Last month’s marketing tip was ‘How can your prospects try before they buy’.  However for some, because of the type of products and services offered, it’s not so easy to do this.

So how else can you demonstrate your expertise?

Offering to speak at networking events provides a great opportunity to raise your profile and explain how you can resolve your audience’s problems through your products and services.  Immediately, you are the expert in the room and in the minds of your audience.

Being a guest speaker could be pushing you way out of your comfort zone but it really is well worth the effort to gain the skills and confidence to stand up in front of a very friendly audience (honest!). 

Soon after I started Attractive Marketing, Nicci Bonfanti of Manage2Improve gave me my very first opportunity to speak at one of her Superhero Business Owner workshops and she’d never even seen me on my feet before!  I’m hugely grateful for the opportunity and the experience, which I’ve continued to build on.  Nicci coaches presentation skills so I’ve asked her to share her top 5 tips on preparing for a presentation:

1.   Find out as much as you can about your audience before you go – gender, ages, types of profession, previous speakers, etc.  If you can, get a list of registered attendees so you can imagine who will be there and the kind of things they will want to hear.

2.   Think about the potential problems, fears and frustrations that the audience may have that you have solutions for and make that your topic.  Give away lots of value in your talk that will really help them.

3.   Demonstrate your expertise in an interactive way: get them involved in saying or doing something as that will make it more memorable.

4.   Have a clear message for them to take away and take action on in their own business or own life.

5.   Script and rehearse your start and your ending so you are not nervous.  But structure the part in the middle so you speak from the heart and not the page.

I shall be speaking at  Fabulous Women Esher/Oxshott on 26th July and Kingston Smith Bitesize Breakfast Briefings in Redhill on 24th October.  Click on the links if you’d like to come along.

Please use the comments box below to ask questions and share the events you are speaking at.

If you’ve not presented before but this blog has inspired you to make it happen, I’d really love to know and if I can, support you at your first date.