The Short Self-Promotion Business Speech

Continued from the previous page:
Writing and Developing Your Business Speech

Promoting and Publicizing Your Business Speech

George: 
How did you find groups to speak to?

Patricia: 

So then I went to the library and I looked in the reference book materials there and found a book that listed all of the organizations in my community. Then we got 3 X 5 cards and actually filled out the 3 x 5 cards because I couldn’t afford the cost of copying the pages from the book.  Then I took that home and then I budgeted an hour a day for marketing and what I did was I simply called the most promising people. What I thought were most promising people first.

I would just call them up and say that I was a lawyer and that I liked to speak and that I liked to speak about topics relating to wills and probate and health care and I would be willing to come out at no charge and talk to their organization. 

I was accepted by a great many of these organizations over a period of time and that’s how I started doing the speaking.

George: 

And these were Rotary clubs and different civic organizations and maybe some charitable organizations and just folks you found in the library and I guess that would probably be easier these days with the Internet and there are ways to find the names of those organizations.  Just stopping in the Chamber of Commerce in your town wherever you live, is one way.

Patricia:  

Yes the Chamber has information and sometimes different organizations put out these publications. Sometimes the United Way will have publications that you can use. 

George:   

So your presentations basically evolved as you went along.

Now, when did the presentation that you did at the star, how different was it than the presentation you did to that 98^th group in the third year? 

Patricia: 

Oh yes, by the end of the third year I would actually have people rolling in the aisles and telling me that I should join a comedy club because my material was so entertaining.

George: 

Well we’re going to get to that in a little while because I know one of the questions that always comes up is people say “Well I’m not a comedian.  How can I be funny?  How can I keep people interested?” You’re not a comedian either but you developed funny material nonetheless.  Let’s talk about humor as a whole separate thing in just a little bit.

George:   

Were there some fringe benefits that accrued from speaking to groups?  Did you get attention from the media?  Did you get job offers, things like that?

Patricia: 
Well the attention from the media was very nice.  I have been given a marketing award from out local marketing society.  It’s a very prestigious award in our local community for my marketing innovation and to the program that I had developed.  Specifically for the fact that I did this marketing with very little cost.  In addition I was recognized by the Chamber of Commerce as a Small Business Leader of the Year for the same program.

George: 
And things like that get attention in the media. Something happens when the media calls hears about you and asks you to comment about something in the news.  I call it the halo effect. When somebody from the media invites you to speak or to be on a radio show or a TV show, it gives you tremendous credibility.  Then that has a snowball effect.  Did you find that to be true?

Patricia: 
Yes that is in fact true.  I’ve been on the local radio stations answering questions live on the air. I thought at first that would be very challenging, but actually it was quite easy.  I’ve done taped TV programs, on topics relating to my subjects.  A number of times the newspapers have come to me and interviewed me on a subject.  I did a piece once when somebody was talking about pets and dying and what to do with your pets.  You can set up trusts and make other provisions for them.

George: 

There’s something I tell people about all the time about once you begin to establish credibility with some of these groups that you talk to, word does get around, does have a snowball effect and the same thing’s true in the media. You get into a media situation where you’re on a radio show or maybe being interviewed in a TV news story or there’s a newspaper story about you.

I like to say that what I heard Reggie Jackson (Ed: famous baseball player in the 70’s & 80s) say once is exactly true. 

Reggie Jackson was a great baseball player but he was also in the news a lot (because he was controversial) 

He said one thing he noticed about the media is they’re like birds on a wire: when one flies they all fly. 

That, in my experience, has been true. 

 
By the way, did you do any conventional advertising when you were making all these speeches?

Patricia: 
Very, very little.  I added up my expenses when we said we were going to be doing this and in the year 1991 I spent about $3300.00 on everything for marketing.  Including all the copies, my business cards, the telephone yellow pages ads, everything.  So I did very little advertising of the conventional sort.

Next page: Making Your Speech Funny