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Blog, Business, Coaching, Faith, Spiritual Gifts, Travel, Writing

Sought After Speaker Summit Part 8

Last weekend, I had the privilege of attending Caterina Rando‘s Sought After Speaker Summit in Los Angeles, CA. This is part 8 of my Sought After Speaker Summit blog series. You can read part 1 here, part 2 here, part 3 here, part 4 here, part 5 here, part 6 here, and part 7 here.

On Friday night, Caterina Rando offered an optional Q & A Session for anyone who was interested to ask her more questions. My friend Shelley calls me a question box. I always ask people questions because I am very curious and want to learn new things. The Friday night session was primarily dedicated to writing a book.

Here are more tips Caterina gave us for writing a book: Just choose the things from this list that apply to YOU.

    • When writing, you want to be educational, motivational, inspirational, and transformational. It’s tricky, but you must include all these. It must be reader-centric – not about you! Use exercises and stories to engage them.

      Beth Jones, speaking at Women of Destiny conference

      Beth Jones, speaking at Women of Destiny conference

    • Use your story, but bring it back to them.
    • At the end of a chapter, always have a call to action.
    • You can write standing up, while working out, by buying the Treadmill Desk or NextDeskFit.
    • The back matter of your book (marketing pages) is more important than the front matter (dedication, contents, acknowledgments). Plant seeds. Say something like, “For more information on Beth Jones’ speaking, visit www.BethJones.net. Or, “Here’s a coupon code to get xyz on my website.” In the back of Caterina’s books, she has resources of her trusted alliance partners to get a special code.
    • Your book is like an expensive brochure. You need your bio, your picture in the back (back cover or inside sleeve), your speaking topics, the url for your speaking page, etc.
    • Books need to be evergreen, relevant in 5 to 10 years from now.
    • Use massive distribution. Hire people to help you with your book. Repurpose the content. Put your book on the Kindle/Nook. A book carries a lot more weight so use massive distribution. Amazon has a POD division. Give your book away on Amazon for 1 to 3 days. This will give you exposure and visibility, and you can truthfully say your book is an Amazon best-seller!

      Walking with God ebook by Beth Jones

      Walking With God ebook
      BethJones.net/beth-jones-estore/

    • If you have your book available on audio, never read your book. It takes practice for those to sound good. Use professional editing. Caterina advises not to do your own editing; hire a VA. Use good headphones. A good mic is the Bluebird.
    • Survey your clients to find out what they want in your new book or your new program. Give them options for helping you choose the book’s cover or title or chapter topics. Say, “I’m creating my 90-day Catch a Star and Make Your Dreams Come True program. What do you want me to include in this program?” Facebook is a great place to survey: “Here’s my 10 titles. Which one do you like best or what other title would you use?”
    • Your one title may not resonate with your niche! Be benefit focused.
    • Be brand consistent with your book.
    • Just do it. Stop getting ready to get ready to get going to start. One client told Caterina that she was “in beta.” She had one year of her coaching, a year in her mastermind group, and her revenue was growing but she was running her business like a corporation. It was taking her 2 years to get out there. The longer you do that, the longer you are pushing off your revenue!
    • Send your book to the Library of Congress to copyright it.
    • Buy an ISBN so it can be tracked on Amazon. You can buy one for $125 or a block of 10 for $250 (or more).
    • On vacation, be on vacation. Caterina said it’s hard to shift to business space when she’s on vacation somewhere. It just doesn’t work.

      Beth Jones on Jacksonville, FL beach

      Beth Jones on Jacksonville, FL, beach

    • Create events talking about your book. Be loud and proud about being a speaker. Tell family, friends, or clients: “I want to go to Houston. Do you know of any massage therapists I could speak to while there?” This may not be an event, but you can create an event ahead of time! “If you put 25 people in a room, I’ll come and speak to them.” Learn to power think. Do workshops to promote your book!
    • Be open to travel anywhere in the world. If you are thinking you’d love to speak at that event to promote your book or programs, you might be able to speak next year at it! Sometimes Caterina pays for her traveling on her dime. It’s worth it. She took her dad to Venice, Italy and he cried. Traveling is a great opportunity of life.

      Me on the beach at Half Moon Cay, Bahamas

      Me on the beach at Half Moon Cay, Bahamas

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Have you read my book Bahama Mama: When God Uses Ordinary Women For His Extraordinary Purposes? Check it out by clicking here. Just $5!

woman scuba diving
Blog, Business, Ebooks, Faith, Spiritual Gifts, Writing

Sought After Speaker Summit Part 7

adventure

adventure

Last weekend, I had the privilege of attending Caterina Rando‘s Sought After Speaker Summit in Los Angeles, CA. This is part 7 of my Sought After Speaker Summit blog series. You can read part 1 here, part 2 here, part 3 here, part 4 here, part 5 here, and part 6 here.

I loved attending Caterina Rando’s Sought After Speaker Summit in Los Angeles, and learned many things.

On Friday night, Caterina offered an optional Q & A session for anyone who wanted to stay longer to ask her more questions about any subject. Naturally, I stayed to take advantage of learning from her expertise! She dedicated this session primarily to writing your book.

Having a book gives you more credibility as a speaker. It establishes you as an expert in your given topic. A book is a confidence builder for you and the event planner. It is an additional revenue stream for your business, allowing you to sell products from the back table.

stack of books

stack of books

You can repurpose a book’s content into a keynote speaking presentation, workshop, webinar, telecall, telesummit, ecourse, and a new coaching program. Info products are good, but will not give you as much credibility as authoring a book.

Here were some of Caterina’s tips for writing a book:

1. What do you want the book to do for you? She discovered she has brilliant idea syndrome (hearing others’ brilliant ideas and immediately wanting to implement them) and brilliant book syndrome – i.e., you have 25 books inside of you (but not one done!).

2. Make sure the book matches your upsell. If you have no upsell, all you did was just speak to an audience. You can’t run a business on good will! A business makes money (a profit)!

3. Don’t be a “grab and go” speaker (grabbing your stuff and then going right after you speak). If someone is writing you a check, make sure it’s a great presentation and you engage with the audience before, during, and after you speak. One way to do this is interacting with the audience selling your book: autographing her book, taking pictures with her, talking and praying with her.

Karen Wells, Shannon, and me

Karen Wells, Shannon, and me
Doreen Penner’s Women’s Retreat, Canada

4. Be strategic about the talks you give and use your book’s content. When someone wants to pay you to speak, take it – but make sure it’s under the umbrella of what your purpose is!  Mention the book while you speak, quoting from it or using examples from it. This helps to sell your book!

5. Define your audience for your book. It may change. Who is your ideal client? You can’t market to the entire planet! Caterina “helps service-based entrepreneurs to be loud and proud about their business, and to thrive.” Who do you want to serve with all your heart, where it doesn’t feel like work? Who you served before may not be your audience now. If it feels like work you may not have found the right audience yet.

Women laughing

Women laughing

6. Be discerning of your time. Caterina is launching her new book, On Wings of Faith. She has warm leads for this book and is out giving marketing speeches, not just chatting small talk to people. You have so many things that could be revenue-producing. You must be discerning of your time. Don’t go speak somewhere if your message is different than what they want and it’s not the right audience for you. This leads to…

7. Say no! You say no by saying, “Thank you so much. That really doesn’t work for me. Let me refer to another great speaker.” Turning people down is a skill. Do it with the 3 G’s ~ generosity, grace and gratitude. The audience at this event came up with the 3 G’s. Caterina says this is the topic of writing her next article. 🙂

8. BUT, be open to ideas coming in that have nothing to do with the topic, that are focused on uplifting your business. Discover possibilities! Sometimes you will recognize ideas that appeal to you, such as tips for traveling for business women, but you won’t act on it. A wonderful website for women in business who travel is the Stiletto Dash, such as staying hydrated and not having desserts. Have a place to capture your ideas. You have enough projects now, but you may do this later.

Strawberry cheesecake

Strawberry cheesecake
Dining car on train, Canada trip

9. Know what your limits are and prioritize. Caterina was planning a social media marketing summit for October, but realized she already has 9 programs she is working on! The beautiful thing about being an entrepreneur is that you can run with an idea.

Like

Woman pressing social media Like button

10. Not everyone will love you, your book, your speaking! It’s hard to be a prophet in your own land. (Luke 4:24) But in San Francisco, Caterina does lots of programs. They are always full, so that’s not always true. Test everything. Test things 3 times before quitting or moving on to something else!

11. Use your book to get booked. 🙂 Generate revenue with your book through speaking gigs, and then selling your book at the back table. Who needs your important message? There are women in this world who need to hear your important story.

The Hands of a Woman

The Hands of a Woman, womensbattles.com

 

12. Think about the framework of your book. How many words do you want? What’s happening in each chapter? Some ideas are stories, exercises, and questions. Pull books off shelves. Look at the format. Do a checklist at the chapter’s end for all chapters. Use boxes. Design your chapters attractively with bold headers and sub-heads, bullet points, visually appealing graphics.

woman scuba diving

woman scuba diving

In the next post, we’ll discuss books more. Do you want to write, are you writing, or have you written a book? Share in the comments below.

Be sure to check out my ebooks and other info products at my estore here.

Sought After Speaker Summit binder
Blog, Coaching, Faith, Speaking, Spiritual Gifts, Travel, Writing

Sought After Speaker Summit part 3

Sought After Speaker Summit binder

Sought After Speaker Summit binder

This is part 3 of the Sought After Speaker Summit training. You can read part 1 here and part 2 here.

Who was there?

There were women from all walks of life at this training – all ages, races, economic classes, faiths or religions, marital status, education, work experience. I think we all had the same goal: how to achieve success, how to reach the next level in our businesses. And I think success is something you have to define personally, what it looks like for you.

For me, success does mean building substantial wealth. Not to buy new toys, but to help get our family out of debt, build wealth for us and our children’s futures, and to travel all over the world for both missions and pleasure.

To me, success also means life-work-family balance. God and my family come before my business. They are my priorities. At the same time, they need to honor and respect when I need to work on projects.

This doesn’t always happen. I’ve talked with other speakers and entrepreneurs, who have said it happens at their houses, too…they get interrupted just as soon as they start working on something important!

God spoke to my heart last year and told me that my family is NOT an interruption. To realize they matter more! This is something I continue to work on and ask God for help daily.

One of the reasons I choose to work from home is because I love being the CEO of my business, setting my own schedule, taking time off when I want or need to, spending time with those I love. I am using the spiritual gifts God has given me in my work, fulfilling my purpose and my dreams in speaking, writing, coaching, and traveling.

This is what God made me for. I love it! 🙂

Some of the topics covered at the Sought After Speaker training were:

  1. The 10 Steps To Becoming a Sought After Speaker
  2. Create a Compelling Vision and Make Your Business Thrive With Speaking!
  3. How to Get Your Speaker Sheet Done
  4. InfusionSoft -The Easiest Way to Grow Sales
  5. 10 Different Ways to Add Revenue and Clients To Your Business with Speaking
  6. How to Make Your Offer to Come Home with Clients
Caterina Rando

Caterina Rando
SAS Training, Los Angeles

I’d guess there were about 75 or more women there. The room was full. Some of the Sought After Speaker training attendees were clients in her advanced programs. On the second day, they led workshops on different topics that were their areas of expertise:

  • 5 Things to Do With Blogging and SEO to Get More Clients
  • Feng Shui Strategies (I stayed far away from this one!)
  • Create a systematic schedule of events for a successful email marketing campaign
  • How to Use Social Media to Become a Sought After Speaker by Yvonne Elm Hall, who I sat by and talked with the first day. She has tripled her revenue working with Caterina! I LOVE her pretty website and heart logo!
  • How to Sell Your Services on EBay
  • How to look Like a Successful Sought After Speaker, by KL Moore.

I made two new friends, who sat at my table, so I was really excited about that. KL is a Christian, and I told her I didn’t believe in coincidences with her sitting right beside me! KL is in Caterina’s advanced business program and encouraged me to sign up for her advanced speakers’ program next year. She’s praying for God to show me what to do, and we exchanged emails and plan on talking again!

KL Moore, petite, pretty and powerful, is standing on stage here (first on the left) as Caterina asked her and her other advanced program clients to come forward to share how the programs have helped them in their businesses.

KL Moore, Image Consultant & Speaker

KL Moore, Image Consultant & Speaker

Here’s Vanessa at my table – the very pretty Asian, tiny woman on the right. The other women at my table were so sweet, but I forgot their names – guess I need to practice this skill, as Caterina would say! I think the woman in the middle was Nancy and the woman on the left was Julie – but don’t quote me on that!

Notice the cute, colorful orange binder on the table that Caterina gave us for the training. It has sheets with helpful tips and action steps for us to write down and begin.

Vanessa Pearson, Financial Advisor

Vanessa Pearson, Financial Advisor

Here’s Yvonne (middle seat), looking at the camera. Yvonne is a Social Media Brand Strategist. Hers and KL’s workshops had great info.

Yvonne Elm Hall, Social Media Brand Strategist

Yvonne Elm Hall, Social Media Brand Strategist

Another woman I met, Janet McIntosh, is a VA (Virtual Assistant), so I got her card! I may need her as I intend to apply what I learned at this training!

After lunch and during a couple of the breaks, 80’s music played and some of the women danced. That was fun.

Some women danced

Some women danced

Caterina had some leftover goody bags from a previous training, and this goody was in the pink bag: Woman Entrepreneur Extraordinaire – secrets of business success, written by multiple authors.

Women Entrepreneur Extraordinaire book

Women Entrepreneur Extraordinaire book

Caterina autographed it for me, signing it, “Beth, Expect Success!”

Beth, Expect Success!

Beth, Expect Success!

Yes, I do!!!

This week I”ll share some of the things I learned with you! I’m thankful to God for this amazing opportunity, grateful to Ray for working overtime shifts for me to be able to go, and to Heather for letting Leah stay with her while I was gone and Ray was at work.

What do you think about this post? What trainings have you gone to for speaking or your business, and what was your big aha? Mine was the amazing content and how “available” Caterina was with the attendees! I also loved making a new friend, KL!

Leave your comments below.

Beth Jonees, International Speaker/Author

Beth Jones, International Speaker/Author

 

Beth Jones, International Speaker/Author

http://www.BethJones.net

Do you need a dynamic keynote speaker for your women’s conference or event? I’d love to work with you to help make your event a great success! To book me as a speaker, email me at elizabethdjones@gmail.com or contact me here.