Stop Customizing Your Speech! (Do This Instead…) (1 of 2)

There’s a paradox when it comes to customizing speeches…

On one hand, it feels like an effective way to create an experience that is both highly-relevant and deeply personal for your audience. But overly customized experiences can cause you to miss out on tons of stageside leads!

That’s why I’m proposing a different way to win more gigs…

:: drumroll ::

Customize your session description!

Now, this week’s post was actually inspired by one of our premium members named John.  To be fair, John is essentially doing everything right.

He understands the power of using a session description as a marketing tool and he followed the basic structure I recommended to show off his speech.

There’s just one thing he’s missing… session description customization. Because just a few important tweaks can turn a “good” session description into one that knocks their socks off.

Ready to see this in action?  Okay, here’s John’s story…

John is 90% There

First off, I love it when members share their successes and challenges.  It’s such a thrill to see how you apply the skills and knowledge we discuss.

(Seriously, feel free to reach out!)

In John’s case, he was writing to me after losing a gig.  But not just any gig… it was one he was SURE he would win.

John is doing a lot of things right:

• He created a Discussion Document (which is really a custom webpage) for his event organizers and he’s using it to showcase his speech.
• He’s rebuilding his keynote based on the principles found in the book I wrote with Michael Port, The Referable Speaker.
• Then, he wrote up a great generic Session Description using the format I’ve recommended.

After losing the gig, John asked his event organizer for some feedback and received the following reply:

"I can’t say there were any concerns with your approach. Just the opposite, you did a great job seeking to understand us and our needs and I’m confident you would have been a great speaker at our event.

For what it’s worth… The other speaker provided a detailed outline of their message, with multiple options of principles and stories.  With that feedback they quickly delivered a tailored message that we felt strongly about, so we pulled the trigger.

Take a closer look at that last bit because that’s the really important part…  

"With that feedback they quickly delivered a tailored message that we felt strongly about, so we pulled the trigger."

...they pulled the trigger after reading about the other speaker’s “tailored message.”