How Entrepreneurs Can Increase Their Income by Public Speaking with Odell Bizzell: An EOFire Classic from 2022

0:01Light that spark fire nation JLD here and welcome to entrepreneurs on fire brought to you by high level, the all-in-one sales and marketing platform. On today's classic episode, we'll be breaking down how entrepreneurs can increase their income by public speaking. To drop these value bombs, I brought Odell Bizzle into EO Fire Studios. Odell has published 10 books, partnered with over 240 organizations, and teaches entrepreneurs how to double their income with public speaking. He's been featured in over 200 media outlets. In today, Fire Nation, we talk about how we don't forget experiences we've had, especially those we've never had before and how all roads lead to public speaking and oh so much more.

0:40And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Odell and our sponsors. Are you ready for the ultimate all-in-one platform for entrepreneurs, marketers, coaches, and agencies? Build funnels, automate follow-ups, manage clients, and even white label your own software. Say hello to our featured partner High Level and visit highlevelfire.com to start your free trial today. Franocity has helped hundreds of people leave unfulfilling jobs, invest in recession-resilient businesses, and create legacy income for their families through franchising. Get started today with Franocity's Franchise Funding Guide, packed with real-world strategies to launch your business without draining your savings.

1:25visit franocity.com. That's F-R-A-N-O-C-I-T-Y dot com. Odell, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. Fire Nation, what's going on? Odell Bazell here. I would say that proximity is the ultimate cheat code. And I know people kind of buy into that, but it's literally it. I remember hearing Denzel Washington say, if you hang around a barbershop long enough, you're going to get a haircut. And if you hang around successful people long enough, it's going to happen. It has to happen. And I think more people need to lean into that.

2:14And I also believe that public speaking is a great way to manufacture that. Well, that is the main focal topic of our conversation today. How entrepreneurs can increase their income by public speaking. And you believe, Odell, public speaking is not the second greatest, but the greatest marketing medium in the world. Tell us why. It's the greatest. And a good friend of mine, he said, if it works on you, it can work for you. And public speaking as a medium has been working on us all of human history. Industries have been born through the spoken word. If you think about religion, the spoken word, if you think about education, the spoken word, if you're an entrepreneur, if you're in business, even if you're in corporate America, you have meetings through the spoken word.

3:08It's all through spoken word. And a lot of times we try to find market to message match and media, like what's the best way? Is it video? Is it email? We respond the best to a human voice, a human voice that sounds like it knows what it's talking about. And public speaking is, there's nothing else better than it. And it can only improve all of the other means of marketing. So that's why it's Well, I love that. And one thing I always like to refer back to when people ask me why I like to public speak or to tell stories, I say, listen, you know history. What's history broken up? It's his story, her story.

3:51We love stories. We love talking. We love sharing. We love getting around a fireplace and hearing once upon a time. I mean, that is all public speaking. That's speaking in front of people. And so many people, Odell, I'm going to say 85 to 90 % identify as introverts. But you believe shy, introverted entrepreneurs can double their income with public speaking, even if they don't want to be quote unquote speakers. How is that possible? For sure. And so many, John, I've been a professional speaker since 2008. eight. And so many people that I know in the business are introverted. And so being shy and being introverted, sometimes it's a little different, but if you're shy, if you're somebody who's saying, I'll do now, I'm not going to be standing on a stage delivering any type of monologue or anything like that.

4:45There are actually four types of public speaking. Um, platform speaking is probably the one that's the most well-known, you know, people think of a Jim Roan. They think of a Tony Robbins. They think of a Les Brown standing on a huge stage. That's just one type. The second type of public speaking is teaching. So you're actually breaking down the ideas and the concepts that are brought about in a keynote, and you're breaking it down to a how-to. So you're teaching how. If you've ever taught your kids or your siblings or anybody else how to tie their shoes or how to eat with a fork or something like you've taught.

5:20So teaching is a big part of public speaking. If you can teach something, then you can use public speaking to increase your income, especially if it's something complicated. Also interviewing. You all, Fire Nation, are listening to the platform of John Lee Dumas, who built a multi, multi-million dollar empire from interviewing other people. And so if public speaking, interviewing, we're doing this publicly, Right. And then there's hosting. So it's distinguishing between teaching and platform speaking. Interviewing hosting is where you're basically at an event or you're facilitating experience and you can do that.

6:00So to put it all together, if you consider yourself shy, it's something that you can outsource. It's also something that you can do in limited capacity. and really quick, John, Russell Simmons, the founder of Def Jam and all that stuff, they had Def Comedy Jam way back in the day. Some people will remember this. Your younger listeners probably don't know what I'm talking about. But Def Comedy Jam, Russell Simmons was the founder of Def Jam. And so he would always come in at the end and say, thank you and good night and leave. That's the only thing he would say because he's very shy and introverted.

6:38So you can use it, but what you have to do if you're shy is you have to learn how to assemble your ideal clients in a fashion to where as they want to buy. We have to create an environment for them to buy, and then you can use public speaking to double your revenue. And there's a quote that I love from Ralph Waldo Emerson, do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain. So Fire incarnation. You become a better speaker by speaking. You become a better podcaster by podcasting. You become a better anything by doing that thing. So yes, if you are shy, if you are an introvert, these things can absolutely be overcome.

7:18And I'm not saying you're going to become an extrovert, but I'm going to say you're going to be able to get up on stage and be like, whoa, I kind of like this. I mean, I know a lot of people can probably listen and resonate with the following. You go to a karaoke bar with a bunch of friends and 90 % of them don't want anything to do with that stage. But you know, the night goes on, they kick back a couple drinks and they're hanging out and then one of them that was absolutely no at the beginning of the night, gets up on stage, sings one song. All of a sudden, she's Mariah Carey. You cannot get her off the stage.

7:50You can't get that dude off the stage from singing Sugar Hill Gang. You can't get him off stage because they're just like, wait a second, what was this thing I was fearful of? I just did it. I enjoyed it. I'm having fun. I want to keep doing that thing. So that's something I just wanted to share right there. And before we do move on, Odell, if there was somebody that came to you and just said, hey, I'm just terrified of speaking kind of beyond what I just shared of just, you know, obviously get up and just do it and face your fear. Is there something like some like unique strategy or hack that you found that's really helpful for people in that situation?

8:25Absolutely. Talk about what you know. Talk about what you know. And if you really want to use this hack, talk about what you know to people who you know don't know that thing. That's the best way because, again, if we're thinking about it from a primitive standpoint, we have our different idiosyncrasies, our different personalities because of some sort of conditioning or because of something that's in our DNA. But all people like to share what they know. And so if you can share what you know to people that don't know it, so maybe on the job, if you have a job still, maybe it's to a subordinate or to somebody that is a newer professional in the field.

9:09If you're an entrepreneur, maybe it's to your team. You say, hey, I just heard this great podcast, you're an entrepreneur on fire. Oh my gosh, you need to listen. You don't know what John Lee Dumas is? Let me talk to you about him. And he had a great interview with this guy named Odell Bazell or Odell Beckham. I don't remember his name exactly, but you're talking about something that you know that they don't. And then what you'll find is people will be interested. I don't care how shy you are. If somebody is interested in you, you start talking. Oh yeah. Oh, you're interested in what I have to say.

9:42And then it makes it so much easier to get those reps in because you can create an environment in which, okay, maybe I'm not the smartest person in the room. I'm not saying that you need to always be the smartest person in the room. In fact, the opposite of that is true. But you should be a person. This thing right here, right here, I know this. And so I can tell you a little bit about it. I know the show, The Office, better than most people. So I'm going to talk about how when Michael Scott left, The Office kind of went down a little bit, but Dwight took over. I can use those different things to bolster my public speaking skills.

10:17Fire Nation, if you think we're even close to done dropping value bombs, you got another think coming. We'll be right back after thinking our sponsors. Okay, let's talk about a platform that's completely changing how entrepreneurs are running their business. And they are also our featured partner, High Level. If you're an entrepreneur, coach, agency, or course creator looking to grow faster and smarter, High Level is the all-in-one platform that replaces your entire tech stack. Seriously, think ClickFunnels, Calendly, MailChimp, Kajabi, and even your CRM all rolled up into one powerful white label solution.

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13:59That's F-R-A-N-O-C-I-T-Y.com to download your free franchise funding guide today. Odell, let's talk money. Let's talk dollars. Let's talk revenue. How does one actually get paid to advertise through public speaking? What does that look like? Give us some examples. For sure. And with public speaking, people think a lot of different things about it, John. I think, you know, if I'm that platform speaker that we were referencing earlier, the Les Browns of the world, the Lisa Nichols, the Mel Robbins, if I'm standing on that stage, that's one way to get paid. If somebody pays you, and I know you've had this experience, somebody pays you to speak to their audience.

14:42They pay you because of what you know or who you are, some combination of that. So that's one way you get paid. The other way that you can get paid is through using it as a paid advertising model. And this is the most beautiful part of public speaking. And this is something that if you're listening, however you're listening, if you're washing the dishes, if you're driving or whatever, just kind of just note where this is because you want to reference back to it. If you want to get paid to advertise through public speaking, first and foremost, you have to create some sort of event or some sort of experience for people to take part in.

15:21So what would that look like? It could be as simple as a video sales letter. And this is a ninja strategy that I used during the middle of the pandemic to make about 70K in a month just from speaking. So pay close attention. You reach back to former clients that you had, or you reach to an audience that you know that you're looking to get into. So your target market. So you need to know that. But you create a video sales letter. If you don't know what that is, you probably haven't been listening to this podcast that long. But a video sales letter is very simple. You're standing in front of a camera, sitting in front of a camera, and you create a message.

16:04It can be short. It can be a short message talking about the next thing that you have coming, whether it be an experience, whether it be a new product, whether it be whatever. And so I'm just going to use the most random example I can think about. I just went to the barbershop. So I'm just going to use that as an example. So if you're a barber or you sell those services or something like that, you reach back to your former clients, have a video sales letter, say, Hey, I'm offering this new look luxury, a barber package for men that have beards and whatever, whatever. And you know, you're going to charge a hundred dollars instead of$20 or whatever you charge.

16:39And so what you'll do is you will pay. And I know we're talking about getting paid to advertise. You're going to pay. You're going to offer those people, hey, here's 20 bucks, 20 bucks, 30 bucks, whatever you feel. $20,$30. Watch this video sales letter. And here's how you get the money. You watch the video sales letter. You fill out this feedback form. You send it to three people that you think would find this useful. Follow all the steps. Do the video sales letter. That's why it's important. Be good at public speaking. Do a good video sales letter. If you really want to jazz it up, maybe you're not the one to do it.

17:13Maybe you hire somebody, but you do that. So you reach back. Let's say it's 100 clients. Just making this up, but I'm trying to give you something tangible to pull on. 100 clients. You say, look, I'm going to pay you 20 bucks. 20 bucks. If you do, watch this, do these steps, fill out this form. And so you're out of two grand. Again, I know we're talking about getting paid to advertise, but you're out of two grand, but they're former clients. So they're probably warm to you. So if you're offering, let's call it a hundred dollar thingy in this example, as a barber, then I would just guess if your video sales letter is not good, 20%, 20 % would take advantage of that thing.

17:59So then, Hey, that's 20 times a hundred. So that's two grand. So now you're, you're broken even, right? You're broken even. Here's how the getting paid part comes in. Well, they shared it with people because that was a condition of them getting paid. So they probably introduced it to somebody had no idea what, but who thought that it could be helpful. So they shared it. Let's just say your condition was three people. They had to share it. So you had a hundred people share with three people. That's 300 other people. Let's say again, video sales letter, it's not that good, but it gets the point across.

18:38It brings the offer up and the offer is something they could use. From those 300 new people, keep the numbers. Let's bring them down a little bit. Let's say 10 % of those people actually take advantage of it. So that's 30 people that take advantage of your$100 thing, that's$3 ,000. So you're advertising. Now you have more clients. You've reconnected with your other clients, but you got paid. You got paid to do that. And that's just one way that you can get paid to do it. You can also do events, feeder events, virtual events. You can do virtual summits, all those different things to bring money in as you're advertising and create even more offers for the new people and the former people in your network.

19:25Fire Nation, I hope the wheels are turning. I hope the ideas are coming out and I hope that shyness, that introvertness is dissipating quickly. Now, outside of speaking on stage, what are some other benefits? I mean, you've talked about a lot. We've got the video sales letter. We've got the podcast. We've got XYZ. But let's really kind of go broad here. What are some other benefits from public speaking? Oh, yes. Here we go. I love this part because I actually, I have to give flowers to a good friend of mine. He's amazing at what he does. He's a marketer. Some people probably heard him and I always name drop if it's good, John.

20:08So I always name drop if it's good. I hope that's okay. Sure. But Billie Jean is marketing. I got to spend some time with him. Amazing dude. And this one thing, it blew me out the water, made me six figures, just this one thing. So I hope you listening, you can integrate it in your business. Most people create boring experiences for their clients or no experiences. Hey, you got the thing? Cool. You got the thing? Thanks for getting the thing. Hey, you want to get the thing again? There you got the thing again. That's it. So outside of speaking on stage, I don't want to speak on stage with. I don't want to do all this stuff.

20:45I don't want to do a podcast. I don't want to be John Lee Dumas. I don't want to do that. Okay, cool. Just create an experience, an experience. And with that experience, you be the person that helps host or facilitate that experience. For an example, if you are, let's just, and I'm making this up just off the top of my head. Let's say that you work in the healthcare field. Maybe you're a birth worker or something like that. whatever. But the clients that you have just say, hey, we're going to have a retreat. Pick a date, maybe a vacation, maybe a night, maybe Puerto Rico, whatever. You pick a nice retreat type thing.

21:26You create an experience for them to come. Most of your clients won't do it. Most of them won't. The best ones will. And when you create an experience, they don't forget. We don't forget experiences that we had, especially things that we've never done before. A quick example to kind of hit this point further home, set apart from the health care field. I started an association within my space. I get paid a lot of money to speak at colleges, universities and associations connected to that. I started my own association and what we did, we had a leadership retreat in a mansion. in a mansion leadership retreat these are people that work at colleges that work at universities work at community colleges you know they might go to a nice hotel for a conference or something like that they don't go to mansions john they don't go to mansions so we just hey we're gonna do this and it was right around the holiday season right around about three or four days before christmas they came in it was an amazing experience we're still on group chat and these are 10 people that will that have either paid me before or that are in the works of paying me and i just created an experience i didn't even do anything i might have i might have spoken for 30 minutes but most of my time was hosting hey i got everything you need hey you got it oh you want to play uno hey let's get in here with house rules or what we doing like that's all oh what y 'all want to eat chick-fil-a today or no not chick-fil-a jason delhi oh no okay all right this is what we're that's all I was doing.

23:05I was just hosting. And you can get some, you can outsource that and just be, Hey, how are you? So if you create an experience that your clients can take part in, again, it's a part of public speaking because you have to communicate a message. You have to communicate, Hey, this is why we're here. This is what we're going to be doing. This is the outline, et cetera, et cetera. But once you do that, you set yourself apart from the competition and then they remember you because they experienced you and then they'll buy from you more often and more easily. I love all of that. And Billy Jean, man, we go way back.

23:37I used to be able to hang out with that guy a lot more when I was in San Diego back in the day. He's been on the show multiple times. He was actually the sole sponsor of Entrepreneurs on Fire for two years, which was fantastic. And I loved one of his phrases, which is, boring will put you out of business. I mean, you use that word boring with him and how to not be boring a few times, Odell, but I just love that whole sentence that he put together because it's such a great way to think about how you're operating in general. So you shared so much value throughout this entire interview, Odell. Take the mic.

24:11What do you want to make sure Fire Nation really gets from everything that we've talked about here today? For sure. I want you to just listen to this closely. All roads lead to public speaking. All roads lead to public speaking. That's something that my mentor and business partner, Stan Pearson II, told me a long time ago. And it's so true. So for you listening, if you're thinking about your business, if you want to increase your revenue, if you want to, everybody wants to increase their revenue and you want to do it with less work, figure out some way to integrate public speaking into your marketing efforts.

24:46It could be if you do direct mail, just add a video to it, just add a face to it. If you don't do direct mail, consider doing some sort of event or something that informs your ideal clients, that inspires your ideal clients and shares with them opportunities. I think if we take one note and this will be the last thing I say, if we take a note from companies like Apple or Disney, they are in the business of awing, assembling and acquire acquiring clients. that's the business that we need to get in. And you get in that business by getting really good at communicating your message. If you can communicate your message publicly, oh, you're public speaking and you will make more money with less effort.

25:30Fire Nation, you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with. You've been hanging out with OB and JLD today. So keep up the heat and head over to eofire.com, type Odell, O-D-E-L-L in the search bar. His show notes page will pop up with everything that we've talked about here today. And Odell, if Fire Nation wants to connect directly with you, any call to action you have, share that now. For sure. The best way to connect with me is, and I have actually a special offer for Fire Nation. You can go to publicspeakingprofits.com backslash fire. And I have a mini course that basically walks you through some of the things that we talked about.

26:11It's free and it's only free because you're consuming this amazing content. So you get that. You can thank JLD for that one. You get the free mini course and it's just four short videos. It doesn't matter what industry you're in specifically. You can use the ideas. You can use the frameworks and the principles that we share to help you double your revenue. And that's the whole goal. And also on that page, you'll find access to our private Facebook group, Public Speaking Profits, where I share live information every single week that you can consume. So excited to have you join what we're doing at Public Speaking Profits and keep on listening to the only podcast that puts you on fire.

27:00Odell, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side. Hey, Fire Nation, today's value bomb content was brought to you by Odell. And Fire Nation, if you've ever thought about creating your own podcast, The Podcast Journal is for you. It is a gorgeous full leather journal that will guide you step by step in the creation and launch of your podcast in 50 days. Visit thepodcastjournal.com and I'll catch you there or I'll catch you on the flip side. Are you ready for the ultimate all-in-one platform for entrepreneurs, marketers, coaches, and agencies?