tactical side has massively changed. What hasn't changed, and this is the bit that I love and that I really work on, is the strategic side because marketing for me is still, has always been, will always be about relationships. It's about building a relationship with the person to whom you want to sell something. The person what you are trying to market to. And without that relationship, you can't sell to them. Now, it's slightly different with blue and white or pink and white mugs. It's transactional with a product. It's easier. You don't have to build a relationship, although there are some brilliant companies like Apple build relationships with their customers and their tribe, and people queue outside Apple stores for days to get the latest product. when they possibly don't even need it. But that's another story. But that's so, so Apple are doing it brilliantly. But generally with service businesses, it's still about building relationship. That bit of marketing hasn't changed. It's never going to. But what has gone wrong for a lot of companies is they've forgotten that and they've gone, oh, we should be on Twitter or X or Y or whatever it's called these days, or we should be on TikTok or Instagram. And I'm sitting there going, no, Not until you've worked out the strategy. Strategy before tactics is one of my mantras. And too many service businesses rush into the tactical side. Oh, everyone says I have to be on TikTok. Like, no, I regularly say to my clients, don't you dare, don't even go anywhere near it. Let's get the strategy sorted.

Yeah.

About what makes you different, what makes you stand out, what are your goals, where are you going with the business? and who are your ideal client? Because when you know that, then you can really get the right sort of marketing. So yeah, from that point of view, no, that bit hasn't changed. And when you get the strategic bit right, it works. Absolutely.

And the same things are identical for speaking because without that clarity, you're not actually gonna be creating an effective talk. So those, those things are absolutely the same. And I think that's the problem. I think I think the issue is that we're just, we're human and we want to find a shortcut. And, and so many of those tactical, you know, get 6 figures in whatever are shortcuts or they appear to be shortcuts and magic wands. And the truth is that they won't work unless they're on that strong foundation, which you're talking about.

Absolutely. You've got to have the foundation and this is this is where it frustrates the heck out of me because there are a lot of companies out there who are doing a massive disservice to those of us in marketing who do know what we're talking about. I've come across so many people who said, oh, I tried marketing, I tried this, that and the other, I spent so much money and I've been burned and I can see why and it's because they haven't got the strategy, but they get lured in by the companies who promise the quick fix, they promise the magic wand and they promise the earth and pay me all this money and I'll help you create a 6, 7-figure coaching speaking business, but they don't help you with the foundation. And yeah, it's, oh, drives me nuts. That's, that's another soapbox for another day. Yeah.

And I think, I think that the, the, the other point of this is, is that foundational stuff, you can work with someone, but it's work that you need to do. Like, you can't really outsource that stuff. Absolutely.

No, you've, you've got, you've got to do it. I've, I've I've had an interesting time recently with my business when I've had to take my own advice and get on the phone and make lots of marketing calls. But it started with, okay, where am I? What am I good at? What makes me different? What are my goals? And who are my clients? Who do I really love working with? Because I've worked with hundreds, possibly thousands of businesses over the last 20-odd years and I could have phoned the wrong ones, but I put together a very targeted list of about 40 companies who I wanted to reach out to and say, hello, I'm still here, how are you getting on? And it's reaping rewards because I started with the strategic side before going, right. And actually the strategy bit then made it obvious to me that I just needed to get on the phone. I needed to pick up the phone and make calls to people and it's working. So no social media required. Hooray.

Fantastic. I love that. Which one of the things that you mentioned in terms of your strategy, you know, thinking this through was around, you know, what makes you different. And one of the big things that you talk about is why unique selling points Don't work. And there was a big push, and there still is, you know, lots to say, find your USP, your unique selling point. Um, but tell me why you believe that that is a, is a bad way to approach things.

This is, this has come out of a lot of research. I started noticing quite a few years ago, I, I work with a lot of coaches, and a lot of them were saying to me, Well, I'd say, what, what makes you different? I remember one saying to me, well, I, I, I specialize. I said, okay, what do you specialize in? And she said, life coaching and business coaching. I was like, that's all of it. That's not specializing. That's all of it. So there was that. And then people started saying, oh, I'm different because I help my clients get from where they are to where they want to be. And I'm like, that's what all, that's what all coaches do.

Mm-hmm.

So bless them. I love working with coaches. They are, they are fabulous and great fun to work with. And I've had some amazing coaches over the years. So don't get me wrong, I think they're great. I love the profession. But when a coach says, I, they, they all, a lot of them say how they're different, but they're actually all saying the same thing.

Hmm.

And like I said earlier, it's intangible. You can't pick up the mug and go, is it blue? Is it pink? You can't pick up a coach and go, okay, what results am I actually gonna get? Because that's not how it works. So quite often with coaching, consulting, speaking, the client is paying in advance before you've delivered anything. So you've got to show them what makes you different and just saying the same as everyone else, it is not going to work. So that's what got me down this route of, okay, USPs don't work because, and the other reason is that working with micro businesses, a lot of my clients, there's just one person in the business. It's like my business, there's just me and a snoring dog. So quite often people will say to me, oh, but what makes you different, Chantal, is you. And I think, well, yes, Yes, I am my own unique selling proposition, but I can't market myself as that. I can't put on my website, I am different because I am me. I, there had to be more to it. And that's why I dug even deeper. So I now know what that me looks like in terms of my business based on what my clients are looking for.

And you have termed this in a sense, those things as the standout strategy. Um, so tell me, let's dig a little bit deeper into how you found it. So you spoke to your clients and what were you looking for particularly to find, you know, what, what your strategy is?

What, what actually happened was I went to a workshop where somebody introduced me to, they were called something completely different, but we basically were talking about the fact that People buy from people. We know that. And we buy on emotion. We buy because we want something, not necessarily because we need it. I want a new pair of boots. I don't need a new pair of boots. I adore wearing high heel boots, always wear them when I'm speaking on stage. And I will quite often see a new pair of boots in a shop and go, oh, I want those boots. So That, that workshop got, got me thinking about it. And so more and more research and endless hours of, of reading. And the research is showing that we make about 95% of our decisions emotionally, subconsciously, irrationally. I want that new pair of boots, therefore I'm going to have them. That's it. That's the, that's the emotional, irrational subconscious as well, because my brain, before I'm even thinking about it, is going, I'm, I'm buying the boots. It's very dangerous. I've done it with horses as well. I've ended up buying horses when I really shouldn't have done. Messy. Anyway, so there's, there's that 95%. There's the other 5%, which is tiny, which is the rational side. So I go, I want that pair of boots. The rational side then comes in and goes, ah, well, you can have those boots because they'll go with that dress that you haven't worn for a while. So we rationalize, and, and we do it with horses and with going out to restaurants and buying holidays and, and, and buying, buying coaches, consultants, and speakers. Quite often somebody will book you as a speaker and they're not really sure why. They have this, quite often it comes out as a gut feeling that you are the right person for them. They can't quite put their finger on it. You know, you might have had a time when you've met someone and thought, oh, I just, I just, just want to work with that person. And it's your subconscious. It's, it's the emotion. It's the emotional side that's, that's kicking in. So that got me looking into the fact that people buy on emotion. They buy because they want something and then they back it up with going, hey, I need it. Um, and so I've identified 5 standout strategies. Would you like me to tell you what they are, Sarah?

I would love that. And we're also gonna talk about mine because I did something which we're gonna talk about later. But yes, let's do that. If that's, that would be great. So what are they?

Okay, so there are 5 standout strategies and I'll rattle through them quite quickly. There's a book coming and there's lots more information on the website. But basically every business, the majority of businesses who I've taken this test to and who I've worked with have one of the 5. This is not about trying to use all 5. They don't work in succession. There's no Venn diagram with overlaps. There will be one that is your main strategy. Sometimes some people, some businesses have a second one. Very occasionally people have 2 that are absolutely both spot on together, but that's quite rare. So the strategies, I will whiz through them. Certainty. Certainty is where you are seen as a safe pair of hands and your clients buy you because you're a safe pair of hands. It's the least exciting and the least sexy of the 5, and it's the easiest one, and it's the one I use for my business. It's what my clients want. And when I was first digging into this, when I asked my clients, why do you buy from me? They all, a lot of them went, well, you're a safe pair of hands. You just tell us what marketing to do. There's no faffing around. Just get on with it. So that's what I, how I promote myself. So that certainty. The second one is connection. This is where This works really well for networking organizations. I was chatting on the phone just this morning to somebody who runs a lot of networking groups, and we were talking about the fact that people buy membership because he knows who to connect them to. You turn up at one of his events and he'll go, oh right, you need to talk to so-and-so. So that's connection. That's why somebody might buy from you. I don't see it that often with coaches and consultants, but definitely with other organizations like networking The third one is called contribution, and this is where clients want to, when they work with you, they want to feel part of something bigger. They want to feel a sense of, of giving back.

Hmm.

I have recently discovered the most amazing company called Standout Socks. And, you know, I speak about standout strategies. So to discover Standout Socks is just amazing. They're based in the UK. They were set up, I think, by 2 brothers, one of whom has Down syndrome, and they were looking for a business that he could be involved with, and they make these fabulous socks. The designs are wonderful. I have a bright orange pair. They're gorgeous. They're beautifully made, and they— the majority of their staff have some sort of learning disability. So when I buy Standout Socks, I'm not just buying a pair of socks for me, I'm helping other people. That's contribution.

Yeah, yeah.

Works brilliantly with charities as well, but Standout Socks is my, is my current favorite. The 4th one is growth. This is where clients will buy from you, book you, pay you because you can help them to grow either personally or professionally or both. I see it a lot with coaches. My own coach, Ian, I first started working with him because I wanted to grow my business. We actually focus more on my personal growth now, um, but So for some coaches who can do both, that, that's fabulous. I see it a lot with motivational speakers. There might be a company saying, look, our teams aren't working together, our people are demotivated, there's high staff turnover. Get a motivational speaker in, help them to grow the individuals, help them get their mojo back. Works, works really well. And the 5th one is called significance. This is where People will work with you because they want to feel heard, seen, listened to. It's all about nurturing them. It's about making them feel good.

Hmm.

My, my partner William, who you know, as we are recording this, he is exhibiting photos in London on the Mall for the first time. He's— it's his first exhibition and it's fabulous. They look amazing. And we have been talking about how to promote his photography further. And I actually think that significance is the right strategy. strategy for him, because if you hang one of his photos in your house or your hotel, people will walk in and go, oh wow, I love what you've done with the place.

Yeah.

And you get this, this sense of pride in your home or your hotel interior or whatever. That is significant. And I know it's slightly different because it's a product, but his photos are so much more than just products. Um, and particularly when you commission him to take a photo because he takes commissions. He looks after his clients and nurtures them and makes them feel special. And the end result is this beautiful image that captures— he does landscapes, so you could say to him, go to the Lake District and take this particular photo, which is one we did, we did last year, and you get this fabulous feeling afterwards. So those are the 5.

Cool.

Any questions? Yes.

When you discovered your strategy, What alterations, what changes did you make to your own marketing as a result?

A total and utter shift from purple to blue. So the reason I've assigned colors to each of them, I'm just digging out those. Oh yes, of course. So I use, I have a color that goes with each of the strategies. It just makes it a bit more fun. There's a bit of, there's a little bit of science behind it. As with all marketing, I thought that my clients worked with us because they wanted to grow their business. I had a team here, I had staff working with me. They were mostly young, mostly young enough to be my own children, which was kind of scary. And they were big into social media and were, we were always looking at what else we could sell to clients. You know, do you need videos? Do you need a, do you need a blog? Do you need a better website? let's grow your business. And the more I did the research and started talking to clients, the more I realized that wasn't what they wanted. They wanted this safe pair of hands. They wanted certainty. Now, part of the research has been developing the language that goes with each of the 5 strategies. So when you know your strategy, you can use the language that goes with it, which are words of emotions and feelings, because like I said earlier, People buy on emotion. So if I was saying to my clients, I can help you with rapid growth and I can make you feel empowered, you can't make anyone feel anything. I can help you to feel empowered and inspired to grow your business. That for me, that for my clients doesn't work. Whereas if I say, I'll give you the clarity and the confidence you're looking for, I'll give you the clarity of your marketing message and I'll give you the confidence to shout about it. They'll go, that's what we want. So for me and my business, it was a complete turnaround of moving away from growth of their businesses to certainty. I work generally with people who are brilliant at what they do. They have fabulous reputations already. The main element that we work on is maintaining that reputation, keeping it going, keeping them being brilliant, keeping shouting about it. They're also, my clients are also rubbish at marketing. Sorry, you lot, but you are. They hate it. They don't want to do it. They don't wanna have to. That's why That's— they pay me to tell them what to do or to do it for them. So again, it's that clarity, it's that, that safe pair of hands, that straight talking. I have to warn potential new clients that I'm very straight talking, that if I see them about to do something that will lose them money, I will tell them that they're about to be silly. And I'm like, stop it, don't do that, do this instead.

Mm-hmm.

My, my clients know if they're about to spend money, they need to check it with me first because I'll generally go, no, Don't do that. Yeah, yeah, it was, it was a complete turnaround of the marketing, which actually led to a complete turnaround of my business. And all my staff left, uh, not all at once. They, they all began to realize that they didn't want to work for a safe pair of hands company. They were too young and excited to, to do that. They all wandered off to, scampered off to other, other, other pastures to go and do, you know, to go and work. One of them went to be head of social media for a Really big company and was absolutely loving it because it was all about social media and growth. So yeah, complete turnaround for the better, might I add, because all my clients stuck around and they're all lovely.

So fantastic. I love that. So, well, let's have a chat about me.

I'm slightly nervous.

I'm not gonna lie. Um, because you offer a free test and we'll be talking about where people can have a go at this. Later on, I took the test.

Yes.

To understand what my standout strategy should be. And you have the results, which I don't know until right now. So, um, so I'm curious to know what—

It's nerve-wracking for me too, because it does, it does always work 99% of the time. So as, as you were going through the test, so for anyone who hasn't done the test, on my website there are 5 lists of words, and what I asked Sarah to do Was read through the words and tick the words, the feelings that she hears. So if you say to your client, Sarah, how do you feel when you work with me? Hopefully those words are what you ticked. So if for anyone listening, if you don't know how your clients feel, the first thing to do is go and ask them.

Yeah, definitely.

You have to ask them, how do you feel when you work with me? And if they go, oh yeah, we love working with you, you're great. That's not the answer to the question. Dig further. How do you actually feel when you work with me? So that's what Sarah did, and Sarah ticked some, some numbers, some words. Sarah, as you were going through the words and as you've been listening to me talking about them, do you have an idea of what, what might be your strategy? Do you have a feeling?

Um, I think it's probably gonna be a Toss-up between— I don't know, there's like— so certainty might come up potentially, significance. I don't know, there's a few that I feel like could be, but, um, uh, yeah.

Shall I put you out of your misery?

Yes, yes.

The way this works, I won't get too technical, but you tick some boxes, the form comes through to me, we crunch the numbers through some software and a spreadsheet that the other half created while he wasn't taking photos. Now it shows that your highest score is certainty. You're blue like me. You are a safe pair of hands. So when you say to somebody, I will help you develop a talk, I'll help you be funny, I'll help you whatever, they know that you will.

Mm.

You've got that, and I feel this from you, you've got that air of confidence of, I will just get on and get it done for you, or I will show you how to get it done. I have a fabulous course and I work you through it and I nag you and I tell you off when you haven't done your homework. I know this because William has been telling me that you've been nagging him off and not doing his homework. Good, keep doing it because somebody has to. So that for me is a huge amount of certainty. Now, your second highest score, which is far enough lower than certainty that it means we don't have to worry about it too much, the second one is growth.

Oh yeah, that makes sense.

Yeah. Yeah. So this works really nicely because I think clients will come to work with you because of certainty. They want certainty. They want somebody to hold their hand, walk them through the process. The results for them is growth of their business and probably growth personally, because if you're saying to somebody, get on stage and deliver that TED Talk, that's, that's personal growth too. But that's not why they buy from you in the first place. And that's something for you to watch in your marketing because if you're saying to clients, potential clients, I can help you grow by helping you get on stage, etc., etc., help you grow your business, they might buy, but they're more likely to buy if you say, I'll take you through the process, we'll get you results, don't worry, we will get this sorted. And then chuck in a bit of interestingly significance. You only actually ticked one on the list for significance. So, way down. Fine. Good. I like those 2, certainty and growth.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And I think we do a bit of that, but that's certainly going to help us focus things more into, into what, what, you know, what's coming through.

Yeah.

And I think that's the thing. I think one of the big things that I do as a strategy is give people the opportunity To work with me before they buy. And I feel like that's probably where they get a good sense of those things, particularly certainty.

So that is a really good way. It's, it's kind of, yeah, it's kind of the test drive, isn't it? The try before you buy. And that will allow people to go, yeah, I like her. I trust her. I'm, I'm seeing results already. I remember years ago I signed up to, no, I didn't. I had a conversation with a health coach, my, my hormones and energy level were going all over the, all over the shop. And I met this lovely lady, Candice, at an event, and she said, well, do you want, do you want a free 1-hour session? I'm like, yes please. So we had an hour's phone call, and she talked to me about my goals and what I was wanting to achieve. And by the end of it, I was like, I am so signing up to your 3-month program. And the results were phenomenal. I was really thrilled with what she helped me do. But it was because we had that 1-hour session where She was total certainty. You know, there was no fluff. There was no promising of, of— it's a bit like all the marketers we were talking about earlier who promise you the earth if you go and post on TikTok 6 million times a week. There was none of that with Candice. It was like, well, this is the program, and if you follow it and if you do your homework and do what I tell you to do, then yeah, you're gonna lose weight and, and get fitter and healthier. And so it's, it's the same with you. If you give people the chance to, to get a taste of who you are and what you do, Perfect. Love it. Lead with the certainty in your marketing and then sprinkle a little bit of growth as well.

Thank you. That's really, that's really useful to have that, have that sort of confirmed. And now if we switch to speakers in terms of them doing something similar, now obviously they can take the test, but if they don't have that clarity in order to choose the right words, Then would you suggest, and again, I'm making some distinctions here because I always talk about there's 2 different types of speakers. Well, 3 actually now that I work with. So there are those who are speaking and they will be using speaking as an asset, as a marketing asset to grow their business and win clients. And then there are others who are speaking professionally and get a fee and there are some who straddle both and do a bit of both.

Yeah.

And then I recently started looking at cruise speakers as well, which is a whole other kettle of fish. But let's focus on the, on the first 2. If we're talking about professional paid speakers, yeah, they should be contacting their speaker bookers or internally or wherever to get that feedback.

Yes.

About how they felt having them speak to the audience and how the audience felt as well, potentially. Is that right?

Yeah. Now with speakers, we have this fabulous challenge, and I'm really glad you've made the distinction between the different types. So let's focus on the speakers who are being paid to speak. It's how they bring in their money, either through their own marketing or through bureaus and bookers and agents. The challenge that those speakers have is that the bookers will generally buy on certainty. They want you as a speaker to turn up, on time, if not 3 hours before, to have done your homework, to have had the pre-conference calls, to have asked what does the client actually want, and for you to turn up and deliver your socks off and make them look good. Your job is actually to make the booker look good. So they really want that certainty. Yeah. So, and in some ways it's crazy because actually as speakers, we should all be doing that anyway. We should be turning up early and being ready for the sound checks and delivering what we've been paid to deliver and not deviating and all of that. And yet there are speakers who don't do it. There are the divas and the divos— divos, I think that's the male one— who turn up and go, actually, no, I'm not going to do that, I'm going to do this today. And the poor booker is left going, hang on, that's not what the audience is expecting. So if you're booked to deliver this, then deliver it. So to an extent, yes, we should all be delivering on certainty, but particularly for bookers. Now the challenge comes because quite often we could be booked by a bureau who wants certainty, but the audience wants growth or the client wants significance. So this is why it is so important to have the conversation with the end client wherever possible. You know, I would hate to get a booking from a bureau where I can't speak to the end client, to the— and even some of the audience members are like, what do you want? What are you looking to deliver? What I find fascinating is sometimes having the conversation where the booker is saying, yep, certainty, absolutely. The HR director, for instance, who is paying the bill says, oh, I, I, I, the team aren't working together, therefore I need motivation. And the audience are going, we just wanna be heard. And there you've got certainty, growth, significance.

Hmm.

So it's really important to have as many conversations as you can. To find out what's expected. And if, I mean, for me, I'm lucky, I deliver on certainty. My marketing speeches, talks, workshops are all practical certainty-led marketing. If you want growth or significance, I can recommend you to other people. So for me, I use the same strategy everywhere. But a lot of speakers, particularly, you know, if you're a motivational speaker, your audience is gonna be buying you on growth. And motivation and building up their courage and self-esteem. Whereas the book is going, nope, just, just need somebody to turn up. So it's fun. It's a, it's, it's just an added. When, when I first started realizing that this was going on for speakers, I was like, am I gonna have to write a separate book for speakers? Well, you never know. Maybe that's version 2. Yes.

Interesting. Interesting. Well, thank you for sharing that.

Okay.

Now, other thing that I was, when I was doing my research before, um, sort of, you know, planning this show and so on, I was curious about one of the things that I read around measuring your marketing. And I, I think this is another area where people fall down or they're cursory or it doesn't align to the strategy. And I, I was curious about you. How do you measure your marketing and what advice have you got in this area?

Oh, that's a fabulous question. I can't remember the last time a podcast host actually asked me how I measure my marketing. Okay, one of my marketing mantras is do more of what works and less of what doesn't. Do more of what marketing works. The only way you're gonna know what works is by measuring it. And this is where, yeah, a lot of people rush off and do TikTok or Instagram or networking or whatever, and they're not measuring what they're doing. So the first way to measure is every time you get a call or an email or a contact from a new client, you ask them, how did you hear about me? Now, quite often these days they will say, oh, I think I saw your website. Did I hear you speak? Was it Sarah who recommended? Or maybe I heard, there will be so many touchpoints, but try to get back to the very first one. It might take a bit of digging. You know, if I get an inquiry and somebody says, or if somebody took the test recently who I've never heard of, bought my book as well, preordered it. Fabulous. And on the how did you hear about us bit, he put website. That's not very helpful. So he's gonna get an email going, hmm, whose website was it? Mine? How did you get there? And I'm being very nosy because I want to know what he was, what he was searching for. Chances are he's gonna come back and go, oh no, actually it wasn't that. It was, uh, Sarah recommended me. Because sometimes people just, they can't remember, they guess, they make, they make something up. So that's the first point is dig into the source of the inquiry. That's what you have to measure. I have a database on my computer and onto it go all of the, it's got all of my clients on there. It's got all my prospective clients. And every 3 months I say to my lovely database, please give me a list of all my current clients and the source of their inquiry. Now I've got clients I've been working with for 15 years, so they come up every time, but that's fine. So I then look at the numbers. So I look at the source of the inquiry and I do it just for my existing customers. You could do it for all of your inquiries. You can do it for your customers going back. You know, I could do my customers going back over the last 24 and a bit years. I think I would get the same results that I get every 3 months when I do this because every 3 months I get the same results. 30% of my new business comes from networking, 30% comes from people who've heard me speak at an event and 30% come through referrals. And I know that doesn't make 100, so there are a few other little bits and pieces. My longest serving client who's been with me 15 years, we were actually at university together and he found me all those years ago on LinkedIn and Picked up the phone and said, hello, can you help me with my consultancy? And I'm still helping him and it's fabulous. So there are, you know, and there are, I've got a couple of clients who are, it's, it's personal. I've just started working with an osteopath who happens to be my osteopath. And one day while she was doing something to my neck, she was like, oh, I think I need some marketing help. Okay, well, let's have coffee and talk about it.

Excellent.

There are, there are some personal ones that, that come through. But every 3 months my numbers are the same. They go up and down a little bit. And actually watching the numbers shuffle is quite interesting because if I spend a lot of time not networking, the other 2, the referrals and the speaking, go up. Or if I haven't gone out and spoken, because I use, as well as being paid to speak, I'm one of those hybrid ones. I get paid to speak and I use speaking to market my business. So if I spend any time not speaking last year, I had to take some time off due to back surgery and I noticed the numbers change. I noticed overall the number of new clients coming in had dropped, but I think the number that were coming in by referral was up. So, but it's always the same, it's the same 3 numbers, which doesn't mean that I don't do any other marketing because I talk about an ABC of marketing where A is ask for referrals, B is business networking, which is speaking and networking and then C is content and the content is the backup. I send out an email newsletter once a month. That newsletter goes out on my blog and it goes out on LinkedIn. I've got articles and all sorts on my website. So it's the backup when somebody is referred to me, they're gonna go and look at my website. Check you out. Yeah, they'll check me out. They'll want to see good content. They'll want to see up-to-date articles. So the content bit is really important. But And that's, that's kind of why I don't do social media, because I don't need to.

Yeah, no, that makes sense. And, and it's interesting, it's kind of like, you know, watching those figures fluctuate. But it's good, I think, to have that diversity in terms of channels coming in, because it means that if, if, you know, you're, you're sort of not hedging your bets, but you're covering all the bases, if that makes sense.

Absolutely. Yeah. And also because, you know, I said earlier that some people can't remember how they first heard about you, but it's you. It's quite often a combination of the 3. So somebody might hear me speak, meet me at a networking event, and then be recommended to me as well. Or they might get the recommendation first and then come to an event where I'm speaking and then bump into me at a networking event and then read my newsletter. So those, those 3 referral, speaking, networking, they're all integrated. And yeah, I do often get people who go, well, was it that or was it that?

So that's, and that's really cool. I think Google have just done a new study on the customer journey from trigger to purchase and sort of surrounding the whole shebang. And they found some really interesting things is this concept of exposure. And, and really it's about making sure, and this is what marketing is partly for as well, is making sure that you're in the arena when someone's trigger gets, uh, gets, you know, clicked, that they want to, to buy something, that you're there. And if you're not doing any marketing, then you're not. It's, you know, kind of who's in front of me at the right time. So you've got to be in the mix, which is what you're talking about. So that's, that's cool.

I've heard people say, it hasn't happened to me yet, thank God, but I've heard people say that, oh, I didn't, I didn't go networking for 6 months and people thought I'd gone out of business. And I've had, I've had potential clients say that. And yeah, it happens really quickly because there's so much noise out there, you know, particularly if you're a coach, a consultant, a speaker, they're really competitive industries. If you're not talking about, if you're not shouting about how great you are and reminding people, the phone calls I've been making over the last couple of weeks, there are people who are saying, oh, it's so great to hear from you. Oh, it's been years. And embarrassingly for some of them, it has. It's been like 5 years. So they, they've forgotten about me, but it's really lovely to, to reconnect. So yeah, we have to look at ways of staying front of mind without bombarding people and without pissing them off. You know, still giving, still giving them value. So really important.

Yeah, absolutely. Cool. Okay, good. So I'm gonna ask you next about, we might have covered some of this already, but about the 3 most important things that you think speakers need to get right with their marketing.

What do speakers need to get right with their marketing? I think they have to go strategy before tactics. I think if you're struggling as a speaker or you need a bit of a boost, the best thing you can do is actually stop, do some thinking, do some deep work, look into the strategy, look at what makes you different, go and take the test, find out what your standout strategy is. But look at what makes you different, decide where you want to go, like how many clients do you want? What type of clients do you want? Work out who your ideal clients are. Do all of that before jumping into anything tactical because otherwise you'll be— I see speakers who are struggling and the response that they have to that is I have to be everywhere all the time and they will go on to every single social media platform and they're posting all the time and they've got mixed messages. They don't know who their audience is. They don't know what they're saying and it just makes things worse because they confuse people. So yeah, so go strategy first. That's the first one. Secondly, I would say focus on relationships.

Hmm.

We've talked about how most of a third of my work comes through referrals. That's why at the moment I'm focusing on phoning past clients, not to say, have you got any work, more work for me, but saying, who could you recommend me to? And it's actually, it's a really easy phone call to have because those of us who are British are not very good at promoting ourselves and asking for anything, are we?

No.

So to pick up the phone and go, hello, Mr. or Mrs. Former Client, have you got any more work for me? We hate doing that. And unless we're into sales, then we're rubbish at it. What's much easier is to pick up the phone and go, oh, hello, how are you? Yeah, I know it's been 5 years. I'm really sorry. What are you up to these days? Oh, and by the way, do you remember that work we did together? Anyone you know who could, who needs that sort of help? The number of referrals and recommendations I've had has been fabulous. Some of them have gone off on weird tangents and I've got all sorts of wonderful follow-ups and contacts to make, but it's a much easier conversation. Some of my clients are now going, oh, well, actually, I could do with a bit more help, you know.

Mm-hmm.

And I haven't had to ask them.

Interesting.

Yeah, that's, that's number 2. Yeah, don't, don't forget about, about your clients and your existing contacts. Number 3, just be bloody brilliant on stage, you know.

Yeah.

Constantly be— I used to have a friend, Tom, who would say the best way to promote yourself is just to be a really shit-hot speaker. Excuse my language. There's a bit more to it than that, and the better you are on stage, the more people are going to remember you and refer you. I've been on a quest for the last— well, actually it's been the last 24 years, but for the last couple of years definitely to get better at speaking. And I've invested a lot in me. I've worked with people to help me with the script, with the posture, with walking on stage, with the delivery, with the vocal work, all sorts. I, I go to all sorts of workshops, webinars, sessions looking at how to become a better speaker. I'm constantly asking my peers, the people who are better than me, to say, what can I do? How do I get to your level? And there are some amazing folk in the speaking industry and everyone who I've said, can I pick your brains? They've all gone, yeah, okay, I'll give you some feedback. Yeah, you're rubbish at this and get better at that. It's all about building relationships too. So, so work on becoming an absolutely brilliant speaker by getting feedback. It's not good enough to just go on stage and go, oh yeah, I'm really good. No, ask the audience, ask people who you trust, ask people who are already better than you. What can I do to get better? That's tip number 3. That's what I should do.

Brilliant. That's fantastic.

It's not directly marketing, but it sort of is.

So, no, absolutely. Yeah, because it's, uh, it's proving your, you know, that's back to certainty, isn't it? In terms of people buying great speaker, the best way you can share that is by being a great speaker when, when you speak. Absolutely. In terms of you, you mentioned your own speaking journey. So can you tell me a bit more about that? So this is, so you do both. You're one of those hybrid speakers that uses speaking as a, as a way to grow the business, but also to, to, you're a professional speaker as well. How did you, you know, when did you start using speaking in your business?

I started using it to promote my business first, and I've been doing that. So I set the business up in 2000. I discovered networking in about 2001 or 2002, and I probably started speaking in about 2004 or 2005. I was rubbish at it, hated it, and a friend dragged me kicking and screaming to Toastmasters. And I will, I spent 2 years with the local Toastmasters group and discovered that I actually rather liked being on stage. And I learned so much from all the people there. They, Toastmasters are fab. They have amazing programs that, that you can follow. But I also learned from just watching other people and from, from doing a 10-minute talk and then getting feedback and watching other people do a 10-minute talk and watching how the feedback works. So that's, yeah, it's probably that, that long ago, 20 years ago that I started using speaking to promote my business. I love teaching. I love sharing marketing advice. So ask me to run a workshop, ask me to do a 5-minute speech. Oh, no, thank you. Even though I have to sometimes ask me to run a 3-hour workshop. Hallelujah. Yes, please. Because I can cram it full of value. So I would often give talks at networking events. I would often run free or low-cost workshops all about marketing and that always worked to promote the business. I then started getting paid to do it only a few years ago because I don't know, I think I was too busy using speaking to promote the business and doing other marketing, you know, other work marketing for clients. I now don't do marketing for clients. I mentor them and I tell them what marketing to do and then I support them through it, which has actually freed up more of my time to focus on promoting me as a speaker. So I will quite often go and speak to peer groups. I had a brilliant conversation with somebody earlier today who said, yes, please come to speak to our group next year and I'll pay you to do it. And some keynotes. I'm more of a workshop kind of girl. I, like I said, the 3 hours of stuffing it full of value, that's my thing.

Perfect.

That's been just sort of in the last few years. So it's a mishmash. It's a mixture and I love it. Great.

Oh, that's brilliant. And one, one sort of question before we head into the sort of standard questions. You mentioned that you, the, the speakers that you thought were better than you, that stood out to you, you went and got advice from. What made them stand out to you as speakers that you'd want to get advice from?

Okay. One, one of the easy ways within the Professional Speaking Association, I'm involved with, the PSA. We have something called PSAE, the PSA Award of Excellence. Now, this is an award that is— you have to be— you can't apply for it. You have to be nominated by your peers. And every year within the PSA, there will be a bunch of nominations. And at our annual conference, we then award a few there aren't very many. Some years there aren't any because nobody has really hit the mark. So for me, it was a bit of a no-brainer to go to some of the PSAs who I know and say, you're amazing. Tell me how you do that. One of them, my friend Simon, is that he and I run workshops together for speakers. And so he and I were actually both on the bill for one of the PSA regional events. He was doing the sales bit. I was doing the marketing bit. And I said to him, oh, I'm on stage after you. Can you sit and write some notes for me and give me some feedback? Because you're fabulous. He is amazing and he's a PSAE and he's also very generous. So he, yeah, we had half an hour conversation. So I, at the moment, I'm going for PSAEs, but I'm also getting, they need to have seen me speak. That's the other thing.

Yeah.

And Simon and I have worked together for years, but then I delivered a keynote at one of these sessions. So that was useful. So that's what, for me, that's what makes them stand out. They are, they are, they have the Award of Excellence. Their peers think they are phenomenally good. So, and they are, and they're all nice people as well, because part of the award is about what they've given back to the PSA, to the associations, and they've all given back. And they're all the sort of people you can go to and say, can I pick your brains for half an hour? They go, yeah, of course you can.

Excellent advice.

From industry experts. Brilliant.

Excellent. Well, that's brilliant. Thank you so much for sharing all of the standout strategy stuff. And we're really, you know, the book's coming out in October. We will put a link to the website if when this is released, the book's already out, we'll put a link to that as well.

There's a pre-order page on the website. You can get an order.

Perfect. Excellent. We will do that. Before we sort of talk about exactly where people should go, I have some questions to ask you, if you don't mind.

Go for it.

First question is, what's the best thing that speaking has done for you?

Best thing. Oh, now this is gonna, this is gonna be weird and fluffy. The best thing that speaking has done for me is It at the moment is allowing me to show William the world.

Hmm.

William hasn't traveled very much. It's, it's chapter 2 for both of us, as we're calling it. And I've been National Press of the PSA this year, which has allowed me to travel internationally, and I've taken him with me, and we have had the most fabulous adventures. So we're both going and speaking at international conferences. And I get to take him with me. I mean, he has to pay, obviously, but being able to take him on our travels and 3, 3 of the 5 photos that he's exhibiting in London have come from when we've been traveling for speaking work. That's—

Brilliant.

That, that, I know that's probably not what people are expecting to hear, but that's— That's brilliant.

Well, it does unlock new adventures.

Yes. Oh yeah.

You know, we've got all sorts of staff ideas and adventures now.

So lots more to come. Brilliant.

Excellent. Okey doke. Now, next question. Uh, has there been a time, a gig, a speaking presentation where things have not gone to plan, where you wanted the ground to swallow you up and you were like, I never wanna think about that ever again? Has that happened to you, Chantal?

Uh, yes. Yes, it has. Not very often. There was, there was one I did recently where there was somebody in the audience who I knew, and this, this wasn't a paid gig. It was more of a, a promotional one. And there was somebody in the audience who I think I wasn't expecting them to be there. And it's somebody whose opinion used to really matter to me. And as soon as I saw them though, I, I kind of went, And, and the whole imposter syndrome crashed down. I was like, I'm not good enough. I can't possibly do this. And I was stumbling. I was losing my lines. I, I wasn't, not that I have a script, but I didn't feel in flow. That person then actually asked me a slightly awkward question and that just, oh, that was just it. I was like, just kill me now.

Oh, sorry.

I got through it. I scurried away at the end. I actually messaged the organizer the next day and said, I am so sorry. That was really not my best. And he came back and bless him, he actually videoed the event and I watched some of it and it actually wasn't as bad as I remember, which is— there's a tip, get yourself videoed because it's painful. It's hideous watching ourselves on video and the feedback is really good. But, but what worked best was, was emailing the organizer and saying, I'm really sorry, that just, that just wasn't me. But also saying to him, I know what the problem was and I'm working on it. And he was like, yeah, great, that's fine. So yeah, it happens. The imposter syndrome, the, the giant gremlin that sometimes sits on my shoulder going, you're not good enough, you can't do this, get off.

Yeah, it's, it's a tough one. And it's, I, I talk about it being the creator and the critic and, and it's a big part of trying to get people to understand and to develop. This is a skill like anything else, a practice. That you, you have to— they're brilliant. You know, your creator is your playful, childlike side, and, um, the critic is the logical parental side, you know, criticizing yourself. And they are brilliant, but they don't work well together. So we have to practice. When you get, get onto that stage, that just stays off. But it's hard, you know, it just is something that we have to work on.

You know, you can rehearse and rehearse and be prepared for it, and then something derails you. And I think for me what happened is the critic went, you can't do this because that person's in the audience. 7-year-old me should have come around and gone, right, come on, let's have some fun. Let's get some colour pens out. Thank you, because that's what I'm gonna do next time when I can feel it all going hideously wrong. I'll get the 7-year-old out with coloured pens.

Yeah.

Thank you, Sarah.

Yeah, no worries, no worries, no worries. Cool. Right, next question. What's the book that's had most impact on your life and why?

Oh, this is another weird and fluffy one. When I was 20, one of my sisters gave me a book called The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck, I think. And I'd never read— I was only 20, I would— but I'd never read any sort of self-help book. I didn't know they existed. I didn't even know that my sister Bella knew about this book. And there's something in there that I have always remembered, which is about the delay of self-gratification, as he calls it. So it's when you've got 10 things to do on your to-do list, and it's really easy to go, I'll just do the quick ones first because then I get a bit of a buzz. Actually, you get a bigger buzz by doing the harder work first and then finishing off with the little ones, with the, the easy ticks. I am, I am too good at going, oh, I'm just gonna go and check my emails. I'll just do that. I'll just get that out of the way. Half an hour later and I haven't started on my phone calls. So that's a bit of a, a bit of a woo-woo self-help one. But yeah, that, that one. I mean, there have been, there have been loads of books.

That's great.

That's had a huge impact. But that, that was, that was the first one where I went, oh, okay. That, of course, and, and Mr. Gumpy's Big Big Day Out. That's a fabulous book too. I've not heard of that one.

Oh, we'll try, we'll put both in the show notes in case people want to, to have a look at that as well.

There are, there are 2. There's Mr. Gumpy's Day Out and Mr. Gumpy's Big Adventure. I think that's what the titles are. They're books that my mum gave me when I was about 4. I still have them on my bookshelf. I, I love them, and they've got beautiful pictures on of Mr.

Gumpy in his car and all the animals that Oh yeah, and sometimes, sometimes those books can have profound messages as well, so that's cool.

I'm going to go and reread them.

Excellent. Now, we might have already covered this, but who knows, there may be something new come up. The penultimate question, what's the best bit of business advice you've had and why?

Best bit of business advice. When I was thinking about setting up my own business, I went to, I was living near Oxford at the time and there was a center there where you could go and do courses in how to run a business. And I had a mentor who helped and he said, what are you gonna do in your business? And I said, well, I could do copywriting, I could do database work, or I could do general marketing. And he said, pick one, pick one thing and focus on it. And I said, right, I'm gonna do copywriting because that was what I really loved and I could feel more of a business attached to that. So that's what I did for the first long time in the business. I promoted myself as a freelance copywriter and it got me into all sorts of other areas, but it was having that focus. Now, I'm not saying to everyone, go and be a copywriter, but it was that focus and I stuck with it and then I added on more services and I, so I client who I wrote an article for her and we got it placed in a magazine and she said, right, well, I want this every month. So I created a monthly service for her, but it was still based around copywriting. And then I added in the consultancy because then clients were saying, well, okay, the copywriting is great and the monthly writing is great, but can you advise us on our website? And, you know, just expanded. So that's where it became a consultancy. But it's, yeah, it's always been around words, language, marketing, relationships. I see so many people who pivot or completely change direction because their business isn't doing so well and they drop it and go off somewhere else. Don't do that, you know, focus on what you are good at, stick with it. That determination, I'm stubborn as heck, I'm a Capricorn, I'm a goat. So, but having that determination, right? This is what I do. I'm sticking at this. I'm gonna make it work. So definitely.

And I think this is the thing though, people are so scared to focus because they're worried about the doors that it's closing. But actually, if you focus on that, it opens other doors for you.

And it's the same with these standout strategies. I know that if I focus on attracting clients who want certainty, they will come, they will pick up the phone and I just go, yep, great. When do you wanna start? That's my sales pitch. Whereas if I'm trying to promote my business to people who want growth and significance and all those, the marketing gets messy and complicated and ridiculously expensive. Whereas if you go, no, I'm doing this, I'm sticking to this line. Yeah, so much easier.

Perfect. Now, last question then. Um, if you could have a mentor, They can be alive or dead, fictional or non-fictional. Mr. Guppy could be in the mix. Who would you choose and why?

Yeah, Mr. Guppy's close up there, followed by Peter Rabbit. You see, you've got, you've got, you've got the kid in me out and playing. I can't take anything seriously now. You should, you should, you can't see them, but the toys, the stuffed toys that are on the windowsill at the front of me. I, I would like to spend time with Christopher Reeve, who was Superman.

Yes. He—

I got, I, I got to know him, as it were, after he was Superman. He, he was a horse rider like me, but was way better than me, and then had that horrific accident where he came off his horse, his hands got tangled up in the reins, he couldn't get his hands out in front of him, he landed on his neck and broke it. And yet he made the most of it.

Mm-hmm.

I, he wrote a beautiful book called Still Me, and I have it and I've read it. And it ba— he, he talks about the fact that the accident allowed him to stop acting, although he did do a little bit more, but to go into, into direction. He wanted to be a director and he could still direct from his, from his wheelchair, from his bed. So the, the, the positivity there is, is, is phenomenal. You know, I think how on earth does somebody cope with that? amount of change. I couldn't ride my horse for 3 or 4 months last, last year because of my back, and I got depressed about it. And he was, he was, you know, he could never walk again, and he still turned things around. So I think, I think Christopher Reeve, I think I'd like, I'd like him, please, if you could arrange that. I'd like to spend time with him.

I shall, I shall do my very best. Um, listen, thank you so much again for sharing all of that, and I know people Yeah, exactly. And I know people will have got a ton of value from, um, listening to this. Now let's talk about where they need to go to take the test, preorder the book, perhaps book you to speak, uh, or book a workshop. Where should they go, Chantal?

The best place is my website, which is appletreeuk.com. There are pages on there. There's, there's a take the test page. You can go there and fill in Fill in the forms, spend a bit of time, think about, think about the emotions and the feelings, and then send it through to me and I'll send you back some results. There are details on there about me speaking and, and workshopping. There are also, I don't know how many years worth of my newsletter Scribbles. If you want to sign up to Scribbles, you can do it there. And there are loads and loads of back issues. So there is a mountain of value for anyone who wants to go and browse and read those. Oh, and there are lots of, there's an appearances page where I where I've got— you'll be on there soon, Sarah, when this podcast is live, because all my podcasts go on there. And again, just listen for lots of useful stuff and value. So it's passionfreeuk.com. It's all there.

Brilliant. We'll put that in the show notes along with Mr. Gumpy and, uh, and everything else. And thank you again for being so generous with your time, with, uh, your experience and sharing that. Um, and good luck with everything that you are up to and good luck with the book. I can't wait to have a look at that.

Oh yeah, that's, that's on. That's on the website too. You can go and pre-order there. But thank you, Sarah. It's been so much fun talking to you today. My inner child is bouncing around again. It's great. Thanks.

You're welcome. Take care.

Bye.

Wow, we certainly unpacked a lot there. Did you get some insights into what your standout strategy might be? If you don't feel like you know, if it's not clear from, you know, chat that we had, then maybe you need to do a little bit more digging with your clients, as Chantal said, to, to understand how they perceive you and what you do for them. And then go over to appletreeuk.com and take the test like I did. It was interesting to hear mine. What do you think? If you're a regular watcher or listener to the podcast, you'll probably have a sense of what it's like to work with me a little bit. It'll come through. Did you feel that it was right? What do you think? So yeah, interesting stuff. I would definitely go and take this, the test, when you can to get that feedback for you because I think once you've got that clarity around how you should be positioning yourself, it will make that marketing much Much easier and simpler, as we said right at the start of the show. And do go and find Chantal on LinkedIn and let her know if you got value from watching on the YouTube channel or listening over at wherever you're listening to us. Now we are on the cusp of 300 episodes, which is amazing. It's it's been a long time since I started the show back in two thousand. 2017, and it is a milestone. It's taken me a bit longer to get there, you know, there's been some weeks where we, we haven't released a show, you know, you have these ebbs and flows when you're a content creator, but I love sharing this speaking stuff with you guys, and I think it's important to mark the 300th show in some way, and we are going to do that. So, keep on watching and listening, and you'll be finding out what we're doing on the next show. Before I go though, I just want to say thank you so much for choosing to listen and watch The Speaking Club. It's an effort to put the content out, but it's so worth it. I love to meet the people who listen to the show. They often come through into my world and we get to meet in person, or face-to-face or over Zoom. It's lovely. So I really appreciate you giving me your time and attention, and I hope that you get a tremendous amount of value from it. Well, I will see you next time. If you do enjoy the show, make sure you subscribe to the YouTube channel or to the podcast wherever you're listening, and I will see you next time, as I said. But in the meantime, you know what I'm going to say. I've said it nearly 300 times. Go out, grab your life by the nuts, and get cracking. Bye-bye. If you want to discover how to create a killer pitch that makes you or your business stand out from the crowd, then you'll want to grab your copy of my book, Straight to the Top. It will help you clarify your USP, your business story, who your target market is, and will make them buy. You'll discover how to get the edge on the competition and position your offer for success. You'll also get proven elevator and investor pitch frameworks to use for maximum impact. To get the book for free plus lots of extra bonuses— you just pay shipping and handling— go to standoutpitch.com today.