How do you stay relevant in your industry? At Influence 2019, the National Speaker Association Convention, I was asked to deliver a presentation on “How to Become and Remain a World-Class Speaker.” I knew I needed to consider the following issues: One, what would a client consider as world-class? Two, how do you perfect your presentation to make it world-class? Three, how do you stay relevant for decades?
As a keynote speaker, it is unrealistic to expect to be the flavor of the month for more than 20 years. This is probably true in all professions. However, regardless of your industry you can stay relevant when you learn to listen to your customers and clients.
Stay Open to Opportunities
To stay relevant, stay open to opportunities. A turning point for me was when a woman called and said, “I don’t know if you do this, but if you do, I want to hire you as a gift to my husband for his birthday. Seven of my salespeople attended your speaking school and came back raving. If you are an executive speech coach, I want you to help my husband. He’s a fairly good speaker, but he could use coaching on an upcoming, very important, presentation.”
For several years before this, having worked with speech coaches and delivered presentation skills training, dozens of people had asked if I was a speech coach. I would always answer, “Well, no, go to the people that I’ve hired.” When I realized how often I was asked, I officially put up my shingle as an executive speech coach.
Listen to Your Clients
To stay relevant, listen to your customers and clients. Another turning point in my career came when a national sales manager said, “Patricia I liked your speech, but I loved how you delivered it. Can you teach our salespeople to speak that way?”
He went on to explain, “It takes us a year to be in a position to have a one-hour meeting with our prospects. If we get the business, it’s worth $9 million a year. We’re losing sales and it has nothing to do with our price or offering. The presentation skills of our competitors are just better than ours.” Little did I know, this national sales manager had just given me the secret to always being in demand no matter what the economy is doing.
Listening to what my clients and prospects have needed has helped me design and navigate a successful, 40-plus years career.
Adapt New Strategies
To stay relevant, adapt new strategies. As the market changes, so do the strategies to best serve our clients. Offer a variety of approaches to meet your clients’ needs. Some years ago, I expanded my offerings to serve my clients virtually.
Speakers are content experts. My advice to speakers is that it doesn’t matter if clients want to hire you for your advice for one person, for 10, for 500, or for 5,000, or whether they want it in person, in a webinar, or interactively online. I’m able to serve my clients online through Fripp Virtual Training, FrippVT.com Powerful, Persuasive Presentations. This is one of the ways I help speakers, trainers, and content experts stay relevant.
My best advice for all industries is “Listen to your clients and adapt with each passing year.” Stay relevant in your industry.
FrippVT
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FrippVT is a state-of-the-art, web-based training platform that emulates live training and coaching. It is almost as if Presentation Expert and Executive Speech Coach, Patricia Fripp were sitting in front of you. FrippVT is designed to be immediately engaging and makes it fun to learn. If you are a novice presenter or a seasoned professional, you will find the content both practical and relevant.
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“Having easily connected easily to Patricia Fripp’s principles for refining my speaking, I began to feel more confident. Whether I’m speaking to one person, a small group, or hundreds of people, the art of communication is a gift. FrippVT provides the structure and strength to allow one’s heart, passion, and message to be received easily with deep resonance.”
– Amy Towner, CEO, Ventura County Health Care Agency
About Presentation Expert, Patricia Fripp
Companies that want to drive sales and gain a competitive edge hire Patricia Fripp to help them improve their important conversations and presentations. Kiplinger’s Personal Finance wrote, “One of the best ways to invest in success is to learn presentation skills from Patricia Fripp.” Fripp was named one of the “Top 25 Women in Sales” and is among the “Top 30 Coaching Gurus.”
