The absolute easiest, fastest and cheapest way to fill your next workshop is to get up and speak at somebody else’s workshop! It’s kind of counter intuitive… fill your workshop by speaking at another one?

To counter confusion, let’s call this tactic, “Book SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS.”

Here are a few places you can go to speak:

• Corporate settings-plenty of organizations have monthly or annual sales meetings, or professional development meetings.
• Multi-speaker seminars and conferences
• Business networking groups-Chamber of Commerce, Women in Business
• Company retreats-some companies take their staff out on a vacation like a cruise, to celebrate company success, stir up company morale, give news about the company business happenings, to reward performance, etc.

There are 2 HUGE REASONS why speaking engagements are the BEST way to fill your room:

1. You save time, energy and money: Since someone else has already gathered the people, set up the event, done the marketing, and taken care of the logistics, all you have to do is show up and be BRILLIANT!
2. You increase the likelihood you are speaking to a ‘qualified audience’: Here’s what I mean by ‘qualified audience’. If you’re selling a workshop or seminar, then a “qualified audience” is any group of people who’ve shown they are willing to go to workshops and seminars. An even more qualified audience is one that has also proven they like to BUY things at these gatherings (e.g. they’re willing pay for a ticket to get into the workshop or seminar). If you can get a Speaking Engagement where the audience has paid to get in the door – those are ideal!

Keep in mind, some people will never go to seminars. No matter what. While others LOVE to go workshop and seminars just to be around other people. Of course – you want to focus on the second group of people. And guess where you’ll find them? At other seminars and workshops, of course! So get on those stages as fast as you can.

And now for some really great news…contrary to what you might think, Opportunities to speak are everywhere!

Many, many, many organizations and groups are begging for speakers right now. All you need to do is to get in contact with the people who are responsible for assembling groups of your specific audience – a.k.a ‘target’ or ‘niche’ market. For example, if you are selling a Women’s Business Coaching Program – get a speaking engagement at the local Women In Business Chapter.

Here is an easy 5 STEP PROCESS to find ideal Speaking Engagements:

1. Make a long list of groups that are in your Specific Audience.
2. Find out who is responsible for assembling each group
3. Find out what opportunities there are to speak to each group, and how often.
4. Get in touch with the person in charge of booking speakers
5. Contact them and entice them to bring you in to speak to their group.

Ideal speaking engagements (see Step 1, above) can be found online (do Google searches), and in magazines directed at your Specific Audience. You can also find associations that focus on your topic, you can check out free or paid publications, and you can even look in newspapers. Now the only thing left to do – is get on those stages!