Book More Business - Make MORE Money Speaking with Lois Creamer

SPEAKER_01 0:04

This is the Beyond the Story Podcast, a show that goes way beyond the story. Lois, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_02 0:25

Honored to be with you, Sebastian. Good to see you, my friend.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

It's great to see you too. We were just talking before we started the interview. And uh, of course, always incredible feedback and ideas uh coming from you and your many years of experience on here. And saw your LinkedIn post a couple of weeks ago about the brand new book. And I said, what a phenomenal opportunity to reconnect with you and talk about the book and talk about what you've been up to. And that's just what we do here in podcast land. So great to see you again and congrats on the book.

SPEAKER_02 0:53

Thank you. Very exciting, hot off the press. Very exciting.

SPEAKER_01 0:56

Amazing. Well, I like to tell people's stories on this podcast. So for some context for our listeners, let's back up a little bit to the beginning of the story, wherever the beginning is for you and where you really set out on your journey and became a speaker and really bring us into present day. And of course, I want to dig into the book and how that came about and what it's all about.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

Well, actually, it all began by accident. I am here, not by plan. Um, I uh right out of college, I got a great job working in sales and marketing with a Fortune 10 company here in St. Louis, where I live. And um, I was very fortunate, very fortunate. Uh, I left that job after a number of years because my husband and I adopted a baby and I wanted to be a mom. That was my highest calling, quite frankly, still is, and uh stayed home a number of years and then got connected with a very successful professional speaker, Shep Iken, uh former national president, National Speakers Association. And a college friend of mine told him to call me and said maybe she's ready to get back in the job market. And I, you know, I'd been threatening to get back in the job market, Sebastian, but I I wasn't sure how serious I was. Shep was looking for somebody full-time. I wasn't looking for full-time. And we talked, and he said, Would you like to give this a try? And I thought, well, this is kind of interesting. Okay, we'll give it a try, and we can we can see how it goes. And so I started working for him. I didn't even know speaking was an industry, Sebastian. Never heard of any such thing. He told me what he made per speech. I said, You're kidding. People pay you to do that. I was in total shock. Um, what a talented guy. I said, I learned the business at the feet of the master. Um, but I worked with Shep for a number of years. And then I started getting asked out to lunch a lot by professional speakers. How do you guys sell? How do you do this? How are you able to do this? And I started wondering could there be a business in this for me, consulting with speakers? And back when I started in 1998, which sounds like 1898, every time I say it now, Sebastian, I was actually blonde back then. Um I thought, I don't know whether there's a business in this for me, but I think I'll give it a try. I would regret it if I didn't. So I had met a number of speakers through National Speakers Association. I had even done breakouts at national events on selling speaking services. So I started emailing everybody I had ever met, and suddenly I started, people started saying, What would it look like to work with you? And I had a business. I was very lucky early on. I had some great clients who gave me wonderful opportunities. And that's how I got to be here. And then I started speaking on uh sales to corporations and associations because a speaker client of mine had another business, asked me to come in and did that and started thinking, wow, this message is really good for them. Did that for a number of years, don't do that anymore. The only professional speaking I now do are to groups of speakers in the United States, Canada, and around the world, groups of professional speakers in this professional speaking associations. Um, and all I do now is work with speakers and consultants on growing their businesses. So that's my story in a nutshell.

SPEAKER_01 4:21

I love it. So you're not doing any more keynotes anymore. I mean, outside of the world of the speakers.

SPEAKER_02 4:26

I don't, I'm not. I don't. Um I it it got to be a bit much juggling them both, and the travel was more than I wanted to do. And I wanted to, I didn't have enough time to write, uh, to do some of the things that I really wanted to do. And so I stopped doing sales. And this is my first love. And it's a very it's the nichest business in the world. In fact, when I wrote the first edition of Make Money Speaking um in 2017, I bragged to anyone who would listen, Sebastian. This book is gonna sell in the tens. And they said, of millions? And I said, no, the tens. And that's if my family buys copies, because it's such a niche book. That little book did so well for me. Uh, that's why I wrote the second edition, Make More Money Speaking, uh, updated it with new information. Um, because the world has changed in our industry in the last several years after COVID and with the advent of AI. But that's that's really how I got started. That's why I decided I'm going to stick in the snitch business. I absolutely love it.

SPEAKER_01 5:35

Yeah, I can tell. I can tell that uh you're deeply passionate about what you do. Your your represent your reputation within the speakers' community precedes itself. Um, you know, and that's just a direct reflection of doing what you love.

SPEAKER_02 5:48

Thank you. I I feel really lucky, don't you? I mean, you and I both get to do what we love. We're both very fortunate.

SPEAKER_01 5:54

It is, it absolutely is. I uh haven't been part of the uh NSA world for for for a few years now. Um did some small did some stuff from podcast stuff with them a couple years, a couple of years back on there, but in my very early days when I made a decision that I was going to be a speaker, I said, Well, I better get in a room around people that are doing what I want to do. And that was really my motivation.

SPEAKER_02 6:16

I listen, I think that that is always smart advice. I always believe hang around with people who are doing what you want to do and who are successful doing it. Success leaves clues, and you can pick up a lot of them around successful people.

SPEAKER_01 6:31

Yeah, you sure can. You sure can. So let's dive into the book. Why uh why a second version to make more money speaking?

SPEAKER_02 6:39

A couple reasons. Um, I have a friend who'd been encouraging me because I constantly write blogs, and she said, You've got so much new information coming out. You ought to redo your book. And I kept thinking, well, I kept again, I kept threatening to do it, Sebastian. Then two uh young men were in town speaking at a college here in St. Louis, and they they said, Would you join us for breakfast? And I said, Absolutely, I'd love to. We had a great breakfast. They walked me out to my car and they said, they both said, we recommend your book all the time. I was very flattered, got in the car, driving home, and I realized this book doesn't even have the word virtual in it. How relative is this to what is going on right now? And that's when I committed and I said, I've got to update this. And that's when I absolutely decided that it had to be done. And so this book has this uh second edition has information on virtual presentations, on licensing, on AI, though AI is will be changed tomorrow. So it has some of my early thoughts on AI and how to keep your finger on the pulse of what's going on. But our industry has changed so much, and I really realized how much uh on a culture level it's changed when writing the second edition.

SPEAKER_01 8:00

So what's let's let's dive into it. What it for for those not familiar with the with the with the first edition of the book, um, what's what what's the the general premise of it? Obviously, making more money speaking on here, but you're you can probably articulate a little bit more and help us understand you know what the book is all about, and then of course, what's what's been added to it with the second version.

SPEAKER_02 8:21

Yeah, this book is all about the business side of speaking. I don't help people decide what their expertise is, I don't help people write speeches, I don't help people give speeches and give presentation skills. When you have all that is when you come to me and you want to make money. So it's really selling and marketing speaking, how to grow your calendar, who you should be talking to, what you should say, what they'll want to see from you, uh, how to leverage success uh down the road, how to target market. Um, it's it's all about the business side of speaking. So it's just that little piece of it that I do. Um, you know, I'm kind of reminded that when I spoke on sales, I was telling you before, I had a frequently asked question section on my website. The first question on it, Sebastian, was besides sales, what do you speak on? Answer, nothing. If you want something else, I'll refer you, but I won't do it. And I got business based on that. I got business based on that. So I stay in my lane. I've been doing this over 20 years. I've got a long list of people who do the things that I don't that I like and who I've referred clients to and who where my clients have been happy, which is very important to me. Uh, but I just stick in my lane. So this book is all about the mechanics of establishing, running, and sustaining a viable speaking practice. And also, my sense of the speaking business is this you're not just a speaker. We're really in the intellectual property business. We're purveyors of intellectual property. Speaking is just one avenue, one way to take your expertise to the marketplace. So I like to talk about how do you leverage the value of that intellectual property in other ways through books, courses, workbooks, membership groups, consulting, coaching, uh, working with small groups, mastermind classes, other things, other ways for you to do what you do to go in deep with clients. Um, and really so you can make a sustainable good income from having a speaking business.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Yeah, and you're not just dependent on chasing airplanes and and being on stage to make it.

SPEAKER_02 10:37

No, it is you can't do it. You you can't do it. I I was just uh spent an entire day trying to get home from Montreal. An entire day in the Montreal airport and the Toronto airports. And it reminded me that I don't want to be doing that every day. And it is not a sustainable way to run a business because I always tell my clients this for every time you take a speaking engagement, you accept accept and contract for a speaking engagement, you're taking at least two and a half days off your speaking gap. And so you've got to think about that. You've got to think about that. I I was talking to a young man who is a new client of mine, and I said, you know, what do you want your business to look like? Just trying to get some big picture visions. He said, I want to do 150 speeches a year. And I said, I'm going to put you, I'm I'm just going to ask you to wait right here on Zoom while I go take some aspirin. I'll be right back. I mean, he didn't know what he was, what he what he was looking at.

SPEAKER_00 11:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:44

Uh so uh uh my book gives you, I think, a realistic view of the business. Uh Sebastian, you know I'm I can be a contrarian. Um, I'm very blunt in my assessment of the business. And I talk about this business. This is really a sales job where we occasionally get to speak.

SPEAKER_00 12:02

That's what this is. Yes, it is.

SPEAKER_02 12:05

Isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 12:06

Sure is. So I'm a realist.

SPEAKER_02 12:08

Yeah, I'm I'm a realist with it. I want people to have realistic expectations of what they can do and how they would define success as they move along.

SPEAKER_01 12:18

I love that. Yeah, I what what really stuck with me from what you shared was a lot there. But number one, and I thought a lot. Like, my my daughter's raised now. I'm a 45-year-old empty nester. What the hell am I doing with my life? Like, what's next now? And I'm like, I should be booked solid, chasing planes constantly. And I'm like, I do a fair amount of traveling as it is, maybe once or twice a month. And it still seems like a lot. So is that what you really want, Sebastian? And again, what uh you know, I go wherever an airplane goes and wherever I'm aligned to be. Um, but do I really want to be on the road a hundred and you know, 150 days a year? I don't know. But um, now that you break it down the way that you did, I just had a guy on my podcast right before this episode, actually. He said, I've done uh over 800 paid keynotes in every single continent. And my favorite talks to give now virtual.

SPEAKER_02 13:15

Well, listen, during COVID, when our calendars were empty, and and you and I were wishing we had invested in Zoom before COVID, before the lockdown, we a lot of our colleagues were all over social media saying, Oh, I miss travel, oh I miss travel, oh my gosh. And I'm sitting here thinking, in my office, right here, thinking, I don't. And you know, the fun level of my business counts a lot for me. I mean, I started my own business to make money, but also to enjoy life. Yeah. And so I really did had to ask myself, am I doing what I really enjoy? Am I working towards what I want things to look like tomorrow and the next day and the next day? And so I like doing virtual and I do a lot of virtual presentations. I still go out uh on many occasions in person to speaking groups, um, but I am pickier now than I used to be. And it's just because I want to run a business that I can enjoy as well as make money from.

SPEAKER_01 14:24

Yeah, absolutely. One one name comes to mind a colleague of ours when I think 2020, and that's Jeff Sivilico. Yes. He was stuck in Costa Rica, stuck in Costa Rica, and you know, juggling dining room table in the condo that he was renting from. But that that was really that teed him up to come back and go to Las Vegas and really go all in with a lot of his virtual stuff. And he had, he's like, I remember talking to him about it. He said, I found a guy with a production studio up the street. He's not producing anything because nothing's getting done or shot on here. I'm like, can I just can you just make all this work and let me do my thing? And he was really kind of a you know, a pioneer during that space.

SPEAKER_02 15:06

Listen, he totally was. The joy for you and me and our entrepreneurial listeners are that when we see a trend or we see something change, we can change at the drop of a hat. When I worked for that Fortune 10 corporation, we our decisions could take a year to implement because they had to go through layers of management. And to think that if we don't like the way things going or the industry shuts down, we can start doing virtual programs like that. It's really amazing. It's really an amazing thing. And Jeff is the poster child for that.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

He totally totally is. I found you know, it's funny, I did not meet him through NSA, but our world is so small. I found his reel when I was doing a lot of MC work. I've since I've since retired as an MC because it's the hardest job in the building.

SPEAKER_02 15:56

It is hard.

SPEAKER_01 15:58

Um, but I remember researching MC reels and finding his, and his is hands down the best MC reel you can ever.

SPEAKER_02 16:07

I mean he's incredible. I mean, he's he's an incredible talent. He also happens to be an incredibly nice guy, real generous guy.

SPEAKER_01 16:15

Oh, he is, and funny, offline funny, and that led to um uh to meeting uh uh John um demon uh Demincencio. I always screw his last name up because it's a long one. Um and they're good buddies because they're in the same, they got their same mastermind group together. And John was doing a gig as Dr. Phil for a bunch of attorneys last year and hit me up. We had never met in person. What's that?

SPEAKER_02 16:42

I that's funny. That is funny.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

Yeah, it was. He does uh, well, he's known for Trump, obviously, but he does Dr. Phil Guy Fieri. So he calls me with his Dr. Phil personality and said that with asking me to go to lunch on here with in his Dr. Phil voice. In fact, he just texted me last week and said he's coming back for that same gig. Uh, and maybe the next week or the following week on there. So I look forward to uh seeing him again. Yeah, I'll never forget he told me I'm I'm um he's you know I'm 62 or 63 years old. I'm still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up.

SPEAKER_02 17:14

Hello. You know, the joy is in the journey, isn't it? I mean, I I think that that's that's why I still really love what I get to do because I think that that I'm enjoying the trip. Yeah. If I ever get to the end destination, who knows what that would look like. But I'm enjoying the journey.

SPEAKER_01 17:32

Yeah, that's what it's all about. I wish I would have known you were in St. Louis. I hosted two events there this year, uh, downtown with a buddy of mine who's based out of there. He owns a um, he does a uh personal branding and and digital marketing uh for brands. And I did podcasting. It's called Builders of Authority. And I said, hey, why don't we team up together and do an event? So we hosted at a really cool co-working space downtown uh that used to be an old bank. It just did a one-day one-off event and then brought everybody to the blues game for our VIPs and then went to the yeah, then we went to the Cardinals game for the one we did uh in June. But great, great, great city in the summertime.

SPEAKER_02 18:08

Well, yes. Listen, you next time you uh you come, I'm gonna I hope to be able we can share a meal together.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Yes, we are 100% gonna do that, but you're not gonna get me up in that arch, not doing it.

SPEAKER_02 18:18

Me either. I've never been up. I'm I have no desire.

SPEAKER_01 18:22

I saw that little part in the lobby. I said, absolutely not.

SPEAKER_02 18:26

I I did too, and I said, put me in a juice can and shoot me up to the sky. No appeal whatsoever. None.

SPEAKER_01 18:33

They say that thing kind of sways while you're up there, too.

SPEAKER_02 18:36

I said oh, it does.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

No, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

It does. Yeah, I'm with you. I'm with you. We'll keep our feet on terra firma.

SPEAKER_01 18:43

Yes, yes, absolutely, absolutely. Well, um, congrats on the book. I'm just so glad we got a chance to uh uh to catch up and um let me learn more. I'm gonna dig into this book myself. I'd be a fool uh not to do it. Those of you listening, book more business, make more money speaking. If you're a speaker, hey, maybe you're an aspiring speaker. This book will help you both of them, both the the the first version and this newest version. So pick them up wherever books are sold on here. Uh Lois, always great to see you. Any final thoughts for our listeners?

SPEAKER_02 19:14

No, just um enjoy what you do, run a business, and make sure that you always have your fun level on high doing it. If you don't, that's something that you're gonna regret down the road. Um, and I just hope that they can have as much fun as you and I have had in our businesses and today. So much fun being with you, Sebastian. Thanks.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

So much fun being with you too. I think about that a lot when people say, so how do you help people with a podcast? And I say we do all of the work so that it doesn't become work for you because when it feels like work, it's not fun. And when it's not fun, we quit. There you go. I'm with you. Thanks again, Lois. Until next time, friends. Thanks so much for tuning into this episode of the Beyond the Story Podcast. Be sure to appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show. This way you'll get updates as new episodes become available. If you feel so inclined, please leave us a review. Be sure to appreciate it. Signing off from the podcast, launchlab.com studios. We'll talk to you next time.