I see too many speakers, consultants, and thought-leading executives who commit to a speaking strategy built around their professional passions, interests, or favorite topics within their expertise.
Sounds like common sense, right?
Well, that would be a huge mistake. DON’T do it!
For your speaking efforts to pay off in terms of marketing results, you need to design the presentation content NOT around what YOU are passionate about, but what your buyers and prospects are passionate about!
Imagine a pair of X-ray vision goggles that you are now using to zoom in on your target clients.
Ask yourself the following:
- What do they want?
- What are they missing in their lives?
- What hurts?
- Where is the pain?
- What are they yearning for?
- What do they worry about most?
- What are their biggest headaches, heartaches, and hassles?
- What are their urgent, pervasive, and expensive problems?
Gather Live Ammo Data
What’s the first step? Research. Preparation. Homework.
Industry, regional, business, and company news is now at everyone’s fingertips online.
Look for verbatim quotes, video clips, blog entries, trade journal profiles, and podcast interviews to capture as much as you can from representative members of your buyer persona.
Then go directly to the source – YOUR real live customers and prospects.
If you’re not intelligently researching your prospects’ issues, challenges, and pressures, how can you possibly come in with credible high-perceived-value solutions?
One of the best ways to approach prospects is with:
- Interviews
- Surveys
- Research
- Data gathering
It positions you and your firm as an expert resource and it gives you valuable data you should be getting anyway!
Bottom line: for thought-leadership marketing to work for YOU, you have to be a dealer, collector, curator, and dispenser of thoughts… and one of the best ways to LEAD is to LISTEN.
The first step to improving your speaking-driven business is a realistic look at everything you’ve got going on – your marketing, messaging, packaging, your topic/niche, your prospecting, your sales approach, your fee structure, your service menu, the whole enchilada. Want an expert opinion on what’s really going on – and how to fix it? Book your free consultation call with us right here.
