Black Friday Special! E-Course 50% Off!

Quick update to let you know a GREAT DEAL I’ve put up, for today only!

You can get my 3-module e-course, How to Launch Your Speaking Ministry, for 50% off. Today only, it’s just $25!

Here’s what it teaches you:

Module 1: Preparing the Foundation

• Develop Your Signature Talk
• Identify Your Niche
• Write a Tagline
• Get Everything in Place to Generate Word of Mouth: know how you’ll follow up; have beginning promotional materials; make yourself easy to find
• Learn How to Record Yourself
• Learn the 25 Easiest Groups to Speak to–and how to find them!
• Get Your Friends Working on Your Behalf!

And you’ll learn the big mistake beginning speakers often make that jeopardizes word of mouth and their ability to get larger engagements later!

Module 2: Capturing their Attention, and Keeping It!

• Learn How to Collect Email Addresses, and what to do with them!
• Find the 3 Best Methods to Make Your Talk Effective: The more effective, the more they’ll recommend you!
• Discover the Keys to Making Organizers Happy, so they’ll recommend you!
• Cure Your Speaking Foibles–and banish your “ummmms, you knows”
• Generate Testimonials
• Record yourself, both in audio and video, to use later!

Module 3: Creating Professional Materials

• Edit and Create Demo CDs, which you can also sell at engagements
• Create video clips on YouTube
• Create a testimonial video
• Print up one-sheets
• Develop a Fee Schedule that Works for Everyone!

You’ll learn the secrets to setting your fees, helping people find you, and giving off a professional, competent appearance.

Find out more here, today only!

Use Your Words: Marketing Your Book

Every Tuesday at noon EST when I’m not speaking, I host a BlogTalkRadio show dedicated specifically to speaking! This week we went off the reservation a bit to talk not just about speaking, but also about how to market your book.

Normally I just do a condensed version of the show on the blog, so that people can catch what they missed listening to, and I’ll try to do that here, too. But I’ve got to tell you, this show was packed with really useful ideas, and so you really need to listen!

Here, though, is the nutshell version:

The key to marketing is not to create an audience for your book. It’s not even to bring the audience to you. The key to marketing is to figure out where your audience already is, and then go and stand in front of them!

You basically have two main circles of influence to do that in. You have those people that you know in person and will meet in person, and you have the online world. You can’t ignore either sphere. The people that you know personally you have a deeper relationship with, and you’re more likely to be able to sell to them. But they’re such a small proportion of the population. You also need to reach out to the masses. So you need a wide reach on one hand, and a deep reach on the other. Let’s look at how to handle both these groups:

A. Marketing to Your Personal Spheres of Influence

1. Ask your friends for help

Send out an email to your friends announcing your new book. But don’t JUST announce your new book. Figure out who the main reader of the book will be, and what their main problem is. Is it young Christian moms? Is it recovering alcoholics? Is it men who have just been through a divorce?

In your email, say this clearly, like this:

“I know single, Christian women will really appreciate this book. Can you do me a favour and forward this email to FIVE single, Christian women that you know? Thanks so much!”

Ironically, naming a number, like five, makes it far more likely that the email will be forwarded. If you just say, “forward this email to single, Christian women” people won’t do it, because they don’t have an easy way to measure how big a task that is. Specify a number, and they’ll do it!

2. Figure out Where People Meet

What is the main problem your book is addressing? Or if it isn’t addressing a problem (let’s say it’s a women’s devotional), then think about the key people in your niche, and ask what problems they have.

Here’s why: people are more likely to meet to solve a problem then just to be together. So you have support groups for everything under the sun. Figure that out, and then contact those groups.

B. The Online World

The online world works on RELATIONSHIPS, not on marketing. If you start a blog, or start a Facebook page or a Twitter account where your main goal is to sell your book, and you make this obvious, you won’t be successful.

For your presence to be felt online, you have to participate in conversations that are already occurring. So start a blog where you talk about the problems your niche group faces (again, people are more likely to go online looking for answers to problems).

Then find people on Twitter who talk about those problems. Identify two or three good influences, and look at who they follow. Chances are they will follow people similar to your niche. Follow them, too.

Then just start participating in conversations. Share great YouTube videos. Retweet people. Put up interesting content.

Yes, you can share your book, but it is actually better to develop a relationship first, so that you stand out in the crowd and you build goodwill.

For instance, I once saw a tweet from a woman who was looking for a specific knitting pattern. I knew where to find it, and I tweeted her the link. It took me about 45 seconds. Now I love to knit, but my books have nothing to do with knitting. But that woman was so grateful, and she remembered me, that now she retweets almost everything I post about marriage. I made a connection by doing something helpful.

That sounds like a lot of work, you say. Yep. It does. But that’s what online marketing is. Try to schedule a little bit of time everyday to read through people’s tweets and respond, and to post interesting stuff on Facebook. If people think of you as someone who collects information in your niche, they’re more likely to listen to you when you talk about your book!

That’s the quick synopsis of the show, but there is so much more there. So listen in to this 30 minute recording, and take notes!

And if you want to know more about how to build an online community, my download, Build Your Online Community, is invaluable!

5 Ways to Make the Most of your First Speaking Engagement

So you’ve been working hard and you’ve landed your first speaking engagement! You’re so excited, but you’re scared at the same time. Will you make a fool out of yourself? Will people like you?

If you want to grow your speaking ministry, then you’ll also want to make the most out of this speaking engagement, so that it will spread word of mouth about you, and help you to garner even more engagements. You don’t want to speak once and then be back where you started: with no prospects in sight.

So here are steps to take to make sure you grow buzz about your speaking ministry:

1. Give a GREAT Talk

That’s the hard part, I know, but you’ve been building towards this for a while. You deserve to give it your absolute best shot.

And don’t be too nervous about it. Remember that chances are most of the audience won’t know it’s your first engagement. Don’t volunteer that bit of information, either, or else they’ll start getting nervous for you. Just walk up there, with confidence, knowing that God has put you here.

And how do you give a great talk? You don’t want to preach at your audience; you want to take them on a journey so they’re ready to hear your central message, and they’re ready to listen to God. Telling them a bunch of facts won’t work; connecting on both an intellectual and emotional level will. If you’re unsure of how to do this, I have an audio download, with a great handout, that will take you step by step in how to prepare a talk. It’s almost a fill-in-the-blanks thing, and will help you identify your central, unique message. Find out more with this audio download, Craft Your Signature Talk.

2. Record Yourself

In the future, you’re going to get speaking engagements through word of mouth, and that’s going to work best when women’s ministry leaders who may hire you can actually “hear” you. So record yourself. Later, you can use that recording to make a 2-3 minute video and audio clip to put on your website.

Don’t worry if you don’t know how to do that. Don’t even worry if you don’t have a website yet. Just record yourself, and then when you are ready, you’ll have something to work with. But if you don’t record yourself now, you can’t get that opportunity back.

Here’s a great recorder that works for me. You’ll need an external microphone, too, to pick up your voice the best.

3. Collect Email Addresses

Hold a draw for a prize, or something, and ask people to fill out a ballot with their name on it. Provide a box they can check if they want your newsletter about (whatever your main message is). Don’t just offer your newsletter; few will take it. But if you present it like this:

• Monthly Newsletter with Devotional
• Monthly Ezine on Christian friendship
• Monthly Ezine with Mom Tips
• Monthly Ezine with God’s Encouragement

Or whatever may be relevant in your case, more people will check the box. With this method, you’ll likely get about 30% of people signing up for your newsletter, which isn’t bad. You don’t want people to HAVE to enter their email address to win, though, because it’s more likely they’ll treat your emails as spam.

4. Take Pictures

Hand your camera to someone who looks like they know how to use it, and ask them to take as many pictures as they can while you’re up there. Take pictures around the table, too. Just take as many as you can, because you can use these later on Facebook, on a blog, on your website, or even on promotional materials.

5. Get testimonials

If anyone tells you that they really enjoyed you, ask if they’d mind emailing that to you. Or ask for their email address, and then email them afterwards and ask if you can quote them on that.

Send an email to the person who organized the event, and ask her for her feedback. The more testimonials you have, the better it will be for your website!

Even if you don’t have all the pieces in place yet to promote yourself, if you follow these steps, then when you do have a website running, and a newsletter running, and a Facebook presence, you’ll have content. So don’t ignore these beginning engagements. Use them for all you can get out of them! And remember: God is opening doors. Step through them!

Live Blogging Marketing Conference–Tomorrow!

Hello, all my marvelous followers! I know a few hundred of you receive this blog by email, and I wanted to let you know about something exciting happening tomorrow!

Right now I’m in the Toronto airport, heading for Chicago, where my agent is having a marketing seminar all day tomorrow. We’ll be talking about building your platform, using social media well, creating your brand, and more!

I want to let you know some of this great information, so I’ll be live blogging and Tweeting and updating my Facebook page throughout the day. So please, drop in, listen, and ask questions. Maybe I can pass them along to the speakers!

Use Your Words: When Your Ministry is Stuck in a Rut

I received a wall post on our Facebook group a while back from a speaker who said:

Last year I had many speaking engagements, but this year I only have one. And I have no more down the pipeline. What should I do?

Excellent question, and today on Use Your Words, my BlogTalkRadio show, I addressed just that. You can listen in here, but here are the highlights:

1. Make Sure Word of Mouth is in Place

Speakers tend to get hired because of word of mouth. Someone hears you speak, and then they recommend you. That’s why you MUST collect email addresses everytime you speak. Give away a door prize that they can win if they sign up for your newsletter. Then send that newsletter out about every 4-6 weeks so you stay in people’s minds.

Set up a Facebook Page (or let people subscribe to your Facebook account) so that they keep you in mind and can find you if they need to.

Make it easy for people to recommend you. If you haven’t been saving email addresses, likely you still have some. Go back and get the addresses from those you spoke to last year, and send them a newsletter, mentioning what you’re doing, and ask them to pass it on to other women’s ministry leaders.

2. Let Your Friends Know

Friends can be the best at generating word of mouth, but often they forget because they don’t think of you as a speaker. Send an email blast to all your friends asking them to recommend you as a speaker to anyone they know in women’s ministry. Every few days, post on Facebook what you’re doing with speaking–writing a new talk, preparing a new retreat, going over pictures from a previous speaking engagement. Remind them you’re a speaker. And then every week or so, post an actual request for engagements. “Anyone know of a church looking for a women’s speaker for a spring outreach? I’m booking up now for the spring! Contact me (or pass my name on)”

3. Ask Friends About Who They Know

Take a few minutes and brainstorm every person you know who attends a different church than you. Then start contacting them and asking the name of the women’s ministry coordinator. Now you’re ready with an introduction to that church. Following the steps on how to Cold Call to get speaking engagements, email and mention your friend’s name.

4. Jazz Up your Website

If you’re going through a downtime, take some time to jazz up your online presence. Make sure your website is top notch. Hire a designer if you need to. Prepare a short video with clips of you speaking. Post your testimonials. And prepare your Facebook page.

5. Research Workshop Opportunities

Workshops can be a wonderful way to generate word of mouth, because most take place at conferences with women from different churches attending. See which conferences are coming your way this spring or next fall, and then contact the organizer to do a workshop. Speaking to a group of 50, with 30 churches represented, is more beneficial marketing-wise than speaking to a group of 200 all from one church.

6. Get Listed in Your Denomination

Finally, make sure your denomination knows about you. While it’s fine to speak from any denomination, often the only one who will explicitly advertise you is your own. So find out if your denomination has a state or national women’s ministry coordinator, and a website. If they do, send in a DVD or a CD of your talk, and ask to be listed as a potential speaker.

Sometimes we all go through downtimes, and it’s easy to get depressed. But it’s pretty normal in the speaking world. So take these downtimes as an opportunity to make sure all your marketing and word of mouth generating tools are in place, and then start reaching out. You just may find your schedule books up quickly!

You can listen to the whole Use Your Words show here.

If you want more information on how to generate more bookings, my practical audio download, “How to Get Better Bookings”, is an invaluable aid. Find out more here.