Conference fees and new work?

["Hart, Geoff" <Geoff-H -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA>]

Michele Davis <<...spoke at stc last year for two seminars. i paid the $350
for the conf. and the exorbitant rates for staying at disney. ,y logic was
that i would get writing opportunities from the seminars. lol! not one lead
called me. i won't do it again.>>

One very important tip: unless you're Kevin Costner and building a baseball
diamond in a cornfield, "if you talk about it, they won't necessarily come".
<g> Most of the people you'll meet at STC are wage slaves like me, and they
generally won't be attending the conference to headhunt you or look for
contractors; generally, there are plenty of competent contractors in their
local area. What they _will_ do is remember your name after the conference,
and that recognition gets your foot in the door when you follow up with a
query letter, e-mail, or phone call: "Remember me? Great! Got any work for
me?" A record of public speaking is also a great asset on a resume: it shows
that you don't just work quietly and anonymously, hoping that nobody notices
you, but that you also feel sufficiently confident in your work to tell
others about it and risk their public criticism. In effect, you're telling
them you consider your skills world-class, and aren't afraid to espouse your
views in the face of all challengers. _That_ says a lot to a prospective
client.

The problem with simply presenting your information is that it's too
passive: you're relying on unmotivated people to take the initiative to ask
you for help. Instead, you need to obtain contact information from as many
people in the audience as possible. One of the better tricks for that is to
offer to send along your speaker's notes by e-mail to anyone who leaves you
a business card or would be interested in working with you in the future.
Use the former part of the tip cautiously: Yes, you're giving them value by
sending along your notes, but you're also going to be marketing to them, and
if that's not clear, some people will consider your offer deceitful or even
"spam". There's some justice to that. The latter part raises fewer
objections, because you mention your availability and let only those who are
interested contact you, but it's also passive and thus less effective.

Another way to leverage your speaking at the conference is to offer
interested people 15 minutes of your time after the speech so you can
discuss _their_ problems. Demonstrate that you've got what it takes to solve
their problems, offer your business card (and brochure if you've got one),
and tell them explicitly that you do consulting work and would love to
consult further for them. Don't solve all their problems, but do make the
meeting worth their time and show that you understand them well enough that
you _could_ solve the problem if you had a few hours rather than just 15
minutes. Again, this is a difficult sales pitch, since there's an
expectation (fair or not) that you're at the conference to provide
information for free, with no strings attached. Using the conference as a
marketing ploy may not go over well with everyone. Alternatively, giving
them the URL of your Web site can work well: they can download the files
themselves, without taking any of your time, and if the site itself is
compelling, they'll also stick around long enough to see what else you have
to offer. Maybe they could sign up for your newsletter? Still too passive
for really good marketing, but perhaps it strikes a good compromise between
aggressiveness and passivity.

None of these approaches guarantees success, but simply relying on people to
send you work without actively prompting them to do so generally fails.
Plus, you may have fallen into the worst-case scenario: You did such a
wonderful job of presenting your topic that the audience learned enough to
solve their problems by themselves, without your help. People who make a
living by combining consulting with public speaking have generally learned
to present just enough information that the audience feels they learned
enough to repay their time, but not so much information that the consultant
is no longer necessary. A very difficult balance to strike, but a great way
to enrich yourself if you can do it well.

--Geoff Hart, FERIC, Pointe-Claire, Quebec
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca 

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