This article is the latest of a series of public speaking book reviews here on Six Minutes.

• What’s Inside?
• The Price
• What I Loved
• How could it be better?
• What Others Think
• Verdict

What’s Inside?

Based on the provocative title, you might think this book is heavy on memoirs and light on educational content. You would only be half right.

Confessions of a Public Speaker is packed with personal stories from the author and also packed with tips and advice for speakers from all backgrounds. A more appropriate title would probably have been “Insights of a Public Speaker” or “Lessons Learned by a Public Speaker”; of course, neither of those titles would like sell as many copies as this best-selling book is.

The video below shows the author talking about what the book is about…

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Price

At the time of writing this review, you can get this hardcover book for only $16.49 from amazon.com. This is 34% off the list price.

At this price, it isn’t surprising that this book is the 7th most popular public speaking book on amazon.com since being released last November. Readers love it — everyone’s giving it 5 stars.

3 Things I Love about Confessions of a Public Speaker

The three things I liked most about Confessions of a Public Speaker are:

1. Packed with Great Insights

Confessions of a Public Speaker touches on a broad set of issues — fear of speaking, preparation, organization of ideas, delivery techniques, teaching approach, dealing with a difficult crowd, preventing mishaps, speaking technology, and many others. Every speaker will find new advice and insights here.

As just one example, the second chapter (just 11 pages) is perhaps the most concise, sensible advice on public speaking fear I’ve read.

2. Wonderfully written!

Most public speaking books are written by speaking experts who, if I were to guess, are not authors by nature.

Confessions of a Public Speaker is different.  Scott Berkun is a best-selling author (see: Making Things Happen and The Myths of Innovation) and refers to himself as a writer first, and a speaker second. His humorous, witty, and sharp prose make this a thoroughly enjoyable read.

3. Honest to a Fault

Confessions begins with an odd disclaimer:

This book is highly opinionated, personal, and full of behind-the-scenes stories. You may not like this. Some people like seeing how sausage is made, but many do not.

Although everything in this book is true and written to be useful, if you don’t always want to hear the truth, this book might not be for you.

It’s true. The honesty in this book may shock some, like this passage:

No amount of training will make a man with two brain cells seem anything but dumb, as the problem is not his ability to speak, it’s his inability to think. It’s rarely said, but some people will never be good public speakers. Unless they find someone to do their thinking for them, they only have, at best, half the tools they need.

[...] The problem with most bad presentations I see is not the speaking, the slides, the visuals, or any of the things people obsess about. Instead, it’s the lack of thinking.

Personally, I appreciate this fresh approach.

How could it be better?

1. More Cohesion from Chapter to Chapter

Each individual chapter is well-written and feels “just right” as far as depth. However, I didn’t notice much continuity from one chapter to the next, and there’s no obvious rationale for the ordering of material.

Maybe this isn’t a bad thing. Each chapter stands on its own. It’s easy to read the book in short bursts — like I did, one chapter each night.

2. Better Photos

There are photos distributed throughout the book (and even one short chapter with a whole series of them), many taken by the author at speaking venues. The photos are referenced in the text, and they help to tell the story.

Unfortunately, the photos are not in color, and the contrast levels are too low, so many of them hard to view. A few are completely washed out in my copy.

Maybe this was a tradeoff that keeps the price of the book low? Maybe it was only my copy? Maybe the photos could be shared on the author’s website for keeners like me who want to squeeze every drop of meaning?

Update: Apparently, it wasn’t just my copy. On Scott’s blog, he reports that the low-contrast photos were a mistake in the first print run, and says the 2nd and 3rd run fixes this problem. If you get a copy now, you should get the good photos.

What Others Think

Gina Trapani, Lifehacker:

If public speaking is a part of your job–and it is, in some capacity, whether or not you’re Barack Obama–this book is a worthy read. It’s converted at least one person who has turned down speaking engagements because the idea was too scary to someone excited about getting better at a special and important skill.

Ben Rothke, Slashdot:

[...] Confessions of a Public Speaker is unique in that it takes a holistic approach to the art and science of public speaking. The book doesn’t just provide helpful hints, it attempts to make the speaker, and his associated presentation, compelling and necessary.

Jeff Bailey, Wired Presentations:

If you are new to presentations this should be the first book that you read on the topic. It gives a lot of great advice that many people take for granted.

Rhett Laubach, Authenticity Rules:

I have given at least 100 public speeches each year for the past 18 years and I have found a ton of value in it.

Ian Griffin, Speechwriter:

Confessions of a Public Speaker offers presenters—and those of us who support executives who give presentations—a great source of ideas to improve both the content and delivery of future talks.

Verdict

Here’s my confession… I didn’t want to put this book down.

Confessions of a Public Speaker provides sound advice that can help anyone improve their speaking skills. Highly recommended.

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Have a Question? Contact me anytime, or find me on Twitter: @6minutes

Andrew Dlugan is the editor and founder of Six Minutes. He teaches courses, leads seminars, coaches speakers, and strives to avoid Suicide by PowerPoint. He is an award-winning public speaker and speech evaluator. Andrew is a father and husband who resides in British Columbia, Canada.

A dream? Not if you understand how to brand yourself as an expert, one of the steps to becoming a speaker in demand.

In this article, we tap into the wisdom of five experts from the fields of branding and public speaking. They discuss the importance of personal branding, and they offer advice about specific tools you can use to shape your personal brand.

Be the Expert

As a public speaker, you will have plenty of opportunities to speak, but your potential audiences also have plenty of other speaker options. Beyond simply having a skilled delivery, go-to speakers have developed a specific area of expertise. That expertise keeps their audiences coming back for more.

Jane Atkinson stated that the trick is to have your name become synonymous with your expertise. If people aren’t taking you by the sleeve, offering to buy you lunch just so they can pick your brain about your area of expertise, they should be.

Jane Atkinson:

In the speaking industry, it’s all about focus. You can’t be all things to all people. The best way to start building your brand is to declare your area of expertise. People need to know what they are getting from you. As people recognized my expertise, they kept asking me for my professional advice, and I thought, “Some day I’m going to charge for this advice.” I was developing my personal brand.

For Jane, especially in the speaking industry, more is not always better. Likewise, according to Nick Morgan, saying ‘yes’ to every opportunity may seem like a great way to establish more business, but it can exhaust you and dilute the potency of your personal brand.

Nick Morgan:

It wasn’t until I had the courage to say ‘no’ to some people that my brand began to take on some clarity.

The clarity Nick refers to comes from defining an overall vision and shaping our personal brands to help others see that vision the same way we do. But the vision must have a sharp focus. As an example, Aymee Buckhannon related how she found her own focus by helping others develop their personal brands.

Aymee Buckhannon:

I built a website for a life coach as a favor. Then another person saw it, then another person saw it, and the rest is history. Now I define myself confidently as a “branding strategist” and focus mainly on network marketing professionals.

Developing expertise in an area of interest to others may take years. By then, hopefully your area of expertise is something you still are passionate about. When you can align your expertise with your passion, you are well on your way to being the speaker audiences crave.

Manage Your Personal Brand

Even when you’re not behind the podium, you convey a presence to the world, be it in your one-to-one relationships or via the Internet. So, how do you make sure that the image you convey helps your speaking career instead of damaging it?

Joe Calloway wrote, “Your brand resides in the minds of your customers [...] Your brand is whoever customers think you are, whatever they think is your promise to them, and whether or not they believe that you keep that promise.”

It’s not too difficult for a presenter to replace the word “customers” in Calloway’s example with “audience” – or even “potential audiences”. Expanding your speaking opportunities means shaping your brand as a presenter, because your brand affects:

• Your ability to be hired to present.
• The types of speaking engagements you are offered.
• Your audience’s expectations.

Our experts agree that a speaker’s personal brand is as important as how well a speaker delivers a presentation. According to Joe Calloway, the two key questions are whether your brand is what you want it to be and whether you have created it by design.

Joe Calloway:

If I were to ask your clients or professional colleagues what it’s like to do business with you, whatever they say next is your brand. For me, one of the key elements of my personal brand is that Joe Calloway is “easy to do business with.” It’s very much by design and has become a key “tiebreaker” that has gotten me a ton of business over the years.

Cynthia Starks said that, for her, a personal brand is more than a choice of colors for a website or business cards. She takes a “big picture” approach to personal branding, remaining aware of how she comes across to other people in both personal interactions and in her dealings with others on the Internet.

Cynthia Starks:

I think personal branding is who you are – and that “who” comes across most fully in your personal interactions – on the ‘Net and in real life.

Are you kind? Are you willing to hear different opinions? Willing to be a resource to others? Are your online comments encouraging and supportive instead of sarcastic or cynical? These sets of behaviors are truly your “personal brand.”

Jane Atkinson echoed Cynthia’s observations about a more inclusive definition of personal branding. She cautions against losing track of your brand as a speaker.

Jane Atkinson:

People are building their personal brands, whether they’re aware of it or not, and sometimes they may unintentionally be creating a negative brand for themselves. It takes intention and focus to build an effective personal brand.

Jane suggested taking an active role in creating the brand that you want as a speaker, a sentiment shared by Aymee Buckhannon, who pointed out that when people see that you deliver what you promise through your personal brand, you increase your opportunities as a speaker and in other channels, too.

Aymee Buckhannon:

If people like to work with me for what I offer as a leader, or a branding strategist, then it won’t matter which product I carry. Meaning, if that company goes under, or if I change course, my personal brand is me, and not “enter product name here”.

Like many professional speakers, Nick Morgan is also a successful author. He said that the benefits of a well-crafted personal brand have extended beyond his speaking career to help his book sales, even in a difficult market.

Nick Morgan:

All the interviews and connecting I did when my second book came out have paid off in increased book sales. Your book will disappear without a trace unless you personally take charge of marketing it and work very, very hard.

Our experts agree that personal branding is a journey, not a destination. We must think hard about our goals as speakers and consciously develop a personal brand that we can realistically (and diligently) maintain.

Three Fundamentals to Managing Your Brand

Our experts suggest three key ways to promote your personal brand online.

1. Blog it!

Nick Morgan:

The blog is fundamental. You have to have something to say, and the blog is the place to start. Start a blog. If you don’t have a blog, you don’t have an opinion, and why should anyone pay attention to you?

Aymee Buckhannon:

You can even start your blog with a freebie. I believe content is more valuable than “aesthetics” at first. However, as you begin to work your way through the online world, you will need an upgrade and a professional look that stands out from all the “freebies”.

2. Get Your Own Website

Aymee Buckhannon:

If you do not own www.YOURNAME.com, get it now! Once you are famous or you have managed to brand yourself, whoever owns that name will profit.

Jane Atkinson:

When I updated my website, I decided that “all roads lead to the book”, meaning my website’s mission was to promote my book and provide sufficient information about it and easy links to order it.

Cynthia Starks:

The best reason for a website is that when someone says, “send me some speech samples,” you can happily say, “they’re on my website. Here’s the address.” 

3. Use Social Media to Your Advantage

Aymee Buckhannon:

The main goal of sites like Facebook and Linkedin is relationship building. Your profile should be about you and not about what you sell. People on these sites are looking for others with whom they have something in common.

Jane Atkinson:

Thanks to social media, it has never been easier to build a personal brand. We need to be careful what we post if we want to maintain a credible brand. I use Facebook for more personal touches that tend to focus on my expertise, but I give hints to my personal side, like when I got my new puppy.

Cynthia Starks:

If you’re on LinkedIn, don’t forget the group LinkEds & Writers, where I’ve discovered some wonderful fellow communicators. The Quintilian Speechwriters Group is another excellent group for both corporate and freelance writers. There, you can pick the minds of some of the best speechwriters in the business on a variety of topics related to the process and business of speechwriting.

Discover More About the Experts

• Jane Atkinson (Web | Twitter) is President of Speaker Launcher and author of The Wealthy Speaker. She coaches professional speakers, celebrities, and CEOs to help focus their careers. She has represented numerous speakers who have vaulted to the top 3% of the speaking industry.
• Aymee Buckhannon (Web | Twitter) is personal branding expert and owner of My Personal Brand. She helps her clients develop cohesive personal branding for websites, blogs, and social media.
• Joe Calloway (Web | Twitter) is a nationally known speaker and author of the best-selling business book Becoming a Category of One. He helps companies align their vision, brand, and employee engagement objectives.
• Nick Morgan (Web | Twitter) is President of the presenter coaching and message development company, Public Words, Inc., and author of Trust Me: Four Steps to Authenticity and Charisma; and Working the Room: How to Move People to Action through Audience-Centered Speaking.
• Cynthia Starks (Web) is President of Starks Communications, LLC and is a former IBM and Fortune 500 speechwriter. Leaders in business, education, and government have delivered her speeches around the world.

Similar Articles You May Like... Book Review: Confessions of a Public Speaker (Scott Berkun) Ethos, Pathos, Logos: 3 Pillars of Public Speaking How to Connect With Your Audience by Moving Closer 8 Faulty Speaker Assumptions and How to Fix Them Are Your Speech Gestures Too Small, Too Big, or Just Right? Book Review: The Wealthy Speaker by Jane Atkinson

Have a Question? Contact me anytime, or find me on Twitter: @6minutes

Chaunce Stanton provides marketing communications support for the professional services industry, including architects, engineers, and scientists. For more than eight years, he has routinely helped teams develop messages and craft polished presentations for multimillion-dollar projects. Chaunce is an enthusiastic member of Toastmasters International in St. Paul, Minnesota’s Metropolitan Chapter.

If you have absolutely no idea how to get there, this book will show you what is required.

Jane Atkinson’s The Wealthy Speaker: The Proven Formula for Building Your Successful Speaking Business is packed with advice to prepare you to make the jump to $15,000 speaking fees, whether you are six months or six years away.

This article is the latest of a series of public speaking book reviews here on Six Minutes.

What will you learn from The Wealthy Speaker?

The Wealthy Speaker is a comprehensive insider’s view of the speaking industry. Jane Atkinson guides you through all aspects of a keynote speaker’s business, including:

• Positioning yourself as an expert first, speaker second
• Developing your message
• Setting and negotiating fees
• Development of marketing materials
• Creation of your website and demo video
• Building your contact database
• Working with speaker’s bureaus and event planners
• Growing your business and hiring staff
• Selling products

The Wealthy Speaker is written with authority, and Atkinson’s extensive expertise in the speaking industry is apparent. This isn’t a book with theoretical ideas that might work. These are lessons learned from her successes and failures in the trenches.

Numerous case studies highlight successful speakers and industry insiders. These are fairly short (1-2 pages), but highly enlightening.

Throughout the book, you’ll also find worksheets and personal assessments. These exercises are well-designed to help you apply the lessons to your personal situation.

As a final note, you won’t find much information here at all about honing your speaking skills. And that’s a good thing because that’s not what this book is about. I was happy to see this book kept its focus on the business of speaking, not the mechanics.

What I wish was in The Wealthy Speaker

As much as I learned from The Wealthy Speaker, it’s not perfect. You cannot cover everything in 208 pages. So, what’s missing?

First, as Atkinson states early in the book, the book has a bias towards business models based primarily on keynote speaking. So, you won’t find specific information here to carve out a wealthy career as a trainer, seminar leader, or speaking coach. Perhaps we’ll have to wait for the sequel: The Wealthy Trainer?

Second, a few topics could use more treatment.

• For example, the section on website management is thin. To be fair, Atkinson defers to “experts” for this topic. The topics which comprise her core expertise (e.g. positioning, marketing, speaker’s bureaus) are handled much better.
• The information on contracts also feels skimpy. I expected to find more samples and a richer resource here. Perhaps the rationale here is that wealthy speakers delegate the contract work to staff?

Third, while the table of contents is detailed, there’s no index or appendices (e.g. a list of all the resource websites mentioned throughout the book). This reduces the usefulness of The Wealthy Speaker as a reference tool. Maybe this will be added in the second edition?

The Bottom Line

The Wealthy Speaker is excellent value, and easily worth the purchase price. An investment of $11.53 is a small, small price for gaining so much knowledge.

About the Author – Jane Atkinson

Jane Atkinson has 15 years of experience helping speakers secure more bookings at higher fees. She is a business coach for speakers, specializing in positioning and marketing. You can read more about her on her website: Speaker Launcher.

Jane previously shared her expertise as a guest author on Six Minutes with 6 Key Steps to Dip Your Toe into the Professional Speaking Pool.

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Have a Question? Contact me anytime, or find me on Twitter: @6minutes

Andrew Dlugan is the editor and founder of Six Minutes. He teaches courses, leads seminars, coaches speakers, and strives to avoid Suicide by PowerPoint. He is an award-winning public speaker and speech evaluator. Andrew is a father and husband who resides in British Columbia, Canada.

How many times have you sat in an audience and thought to yourself: “Man, I’d like to be up there!”

Perhaps you’ve given a few presentations and you find out that you’re pretty darn good at this speaking thing. Maybe you join Toastmasters and rise to the top of your club. Some time goes by and you start thinking “I can make a living at this. Imagine getting paid to speak!”

You decide to go for it.

So what’s next?

Here are a few broad steps that you can take to get started in the world of professional speaking:

1. Pick a Lane
2. Be the Expert
3. Get Good
4. Set Up Shop
5. Creating a Great Promise
6. Develop a Marketing Program

1. Pick a Lane

The first step along your journey must be to “pick a lane.”

You need to choose a topic area to focus on, based on your expertise. Now you might say, “but I have several speeches that I’m very good at – how can I choose just one?”

Ask yourself this question: “What do I want to be known for 5 years from now?” If you don’t want to be known for anything and don’t care much about getting paid, then by all means continue with all of your speeches.

If you want to get paid well and be known as the expert on one thing, then pick a lane.

2. Be the Expert

When launching into a career as a professional speaker, many people make the mistake of thinking of themselves as just a speaker. In the big picture, however, you are the central cog of a company that helps to accomplish something.

Whether you help people manage their time better, lead others, get motivated, or be educated on the economy, your company should have a mission.

You should think about speaking as just one of the channels which you use to distribute your knowledge. You might also write books, consult, coach, run teleseminars, host retreats, etc.

The key is this: when you think about yourself, don’t narrow it down to professional speaker; be the head of an empire that helps people in your lane of expertise.

Remember that you can’t fake it. Your expertise must be real and credible. If you aren’t there yet, go out and develop your expertise before pursuing this path.

3. Get Good

Winning a speech contest is a step in the right direction towards getting good, but it doesn’t mean that people are going to pay you.

The real test to knowing when your speech has “made it” is when someone comes up to you after your presentation and says “I’d like to book you to speak six months from now in Las Vegas.”

When spin-off, which is king in our business, is happening on average 2-3 times after every engagement, then you can stop working on your speech. Until then, work the speech. [Ed.: spin-off refers to a future speaking engagement you gain as a direct consequence of your present engagement]

4. Set Up Shop

The speaking business is like any business. If you don’t have an entrepreneurial bone in your body, you may be in for hardship.

To get started, you need cash flow – start up capital. If you are starting on a shoe string, then you are going to find it more difficult. That said, with today’s technical world, things are a bit more possible.

For instance, you can use a blog as your website and manage it yourself. If it looks professional enough, then you might be able to save the costs of setting up and managing a website which can creep into the thousands depending on your supplier.

The key is to be able to communicate what you can do for people within 15 seconds of their arrival to your site. In our ADD web world, you don’t have long to impress someone. [Ed.: ADD = attention deficit disorder]

If they don’t see what they are looking for, they will abandon your website in a heartbeat.

5. Creating a Great Promise

The promise statement is the key to communicating your value to your prospects.

It’s like a tag line and would go on your website and marketing pieces. In five to nine words (less is more), the promise statement tells prospects what they will get by working with you.

For example, a speaker who delivers programs on team-building might create a promise “Helping Teams Win in a Competitive Field.”

You can work on making your promise more clever or reflective of your personality, but the real key is to show the outcome and the value, and to get that decision maker to lean in and say “Yes, we need that!”

6. Develop a Marketing Program

Now obviously I’m simplifying here, but once your website is up, you’ll want to create a flow of traffic to it.

You’ll want to choose industries that would be a good fit for your message and start a marketing campaign that will allow you to position with those groups as an expert.

I often recommend to my clients that they start a twelve month marketing calendar. The goal is to develop a list of followers by having people sign up for something on your website. Then to stay in touch with that list on a regular basis so that when they have a need for your expertise, you are top of mind. A few marketing ideas are:

• developing articles for your target markets
• postcard campaigns
• e-mail campaigns
• direct mail
• utilizing social media
• teleclasses

In my opinion (which comes from 20 years of working inside this field) it takes 3 years to launch a professional speaking career. Of course, there have been a few exceptions. But if you are determined to dive in and earn a living in the world of professional speaking you’ll need to pick a lane, establish your expertise, get good on the platform and develop a consistent marketing campaign.

And if you do all that and show your clients the outcome that they will get by working with you, then you will be on your way to becoming a wealthy speaker.

Similar Articles You May Like... Book Review: The Wealthy Speaker by Jane Atkinson Book Review: Confessions of a Public Speaker (Scott Berkun) What Does Your Personal Brand Say About You as a Speaker? Make Money Speaking – Book Review: Rain Making (Ford Harding)

Have a Question? Contact me anytime, or find me on Twitter: @6minutes

Jane Atkinson is the author of The Wealthy Speaker: The Proven Formula for Building Your Professional Speaking Business. She is a business coach for speakers, specializing in positioning and marketing. For more information, visit Jane’s website: Speaker Launcher.