What Every Event Planner Ought to Know About Keynote Speakers

Keynote speakers are people, too.

Surprising, right?

A lot of planners see speakers as unicorns only found around events and large venues.

But speakers are here to do their best at delivering a message and impacting people’s lives.

As a planner or organizer, there are some things you can do better to support your speakers.

And in this article, we’re going to share 5 things you should know about speakers so that you can book the best one for your event.

Here’s How to Support Your Keynote Speaker Effectively

You want your keynote speaker to deliver a great speech, make an impact on your audience, and move people to action.

A great keynote speaker incites action in those who otherwise would remain still.

While speakers tend to get grouped into motivational or inspirational, there are many who use humor, facts, stories, and more to get their point across.

The ideal situation is to have the speaker you hire tell their story and reinforce your event message.

If you’re like most planners, you want to make sure every single minute is used to its maximum…

….and you want your entire event to go off without a hitch.

However, it’s important to remember, the tighter you squeeze your speaker, the less effective they will be for your audience.

#1. Don’t Pigeonhole Your Speaker

Stay high level with your hired speaker. As long as their story or message supports and promotes your message, they can be effective for your audience.

To hire a speaker and then tell them how to deliver their message is like telling a chicken to stop clucking and start quacking (not that speakers are birds of any kind).

Don’t force your speaker to limit their talents and methods to fit your tactics.

Take a step back and think high level strategy.

Which story or method is going to be best received by your audience?

Go find that in a speaker.

#2. Deliver a Content Strategy to Your Speaker

Building on top of #1, develop and deliver your content strategy to your hired speaker.

Give them the freedom to find a way to plug themselves into the program.

Collaborate with how they believe it best to deliver your message through their approach.

Doing this frees up the speaker to leverage their talents and skills to offer a unique experience to your audience.

#3. Remain Patient But Persistent

You’ve heard of paying the long game with business, right?

You have an event to execute. You have a deadline. And the clock is ticking.

So, set deadlines. Stay persistent with meeting those deadlines. But remain patient with the people you’ve chosen to go on this journey with you.

#4. Allow Personalization

A story about a hiker who wrestles a mountain lion to death is going to be a more impactful, compelling story than pointing at a slideshow with data points on it for 45 minutes.

Allow your speaker to personalize your event theme and message so that they can internalize and deliver it to the audience.

While you should have an objective for your event, your speaker is a master orator who knows how to draw the audience in.

Give them the objective, materials, and tools. Then, let them get to work.

#5. Check Pride at the Door

It’s your event. It’s your audience. And it’s your reputation on the line.

But, allowing your ego to run the show will most likely end in disaster.

You choose who you hire as a speaker, so do your best to book one that fits your vision.

Many speakers are flexible as long as you give them the room to stretch.

Making decisions based on ego and pride, not because of data and experience, can lead to disaster in one form or another.

The goal is to give your attendees something to take to the world, an action plan at the most basic.

Work with the team and speaker you hired to achieve your goals.

Takeaways

At Platinum Speakers Agency, we’ve been promoting our speakers to events all around the world. We believe speakers wield the ability to change lives. It’s time you booked a speaker that can help you do the same at your event. View our roster now and then book one of our speakers today.

Here are the takeaways of this article:

1. Don’t Pigeonhole Your Speaker
2. Deliver a Content Strategy to Your Speaker
3. Remain Patient But Persistent
4. Allow Personalization
5. Check Pride at the Door