8 essentials to become an extraordinary presenter

I have recently began keynote speaking and absolutley loving the opportunity. It is interesting making the transition for a spectator to the speaker. I will start by saying that as soon as anyone promotes themselves as an motivational speaker they lose me. Motivation is not something you can get from another person and certainly not from what someone is saying - Motivation has to come from within. All you can hope for is to inspire people to become more. People are not by nature extraordinary, they make a decision to do extraordinay things. Getting the right mix of content and value as a speaker that also truely inspires people is the art of successful speaking.

Some tools I have found useful on becoming a better speaker include this article from John Spence author of Awesomely Simple.

John recently put some ideas in one of his blogs on how to get into speaking. This is a is a very honest and straightforward memo on what he truly believe it takes to succeed in the speaking and corporate training business.

1.First you will need to get a VERY clear idea of exactly what you are trying to achieve.

2.Once you have a good handle on what you want to be– you MUST put forth a Herculean effort to become as close to an expert on that subject or subjects as is possible.

3.You’ll need to develop a very, very clear set of values and key strategies that will drive your business.

4.You will need to get even more clear about exactly WHAT you sell– and make it super easy for those key target people to make a buying decision.

5.After you figure out all of the above—then you have to be an evangelist for your company and programs—not pushy, never overbearing, and absolutely not a pest — but a very professional and polished marketer of your service to anyone and everyone that meet your “Ideal Client” criteria.

6.As part of your sales effort you will also need a HUGE network of people that can recommend you – send you referrals – give you leads.

7.Another key factor is that people need to meet you and watch you present in order to trust you and want to hire you. That means for the first year or two you need to get out and do as many presentations as possible. You may have to do a lot of these for free or for very little money.

8.Lastly – when you do land a client… you have to simply dazzle, delight, enthrall and surprise them by delivering a level of excellence they had not imagined was possible (in every aspect of the program

The hard part is that no one else can do these things for you. People can help, suggest, guide and mentor you. You can read books on sales, networking, referrals, marketing (a very good idea). But in order to sell your programs and speeches – it MUST be you out on the street, in meetings, at seminars, sending letters, making phone calls, writing emails, sitting down with key decision makers and helping them become excited about the real value you can offer. Excited enough that they are willing to write you a check for $5,000 to $50,000 for you to come in and help their team. A lot of consultants, speakers and trainers know this is the way to build their business — but very few are willing to do the hard work to get it done.

Do NOT worry at all about selling programs. Worry your ass off about being the best presenter you possibly can be. Worry yourself to death about always delivering maximum value to the client. Drive yourself crazy worrying about being incredibly well prepared and totally focused for every presentation. Have a nervous breakdown worrying that your work is so good that the client will be overjoyed they hired you. Worry about all that stuff – and you will never, ever have to worry about being busy. Your clients will keep you booked for months in advance – at whatever reasonable price you want to request. Be fantastic in the information and presentation and the rest will take care of itself. That is honestly the secret!!!

You can read John's full article here and yes it is worth the full read as he illustrates - there are no shortcuts to success.