James Marshall Reilly - One Great Speech: Secrets, Stories, and Perks of the Paid Speaking Industry (And How You Can Break In)

Copyright 2020 by James Marshall Reilly

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Reilly, James Marshall, author.

Title: One great speech : secrets, stories, and perks of the paid speaking industry (and how you can break in) / James Marshall Reilly.

Description: Naperville, IL : Sourcebooks, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019053663 (hardcover)

Subjects: LCSH: Public speaking--Vocational guidance.

Classification: LCC PN4098 .R45 2020 | DDC 808.5/1023--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019053663

For Elizabeth and River

Table of Contents

Introduction

What would you say if I told you that you could make an additional $5,000 per year by only putting in a few hours of work?

How about $10,000?

What would you say if I told you that you could make an additional $100,000 per year with no special skills or additional education and no up-front investment other than a few hours of your own time?

And what would you say if I told you that you could quit your current jobif you wanted toand make more money by simply sharing your own story ?

I must be crazy. Right?

I assure you, Im not.

Welcome to the largely misunderstood, highly secretive, enormously lucrative paid speaking industry.

A $100 million industry with little transparency and few barriers to entry. And yet very few people understand how it works, or how to tap into it. Or, if they think they know, the information they have is often incorrect because it wasnt explained to them by someone on the inside.

On top of that, there are very few outside resources that make this information available. While there are a ton of books on speech prep, speech delivery, and how to speak for free, there arent any books that explain how to actually get paid to speak.

Yet there are thousandsif not tens of thousandsof organizations in America that pay for speeches each year. Global opportunities make this market even larger. As a speaking agent, over the course of just a few years, I generated in excess of $25 million in offers for my clients.

And that $25 million is only a fraction of the money out there. As an agent, Ive had more money turned down by speakers than booked. In fact, as an agency owner, my agents and I once had a cumulative sum of $1 million turned down in a matter of hours . And of course, as an individual agentand even as an agency ownerI represented only a tiny segment of the total market.

Plus, its likely that youve never even heard of most of the people I booked. They werent famous politicians. They werent celebrities. For the most part, they werent household names. They were ordinary people. Schoolteachers. College professors. Small business owners. Nonprofit founders. Health experts. Cancer survivors. Because speaking builds profiles and visibility fast, you may be familiar with some of these speakers nowbut the point is that anyone can participate in the highly lucrative paid speaking business that is, if they know how.

But, you say, weve heard grandiose claims like this before.

In 2009, Tim Ferriss and The 4-Hour Workweek made an equally extraordinary promise: Escape 95, live anywhere, and join the new rich.

By working only four hours a week. Half a day.

The brilliance of this promise is obvious; its so big and so compelling that everyone wants to sign on. In fact, there have been a ton of other life-hack books that offer ways to get rich quick and free up time.

But what Im outlining in One Great Speech will be, for most people, a far more accessible and actionable version of this same promise: work less and earn more . For some, what Im offering in this book might manifest as a four-hour workweek. And, for a handful of people, it might even manifest as a four-hour work month. A week or a month in which you fly, all expenses paidoften first classto a speaking engagement. A single speaking engagement for which youll be paid four, five, or potentially even six figures.

How many offers you accept, and how much you earn, is largely controlled by you. And you dont need to own a company or to have done something extraordinary to join the party. You just need a story. A story you already have.

In my experience, everyone wants to be a speaker. TED made speaking sexy. And TEDx made speaking accessible to the masses. But the thing is, TED and TEDx dont pay speakers. And getting paid to speak is much better than speaking for freeeven at TED. Paid speakers are the new rock stars. And the money can be huge .

In this book I am going to explain every detail and inside secret of the paid speaking industry so that anyoneand everyonecan monetize it. I am going to invite regular people to participate in what is one of the most misunderstood and surprisingly accessible markets available for personal wealth-building in the world today. I will also expose the inner workings of this elusive and lucrative industry and the people who inhabit it.

If you think that the kind of democratization and market creation Im talking about isnt possible or hasnt been done beforethat inviting normal people into what has traditionally been a closed marketplace cant be doneyoure wrong. Consider Uber and Airbnb.

In 2011, Uber launched to the masses with a unique value proposition: You own a car, so let us help you monetize it. What made Uber so successful was that it repositioned the concept of owning a car by presenting it in a different lightyour car is a distressed asset, and one you can put into service. Uber invited people to be taxi drivers who would have otherwise never considered driving taxis. They invited new peoplenew driversinto a market in which very few car owners had previously participated. Actors, students, retirees, the unemployed, and others suddenly had the meansand better yet, the opportunity and mindsetto generate additional income by putting their car to work for them.

A few years earlier, in 2008, Airbnb launched to the masses with an equally compelling promise: We can help you cover your mortgage or your rent, or simply add to your bottom line, by providing a bridge to positive revenue based on leveraging something you already haveyour home. Just like Uber, Airbnb invited people into an income-generating market in which most had not previously participated.