Celebrity Speakers: What You MUST Know About Using Outside Speakers

When you promote a seminar or other event you have a choice. You can either do it entirely on your own or round up other speakers to participate. Celebrity speakers (relative to your seminar audience) are a good option; it certainly helps build credibility in the promotion. But more importantly, choosing a seminar speaker for your event must be carefully weighed out- there ARE pros and cons!

If you do use outside speakers make sure you have seen them speak before asking them to participate. I’ve made the mistake twice of asking someone to speak at an event before I heard them. I’ll never make the mistake again.

Also, make sure you give any and all of your speakers very specific instructions as to how you want them to deliver information and what their time frame will be. In the resource section of this book I’ve includ- ed a sample of what I give to speakers before they speak at my events.

Even when you do this you’ll still have an occasional person that you wish you wouldn’t have allowed a speaking slot.

Most of the time when you do a seminar or workshop, you are the sole speaker. You’re the expert people come to hear. Besides, it’s what you do.

But if you run a bootcamp or a multi-day event, or if you just want to engage in a bit of variety, you may find yourself tempted to use outside speakers. It’s perfectly alright to do so, but you need to be aware of some possible pitfalls and of how to deal with those speak- ers professionally and credibly.

Pros and Cons of Using Outside Speakers
There are pluses and minuses to using outside speakers at your events. If you invite anyone else to speak at your events, you are taking a risk. If the person bombs, it’s your fault. It doesn’t matter why they flop, you will get the blame. There are, as you can guess, some pros and some cons to using outside speakers. Let’s review the major issues on both sides of the coin.

Pros
Break up the monotony
People sometimes get bored just hearing one person talk continuously for an entire event. If you can find people who can add to your event, this alone almost makes it worth it to have them.

Additional expertise you don’t have
You can’t be an expert on everything. People don’t expect you to be. You can deliver the best information possible to your audiences by using speakers who are knowledgeable in areas you don’t know well.

Access their in-house lists
A big benefit to using other speakers is that you’ll be able to mail to their in-house list. This should be a mandatory condition of their speaking at your event. Let’s say that you’re having a bootcamp and asking a dozen other speakers to contribute. If every speaker that you asked to speak had just 2,000 people in their email database you’d be able to mail to close to 25,000 people.

Since the response from one’s in-house list is generally a lot higher than other promotions, you’re in good shape. This will make it easy for you to pack the house for your event.

At least it’s easy if their lists are a match to the kind of event you’re promoting. If you invite someone to speak at your event on financial planning and their list consists of gardeners, you probably won’t get anyone to respond or attend. If, on the other hand, these are people who have requested information on asset protection, there is a good chance the mailing will bring in registrations.

Money from their product sales
Using other speakers will also allow you to generate more cash. Most speakers you ask to speak will have products to sell. If they don’t, you’ll want to have other very compelling reasons to invite them.

When I do events, I like to make sure that about half of the speakers have products to sell. The others need to be great speakers. I then try to alternate the two. I try to avoid having two speakers back to back who sell product. I also try to avoid having two speakers who are quite good but who may not offer products for sale.

Cons
Unpredictability
You never know how an outside speaker might behave or what kinds of stunts they might pull. I’ve seen a speaker go nuts up in front of a group. This can severely jeopardize your event.

Prima Donnas
A lot of people are extremely difficult to deal with. They make all sorts of demands and are not “team players.” I know one very well known speaker who has been silently banned by seminar promoters due to his difficult nature. Ask other people who have used a proposed speaker at their event before you invite him or her to your event.

Bad Speakers
There are plenty of bad speakers. You don’t want them speaking at your events. Some people have such great content that you can toler- ate a poor speaker. If you do this, just don’t use too many who would fall into this category.

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