Read Confessions of a Public Speaker for Free Online Page A

Lecture series, training conferences, and corporate
    meetings created thousands of events that needed new speakers every year.
    Some events don’t pay, or even charge speakers to attend (as it’s seen as
    an honor to be invited to give a presentation), but many hire a few
    speakers to ensure things go well. For decades, there’s been enough demand
    for speakers thatspeaker bureaus—talent agencies for public speakers—work as
    middlemen, matching people who want to have a lecture at their event and
    speakers, like me, who wish to be paid for giving lectures. If you want
    Bill Clinton, Madonna, or Stephen King to speak at your birthday party,
    and you have the cash (see Table 3-1 ), there is a speaker bureau
    representing each one of them that would like to make a deal with you.
    Which brings us back to whether I’m worth $5,000.
    Table 3-1. High-end speakers and their fees. [ 17 ]
    SPEAKER
ONE-HOUR LECTURE FEE
Bill Clinton
$150,000+
Katie Couric
$100,000
Malcolm Gladwell
$80,000
Garry Kasparov
$75,000+
David Allen
$50,000–$75,000
Ben Stein
$50,000–$75,000
Wayne Gretsky
$50,000+
Magic Johnson
$50,000+
Bob Costas
$50,000+
Maya Angelou
$50,000
Rachel Ray
$50,000
Dave Barry
$25,000–$30,000
[ 17 ] These fees were compiled from public listings on various
     speaker bureau websites. Most sites note that these fees are
     variable and may change at any time, and this list is a sample of
     the highest fees I could find. See http://www.keyspeakers.com/ or http://www.prosportspeaker.com/ .
    My $5,000 fee has nothing to do with me personally. I’m not paidfor being Scott Berkun. I know I’m paid only for the value I
    provide to whoever hires me. If, for example, my hosts can charge $500 per
    person for an event, and they get 500 people to attend, that’s $250,000 in
    gross revenue. Part of what will allow them to charge that much, and draw
    that many people, is the speakers they will have. The bigger the names,
    the more prestigious their backgrounds, and the more interesting their
    presentations, the more people will come and the more they will be willing
    to pay.
    Even for private functions—say, when Google or Ferrari throws an
    annual event for their employees—how much would it be worth to have a
    speaker who can make their staff a little smarter, better, or more
    motivated when returning to work? Maybe it’s not worth $30,000 or even
    $5,000, but there is some economic value to what good speakers on the
    right topics do for people. It depends on how valuable the people in the
    room are to whoever is footing the bill. Even if it’s just for
    entertainment, or for reminding the audience members of important things
    they’ve forgotten, a good speaker is worth something. Think of the last
    boring lecture you attended: would you have paid a few bucks to make the
    speaker suck less? I bet you would.
    On the other hand, many events lose money. The high fixed costs of
    venue and food (the latter often heavily marked up by the former) make the
    event business more complex than it seems. Often organizers must front all
    the money and hope attendance meets their break-even numbers. Many events
    make no profit at all, and understandably don’t pay most of their
    speakers, as the goal is to serve their communities rather than to make
    revenue. [ 18 ] If you’re thinking through all the places you’ve given a
    lecture, and feel angry you weren’t paid, odds are good that no one
    was.
    The disappointing thing is that even for highfees, speakers often don’t do very well. After all, they’re
    not being paid directly for their public-speaking skills. The raw economic
    value proposition is in drawing people to the event, and it’s more likely
    that people will come to an event featuring a famous person—even one they
    suspect is boring to listen to—than to hear the best public speaker in the
    world (if that’s his only claim to fame). [ 19 ] Two of the worst lectures I’ve attended were given by famous
    people: David