S**t! The Speaker's Overran!

We've all been there - watched and listened to a speaker talking for longer than they should.  Sometimes they are politely stopped by the Chair or MC, on occasion, forcibly ( and fun to watch) while other times you simply can't interrupt.

Sometime, speakers over running can save lives such as the case I heard of 30 years ago about an Army troop due to catch a ferry but first had to sit through a presentation. The speaker, a very high ranking senior officer, over ran, causing just over 300 troops to miss the Ferry.  There is no possible way to stop such a Speaker of this type in mid flow due to their seniority and, as they were not a professional speaker, but merely someone thinking they were 'rallying the troops', they had no concept of the length of their speech and just ploughed on regardless. This presentation was being held in Belgium and the ferry everyone was due to catch: the MS Herald of Free Enterprise. At the time, it was a logistical nightmare for events organiser because of people rushing around scrambling for cars and kit the moment the speech ended,  all trying to get off base at the same time. It's only in hindsight that you realise the impact of how costly that particular event's running over could have turned out.

But while most events won't ever have as a dramatic hindsight bonus for a speaker over running most are never the less left with the issues it causes:

• Audienced stressed for missing travel connections, or prearranged meetings or food
• The Venue's kitchen juggling the timing of the food or trying to keep it hot without spoiling
• Another speaker or speakers having to cut their presentation time down or even step aside
• Quietly trying to admonish the guilty speaker while they feel like they've delivered more value by over running and that you should be grateful to them!

Speakers who over run their allocated time simply are not thinking about you nor the event nor your audience.  Members of the audience do plan things around your event or the speaker they've solely come to see and while the speaker demands respect for the audience not to leave during their presentation, so then must it be a two way street and the speaker must respect the audience's time.

To prevent this, make sure your process:

1. Clearly states what time you want the speaker to go on the stage and to leave by and what they are to do there when on the stage.
2. Make is clear to the speaker what you are going to do as a count down timer incase they do forget about timing or their own stop watch has stopped working
3. Make it clear to the speaker what will happen when they have reached the end of their time - how you will be asking them to leave the stage
4. Tell the audience during, 'House Rules', what will be happening about the speaker's timing notices so they know also what to expect should a speaker over run
5. Do not be afraid to brief even the highest senior ranking official, CEO or celebrity about the timing procedure as most will appreciate knowing they've only got 5 minutes left and will happily wrap things up.

Your process should have the timings in the contract and agreed to before they even get to your event.  But if you are relying on simply email exchange for them to be a speaker at your event, then it will be the little thing of one speaker over running who will ruin your day. 

Don't let speakers who continually over run damage your event and upset your audience: we don't like it and that's why we built iwantaspeaker.com

Four Critical Questions You Must Answer If You Want To Hire the Right Speaker

It can be quite Herculean to surf through the web to get the vital details you need in order to hire a Speaker. The dynamics of effective marketing, PR presentations and social media presence does not necessarily make an individual the ideal speaker at your event. The only way to ensure that you do not settle for mediocre performance at your event is to do your research. One of the ways to get the best results is to get honest answers for some of the questions that will be addressed below. In a sense, getting the right Speaker for your program is not complex if you know how to navigate the tides.

Four Questions you must answer;

1) Is the person someone who speaks for a fee at an occasion or is he a professional speaker?
This question may seem obvious to those who are trying to turn on the lights in their event planning career but it is deeper than you think. Both scenarios are ideal depending on the dynamics of your event. If you are low on budget but want to have a great speaker, you may not be able to handle the costs and logistics that go with a professional speaker. You can settle for someone who will strike the right chord in the heart of your audience without over-shooting your budget.

2) Does the Speaker adhere to a professional code of ethics?
It may be difficult to pin down a standalone speaker who manages his itinerary in this range. Most Speakers do not necessarily operate with rules because they do not belong to a professional body or association. This can prove to be a knotty issue if the speaker derails from the focus of your event when he is called to address the audience. It is Ok to stick with a Speaker if you have done your homework but it is better to run with a Speaker that adheres to a professional code of ethics.

3) How easy is the speaker to work with?
You do not want to have a ‘’great’’ Speaker who makes your event planning tedious. There are so many stories about speakers who make extreme demands that may scuttle the success of the event if it is not properly handled. You can stay clear from this dilemma by booking speakers from a certified platform. This gives you the opportunity to have good knowledge about the speaker and the things you should expect at your event.

4) What impact will this Speaker have on your attendees long after the presentation is over?
The essence of organizing an event is to bring value to everyone who attends the program. You may have the right concepts, designs and marketing prowess but it all comes down to the performance of the speaker. It is important to connect with someone who has the requisite knowledge, charisma and ability to deliver if you truly want to have a successful event.

The safe rule is that you can book speakers only when you have done a thorough research and you have a process in place detailing how you are going to work with the speakers.  Not all speakers will want to use your process which is great because you only want those who do and will suit your event.

iwantaspeaker.com is based on the same process as used by the professional bureaus to engage their speakers on behalf of their clients.  iwantaspeaker is opening this process to anyone who books and works with speakers, providing everyone a professional standard when working with paid speakers as well as Speakers on Pro Bono.  

The iwantaspeaker.com process ensures Speakers who have the right experience needed for the audience are quickly highlighted while those Speakers who do not have the experience required or are unwilling to be Reviewed afterwards.  Giving a perfect process for contracting and working together. 

Signs to look for when finding a true professional speaker

If you are going to get a group of people into a room all at the same time who would all rather be somewhere else, you’d better have a good reason, good content, good information for them to be there.

Often the answer to this is:- "Yes I do".  After all you wouldn’t be doing this now would you!

However, to think this far and then concentrate on venue, the chair layout the seating, the guest list and then think about who is going to be delivering this content, imparting information or being the reason enough for the audience wanting to be there is usually left to last minute or given little credit. 

Well that’s just like organising a wedding, hiring the venue, working out the colour, sending out invites and then working out who the Bride and Groom should be!

In today’s connected world, audiences are wanting more and more ‘content’.

The biggest insight I’ve seen is the growth of Tech being used by the events industry in order to plan, plot and pre-engage with the audience and then use it to try and continue engagement during and after the event too.

Then they think about speakers….

The truly professionals speakers are used to dealing with those who are savvy enough to ask, to help you engage with your audience BEFORE the event, as well as AFTER.  Some professional speakers offer pre event and post event follow-up email messages – (in marketing speaker: we now call it nurture and drip campaigns), while others offer conference calls and mini consultations.

However, the true professional speaker also now understands they have to contend with technology while they are on the stage, but not many can actually handle it.

Traditionally we called it heckling.  Nowadays it’s called, ‘interaction and engagement’.

So for a true professional speaker who can handle today’s fast pace changing world, make sure your speaker can:

•   Manage taking questions and providing answers almost as if ‘off-the-cuff’, if they can’t they don’t have depth of knowledge greater than that of your audience
•  Interact and be comfortable with social media, live feed and audience apps while they are on stage – if they can’t deal with this, it means they might not be confident in their presentation enough to allow for distractions
•  Offer your audience tasters and teasers before the event and provide relevant follow up info – if they can’t, you will have more workload to do in order to get, keep and build audience loyalty.
•  Ensure their message is on task and about your event and not promoting themselves – if you use a speaker’s standard template email, chances are YOU are promoting them rather than the speaker writing something for you and your audience to promote YOU and YOUR EVENT which means you’ve just given your audience’s loyalty to the speaker.

When you engage with a speaker, always think how they can help you, pre, during and post the event and then make sure it’s down in writing in a contract.  It’s why we build such a flexible speaker management booking process to cover their involvement from start to finish of the event and not just for the speaking bit.

Using iwantaspeaker.com will help you standardise the process of working with speakers.

How to engage speakers like the professionals

Have you ever wondered how the speaker bureaus manage to find and suggest speakers who are always so professional and won’t let you down?

You are probably thinking it’s because of years of experience in the industry and being so well connected they’ve gained respect and attraction from the speakers as being the reason.

And if you have, I bet you’ve also thought that it would be wonderful if ALL the speakers that didn’t come via a bureau were just as professional as those that did.  And it’s at this point, you’ve probably assumed that because those speakers who are not with a bureau is because they are not professional or famous enough and therefore not worthy of justifying the bureaus hefty price tag.

What you have just done is assumed the “Value + Content = Worth” equation.

The truth is, using a bureau is not an option when you have a limited budget or even no budget. But you can still work out the V+C=W equation with a good speaker management process.

Bureaus and some speakers rely on you making assumptions as this allows them to drive up the price. However, justifying the price is a little more tricky as not all well known famous names are able to deliver a speech of value or with content as much as we would like whereas an unknown but practicing CEO is able to give invaluable insights and content rich and delivers well above their worth.

If you want to book the speakers who can deliver the Value + Content = Worth equation without the additional commission costs, all you need to do is standardise your procedure for booking and working with speakers.

• Have a system where all speakers have to send you the minimum amount of information about themselves which enables you to quickly work out if they could be suitable BEFORE you decide to use them at your next event.
• Have proper Contracts with Terms & Conditions that you send to each and every speaker even if it’s a pro bono slot
• Have a payment method system speakers can understand and trust
• Have a two way feedback process which you are willing to be open about. 

By having a simple process which standardises the way you work with speakers – not matter paid or unpaid, you will find that those who want to work with you will adapt to your process and do what you require.

It’s why we built iwantaspeaker.com – providing you a professional process to standardise working with speakers.