Hire A Motivational Speaker - Website Review

Motivational speakers hold two trump cards…

Personality (Who they are, what they’ve done, their story, etc…)
Ideas (Do they have a unique point of view and how does it relate to your meeting theme and attendees?)

And so the most focused, time-efficient way for checking out a motivational speaker’s website is to approach it with these specific questions in mind…

Am I engaged by the motivational speaker’s personality? If a speaker can’t engage you for a couple of minutes, is it likely he or she will engage your attendees for a whole hour?
Does this motivational speaker have fresh ideas? When you hire a speaker, you’re looking for a novel point of view, not a book report.

There’s one more question I would add to the list: Can this motivational speaker actually produce the goods…on the day, for my audience?

So you’ve arrived at a motivational speaker’s website…

Okay, immediately scour the home page for the demo video (and ignore everything else). Is it easy to spot or has the speaker hidden it away hoping you won’t notice it? That’s the first clue…

If the speaker has hidden a demo video deep within the nested pages of their website, chances are they don’t want you to see it.

And then, as you watch the demo, ask yourself:

Am I engaged and entertained?
Am I hearing new ideas?

Also ask: Was this actually filmed in front of a real audience? This last question needs a bit more elaboration. A newbie speaker is caught in a Catch-22. How do you get a video if you don’t have a gig? On the other hand, how do you book a gig if you don’t have a video?

One (sneaky) solution to the wanna-be motivational speaker’s dilemma is to have someone video them speaking in front of a generic blue curtain. An audience (and audience laughter) is then grafted on in post-production. This common ploy is easy to spot (and actually quite funny) if you’re looking out for it…and now you will be.

Articles

Articles are a concrete demonstration of a motivational speaker’s expertise. If the website doesn’t contain any articles…there’s another clue. Let’s assume you find some articles. Is the author expressing a well defined point of view of benefit to your attendees?

Here’s another way to think about the same issue: Does it seem like each article has been patched together from a bunch of related articles? If the author isn’t writing with a clear point of view, it can seem like you’re reading a “Frankenstein” article…another insight into the speaker’s content.

Testimonials

Okay, you’ve assessed a motivational speaker’s speaking style (demo video) and you’re gotten a handle on his/her content (articles). Now it’s time to ask: Can the speaker produce the goods?

A great motivational speaker will gather a cadre of raving fans around them…It should be no problem whatsoever to get references from independent sources who love what the speaker does on the platform!

And so look for some references on the speaker’s website (or ask for some) and actually follow up with these folks. Ask questions about how conference attendees responded to the motivational speaker and his/her ideas during the keynote speech, throughout the conference and on the evaluation forms.

When you approach a speaker’s website in this systematic way, you’ll quickly and easily bypass the “hype,” hone in on what really matters and find an amazing motivational speaker for your meeting.