Who do you speak to and what do you speak about?
Who I speak to is anyone that is ready to allow themselves to open their mind to what growth truly is.
What I mean by that is that a lot of the time, we look at growth as this very appealing idea, and then we actually get into the work behind it. And we start to realize that maybe we’re biting off more than we can chew.
So what I like to do is to shift people’s minds, framing how they think to say, “Okay, what if we can not only consider growth, but really do the work around it to prepare ourselves for it, so that we can be what I’ve now coined as “growth ready.”
If we can be growth ready, then anything is possible.
What was happening or not happening in your business that made you say, “I need The Speaker Lab’s help?”
At the time I came to The Speaker Lab, I was at a point where I knew I wanted to speak, but I knew I wasn’t taking myself or the process seriously.
For me, the investment in and of itself was my commitment to saying, “Okay, it’s time to get serious with this.” Enough telling people that you kind of speak and think about speaking and all that stuff.
If you want to step into this professional speaker title, what’s that investment going to look like?
It’s going to give you the confidence that that’s what you are, so for me, that’s really what brought me to The Speaker Lab; it’s that notion of, “Hey, if I’m going to really start to show up and call myself what I want to call myself, it’s time I made an investment that very much aligns with exactly that.”
When you signed up, did you have any fears or apprehensions about taking things to the next level? And how did you get past some of those?
I think the business part of it was the most intimidating piece. I’ve learned that through entrepreneurship – my business is coaching and speaking is very much part of that business as opposed to me having that as the business.
So, for me, I’ve kind of gone through that already through the coaching world, but then I looked at the speaking world and just was very intimidated, thinking, “Gosh, there’s lots of speakers out there…There’s so many events out there…How in the world do you actually bring all this into any kind of process where you can say, ‘Okay, yeah, now I see how to get from A to B to Z in terms this whole thing looks like.’”
Navigating the business side was incredibly intimidating, especially because when I came across The Speaker Lab and started looking at it, I was at this huge speaker conference surrounded by all these “been there, done that” speakers.
So I was like, “How do you guys pull this off and make it look so easy?” So that was definitely an apprehension for me.
What were some of your aha moments and takeaways from the SPEAK framework? How did you start to feel confident tackling the business elements, understanding how the dots connect, and how to put yourself out there?
It’s been about a year since I finished The Speaker Lab. so I had to look at the SPEAK framework again, and what’s good is I’m actually operating it. At this point, I’m doing it almost unconsciously.
The part of that framework that stood out to me was Establishing your Expertise. That was really helpful because once you start getting into the business part of it, you start getting a little more intentional and strategic about, “Okay, this is where I can see myself being truly wanted,” and be a smart investment for a company that works in this kind of space or this kind of space.
Once I started getting a little clearer on that, I started to say, “From a business standpoint, I feel I have way more direction now. I know where I’m trying to go. I know the people I’m trying to get in front of.”
I started with events more than I did say corporations, but corporations have slowly started to become a thing for me. But at the start, I’d realized, “Okay, this event likes to have speakers that come in and speak about things that I do; how do I now start structuring this thing in a way where all my efforts are going in that direction?”
The expertise piece, I’d already done a lot of that work around social media and coaching anyway, so then I started thinking about how do I show up as an expert and present myself as an expert to these events that are obviously looking for people like me?
Tell me about the journey of moving towards Corporate?
The reason I’ve moved forward with a true emphasis on corporate is because of my business in coaching. It’s a wonderful way to get a foot in the door and suddenly, now speaking is actually a lower potential investment for them than investing in me and my coaching business.
So it’s a nice one-two punch for me where I can say, “This is Growth Ready. This is Steve Mellor. If coaching is something that you feel is too much of an extended investment that just seems too much right now, but you’d love for me to come in and maybe just frame their minds in a way to start considering growth and preparing us for growth, et cetera.”
I’ve now found that really nice sort of one-two punch in what I’m providing and presenting to people. With Corporations, it seems that there’s so much more red tape to get through when it comes to contracts and all that kind of stuff. I’m definitely learning that the hard way, but in terms of long-term vision, that’s definitely where I’m now channeling my efforts.
Yeah, that sounds like a great business model. I like that you call it a one two punch. Well, what have been some of your results along the way as a speaker who’s working the SPEAK Framework and getting out there?
The scalability part of this is huge. I was brought into The Speaker Lab with one of the coaches, Jake Thompson, and he’s crushing it. He’s doing incredible things and he and I remain friends to this day. And he’s just this really great example from a scalability standpoint of how you just keep pulling in more and more offers within your overall umbrella that is your offer as a speaker.
So the scalability piece is huge for me. I wasn’t expecting to get that from this because again, in many ways I came to The Speaker Lab for like, “Hey, help me just kind of get going.” And suddenly by the end of it, it was like, “Hey, once you get going, that’s all well and good and we want you to get going, but we also want you to exist and continue to grow far beyond your time with The Speaker Lab, and this is the recipe for doing that.”
For me, the scalability piece has been huge, especially when I talked about it earlier with my coaching – for me to use speaking now as a funnel. And one thing that I’ve really started to build confidence in is putting out there is, “Don’t just see me as a keynote speaker, see me as this person that can be there all day,” especially when I’m talking to an organization or a corporation.
Use me in the morning as a speaker, and then let me do what I actually do even better, which is coaching with your leaders in a smaller environment, more intimate. etc. So building that confidence to say, “Hey, yes – here’s speaking, but look, there’s more.”
That is something that I hadn’t even considered would come from The Speaker Lab, so it’s cool to now be at that point where it makes sense for me to even be considering it.
Something I’ve noticed when I do these interviews with people who’ve been out of the program for a little bit, it seems that almost everyone is talking about how they’re scaling their business. Either they’ve added talks or realized they can turn this one talk into three talks or a whole day of workshops, which is so cool to hear. That is what we want – for people to have a sustainable business that can grow. It’s not just about getting booked and paid to speak once. That’s the goal to get you started, but we want you to grow your business and have a life of speaking as much as you’d like, while modifying your business to suit your dreams and vision.
What’s your new normal looking like these days, Steve, as your business grows?
That is still evolving. It just is. I’ve been really fortunate in the last – let’s say six months now – where I had a monthly speaking gig and I’m now getting to a point where my fee is something that I feel excites me.
If I were to go back to that guy that considered The Speaker Lab in the first place and say, “Hey, 12 to 18 months from now, this is what you’re gonna be asking for and people are gonna be saying yes to,” I’m not sure he would’ve believed you, so it’s cool to sort of be at that point.
I’ve done that now in the last six months. I feel much more confident about making that ask. And in terms of where I’m at in my life, I’m not actually looking to speak more than maybe once a month; 12 engagements a year for me is ideal, and then every single year that goes by, just making sure that what I’m asking for continues to go up.
For me, that’s what I was trying to build and I’ve built it in a way; it still needs a lot of work because I’m trying to get more specific towards who I want to be speaking to and why. But I look back and it’s cool to see a six month period and say, “Okay, it can be done. You’re gonna have to keep trusting the process. You’re gonna have to keep coming back to what’s worked to get you to that point. And if anything, probably double down on it even more from now on.”
It’s exciting for sure.
Who would you recommend to The Speaker Lab and why?
Anybody that’s been told they can speak and for whatever reason cannot get out of their own way when it comes to accepting it. Anyone saying, “Hey, I can speak and I want to speak and for whatever reason I don’t see myself as the speaker I could be.”
I would definitely recommend this program to anyone that has consistently received feedback that they are a great public speaker, that they understand how to command a room, but for whatever reason, they’ve never had that final piece of confidence or belief that is required to carry themself as a professional speaker.
That is so well said and totally fits the type of people who benefit from our program. Is there anything else you want to share as we close out?
The one thing I would say is again, even just going back and quickly looking through the book The Successful Speaker and almost without even realizing it – even though I don’t necessarily use the verbiage that came from the book – how much I’m actually executing the process itself.
Obviously this comes in way more detail through the six-month cohort that I was in and I just really want to commend The Speaker Lab in that regard is that you’ve allowed me to sort of create my own process while using your process so that I can I can now execute almost in an automated fashion without having to overcorrect or guess myself, etc.
I just appreciate that way in which it was taught and a way in which the environment was created so that I can kind of make it my own, but at the same time, at its core, I’m very much using those fundamental concepts that came out of the six month cohort.
I couldn’t have said it better myself. I appreciate you sharing all that!