Tweet

Speak Up! Get out there and find an audience for what you do.

Guest post by: Liz Walker

Article Overview: One of the best business building tactics is to demonstrate your knowledge to a receptive audience. It pays to be able to speak well in public and of course it helps if you have a little charm as well.

Speak Up! Get out there and find an audience for what you do.

Speak Up! Get out there and find an audience for what you do.

One of the greatest fears that people have is public speaking - people would rather deal with snakes, spiders even death rather than have to get up and speak to an audience. It's too bad because one of the best business building tactics is to demonstrate your knowledge to a receptive audience. It pays to be able to speak well in public and of course it helps if you have a little charm as well.

Public speaking is particularly effective if your business has a service or consulting component (actually if you are not selling services along with products you may be missing a high-margin bet). People like to be educated rather than sold, so if you are an expert in say, interior decorating or adventure tours, you could hold a seminar entitled "The Ten Interior Decorating Improvements that Increase Your Home's Value Most" or "Planning an Adventure You'll Remember for the Rest of Your Life." Retail shop owners can offer in-store demos or hands on workshops like the ones you see at Home Depot and the other "big box" stores.

Naturally you won't have time to provide all the secrets you have learned about your subject in these sessions; after all, this is your business and you don't want to make yourself redundant. But if you carefully plan an interesting agenda that informs, educates, and whets the appetite of the attendees you'll likely get some inquiries on using your services - not everyone wants to do-it-themselves!

And what's more, you will have identified yourself to people who are obviously interested in what you provide, or why would they even come? If you want to make sure they're the right people, identify who should attend. You could say something like, "This seminar is for you if you are thinking of selling your home in the next six months." or "If you have never been on an adventure vacation, this is the seminar for you."

But whatever you do, be sure to plan your program and do a few practice run throughs. You'll need to see how much time it will take - count on it taking longer than planned. Make sure there's a two-way communication with the audience; ask for questions from time to time.

Have some handouts like a sheet of "tips and tricks" insider techniques that you use to do what you do. Or give samples of your product.

If you're going to do this more than one time, ask for feedback, hand out a survey form at the end to ask how you did or what could be added.

And if you're really serious about building business, hold a draw for a small prize of some kind and in doing so, get everyone's name and contact info. Put a check box on the entry form asking if they'd like more information from you. If they say "yes" you have permission to market to them in the future.

Public speaking can open a lot of doors. Try it and see.

Related Articles
  Speak Everywhere
  WOW Them With Your Speech
  How to Get Booked With No Cold Calling!
  9 Simple Tips for Better Presentations
  Start Your Webinar Planning From Your Audience's Point of View

Article Tags: adventure tours, adventure vacation, appetite, attendees, bet, business building, fears, home depot, improvements, inquiries, interior decorating, prac, receptive audience, rest of your life, retail shop, selling your home, six months, snakes, spiders, store demos
Referred by: http://www.makingprofitspour.com



Related Forum Posts
Re: How many nationalities are on the forum? - Hi Rainmaker, So how many language can you speak? Kevin it is also good to be able to understand Cantonese even though you don't speak it well.
Creating an online business - Hi Praveenv, Setting up an online business in itself is not too difficult. All you need is a website and a way to process payment. PayPal is a great example of an easy to use payment processing company. Then you'll need to find a product to sell. There are affiliate programs like Commission Junction or ClickBank where you can find many different vendors who are looking for distributors. Every time you make a sale, you get paid. Going through C/J or C/B is easy because they track everything and take care of paying you. If you are sourcing your own products then you will need a distributor agreement between yourself and the other company. It outlines things such as how much you get paid, what your responsibilities are, are you the exclusive distributor or not, etc. You should speak with a local lawyer to get this agreement hammered out for you. You should also formally setup a company and business number. This is usually done through a local government office but I cannot speak for how it is done in your country. Good luck!
Re: Twitter vs Facebook - Twitter is strong for quick easy messaging that can reach a wide audience. Facebook takes a bit of work, but can yield great rewards with a little bit of money, the UMV of Facebook is: 131,962,360 users. A massive potential audience.
Re: How many nationalities are on the forum? - Hey, Kev: I call myself Canadian ... but I can't speak French! :-[ My oldest granddaughter just started Play School (I think that's what they call it) and she is enrolled in the French Immersion class. That is great! I think it is valuable to be able to speak more than one language, and I think it also helps to stretch the mind and exercise the brain. GT :-]
Re: The Importance of Testing - Interesting post but I don't agree that many businesses happened by accident. It is always good to thoroughly research your idea to see if there is a demand for it. Its also good to start out small and then add more as you find an audience. At that point, you might find that you need to adjust your original item and add other products or services to fill the needs of your customers. Using that approach with marketing is also good to test the waters and then expand the promotional techniques that work the best for you. Chris


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Too Many Sales Reps Are Wimps

How To Be Happy at Work? Acknowledge Yourself

You Have A Website What Now

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.