100 Tips On How To Become A Motivational Speaker

(HUGE Giveaway: in honor of our 100th episode, we’re doing a big giveaway including lifetime access to The Speaker Lab Community + a 30 minute Skype call with me to help with your speaking business. It’s free to enter. Get all the details here.To celebrate the 100th episode of The Speaker Lab podcast, we decided to compile a list of 100 tips on how to become a motivational speaker (note: if you read ‘motivational speaker’ and immediately think of Matt Foley from SNL, just know these tips apply to all speakers. But how great was Chris Farley as that character? 😃

(Note: if you’d prefer to listen to my velvety pipes share these 100 tips with you through your ear buds, click the audio player above or download episode 100 of The Speaker Lab podcast in your podcast app of choice) This may be the largest collection of speaking tips on the internet. We’ve broken these tips down into 11 different categories addressing all facets of speaking and running a business as a speaker. Feel free to skip around or just jump straight to the section you’re most interested in (possible to link to a link that jumps to each section?)...

1: Preparing The Talk 2: Before You Go On Stage 3: Delivering The Talk 4: Connecting With Your Audience 5: Getting Speaking Gigs 6: Fees 7: The Client 8: Building A Speaking Business 9: Growing Beyond The Stage 10: The Travel 11: Your Health

Free Bonus: Download a free PDF list of these 100 tips + links to all podcast episodes and resources mentioned.

Alright, let’s jump in....

PREPARING THE TALK1. Avoid powerpoint slides with heavy text - Often times speakers want to have Powerpoint or Keynote slides to use as notes for their presentation. This is lazy. Don’t do this. Any slides you use should be an enhancement not a replacement of your talk. If you’re just going to stand up there and read off the screen, what does the audience need you for?

2. Use powerpoint to show images that make a point - Some speakers will build their talk around their slides. Start with the talk FIRST and then (and only then) determine if slides are needed or necessary. Generally, the most effective use of slides is for showing images or videos that can’t be conveyed in words. For example, if you were in some death-defying crash and that’s part of your talk, it’s one thing to tell that story, but it’s incredibly more powerful if you show pictures or video of it all.

3. Write out your material - Professional speakers don’t just make stuff up. They don’t write a few thoughts on a notecard and then shoot from the hip for an entire presentation. They take the time to write and carefully craft their material.

4. Use humor - You don’t have to be a comedian to become a motivational speaker, but humor makes a massive difference. Humor works to endear you to an audience, but it’s also a big differentiating factor in the speaking market. Many of the top speakers in the industry use humor in their talks. (for more on using humor when speaking, check out this episode and this episode of The Speaker Lab podcast.)

5. Tell stories - Humans relate to stories. We connect to stories. Funny stories. Sad stories. Inspirational stories. We love stories. So tell them. Lots of them. Stories will keep your audience engaged and are also easier for you to memorize.

6. Tell 1st person stories - There’s nothing wrong with telling a 3rd person story or using some case study or example. Telling stories that you lived and experienced generally makes the story better for you and the audience. For the audience, they can often times find themselves in your story. For you as the speaker, it’s much easier (and more powerful) to tell a story that you lived versus one you read in a book.

7. Learn from others but don’t mimic - You’ve probably watched a lot of speakers before haven’t you? You’ve attended conferences, events, meetings or you’ve watched TED talks and YouTube videos of your favorite speakers. You know the things they do that work. It’s easy to want to just duplicate what you saw them do since you know it works. But don’t do that. Learn from why it worked and how you can incorporate a similar (but not copied) methodology into your own talks.

8. Your best marketing is a great talk - If you’re a great marketer and are awesome at getting gigs, but you suck as a speaker, you won’t last long. You can’t build a business that way. Your marketing is telling peo...