The High Five

As I travel throughout the US to visit most of NSA's 39 chapters, as well as our sister associations abroad, I constantly hear about the following five key trends in the marketplace.

1. The Definition of "Speaking" is Morphing. In previous years, the term "speaker" was synonymous with a keynoter or a general session speaker, who delivered  30 to 90 minutes of their best stuff on the main stage. Today's audiences want to be more engaged, gain some insights and feel inspired in that time period. They want to learn how to leverage an opportunity, or simply make their lives better. This could come in the form of a keynote or a general session, or through facilitation, training, coaching, consulting or other offline/online delivery systems. The lines between speaking, facilitating, training and consulting are blurring. It's a package of value-added services. The more focused speakers are on presenting solutions, the more clients will value their services. Check out NSA's white paper on the Value of Professional Speaking for a list of value-added services at MyNSA.org.
2. Greater Expectations. Boomer audiences are a fairly compliant crowd. Typically, they will sit through a boring presentation, but younger audiences will not. They will start texting or even walk out! Today's audiences demand quality they cannot access via the web on their own. The solution? Professional speakers must bring their "A" game to thrive in this business. You must do your homework with clients and truly understand their opportunities or troubles. Clients want to see their fingerprints all over your speech. Some call this customizing the speech, which far exceeds putting the client's logo on your handouts. Weave in timely anecdotes, stories, examples, illustrations, best practices, etc. Show that you are a professional who has a firm grasp on their reality and shares your expertise with panache, creating a memorable experience that incites them to action.
3. Co-Creation of the Presentation. Bruce MacMillan, president and CEO of Meeting Professionals International, says that "the number one thing an audience wants is to feel involved in the actual creation and development of the session. When they are involved, they are much more connected, they feel it is more personal to them, and they get more out of it." This includes blogging them and inviting questions before the event, and building their comments into your presentation. As a professional speaker, you also have a depth of expertise that you can adjust on the fly to the needs of the audience, as well as the opportunity to continue the conversation after you finish.
4. Social Media. Social media connects you with your audience. It can also be a primary source for recommendations from within your social network or from a "Googl-ish" search in Facebook, Linked In, etc. Social media will become much more sophisticated as decision makers learn to use these online tools.
5. Shorter Lead Times. When meetings came to a screeching halt last year, professional speakers suddenly had time on their hands. Some organizations cancelled meetings in fear of the AIG effect, and others started holding meetings on property using internal industry speakers. A few months later, companies started to climb out of the foxhole and contacted speakers - but with a drastically reduced lead time. Many speakers are getting calls a few weeks or even a few days before the program. This is hard to understand from a marketing or planning perspective, but this trend is going to continue.

As speakers, it's important to be aware of market trends and remain flexible so we can provide clients with outstanding value and service. With every success, we can give each other a "high five!"

Taken from Speaker magazine  Written by Kristin Arnold