Custom Advisory Service
PR AND COMMUNICATIONS FIRMS
GET MORE SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS FOR YOUR CLIENTS
A Virtual and Live Session: For PR, Communications and Marketing Firms
Public speaking engagements are a proven way for your clients to build visibility, increase mindshare, generate business leads, raise brand awareness, and demonstrate thought leadership. PR firms are often asked by their clients to develop a speaker program to build awareness – perhaps for a company’s senior management team or for the partners of a law firm or consulting firm. Can you use some help in figuring out how to position these speakers in the event marketplace and how to research the best conferences to create the most effective exposure? We can help you accomplish these goals with a customized session in one of these formats:
one-on-one session
intensive workshop for an agency account team of two or more staffers
group session
The program is designed to help your firm create or improve upon an effective process to obtain speaking opportunities for your clients, resulting in successful outcomes. This is not an off-the-shelf public program – it will be customized to your firm’s needs. We will further tailor the session to factor in the participants’ experience level in the speaking arena. The program can be designed for PR and communications firms and agencies of all sizes – from solo practitioners to the largest firms.
Learn the elements of successfully landing speaking engagements for your clients, including how to:
Develop a proactive and successful speaking strategy – an 8-step action plan
Research, identify, and evaluate the speaking opps matched with your target audiences
Create compelling speaker proposals and “pitches” to the meeting organizers
Shape your presentation content to attract an audience without giving a sales pitch
Write effective presentation abstracts to be submission-ready
Reach the decision-makers who choose speakers
Respond to Call for Speakers proposal applications
Maximize your ROIT – Return on Investment of Time before, during, and after the talk
Improve your overall success rate in landing speaking engagements
Pitch podcasts for guest interviews
Learn the tactics, processes, and strategies to develop a truly powerful method of achieving a high rate of success in attaining speaking engagements, using a proven, systematic approach developed by Steve Markman, a leading expert in the field with over 30 years of experience in speaker placement and conference development.
The program is suitable for staff at all levels, from junior staff to account teams to management level and is a cost-effective way to develop or improve upon a speaking placement system for your firm. The program will result in added value for your staff and firm – which in turn will allow you to add even more value to your clients through an enhanced speaker placement service.
The program will result in added value for your individual staff members and your firm as a whole – which in turn will allow your firm to add even more value to your clients. By enhancing your firm’s speaker placement capabilities, you will get an edge over your competitors when you have a client or a prospective client for which speaking is an important element of their PR needs – providing your firm with a marketing and business development advantage.
Additionally, this program can serve as a professional development and training tool that can be used as a benefit to attract and retain staff – highly important in this time of intense competition for PR talent.
What Clients Are Saying
“Steve Markman has been a great extension to our speaker program work at The Hubbell Group. We began using his consulting service to help us pursue and secure speaking engagements for one of our firm’s largest clients, a major wealth management firm. Steve has helped us open doors to new opportunities to reach high net worth audiences, including such organizations as TIGER 21 and Milken Institute. In addition, Steve helps manage a different speaker program for us that has required a significant amount of research into events and meetings that reach elder care groups, healthcare professionals, entrepreneurs, attorneys, accountants and academics. Out of the gate, he helped us secure a speaking invite for the client to The Financial Times Innovate America Summit. Thanks to Steve’s contributions, we have been able to achieve greater results.”
“Steve has an incredible depth of experience and knowledge of the conference world. He also has many valuable contacts that greatly add to the success of a speaking program. During the time we worked with Steve, he helped us to triple our conference speaking engagements and break into new shows. His genuine and positive personality, and professionalism make him a true pleasure to work with.”
“We are incredibly grateful for the time and knowledge and experience that you shared with us. We are excited to implement the straightforward action steps you outlined for us! We really appreciate your genuine intentions of helping us with this part of our journey by using your extensive wisdom in the arena of speaking. This feedback is fantastic.”
“Steve Markman is the best speaker placement person in the U.S. For many years he has been the ne plus extra in securing speaking engagements for executives of our client companies, covering all sizes of firms, in all industries, in whatever geographic areas the firm is targeting…and he lands opportunities in high-impact events.”
“Steve’s knowledge of the speaking industry will help speakers at any point in their careers get more focused and more business. He has been very generous to National Speakers Association-New England.”
“Steve knows how to put you into conferences. Has decades of experience doing this well. At IBM, I relied on Steve to place speakers at business conferences relevant to our work. He knows how to find the “right” conferences and how to persuade organizers to include speakers he is assisting. He takes the initiative to match both well.”
“My goal was to increase the reach of my consulting practice outside of New England at a time when the market here was slow. I had been speaking at local events for several years but was really interested in being on the national stage. Steve quickly got up to speed on my expertise, helped me pull together speaker abstracts and got right down to work. The results have been phenomenal! I have landed some great customers and have achieved my goal of expanding nationally. I highly recommend Steve for organizations who want to put key executives on the national stage. He can take your executives and make thought-leaders of them.”
“Thank you again for the training. It was definitely beneficial to both of us and we’re looking forward to implementing these tactics.”
“Working with Steve Markman allowed me to take a good look at my speaking business – in particular, how to best monetize my expertise—small business marketing and PR. Before we even met, Steve researched my brand and visibility as a speaker. At our first in-person session, he provided feedback on my speaker’s kit, signature talks, and strategies on how to target speaking gigs best suited for my goals – along with a list of contacts I should be in touch with. What I loved was that he understood my business model from the get-go and provided a clear roadmap on next steps, including follow-up. It’s obvious that Steve is not only a top consultant in the speaking industry, but someone who wants you to succeed. He builds relationships, not just a client base. For this and hundreds of other reasons, I’d recommend working with Steve and his speaking agency to build, tweak and get exposure on stage.”
Meet Steve Markman - Session Leader
Steve Markman has over 30 years of experience in the conference and speaker field. Since founding Markman Speaker Management, LLC in 1994, Steve has helped hundreds of organizations obtain speaking engagements.
Steve has worked with clients in all industries and professions. He has obtained speaking engagements for organizations of all sizes – from small firms to mid-sized firms to the Fortune 500, including IBM Global Services, PayPal, Subaru, Bank of America, Hitachi, and Ogilvy PR Worldwide. Dozens of professional services firms have also taken advantage of Steve’s expertise – such as Booz, Monitor Group, Perot Systems, L.E.K. Consulting, Mercer Consulting, and AmLaw 100 firms such as WilmerHale, Ropes & Gray, and McGuireWoods.
Clients have greatly benefited from Steve’s singular focus on landing executive speaking engagements. He attributes part of his success to his hands-on experience earlier in his career when he headed up the conference divisions of leading event organizations such as COMDEX and The Conference Board.
