There are two types of Speakers. The first type is a fee based speaker. This type is paid for an appearance. He or she would usually have some type of fame associated with his or her name. All that type of speaker does is show up, speak, and get paid. Most people are not famous, and thus are unable to ascribe to this type of speaking. The second type is a platform selling speaker. This type ultimately makes more money. While speakers of this nature do not always get paid to speak, they do earn an enormous amount of money by selling a product.

A fee based speaker pays someone to find speaking engagements. That speaker would pay twenty five to thirty percent of his fee to his engagement booker. A platform selling speaker is more profitable because even if he gets paid nothing to speak, he can sell his own products which can be very lucrative. Not only does the platform selling speaker sell a product at an event, he also enlarges his client base for future sales.

When a speaker has his own products to sell several things happen. One is that his ability to find speaking opportunities is greatly increased because he doesn’t have to charge a large fee to make it worth his while. He can attend a function with the knowledge that he has the ability to produce sales. A platform selling speaker can create new products with every speech he gives. DVDs, CDs, and transcripts of especially inspiring presentations are readily purchased by consumers. Information is the most profitable product in the world. Selling products such as these at every presentation is the key to achieving success as a public speaker.

If you require your students to wear a nametag then your staff members need to wear a nametag as well. When I am evaluating a speaker, the speaker is the star; I am not. I wear a nametag. When people come up to me, they see that my name is John.

Your students do not want to try to remember somebody else’s name. Your body language needs to tell them that you are so important they have to remember your name without looking at your nametag. That’s why we all need to wear nametags. If someone is leaving the conference, ask them to remember your name when they come in tomorrow. Tell them, “If you have a problem, just ask for me tomorrow. My name is David, John, or whatever.” When you do this, you’re dropping names.

When you introduce yourself, people will respond in the same way. If you introduce yourself by saying, “Hi. My name is John. How are you today? What is your name?” They will say, “Hi, my name is Joe. I’m doing well, how are you?” If I say, “My name is John Childers.” They will respond by saying, “My name is Joe Blow.” How much information you get from someone is based on how much information you give or ask. How you introduce yourself decides how they will introduce themselves back.

Getting to know your audience, and forming a personal relationship has everything to do with sales and how many people return to your products.

Do not apologize. It ought not to be necessary; and if it is, it will not help. Go straight ahead.

Take a deep breath, relax, and begin in a quiet conversational tone as though you were speaking to one large friend. You will not find it half so bad as you imagined; really, it is like taking a cold plunge: after you are in, the water is fine. In fact, having spoken a few times you will even anticipate the plunge with exhilaration. To stand before an audience and make them think your thoughts after you is one of the greatest pleasures you can ever know. Instead of fearing it, you ought to be as anxious as the fox hounds straining at their leashes, or the race horses tugging at their reins.

So cast out fear, for fear is cowardly–when it is not mastered. The bravest know fear, but they do not yield to it. Face your audience pluckily–if your knees quake, MAKE them stop. In your audience lies some victory for you and the cause you represent. Go win it. Suppose Charles Martell had been afraid to hammer the Saracen at Tours; suppose Columbus had feared to venture out into the unknown West; suppose our forefathers had been too timid to oppose the tyranny of George the Third; suppose that any man who ever did anything worth while had been a coward! The world owes its progress to the men who have dared, and you must dare to speak the effective word that is in your heart to speak–for often it requires courage to utter a single sentence. But remember that men erect no monuments and weave no laurels for those who fear to do what they can.

Is all this unsympathetic, you say?

What you need is not sympathy, but a push. No one doubts that temperament and nerves and illness and even praiseworthy modesty may, singly or combined, cause the speaker’s cheek to blanch before an audience, but neither can any one doubt that coddling will magnify this weakness. The victory lies in a fearless frame of mind. Prof. Walter Dill Scott says: “Success or failure in business is caused more by mental attitude even than by mental capacity.” Banish the fear-attitude; acquire the confident attitude. And remember that the only way to acquire it is–to acquire it.