Cait
Today’s guest on the Born to Rise podcast is a very special guy. Not only is he the only man who has ever appeared on the show, besides an interview I did with Toby a long time ago. Brian is also a former client and a former coach of mine. Brian was my TEDx coach who helped me prepare my speech which has now been seen by over 55,000 people. And he is just incredible. Brian Miller is a magician, turned author, speaker and consultant on human connection. He works with organizations from all over the world who believe everyone deserves to feel heard, understood and valued. He also helps thought leaders, coaches and entrepreneurs get invited to TEDx and deliver the talk of their dreams in his speaking program, conquer the red dot. Brian’s own TEDx how to magically connect with anyone has been viewed over 3.5 million times. Dude’s gone viral, y’all. Publishers Weekly raved about his book three new people, saying Miller brilliantly outlines a system for deepening relationships. His podcast beyond networking features intimate conversations with legends and leaders of industries about the relationships, connections and chance encounters that got them there. Guys, Brian is like a wizard. He’s so interesting. This conversation is packed with value, especially if you are somebody who is interested in learning more about TEDx, landing a TEDx and weaving public speaking into your career as an entrepreneur, you are not going to want to miss this episode. It takes a very interesting and talented dude to weasel his way onto the Born to rise podcast, which is all about empowering women. But I invited Brian onto the show because he has so much knowledge and wisdom to share. So without further ado, please enjoy this episode. If you are tuning in, then I would love for you to send me a DM and let me know your biggest takeaway from the conversation with Brian. Without further ado, here it is. Oh, and the last thing that I want to share with you guys, doors are open for a couple more days to compel my program, five weeks to marketing that moves. It is all about crafting stories, telling better stories being able to market more powerfully in your business. So if you are interested, please go ahead and click the link in the show notes. You can also click the link in our Instagram bio to check all about compelled. Okay, without further ado, here’s the convo with Brian. Hello, and welcome to today’s episode of the boys rise podcast. I’m your host, Kate scoter. And I am so excited, Brian, I think you are our first male guest ever. Oh no. Toby did an interview with me in like 2018. But like besides tovi, you are our first male guest on the show. Welcome. I am so happy that you’re here.

Brian Miller
Well, thanks for having me. I’m honored. And hopefully my hair at least gets me into the category.

Cait
So exactly. There you go. The facial hair, maybe not. But yeah, maybe not somewhere. I’m so pumped that you’re here, Brian. And you know, there’s God. I feel like we could do like a four hour extravaganza, but I’m so pumped to be talking to you about all things, public speaking and TEDx. And, you know, really opening up this world that I feel for so many entrepreneurs and coaches is really quite a mystery. And it’s perfect, because you are not only a TEDx speaking coach, a TEDx speaker with 3.5 million views on your own TEDx. Hello, and an incredible career public speaker but you are also a magician. So I feel like you demystifying a lot of this like mystery and pulling back the curtain for us is just like so perfect for this conversation.

Brian Miller
Yeah, that that’s so funny. I mean, there’s an old quote magicians love that, like magicians have in jokes, as you might imagine any industry does. And magicians are a particularly weird bunch. As you as you probably could imagine. And magicians have this old kind of joke or line that that most people think that somewhere there’s a vault on a mountain in a cave where all the secrets of magic are being kept. And and the truth is, that vault is empty. There’s nothing in it. It’s all the all the secrets are out here. They’re accessible for anybody who wants them and I feel that way about public speaking. intent like this stuff feels really mysterious and closed off. But it’s, it’s just a process that you need to understand. Like any other process.

Cait
Yes. So good. Thank you for saying that. So I would love for you to tell us a little bit more about how you got started in your career. I mean, I’m definitely interested in the magician Vega know a bit about your story. And I’m sure our audience would be interested in that as well. But I’d love to like, learn more about how you transitioned and moves from being a magician, like doing whatever parties and things that you were doing to landing stumbling your way into a TEDx that like blew up went viral and really launched you into an epic public speaking career which has since taken its own turns but tell us like how you got started in all of this?

How Brian got started as a magician and became a full-blown speaking career

Brian Miller
Yeah, the the magic thing is probably for a different time. So how I got into magic is really just how any other kid gets into magic debt. My dad, my grandfather, they bought me magic tricks and magic kits. It was a big part of they loved magic. So I was kind of around magic all my life. No one ever imagined I would end up doing it for a living, you know, who who does Imagine that. And the short version of how I started doing it professionally was the only job I’ve ever had was when I was 16. I worked at McDonald’s for like 10 months. And you know, I was I was working whatever it was 38 hours a week. You know, like when you’re a teenager, they can’t let you go 40 Like 38 hours a week over that hot grill on the back sweating it out with the burger juice hitting your face.

Cait
I’m like gagging over here. pregnant lady

Brian Miller
is the worst is the worst. And so I did that. And while I was doing I was like 16, I was also starting to get paid gigs as a magician, kind of within the last year 1516. Like, local backyard parties, people throwing a summer party in their backyard would give me 50 bucks or 80 bucks, whatever I and that felt like a tremendous amount of money. I mean, I was 16. And it was a different world. And it was a lot of money. And then there’s one day I did a private event for like a local company. And they pay I don’t know what it was it gave me like 300 bucks to spend a couple hours walking around there part of you in card tricks. And I realized I had made more money in an hour doing card tricks. And I was making it a week over that hot grill on McDonald’s. And that was it. I quit I told my dad I’m I’m quitting.

Cait
So perfect. I love that. And I love how like your magic story is so much the initiation into your entrepreneur story. Because isn’t that it? Like Hang on, wait a minute, I can like labor for this amount of time making this much per hour. Or I can do something that I love and get paid a ton of money to do it. Hang on. Yeah.

Brian Miller
Yeah, exactly. It was it was just and that was it. And so I started doing that I supported myself through college like not full time, I had scholarships, and my dad covered my living expenses. But everything else I wanted all anything else I wanted to do my car, I bought myself I paid for I paid for my car insurance, I paid for every other thing going to the movies, doing magic. So I was like a double major maintaining a four Oh, all weekend at nights and on the weekends, I was traveling around the kind of Northeast doing magic gigs and doing my papers and hotels and all that stuff. So anyway, so I ended up making a career as a magician, I eventually got signed to a national agency started touring the country. And, you know, did that all in for about 10 years before the TEDx opportunity. And, you know, my, my TEDx talk, it was a different world for TEDx. It was something that could never happen now, which is I got a call from a guy hosting a local TEDx conference for the first time, his first time running one. At a high school, there was a youth event being run by high school students, but he was the adult overseeing and supervising. He said, We got your name from a bunch of local people. I’m putting on a TEDx conference. Any chance you’d be interested in speaking at it? Yeah. And that was it. That was it. You know, and I was in and he said, Well, what would you want to talk about? And I spent the next few months trying to figure out I went through four or five different possible topics, it could have been a very different talk that never would have done what it did.

Cait
How did you do this? So there’s like so many pieces of this fascinating, first of all, and I just want to like, highlight them before we just keep plowing through because everything you’re saying is gold. Like you were a magician for 10 years before you had your TEDx. So I just think number one, like let’s all let that sink in. It wasn’t like, boom, you started a new hobby and then became an expert overnight and then felt like you needed to push your way onto the stage. It was like you spent a decade turning something that was a passion into a true art form and expertise and honing that till you got enough of a name for yourself that this guy just called you out of the blue and asked you I think that is such a powerful lesson in like letting things unfurl and unfold over time, which is so hard for so many of us who want it and want it now dammit. But just like such a great reminder. And then I love that you also said that this was like us Use production. I mean, because, obviously, and we’ll link, of course your TEDx talk, which everybody should spend like 14 minutes or 12 minutes or whatever it is, go watch. I know it’s definitely shorter than mine, Brian, we didn’t get mine down. But, but you know, definitely go watch it, you guys. It’s an incredible talk. But I want to say about that, like, it didn’t have to be, you know, TEDx New York City or TEDx, you know, London, in order to go viral.

How Brian’s TedX Talk went viral

Brian Miller
It’s TEDx Manchester, high school, Manchester, Connecticut. And it was literally run by teenagers. And by the way, you can tell the production quality is terrible, and like, not really bad, do the best. Yeah, it’s really it’s a miracle. Anybody plowed through the bad. The audio, I’m an audio guy, I’m a trained audio engineer, the audio makes my head explode, because you can barely hear it. Somehow the content was good enough that people were willing to plow through that the background was a bunch of red solo cups that they glued together to make a red background. Read It read, it was trending back in 2015 TEDx cups was what was trending on Reddit from my talk. It was so funny.

Cait
That is hilarious. But like 3.5 million views, I just I want to underscore that because I think so many of us feel like we have to have, you know, the perfect equipment or the perfect outfit or the perfect whatever in order to make it go viral. And I feel like your talk alone is such a beauty, both like how you landed the talk, but also the production of the talk. And then it wasn’t some like international, sexy city. It was a high school production in Manchester, Connecticut. And yet, the content is what blew it up and what launched you from a magician to a public speaker with like a six or multi six figure business traveling around the world delivering keynotes and like known for this work. It’s absolutely incredible.

Brian Miller
Thank you. It’s it’s been wild. I mean, because that wasn’t the goal. The the people were like, wow, like, you know, a lot of people today, like the people I work with to help them get and deliver TEDx talks. They’re trying to get a TEDx talk, first of all, which I wasn’t, they’re trying to get one. And they’re trying to get one for the purpose of usually, if it’s not simply generously expanding their mission, it’s that and building their business, getting more, you know, more potential clients and getting more cachet and increasing their rates, all these things. And people were like, wow, like, how did you design a talk that you knew was going to do that? Like, I didn’t know it was going to do that. Not only did I not know. But that wasn’t even the goal. I was still a full time magician. I didn’t want to be a speaker. I wasn’t imagining being speaker. My goal. This is the truth. My manager and I, and I’ve been with him for now, like 12 years, same guy has been my manager for way from back when I was doing backyard barbecues, he was still my manager. And we did all this together. Scott, you know, he and I said to each other, the goal of this talk is, if we can get like 5000 views, maybe 10,000 views, we can increase our rates. In my corporate work by 500 bucks. Like I was trying to go from being a $2,000 corporate magician to a $2,500 corporate magician, and we were hoping TEDx would get us there. So what happened was just not even on my radar in the realm of possibility. And it was an insane ride for the next couple of years. Like just like trying to hold on to a horse that was just like getting away from me. It was insane.

Cait
That’s incredible. So talk us through what happened after your TEDx. So you delivered it, it started to not only be seen by high schoolers, but by like 10s of 1000s, and then hundreds of 1000s. And then eventually millions of people around the world. How did you like deal with all of that influx of interest? I don’t even know if people knew how to contact you. But how did you make that transition from magician to Speaker both in terms of like practically, but also in terms of your identity? Because your identity underwent a huge transition at that period?

How Brian’s identity and business transformed after his TedX Talk

Brian Miller
That’s such a great question. I’ll answer both of those the practical the business but also the identity because I gotta tell you, as you might imagine, I’ve been asked about this on hundreds of podcast and I think you’re the first person who has ever asked me about the identity shift. So that’s, that’s really interesting. And it doesn’t surprise me at all that you would think to ask about that. With the work that you do and how how good you are at what you do. So So okay, the business end of things. The influx in my inbox came like people were literally googling My name like Brian Miller magician, they didn’t know how else to look for me because I didn’t have a speaker website. I didn’t have anything like that. They found my magic website where it was like, New England’s number one corporate magician, like that was my website. And they would just reach out via my contact form and kind of hack their way through the questions that didn’t make sense for them. And at the end of it in the description box or whatever, like where they had a chance to write something be like, we have this conference we’re hosting in Barcelona for like 100 world class on apologist invitation only we’d like you to be the kickoff keynote speaker, how can we talk to you about it, I was like, okay, so I would get on, you know, calls or video calls I was on, I was one of the 10,000 people on Zoom, like, seven, eight years ago before 10 million people got on Zoom In March of 2020. Because I started having these kind of international conversations. And what would happen is they were like, Okay, we have a 45 minute slot. Can you do the TEDx? But for 45 minutes, tell the story of the blind guy, can you like do that, but for 45 minutes, and we and the budgets were insane, compared to magic, you know, the lowest entry level budgets for speaking were three to four times what my highest rates had ever been as a magician,

Cait
Toto, where I hope to make $500 more land anymore.

Brian Miller
Yeah, exactly three to four acts, just because they saw me as a content matter expert in that as a magician, totally different category. And different bucket money comes from a different bucket in a corporation, right, depending on what they’re looking to book. So. So what I started doing is we started, you know, playing in that world. And the problem was, I didn’t have 45 minutes of content on human connection or on perspective taking, I wasn’t an expert on human connection or perspective taking, I had 14 minutes and 11 seconds to say on that. And that was it in the whole world. That was my TEDx talk. So what I did is we said yes to all these because how do you not say yes, to those, you know, flood of interest. But after I said, Yes, I had a complete meltdown, panic, because I was like, Oh, my God, I am not qualified to be talking about this. Definitely not at those prices. You know, I’m not an academic. I’m not a researcher, I’ve got a undergraduate degree in philosophy, and I spent 10 years in clown shoes, doing card tricks, like I am not qualified to be this person. And so what I did is I buried my head, in every book I could find that had ever been written related to what I was considering human connection, which was not a term back then, you know, that was not a hashtag. It didn’t exist. I, you know, my TEDx pretty much invented that category for speakers which now there are speakers were human connection speakers. And again, unintentional, but it happened. So there wasn’t the one books written on human connection. There were books written on interpersonal communication, and you know, the psychology and the sociology and anthropology and you know, all this stuff. And so I read every book I could, I listened to every podcast I could listen to, I did interviews, informal interviews, and phone calls with anyone who would talk to me to teach me about the science and the research about this stuff, so that I could just not look like an idiot. That’s all he’s trying to do is not look like an idiot at those fees in front of those kinds of audiences. And what I learned from two years of doing that, just two years of insanity, keeping my head down and learning everything I could learn. What I learned is the definition of expert is not what we think it is, we think expertise is degrees, and PhDs or I spent 30 years at a corporation. And now I’m qualified to talk about what I spent 30 years learning what experts really are just people who’ve spent an insane and unimaginable amount of time focused on a tiny, tiny, tiny, niche area of the human existence. And they’re one of the only people in the world who’s been willing to spend that much time focused on that tiny little area. That’s what an expert is. And so I accidentally became an expert over the course of a couple of years, because there was hardly anyone else on Earth, who had my experiences my background, my ability to engage a live audience, from my my work as a magician, but also had spent that much time focused not on communication or teamwork, but layers deep human connection, this tiny little slice subset. And what happened is I became the number one go to searchable person in the world, Google human connection speaker, I’m the number one search result in the world. And it’s just because I spent way too much time doing something nobody else would spend that much time doing. That was the business that

Cait
it’s so awesome. And I love that you just flipped that definition of expertise on its head. And I think that so many people feel whether it’s entrepreneurs, academic, like whatever it is you and it’s interesting that you had that imposter syndrome feeling even after your TEDx had you been on the red dot and you delivered it and I just think this is so interesting that it came up for you and I really appreciate this like behind the scenes glimpse of what was happening in your inner worlds because I think it’s easy for someone on the outside to be like, Oh, well Brian was on a TEDx stage. Of course, he’s a world class expert, and yet that feeling of oh, whoa, they’re like going to pay me three times more. Do I really am just a guy in clown shoes. Like do I really know enough? It’s so Oh, interesting how that mindset can creep in. And it’s inspiring that you like use that as motivation to like really develop and hone that skill set. And you already had a lot of that even before those two years of reading a bunch of books like there was something intrinsically that had already drawn you to that topic to become that expert.

Why anybody could give a TedX Talk (and how to do it)

Brian Miller
Yeah. One that said, and that’s why I say that, like, everybody could give a TEDx talk, right. And, and the thing with TEDx is, and you and I’ve talked about this, we talked about this recently, but there are only two ways today in 2022, to get a TEDx talk, either, you have to have discovered a completely new idea that’s never been seen before in human history. And this is for researchers and academics and engineers, people doing primary research, okay, for the rest of us, the mere mortals. The only other way in is to have a completely new or novel perspective on an existing topic or idea. And that’s where most of us get to live. And the big mistake a lot of TEDx speakers make is thinking either there, I’m not an expert in anything like maybe I make a living, I do a good job. But like, I’m not an expert. How am I qualified to do this? And the answer is, you’re qualified to speak to a unique perspective on that topic, because it’s your perspective. And what you need to do is figure out how your unique set of experiences and background what you know, I’m not the first person who’s ever said, listen, to understand not just to respond or to reply. It’s old borderline cliched advice, it’s been written about a lot. But when I said it in my TEDx talk, I said it in the context of having learned how to connect with an audience as a magician, where 10 years of doing magic teaches you magic is antagonistic. Magic is is a schoolyard taunt come to life. It’s I know something you don’t know. So people don’t enjoy that experience of being told I know something you don’t know. And it’s gonna make you wonder how do magicians create a wonderful, enjoyable, fun experience, in spite of that antagonism? And learning how to do that, as a magician, is what I brought across the chasm into the world of human connection, that something that researcher could have never done, an academic who studies in the ivory tower could have never come up with that perspective.

Cait
It’s so beautiful, and I love that you just like gave us that really specific example, because you’re right, like listen to, to understand not just to react or to respond isn’t a new concept, but you sharing from the depth of your lived experience, as a magician, as a guy in clown shoes, doing backyard barbecue, trade, whatever, like that gave you the ability to tell a story and to also convey your perspective on that topic in a way that was completely new wasn’t invented in a laboratory, but it was born out of a unique experience. And I think that’s such an important reminder for anybody who’s listening and thinking about applying for a TEDx or desiring to deliver a TEDx or any other kind of talk for that matter. But specifically, you know, for TEDx and the application process, you know, specifically how, how permission giving that is to really mine your own story and your own narrative and your own lived experience for what is that unique angle? How can you bring this perspective to life in a way that even if the idea isn’t novel, it is completely fresh and new through your lens?

Crafting a TedX Talk

Brian Miller
Exactly, and, and any of your listeners know your TEDx and they they saw what you and I worked on together. And when you you know, when you came to me, I remember I remember this, like, you had all these these stories and all these different potential topics. And there was this work that you were clear, it’s like, so many people end up coming to me the same way you did, which is clearly you know, how to do the work that you do. But if you try to articulate how you do it, you get stuck. Lot of people who are just inside of you, you just have this sense of how to pull what you need to pull as a coach out of people. But if I asked you to articulate your process, it’s really hard for people to do that. How do you actually get this done? How does it work? What experiences led you to being able to do this and so, you know, the kinds of things you talked about in your talk are not novel or terribly new either. But your lens we decided to focus on one or two stories, where, and this is important. The TEDx talk is not about your story. You use your story as a vehicle to deliver an idea worth spreading to deliver an idea that will change the listeners life. In that way. You get to be the mentor, the hero, not the hero, but the mentor figure and the hero is the listener the hero is the the person sitting it but watching TEDx talks. I was scrolling YouTube at night at 2am with the dog barking in one ear button and Cheetos falling down there. That’s your that’s your audience. That’s what you’re trying to reach. Right and getting that person to shoo the dog and put the other ear bud in. Lean in and start watching. That’s the key and you use your story as the vehicle to engage them to deliver the idea.

Cait
Yes, so powerful. I love that such a great reframe of crafting a TEDx talk and how you are not actually the protagonist here your listener is. And yeah, God, there’s so many layers to that. And I, we did so much work together. And it was so interesting and frankly humbling for me because one of my skill sets I would say is being able is as a communicator is being able to converse and articulate and speak what I learned and like, had a big heaping scoop of humble pie in our first couple sessions was like, Oh, so you mean, I can’t just like have a little outline and go live and just riff? And you’re like, yeah, no, like, you’re gonna memorize every word. And I was like, what? That’s a different animal. And I think, you know, this is actually such a perfect segue to talk, you know more about TEDx, but also the world of a public speaker. I know. So many of the clients that I work with, and women in my programs and colleagues that I have public speaking is sort of this like, cool, older cousin, who we like kind of feel connected to, but don’t really, you know, if we’re coaches or we’re doing the thing, or maybe we’ve gotten some, you know, print media press or digital media press, but landing a paid speaking gig feels like how do I even do that. So for somebody who’s listening, who has a platform, who is a thought leader, who is used to leveraging social media platforms to like, go live, I’m doing that in air quotes, even though it’s a podcast, and you can’t see that. But who’s leveraging you know, the video capabilities and broadcasting capabilities available to us on social talk to us about number one, like landing, public speaking gigs, and also delivering speeches, which are so differently done than just going live on Instagram?

How to leverage your social media to land public speaking gigs and deliver speeches

Brian Miller
Yeah, and I’m so glad you brought up this distinction, because it’s not like one is better than the other, they’re completely different mediums. But there are different mediums, which have different purposes as well. And Marshall McLuhan famously said, the medium is the message. And that’s really important. You know, the way the kind of message you can deliver and land on an Instagram Live is going to be different than on a zoom call workshop than on a phone call with a colleague than on a public stage with 100 people or 1000 people in the audience, the medium is the message, the way people want to engage with you when you’re doing an Instagram Live is very different from how a live audience at a conference is going to engage with you, for lots of reasons. And one of the big ones is the amount of effort and money and time and energy that goes into hosting a real conference. And you’ve hosted like retreats and like your own mini conferences. Well now think about a corporation, some of them spend 15 months planning out their three day conference that they have once a year, before COVID, I was booked 18 months in advance, like the amount of time between them securing the speakers and actually having a conference was insane. So you imagine that this, you know, this group of people, this leadership, or this conference team has spent 18 months and 200 500, you know, $700,000 and a year and a half of their life planning. And they have five slots for speakers. And you’re one of them. And maybe you’re the kickoff because that’s me almost always on the kickoff. The conferences entire success is on my shoulders. And I know that sounds crazy. But that’s what it kicked off speakers job. I’m the first point of contact for the audience, who the audience has spent hundreds or 1000s of dollars for their ticket 1000s of dollars for planes and travel and hotels and all this and they’re there to learn to get their ROI to get the most amount of this conference. And all they’re looking for his reasons to think that it wasn’t worth it. Because that’s how people go to go to do stuff, right? That’s their instinct is we spend a lot of money, we spend a lot of time and we keep looking for ways to complain about it. That’s just what humans do. So you’re the kickoff keynote, you get up on stage, and it’s your job to set the tone for the entire conference for these people to feel like every penny and every second I spent getting to this point in the next few days was worth it. I’m excited, right? That’s your job. It’s actually a really heavy responsibility. That’s why keynote speakers often get far far higher fees than the actual experts in the breakout sessions all throughout the rest of the conference. Most of the people you see it like the breakout, like a one hour masterclass are there they’re not only not getting paid to be there. Sometimes they pay to do those slots. Those speakers aren’t getting paid. They’re hoping people will you know back of room sale sign up for their programs. It’s just the people on the main stage the three four or five speakers that are getting paid. And that’s why we’re getting paid is because we set the tone for the conference. So I just wanted to put that that context out there for why? If you’re somebody who has a platform, like a big social media following, and a great podcast, but you don’t have tangible speaking experience to show that no matter how many followers you have, you may be having trouble you may be hitting a wall with these event planners, because they’re looking at you going, that’s great that you’re good on Instagram. But wait, this matters like this 45 minutes on stage to kick off this conference, we need to know that you’re not just an content matter expert, but we need to know that you’re going to engage a live audience and set the tone for our conference.

Cait
Yes, and there’s so much yeah, and 45 minutes is a long time, like most of us who go live on Instagram or like do social media, live streams, like our audience’s attention span is not that long people spend, you know, on average, what less than a minute on Instagram on a given piece of content, but 45 minutes, that is a super long period of time. And there’s

Brian Miller
a short keynote, that’s a short keynote, most of mine are an hour an hour 15, sometimes an hour and a half, I have a 90 minute version of my keynote.

Cait
Wow, that is a lot. Like that’s a lot. And it’s a lot and it’s such a you can’t just rely on natural talent or charisma or skill set like you need. I imagine. I don’t know I’ve never done I’m doing my first keynote. Actually, I’ve been told you this in May. But I’ll be super pregnant. Let’s hope it’s not 90 minutes. I don’t even know how long it is. But I’m like, Dear God, I’ll need a bathroom break in the middle of 90 minutes? I don’t think it is. That’s great. But it’s so fascinating, because it’s just it’s a totally different kettle of fish.

How to crossover into public speaking

Brian Miller
Yeah, yeah, it is. And so so that was me providing probably too much context. But I feel like I needed to like really over hone in on the context of why you might be a genius and a content matter expert and know how to get a huge social media following. But you might be hitting a brick wall, if you’re actually trying to cross over into public speaking. That’s one of the reasons so. So how do you actually cross over into public speaking? How do you get there? Well, this is the problem. This is the catch 22. Just like when you were starting to become a coach, it’s hard to convince people, they should hire you, when you haven’t had clients, yet, you have that problem of the first couple of speeches, same problem with speaking, what they want to see is proof that you’re an awesome public speaker. And it’s really hard to show proof of that when you haven’t done it yet. And so you’re like, Well, how do I ever show proof of that? If, if no one will give me a chance to prove it, right. It’s that catch 22 problem. So there’s so many different ways you can do this. The best way to do it is well, for me that I you know, I think the best way to do it is a TEDx talk, because it’s instant expert status. TEDx talks actually don’t like professional speakers, it would be almost impossible for me to get accepted to a TEDx talk now, because they don’t like polished professional speakers that they they like raw ideas from kind of real people that are delivering it for the first time. TEDx doesn’t want an idea that you’ve done 1000 times in a speech before they want a fresh idea. So you actually have a better chance of getting into TEDx than getting like your first paid keynote, in all honesty. So there’s that there’s also you have to if you’re somebody who’s really successful as a coach or consultant already, and you’re used to getting paid, you need to get a little humble for a second and go out and do some free speeches, you need to go and just offer in exchange for not not free, like I just said, but a waived fee speech. And by the way, your contract that you signed to do that free speech, quote, unquote, should have your actual keynote price crossed out. And underneath that it says waived fee. So set, set your future set, just a little practical, set your future fee, you know, establish an anchor your future fee, or whatever. But go out and do some waived fee presentations. There’s so many local groups within 30 minutes of driving from wherever you live, that are that need speakers and have no budgets. They have $0, their volunteer groups, their networking groups, there’s so many places where you can say to them, Hey, I’ve got this topic and what they’re looking for, they’ll give you 10 minutes, maybe 20. And so you get small chunks, waived fee, to test out ideas to learn about being a speaker, to work on your storytelling and in exchange for the waived fee. You can ask them for things like permission to film permission to pass around a you know, you know, an email list, get people on your email list. These are also networking events tend to be the kind of people who represent companies that hire speakers once or twice a year. It’s a great way to get in with them. They just saw you for 10 minutes and they remember you now when you reach out three months later about their upcoming events, right? This this you have to get humble like one of them My clients I’ve been working with to bridge her from where she’s been into professional speaking for like the last year, she she got really nervous when I started to talk about like, waived fee stuff, because she’s like, No, I’ve spent like 10 years building up to being like one of the highest paid people in my industry like for what I do, like, I’m not starting over. And I’m like, But you are starting over, it’s a different industry, it’s a different market front Lane completely differently, you have to start over.

Cait
Right, it’s a totally different lane. That’s really interesting.

Brian Miller
Yeah, and so it’s, it’s really just understanding that, just like, you know, getting money is not the only way to get paid. If you can get paid in the video, you can get video testimonials, whenever I used to do those, you can just ask every single person there. Hey, and by the way, I’m going to leave my camera set up in the corner for the next hour after I’m done. If you really enjoyed this, just walk over there and just stand in front of the camera and just say 10 seconds or 15 seconds about what you loved most about my presentation. By the way, introduce yourself your title, whatever you like, video testimonials from audience members raving about you, because of course they are it was free, they feel like they need to give back. Like you can get a lot out of doing that. And that is that one of the easiest ways in to getting the materials and the assets you need to get into conversations with actual event planners running real conferences with real

Cait
budgets. That’s so great. And I love that you just kind of took us back to those scrappy roots. Because I think for so many of us in entrepreneurship, like we have, we all start scrappy, I mean, unless we have some like shoo in conversation or that like magical fall from the sky phone call from the guy organizing the event or whatever. But most of us, including you, I imagine have stories of like being super scrappy, to make it happen. And it’s so easy to look at, you know someone on the outside to look at somebody like you and be like, Wow, career public speaker viral TED Talk like TEDx coach, you know, and just think, Oh, well, it’s, it’s, you know, professional sound equipment in your home office, you know, this guy’s just got it sorted. And you’re like, No, but I was like, propping up my iPhone to get people to record video testimonials. And that’s how it all started.

Brian Miller
I did I did all because the the TEDx it’s like, it’s not forever, and it’s not gonna flood like three and a half million people have seen it. How many of them actually have ever booked me for a speech? I don’t know. 7080. You know, like, in all of the time since 2015, there’s not that many people out there who actually have budgets to hire speakers. And that’s, that’s the other thing I want to make sure your listeners know, which is, there’s no such thing as the speaking industry. And this is what screws a lot of people up. People think, oh, there’s this like speaking circuit where once you get in, then you can get on the circuit and be a paid speaker. There’s no such thing. There’s no circuit, there’s no, these people don’t like meet and have conversations. All there exist. All there is are people at organizations who have budgets that sometimes need speakers.

Cait
That is gold. I’m so glad that you said that and popped that myth, because that is something that even up until right now, I also believed like, Oh, you’ve got to have an in you’ve got to know. And that’s so interesting, as somebody that I would look at from the outside and say is like a career public speaker for you to be like, yeah, no, actually, there’s no such thing as the speaking industry is both. It feels really permission giving like, Okay, I don’t need to think of this as like this inaccessible, red velvet rope, inner circle that I could never access. It’s about making the pitch making the connection, having some evidence of yeah, there it is, boom.

Why you need to make the pitch, connection, and back it up with evidence

Brian Miller
It’s, it’s it’s connection. These are just people and they have budgets, and sometimes they need speakers. And if you can, if you already know how to establish your thought, leadership and your expertise, because you and everyone listening to this already does that. And you’re good at that on socials and things. What I would encourage you to do is if the one difference that I see is people who are really good at using Facebook and Instagram to establish thought leadership, if you want paid speaking gigs, and you want to be seen in that world, you really do need to shift, not stop doing the things you already do. But you need to start doing LinkedIn, because that is where the money that’s where b2b exists, be LinkedIn is b2b and LinkedIn is a nightmare. We all know it’s a nightmare. But so is everything. Right? So like, you can figure out how to leverage LinkedIn. And there’s lots of good ways to do it. What LinkedIn you can think of LinkedIn, not for building an audience, but for connecting with the right people. Yes, posts on LinkedIn only get five or six likes. It’s

Cait
targeted. That’s such a great distinction. And like I’m so grateful that you just shared that little wisdom nugget which was super tangible, tangible and actionable, of leveraging that platform not as a content Mark. burning platform but more as a contact marketing, and not even contact marketing but contact initiating platform?

Brian Miller
Yes, yeah, it’s it’s good. It’s connecting with the kind of people who are looking for people like you who you can solve a problem for them because this they have a problem they need speakers and we already talked about how bigger the responsibility of those speakers is on their shoulders it you know, you know, Jane, the head of HR has been tasked by the CEO, you know, and that’s, that’s, that’s a little, that’s a little outdated? Well, let’s not use Jane, let’s use John John, right, like, because it could, it could be anybody, you know, John, or Jane, the head of the head of HR, you know, has been tasked by the CEO or some or the CMO or somebody up in the C suite, to find the speakers for this conference. And we talked about how important that is, well, not just does the responsibility land on my shoulders as the speaker, but the responsibility of all of us lands on poor John for the whole year. And he’s, he’s going, and so when he hires someone like me, he’s taking a huge risk, by the way, he’s, that’s, that’s, it’s hard to hire someone like me, because he’s gonna go back and say to the CEO, CEO is gonna go, you’re telling me that you are resting the success of our entire conference on a former magician, right? Like, that is a tremendous risk, right that he is taking. And so you can understand that what you need to do is, what you need is John, you need to have connected with him in a way that not only does he feel connected with you personally, but he sees your thought leadership, not your subscriber count, because I can tell you right away, they literally don’t care how many followers you have, ever, you know, I have less followers than the average 15 year old does today, like on Instagram on LinkedIn, I don’t have followers. You see, I don’t have an audience, right.

Cait
But those are vanity metrics don’t reflect like the income that you make the impact that you have yours, the fees that you’re able to command. So such a good not

Brian Miller
as a speaker, not as a speaker. Right? Right. And some people, some people make a living on some people, for some people, those are not vanity metrics in like Instagram influencers make a living because of them. That’s how they get brand deals like totally different market. But if you’re a speaker, they don’t care how many followers you have the hair, what can you do in the room for the people in the seats at our conference this year, that’s what they care about. And so I would say one, focus your your networking on LinkedIn. And two, you need to if you don’t already have a weekly blog, or a weekly podcast, something that exists on your website, not on Instagram, or somebody else’s site where the like Instagram could shut any of us down or disappear at a moment’s notice. It’s very scary, right? Like, so you should you should own I know that’s scary to people listening to this, but like, that’s why I have a weekly blog every Wednesday at 8am. You may not even know this because I never post about it on Instagram. And that’s where you and I are connected. I’ve been writing a weekly blog for like five years, I never miss Wednesday at ADM, anywhere from 500 to 2000 words goes out on my blog, and then that goes to LinkedIn. My blog is where I get booked. Not from any one blog post, but from people I’ve connected with on LinkedIn that start to see oh my god, this guy, every single week has something new to say on human connection. And when it comes to the conference, they have once a year, and they’re thinking maybe Brian, or maybe one of these two other people. They see these two other people haven’t posted anything new in three years. And Brian post something new every single week, this guy is engaged with the current world related to our topic, we want him

Cait
so powerful. Thank you so much for those tangible nuggets, because that is so helpful, too. I was going to ask you, what do you recommend people do and you just gave it to us. It’s so it’s so great. Like, make sure that you’ve got content off of social media, leverage LinkedIn for initiating those contacts and connections and start like just start. I think that’s so so powerful. Brian, this like I said, we could literally talk for three hours. I’m like, holy smokes, how was it already? So crazy. What do you I before I asked like where people can follow along with you and get more information about the work that you do and the coaching that you do and your human connection work and everything else. I want to ask you if you had one piece of advice to give to our listeners who are interested in expanding their thought leadership and truly rising to a new level of visibility and impact with their work. What would it be?

Brian Miller
It would probably be pretty much what I just said I would say either start a weekly practice of either a blog or a podcast. Podcasting is kind of a new blogging, but in some ways podcasting is not as good. Start a weekly practice of thought leadership in a way that is key You’re rated and intentional. riffing on lives is awesome that you build a lot of rapport with your existing audience. Sometimes you pull in new people, people feel really, you know, it’s your humanize. But there are moments of time and they disappear. They don’t stand like live streams don’t tend to be revisited two years later, what you need to do is you need to start a weekly practice of noticing something in the world related to your content area, your zone of genius to use the kind of language you might be using. Is that did I get that right? Yeah, you got it? Good. Got it. I’ve worked with so many people that have worked with you at this point. I’m like, I know the language you use. Now I get because they come into my conversations are likes, here’s my zone of genius. I’m like, what does that mean? So, so start a weekly practice of noticing something in the world related to your zone of genius, and then put it on the internet in a in a permanent format, either a blog, or a podcast, if it’s a podcast, I want you to script it, write a solo podcast, script it five minutes or something like that, and then deliver it, and then put the script on as a blog so that you also have it in text form, like literally start, because what this does is two things. One, it creates a backlog of proof of thought leadership that exists in a place people who have money and hire people like us actually want to go a website or blog, they don’t want to hang out on Instagram. And too, it forces you to actually engage on a regular basis, not just with your audience, but with your content. That’s really critical.

Cait
I love that. Thank you so much. This is so incredibly helpful, Brian, for our listeners who want to know more about you and the services that you offer the programs that you do. As I mentioned in the intro, guys, Brian was my TEDx speaker, TEDx speaker, TEDx coach. To nail my TEDx talk, I was kind of like a deer in the headlights once I realized I couldn’t just riff. And Brian literally helped me turn, as he said, a bunch of ideas and a lot of passion and a lot of fire into a really comprehensive, measured, memorized talk that has been so huge in my career. And so I can’t recommend him highly enough. Where can people connect with you, Brian, and stay connected to all the amazing work that you’re doing?

Brian Miller
Appreciate it. Yeah, conquer the red dot.com is the name of my program. So if you’re interested in TED X, and and that website also kind of includes a larger conversation, if you don’t just want to do Ted, but you want to really build your thought leadership and lead towards a public speaking career. I have programs that are not listed on that site anywhere, but that exist for people that I can tell them about in a discovery call. If they’re the right kind of person. It’s my exclusive program. Happy to let you all anybody on Kate’s listener know about that if you’re interested. So conquer the red dot.com. And then my socials, I’m most active on LinkedIn. So you can find me on LinkedIn. I’m sure.

Cait
We’ll put all of that. And we’ll also put your Instagram we’ll put your podcast we’ll put all the things Brian, thank you so much for today.

Brian Miller
My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Cait
Thank you so much for listening to this week’s episode of The Born to rise podcast. If you liked what you heard, head on over to iTunes and leave us a review. And make sure to check out orange arise podcast.com to stay tuned for next week’s episode. I’ll see you there.

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