A Guide to Increasing Your Speaker's Fees

Dr. Gary Arnold's Book
How the Top 1% of Speakers and Coaches Do Internet Marketing
Paperback: ISBN:978-1-57867-041-3; eBook: ISBN:978-1-57867-043-7

 The amount of money different individuals, within the same profession, earn varies widely. This is certainly true within the public speaking profession. Being a professional speaker can be as lucrative as it is rewarding. However, some professional speakers are not reaping the monetary rewards they are hoping for. The truth is there are some who are disgruntled, and are even on the brink of giving up because they have not able to command high fees.

The First Step to Increasing Your Prices as a Professional Speaker

The ability to get higher fees is in large part dependent on how a speaker perceives his or her own skills and abilities. Experts suggest that professional speakers should give their career a good head start in terms of the fees they charge. This is done by charging clients a lower fee in the beginning of their career. From there the speaker can increase their fees accordingly for later engagements if their audience response was good.

Some Basic Facts to Consider

If you decide to increase your prices as a professional speaker, then you have to look at the facts. First, you have to consider the topic that you will be talking about. Is it something that is entirely new and unfamiliar for you? If so, then you have to do a great deal of research to be able to give a truly engaging speech. If you can demonstrate that you are a subject matter expert you can increase your prices.

Another basic fact that influences whether or not you can increase your fees is the location where you will be conducting your speaking engagement. If you have to travel a long distance then you will likely be able to increase your fee. You should either ask for your travel expenses in addition to your fee or factor them into the fee you charge. Request a 50% down payment of your fee. This will allow you to pay for your airline tickets and so forth, so that you can book your travel arrangements without going out-of-pocket. In some cases, if the client is paying your travel expenses separate from your fee, the event planner will handle all of your travel arrangements for you.

If you want to increase your prices as a professional speaker, it is also of utmost importance that you be able to identify the audience you will be speaking to. Is the audience large or small? Is it made up of college students, businessmen or highly regarded social and government figures? The make-up of the audience is a determiner in the fee you can expect to receive.

Whether or not a speaking engagement is a one-time talk or a series of seminars or workshops will be a factor in the fees you will charge. A speaker should set their price based on the amount of time and effort that he or she will have to put forth for a given speaking engagement.