Public Speaker World

There is a knock at the door.

The time has finally come.

Standing at the door is a policeman and a man whose job it is to take away all your possessions. You are about to lose everything.

What do you do? Do you panic? Cry? How do you protect your young children in the other room?

Charlotte Kemp went through this and survived.

She turned this business "failure" around and turned it into a successful speaking business.

For event organizers, this episode shows how a first-hand, real-life story can deliver so much to the understanding of an audience.

For speakers, Charlotte shares her journey and how she developed a speaking business from nothing.... almost literally nothing.

A speaker who stands still will be left behind.

Speaking is changing and the ideas that used to work are not working anymore.

In this series, we've heard how the glory days of writing one speech and delivering it at venue after venue, is just not as possible as it was in the past.

More and more events want to record what you do and share it with their team and more and more events want to pay for your talk in exposure rather than cash.

So it takes a new way of thinking about speaking to keep moving ahead.

That is what Anand Tamobii is all about.

Anand has spent his life innovating and thinking about innovation. One of his early inventions was a better mousetrap but today he talks about innovation in ideas in business

And he doesn't just preach theory, he uses it.

He has taught himself video editing and his skills lead him to make a documentary for one company instead of giving a speech during COVID.

So today, it's time to start thinking about speaking differently.

This episode is called the speaker who experiments.

If you want to be a speaker and the idea of sending cold emails to people and pressure selling fills you with the shivers then this episode is for you.

Paul ter Wal has built a career as a global public speaker without any of that.

As he says, you won't find his email address and social media links plastered all over his last "slide" and you won't hear him talking about how his latest special offer that will end in 15 minutes.

In this episode, Paul tells us how he does it. He explains how he turned his career as a lawyer into being a speaker on business productivity and happiness.

For event bookers, this episode will show you that perhaps the people who don't hard sell are actually the better speakers.

For speakers, Paul shares some of his more "relationship lead" techniques for building speaking opportunities.

"The office is like a fetish!", says remote working specialist Raul Anton.

Raul has been working in a remote environment for more than 10 years. He has a PhD in communications in distributed teams. As well as leading teams he is a data analytics specialist too, using statistics to help manage processes like hiring in remote environments.

He spent his first 25 years in a traditional office and in factories but discovered the benefits of remote working long before COVID forced it upon many companies.

As he says in the podcast, many firms saw remote working as being about just replacing the office with Slack or Zoom. But Raul says, remote working really to comes into its own when you "rethink the workplace". He challenges traditional ideas of work at every level from team motivation to management to show it can work in distributed environments.

COVID has made Raul an in-demand speaker in both the Spanish and English-speaking worlds.

For Raul public speaking is much more than just about talking. To him, public speaking is an opportunity for discussion. When he goes on stage he likes it when people question and test his ideas as it helps him learn more from them.

Raul doesn't just talk about the topic but lives it every day, working in one of the world's most respected remote companies.

Katja Schleicher is a non-nonsense speaker who works with people to help them communicate in business.

When what you say can make a firm succeed or fail, Katja's role is vital in helping people craft both internal and external communication.

For event organisers, Katja helps attendees focus on what they say to achieve the maximum effect.

For speakers, Katja is someone who can share some powerful ideas on how to make the talks you deliver quotable in boardrooms long after you have finished speaking.

How does the professional public speaking industry work? 

At the top end are people being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to speak for 30 minutes. At the lower end are people being paid nothing or even having to pay themselves to give long talks and workshops to try to build their brand. 

Last year I got the opportunity to speak in front of a conference for professional public speakers and it was an eye opener. 

I made some very good friends and I asked them if they minded me interviewing them about their careers. This series is made up of those recordings. 

There are some very funny stories, some disasters on stage and some great lessons to learn for both experienced speakers, event organisers and people hoping to get into the industry.

More at www.PublicSpeakerWorld.com

What is it like to stand in front of 3500 people without a script and have to entertain them? How do you do it?

What is it like when some of that goes wrong?

Can you really get paid to do this?

Steve Bustin knows. He is a former journalist turned speaker who now comperes events.

In this chat with another professional public speaker, I discover the secrets behind compering events. We find out about the business model, the marketing and we discover some tips on how to approach the role or improve what you already do.

More at www.PublicSpeakerWorld.com

Neils Brabandt isn't mincing his words. The public speaking industry can draw you in, milk you for every last penny of your savings and dump you out with little to nothing to show for it. 

Neils knows because he's been through it. 

But Neils turned things around. He is now a very successful public speaker.

So what is wrong with the public speaking industry? What pitfalls are there? How do you avoid them and can you really come out the other side as a successful speaker?

Dr Mark van Rijmenam understands the speaking business. 

He's a master at spotting trends and then adapting himself to what events want.

He's used that insight to stay on top of the technology space for years and continues to evolve to meet the market.

So how does he do it? How does he ensure he's always what events want? 

In this fascinating chat, Mark shares many of his insights with us. 

What if your life was suddenly turned upside down one day and within hours doctors were saying you were going to die. 

Then someone came along and said, "Let's try and save you". 

This is what happened to Tyron Leigh Harding. 

So far in Public Speaker World, we've heard from people who have found topics that they developed into talks and into brands based on their curiosity.

In this episode, we hear from a speaker who didn't just learn how to live again but learned how to speak in order to share the powerful lessons he learned with others. 

In 2021 I conducted a series of interviews with paid professional public speakers. 

I wanted to understand how this billion dollar industry operates. 

I asked them how their business works, how they market themselves and how they developed their talks. I asked them about their greatest successes and their worse moments. 

It's now time to share those with you.  

Series one is made up of ten, roughly half hour length shows.

In each episode I also look at trends in the speaking industry too. 

By the way, I'm Richard Midson. 

For 25 years I've been fascinated by people who build business and brands, and as a journalist, public relations officer and communicator I've met a of of these people. It's time to share some of these with you. 

So, whether you are in the speaking industry (a speaker or event organiser), or just curious, Public Speaker World will take you inside this fascinating industry.

All the details can be found at publicspeakerworld.com