Wish: Public Speaker Obstacle: No money Need help

[Diamondtaylor893]

Wish: Public Speaking Obstacle: No money... Need help... with booking I have put together workshops & seminars on a variety of subjects. I have done workshops before(...ie for my job), but this will be my first time putting them together myself, from start to finish. I could really use all the help I can get. It is really scary stepping out on your own. Thanks in advance, Diamond

[DStaub11]

Dear Diamond, What kinds of topics are you presenting? If we know that, we may be able to help with ideas for venues. Do Mi, also a workshop presenter

[susiew]

Hi there, Are you in Toastmasters? I've found the support from every group I've been in to be tremendous when I'm pursuing endeavors. Most members seem to be self-employed and many want to be motivational speakers. I'm probably stating the obvious but I hope you can find help from TM! Good luck, Susie

[cleger]

How about this service? From what I was reading, there is a small fee to join, but it is refundable if it doesn't work out. Once I get my act together, I'm going to give them a try. http://www.speakermatch.com/

[thejuicywoman]

Hi Diamond, You may like to check out your local Kiwanis, Lions or Rotary Clubs. They are always looking for free speakers on new interesting topics. Have you considered doing radio as well? They are also always looking for fresh topics and interesting speakers. You can check out http://www.radio-locator.com to find out where the stations are and what format they are and the audience they serve. Let me know how it goes. Thanks, Andrea

[Tituba]

A good book is: \"Speak and Grow Rich\" http://www.amazon.com/Speak-Grow-Rich-D ... 919&sr=8-1

[thejuicywoman]

Hi, Tituba's post reminded me of another great source of information. Another good book by an author whose class I attended is: Grow Rich by Speaking by Mark Rosenberger, CSP (Certified Speaking Professional of National Speakers Association) Free--Six session e-course with audio. Discover How to \"Grow Rich by Speaking for FREE!\" You can get more info for free goodies from Mark at http://www.growrichbyspeaking.com Enjoy! Andrea

[DesireeSommer]

Lots of times local colleges will have small one or two day classes for the community with local people giving workshops and lectures on a wide variety of topics. In my town there are classes on hula dancing, aromatherapy, candlemaking, learning Microsoft Word, ghost tours of the town, beermaking, thai cooking, financial planning, workshop on how to start your own b and b, etc. So that might be a great place to work out your first few runs on your own! You could call your nearest college and see who you could talk to get a position. Another great place where you can find local instructors doing little classes and workshops like this is the YWCA or YMCA, so you could look into that as well! Sounds exciting! Desiree

[thejuicywoman]

Hi, I recently went on the website of a local college in New York and submitted a proposal in outline form of what I wanted to offer to speak about. I help women to overcome food and body obsession using a non diet approach along with teaching stress relief techniques. Within a few hours of my submission, I received a response from the Dean of the Adult Learning division of the school, indicating that she wanted to receive a copy of my resume and for me to make an appointment with her assistant. I followed up and since have met with the Dean and gotten approval to do a course in June. After having secured that gig, I then went to my local YMCA and offered to teach my program there, telling them about the program that I will be running in June. They got very excited and we're now in the process of finalizing the details of my workshop with them for a 60/40 split in their favor. If you consider that your program is a public service, and necessary to help people to enjoy a better quality of life, then you will have many avenues open to you to share and teach your information. There is one other thing to consider that I recently learned. The National Speakers' Association Chapter in New York City is offering a mentor program for newbie speakers. I don't know if there is a fee attached to this or specifically how it works, but it will give inexperienced speakers a chance to get mentoring from well seasoned professionals and both the pro and the learner will commit to doing presentations for each other as part of the learning process. If you want more information on that, you can visit NSA website at http://www.nsa.org. The contact for the New York chapter is Timothy Walker, TJ Walker. I also ran across a video on the NSA website done by Fred Gleeck explaining how you can leverage your content for cash. It' might be worth a peek. Here's the link for that too: http://www.speakingchannel.tv/community ... yc-part-2/ Now there's another avenue that you can pursue and it will also increase your quality of life. Cruise lines are desperately seeking enrichment speakers, people who can do lectures onboard during the cruise. You don't have to be a professional speaker or have any credibility other than loving your topic and being able to speak passionately about it. In order to get approval from the cruise lines, you have to be able to impress them with your versatility in speaking, which means that you want to be able to offer them several different proposals to do three basic kinds of lectures. The first is a topic considered of general interest like weight loss, writing, parenting, anything that fits the bill of what people need on a daily basis. The second is a destination driven topic which is based on enriching their knowledge of the ports that you will visit on your cruise, the third is a basic arts and crafts session lecture. The thing is once you get approval from a cruise line, you have it for life, which means that you and a traveling companion will be able to cruise free in exchange for running your lectures on board. On average, you would just do 3 one hour lectures over the course of a 7 day cruise. If you have a book to sell, you would also get to sell it directly through the gift shop and they would also arrange a book signing party for you onboard. Lots of perqs are given to enrichment speakers who speak on cruise ships but don't just call the cruise lines and ask about how to do it, because you would reveal yourself as an amateur. There's a guy named Daniel Hall who teaches speakers specifically what to do to get approved. To get the best information on this and to learn specifically how to get approved, read Daniel Hall's book, Speakers Cruise Free. You can get more information on Daniel's books and programs helping speakers to get booked on cruise ships by going to http://www.speakerscruisefree.com/cruise-free.html I hope that helps. If you have any other questions that I can answer, please email me at andrea@thejuicywoman.com Happy speaking, Andrea

[Tituba]

Great info juicy! I'm adding this thread to the Resources forum.

[thejuicywoman]

Thank you, Tituba. It looks like we're both burning the midnight oil. Warmest regards, Andrea

[Tituba]

Yeah, isn't peri-men fun. There are alot of women awake at 3am.

[thejuicywoman]

Yup. Wouldn't it be a kick to arrange a chat session of all of us insomniacs? Who knows what fun things we could talk about? I'm off to get some zzzzss. Sleep well. Andrea