The $100K Mistake Most Promoters Make

0:00You're listening to The Vault Unlocked, where the real secrets of success are revealed. Every episode, one founder, one confession, one strategy that created income scale and unstoppable growth. Forget the hype. This is unlocking the code they swore they would never release. The playbook is revealed. The vault is unlocked. And we're back on another episode with Mitch Carson. Mitch has done over 2 ,000 events over two decades. Mitch, welcome to the podcast. great to be here cave on i've looked forward to this it's been a few months until we finally got this nailed down to get scheduled in and i'm looking forward to it yes yes yeah i am too thank you again all the way from thailand yes sir all the way to canada so let's let's dive into this because i mean 2000 to produce 2000 events is not a small feat here so i mean how'd you get into the business in the first place?

0:59I have been a professional speaker for four decades. This is a self-admission. Most people lie about their age. I'll divulge mine. I'm 65. I've been at this a long time. And at some point, the natural evolution of a speaker is to then start, they get frustrated with their producer or agent and think, I can do better than they can. and look at all the money they're making and I'm not making. So that's what cracks the ceiling. And then you start to go out on your own. I mean, hence the entrepreneurial spirit. I then started to produce on my own events and I realized, oh boy, this takes a lot. Because if they weren't just about me, what I mean events, I produce multi-speaker events.

1:48For example, if I were to go into the small business space and I needed a sales expert, I would bring in someone like you. If I needed a Facebook ads expert, I would bring in someone like Propellerhead Bill. And that person would cover that. Somebody else may cover organic advertising. Somebody may cover publicity. And that was what I found was the most critical. And I might have these experts in their category, but A, they may not be able to speak very well. B, they may not be marketed properly, packaged correctly. And that's what spawned what I do today, because if a speaker isn't packaged in a Tiffany box, they're going to sell less.

2:35And I might not put as many butts in seats, which is the overall goal, because then it's just math. It's really all about math. Are you still producing speaking conferences today? Yes, I am. I then went into, because of something called the COVID and the pandemic, had to shift and embrace the online mechanism. So I've run some online summits where I bring in speakers and there is no travel. And it's amazing how different that has. a it's a lot less expensive to invest because you don't have to pay for rooms travel all that moving a staff so that part's there but you do suffer with conversions because when you have an in-person arrangement and you see people the conversions are higher in a live environment and that was evidenced by my very first live event that i produced right after the pandemic cleaned up let's just call it where there was some level of normalcy in las vegas february 2023 i produced the very first co-produced the very first conference on chat gpt because that was the only game in town at that time now there's so many platforms and that event was stellar and that was unique because we made money in the events business in the arena that i operated where it's multiple speakers selling products, you typically rely on what speakers sell to get you into the black, to make you profitable.

4:11Because door sales, registration sales rarely cover the upfront cost of advertising, room costs, and personnel, all of that. You're usually in the red. You don't get into the black until you start selling from the stage. So it's critical to have the right speakers that can sell, resonate with the audience and convert predictably. And at that particular event, which was great to come out of the pandemic with, we were already in the black before the doors opened. The challenge was what we sold wasn't proven, had no testimonials, because AI was brand new. We were literally the first in the world to produce that category event.

4:59Then now there are AI events all over the place. We had copycats left and right. So let's take a step back here. So we're in the producing the event model. And when we talk about, you know, the vault unlocked, it's all about, you know, what was the one thing? I mean, you produced over 2000 events. I went through a whole COVID, you know, the whole COVID situation there. And here we are today. So tell me, like, really, if we said, okay, what's the one thing that breaks events? what would that be oh gosh the one thing would be having the the wrong speakers uh at the event that don't resonate with the offense uh with the audience is you know having a message to market mismatch having a message to market mismatch so having an ai event and someone's talking about poodles and whatever.

5:54Poodles and personnel. Unless they had an AI product that fixed it. To me, that's a no-brainer. To me, you're saying people have ran an event about a specific topic and brought speakers that had nothing to do about the event? Because it was their buddy who wanted to get into the speaking business. So they positioned Susie, who's talking about basket weaving. because I mean, or having the wrong lineup. I mean, to me, that's, I have to be honest, like, you know, if I had a button here, the button would go off and I'd be like, this is stupidity. And that's like, I don't think, I would say that's less than 0.01 % of the population.

6:33So assuming that they get the speakers right. Correct. What is the thing that breaks the event? Not having the correct, not selling. not selling it's not filling the event so i would have to say well i would have to say there are two parts i mean they're multiple but the one you're saying the one thing i think there are two things but it's all under the umbrella cave on of selling without sales there is no business well we know that right yeah i mean you know that you embrace it i embrace i've been selling my whole life. And if you don't have the right sales selling speakers, you're in trouble.

7:17So they have to show proof that they can sell from the stage. Lots of experts in their categories. I mean, lots of people could talk about leadership. Oh my gosh, another leadership speaker. Oh, another personnel hiring the right people. But if they don't have a product to sell and they can't sell shamelessly and with vigor, the event's going to fail in terms of the promoter side you have to have selling speakers okay so that's a different conversation now so because there's selling speakers there's corporate speakers there's speakers who who only sell there's the pitch the pitch you know monster events so the events that you're putting on now getting a little bit more specific are i'm going to call it what it is they're pitch events most of the time yes and but in order to and but you have to have also in some cases the lead anchor.

8:09For example, a friend of mine produced an event here in Bangkok after Jordan Belfort had released that movie, The Wolf of Wall Street. I'm sure you watched it being a sales professional yourself. And Jordan was the draw. People wanted to meet the wolf. And it was right after the movie had released. He brings in all he's a negative because you had to pay. I think it was about 150k for him to show up and there's first class airfare etc to fly him out here so you're already sunk you're negative before the door opens you do sell tickets to the tie audience or this is what they did they sold tickets he's already produced a negative output they're bleeding before he takes the stage and he's supposed to speak all afternoon on on the at the event there were the selling speakers that preceded him yeah and i could say who they are in a minute but he was the he was the anchor without him there would be no attendees yeah so so you use that draw as a mechanism so it's a hybrid it's partial keynote he was essentially the supposed to be the keynote and then he sold the program you said there's an anchor so we're starting to get to the what makes an event successful i was still trying to really figure out what is that one thing that breaks the events and obviously the wrong speaker with the wrong audience i think that's a stupidity that we even have to say that be honest with you oh what happens all the time yeah it's just i just it makes when i hear things like that i just have to be honest it makes me excited of the competition that i'm against in the world yes that's the competition well like that that makes me excited so now we live in a world where you don't even have to be great.

9:57You just have to be good to be great. All right. I'm all, I'm all over that. Um, but then you're saying sales, sales. And so what comes first? Do you get all the speakers and rent all the stuff and get all the marketing or do you sell first?

10:16It's, uh, it's, it's an, uh, I would say a changing marketplace. and my answer would change has changed over the years i mean the old i have an old model when i got into this business it was direct mail in order to get people to register that's how far back i go doing this and yeah so it was direct mail then it's evolved and then you have to we used to do telesales where we would have online pre-selling with teasers over phone calls. People would be doing this. And we're going back to the nineties when I would get on phone calls and we would pre-sell the attendees come and you're going to hear Mark Victor Hanson, who was the co-author of the chicken soup for sale, uh, chicken soup for the soul series.

11:05Mark is an old friend and, and helped him with his event back in, when was this? 2002, as an example. All the speakers were required to get on the phone and call in. There was no Zoom back then. And call in, and people would be live in a phone room. They would be waiting until the telesales opened up, and we would pre-pitch what we're going to sell. So we were seeding them. Here's what I'm going to cover. here are the three things i'm going to cover in my 90 minute presentation uh on x date at uh the west and lax as an example and that's where it was held or windham i think it was and we just discussed without how to fix it here's the problem here's what i'm going to cover as the solution the formulas don't change they're still the same and we went through it mark was profitable because he selected selling speakers, selling speakers, and what built around big names.

12:11Okay. So we haven't got there yet, so we're going to get there. Okay, that's fine. Because in order to understand what success is, we all still have to understand what failure looks like. The failure is having that. The question I had specifically was, if I'm going to do an event, Am I going to invest all the dollars to get the hotel, get the room, get everyone organized, and then start selling? Or do I pre-sell first before I go invest all those dollars? You pre-sell as much as you can. I think I absolutely. The reason I paused when you said that is because there's an evolution. The model has changed, and it's gotten so fiercely.

12:57you either invent, you reinvent, or you lose money. It's fiercely competitive today. So you need to sell either premium packages. So I went to the model of, there was general admission only, then VIP came in. Well, there was advanced seating, you get to come into the room first, you get a water bottle, and you get a black table cover, as opposed to sitting in a white so there's true delineation of where you sit and a lot of these tricks you had to learn by and it worked in small environments 40 50 people two thousands in a in a conference tony robbins is was or still is one of the trailblazers in that market he's top of the food chain and yeah absolutely he is yeah and then grant cardone is trying to be number two well i think he's done actually grant's uh i think he's done um which we can discuss that but uh so now we're talking okay so we know that in the event space to be successful you got to have the right speakers that that resonate with the audience and the it's got to match sounds like you got to have the pitch people so the speakers need to be able to offer something so you can make the money from that and then and then we're talking about pre-selling the idea is to pre-sell them pre-sell the seats you've got to sell the seats at different price points with different value associations so you can cover your butt before the doors open that's the key is how do you yes you so the yeah the answer is yes you must pre-sell something and one is the seating number two it might be if you buy the program now you can get a discount on when it comes to the event so you've already captured money the excitement is there that's another option uh you know and you do this now and you'll save because at the event it's going to be this price and or you leave it open buy a premium buy because they know they're going to be sold at the event they know that this if you bring in russell brunson as an example the guy created he's going to sell you whether you like it or not your credit card better have some slippery grease on it because it's coming out it's coming yeah yeah no i hear you i hear you and if you want to buy russell's program it's going to cost this it's going your investment's going to be three grand but if you buy now uh you can save 10 that's certainly a way to reveal the obvious and save now before you get there and or fire or loosen up your credit card limit because you're going to invest at this event so that's certainly a way to pre-sell i like that question that's a great question do you pre-sell or not yeah why not shamelessly because a lot of people are afraid to sell it's like they love to present and share and educate they don't make any money the people with the mindset of I'm going for the throat.

16:04I'm here to sell and you're going to buy from me. Well, it's interesting you say you're going through the throat, right? Yeah. Um, it's interesting you say that because that, that, that right there gives the, the public speaking pitch fest, the name it has going for the throat. I actually disagree with you. Okay. I, I, I highly disagree with you. I don't think it's going through the throat. It's actually going for the transformation it's going to actually serve and help people and if you're actually believing that you're helping and serving people in order for people to actually get the transformation they need they got to invest they got to invest time they got to invest energy they got to rest resources and they got to invest money because nothing comes for free and in fact people don't value for free so as a speaker my job isn't to cut the throats of my enemies because they're not not cut throats yeah no go throw whatever go for the throats right i'm i'm more like how can i serve people at such a high level that the only solution for them is to move forward and i just think that's a different perspective but what i am here as an event coordinator let's get real back on the tracks is we got to make money in order to make money in order for me to be profitable as an event coordinator i gotta have every one of my speakers making money i mean i know these models i've been these Tony's ran those models there was a company I don't know what the name was uh that was success resources there it is exactly success resources in the world they were the biggest in the world to me I didn't know this was pre what I do now uh had I gone to it when I had my eyes open it probably different but as an outsider of that world I was disgusted I couldn't believe how bad every hour, just a pitch, just a pitch, just a pitch.

17:51You're waiting there just to see Tony, right? So I'm actually don't like that model, but they make money and they work. And that's fantastic. If someone's trying to run that type of model, what's the thing that that's like, you need this one thing for success without that it's over. Well, okay. It may sound harsh metaphorically to say cut for the go for the throat the other is to expect well but it is it's our job to sell people and then if i the the backup or the follow-up to that is and this will answer your question value associated with them investing sometimes people are hesitant to invest they don't know what is there you have to have the right speakers with integrity that deliver as they promise.

18:42So yes, the value has to match what is sold and bringing in the speakers who sell, because there are, I can name five off the top of my head who sell things and then disappear. They're one off. I can, I can name you. We could have a private conversation about, I know everybody in the business has been doing this for a year. Absolutely. They'll never be on my stage again. Yeah, never. Absolutely. So now we're talking about the integrity of a speaker. But what I'm hearing, we're talking about how you produce 2 ,000 events. And you don't produce 2 ,000 events unless you're successful at it. So when we talk about producing 2 ,000 events and what I'm gathering here, if people are listening, it's pretty simple.

19:28Step one is you need an anchor speaker. I don't know if you guys would call them, but you need a speaker with a big name who's going to bring in people. Ideally, they have a list. Ideally, they're ready to also market to that list. Once you have that anchor speaker, you can build the event all around that speaker. Without it, you're doomed. Good luck trying to fill seats, especially in a competitive marketplace. Unless you've got a product that is so hot and trending, they'll come no matter what. And that's why I started with the example of the chat gpt event that was the one exception in my life that filled in four days we sold out in four days because the topic was so hot the speakers were irrelevant only because cave on nobody was an expert then maybe sam altman who start who founded who wasn't even an expert himself he did they probably didn't even know what they were doing back then nobody knew him in terms of where this is today.

20:31There was no Tiffany value. It hadn't been established yet. Today, there are all sorts of people jockeying for that position in the AI space, whoever's written the most books or publications or spoken here or there. That is a different argument. But in most cases, you're correct, unless it is in such a hot topic. Oh, my God, I wish I doubled the gate fee. I would have made so much more money, but hindsight's 2020, but yes, you're correct. I agree with you. It is a grind. If you're bringing in the same speakers who've spoken there the month before they've already been seen and you have to freshen the lineup too.

21:12And, and why I do what I do is helping people become the authorities in their fields. And that's where they get branded with all the media, you know, write a book. It's a formula. It's a formula. A serious speaker has the book for more. Okay. So what's the formula? Let's talk about that. So let's say someone has a message. They don't have the greatest audience, but they have an offer. They got a message and they're looking for the winning formula. What's the formula that's going to get me on the right stages so that I can be seen. I can get the content and I can start building my brand. Okay. Now I can go right into my roadmap.

21:49And this is something that I perfected over the year. it starts with creating your authority positioning. Number one, today, it's different than it would have been before, but it's evolved. The only thing that's changed has been the mediums. So today, if you're not podcasting, you're missing out. So you got to have a podcast. You heard that. You got to have a podcast or you got a podcast? You got to go on podcast shows. Which one? Both. I guest. I'm your guest. I have a show. Guess who's getting invited onto my show? Yeah, well, I'm going to assume me. Yes. Yes, exactly. So authority. Reciprocity.

22:28Work with reciprocity. And a long-term, why I've been successful for four decades is I work off the rule of reciprocity. Yeah. If I put somebody on my stage, if you don't give back, you don't play correctly in the sandbox. It's just how it works in life. If you don't scratch my back after I scratch yours several times, you're a taker, not a giver. Yeah. So that's, that's, that's part of the, the potion is if the mindset of giving, give, give, give why Alex Hermosi was so successful. He gave tremendous free content until he then went for the throat. Exactly. You're right. And then he went for the throat and he did well.

23:11And then he did it the first time and he didn't go for the throat this last time, 105 million people don't realize they say he made 105 million dollars in one hour no he didn't he made 105 million dollars in three years of correct it was a long-term play he's the tortoise he won the race the rabbits get eaten up by by hawks and eagles and snack on them as they're running down the road quickly so let's let's let's go back here because you know we have a formula people are listening i I want them to, you know. I'll give them the formula. Yeah, so we have authority positioning. Positioning, authority positioning.

23:48I would suggest what the top of the food chain is have a top blank podcast in your space that you can brag about. Okay. With the validation of the screenshots of Apple, iTunes, or Spotify. So that's there. Have high conversions. If you can show the numbers that relate to your podcast topic, or then you, and if you're just a guest and I don't say just a guest, but it's important. I guested myself a hundred times before I started my own podcast and I still guest on occasion. I think it's important to continue to market endlessly. It's not over. Yeah. It's an endless marketing outreach. That's not sales.

24:34That's marketing. Sales happen because you're marketed well. So number two is have yourself in major publications and or and the biggest is this is the service I provide is guaranteeing people media placements on television networks. Oh, wow. On television networks, television networks. Yes. I'm a host on NBC three in Las Vegas. I go back and record and then return. And that's that is my big deliverable. I found is when they actually experience lights, camera, action in a studio environment and get interviewed for four minutes on live television, this is what your parents would revere, okay? You're on live television with the real call letters, not this fake BS of sending out a press release and think, oh, I'm covered on Canada news.

25:31No, you're not. You submitted a press released to their secretary at the front desk. That doesn't mean you were covered on the news station. But if you have the proof assets and you have to have irrefutable proof, irrefutable proof that when someone clicks on the logo, you come up, you show your coverage on that TV show. So I guarantee four networks in Las Vegas, ABC, NBC, the CW and CBS, you get covered. guaranteed. And I created that program for all of my speakers who then traveled the world with me. I produced these events, taking people around the world, 19 countries, as a matter of fact, where I would get them TV coverage in each city we went to.

26:22In Dubai, I got everybody on CNBC, Arabia. I got everybody on Dubai One Television. Then we got covered in the newspaper, the collegiate times, which is the leading newspaper in the Middle East. And then they can say they were covered on and that builds the authority, irrefutable proof that they are in fact, the leader in their category. Okay. Because there are a lot of people that talk, I'll use you as an example. Okay, Vaughn, I'm going to, if I can reciprocate, because I think you're, you've got Teflon skin can handle it. It's and, and the book. Oh my God. If you don't have a book or a series, I don't think you're serious as being a speaker.

27:04It's an essential. It's the right arrow in your quiver. Yeah. You need to show all of these feathers. I liken it to, let's talk about a peacock. You've got a peacock. Okay. Americans, Canadians, I'm going to throw you in the mix. Yeah, no, I love that. So let's just take a step back here. We talked to, take it back here, right? it's we got authority authority is number one well how do you create authority we create authority by going on a podcast we create authority by getting on publications we create authority by creating a book and we create authority beyond network television and radio shows publications yeah and getting your name out there now for those people that don't know how to do that i mean what what do they do like i understand this game because i've been in this game but there's people going okay well how do i even get on a podcast how do i get write a book what do you mean write a book like right like oh my god do you help them with all this all this because it's all this i had to out of need it yeah because there was a problem i learned about creating the solution yeah i didn't invent wheels you know you just have to now no let me let me say this because i got a podcast right let's let's just use me just as an example fine fine i got a podcast i have my book i'm on publications i've seen i have been on you know some news stations and i have my publications see you know ceo weekly and huffington post and i have my you know press releases let's call if you want to call those there sure sure um and uh and i go on podcasts right okay no one's calling me to speak on stages all right so how do i convert all of that to actually get on stages now you've got the essentials right now do you have a speaker reel now now we're getting into the meat love it got the speaker reel got the speaker website got me showing as a keynote speaker keynote speaker keynote i'm not just a speaker i'm a keynote speaker baby come on all right you're in the category of sales do you have numbers if i were to approach richard tan who's the owner of success resources as an example he's in singapore not he's not you know a two-hour flight for me and richard and well douglas chu is the one that finds who's his brother-in-law he came to me when i spoke in japan he saw me close the room 6 000 people and do you have proof of the back of the room rush because that is what's you've got to have the right feathers you've got all the feathers it sounds like you're already branded yeah smartly cave on oh i'm just wondering is proof of like proof of the rush would that be uh back in 18 when we ran a conference and in one hour, we had only 500 people in the room.

30:05And before the pitch happened, we had$8 million of credit cards because we sold. Is that proof enough for you? That's huge proof. Huge proof. I love it. This isn't about me. This isn't about me. We could talk about this. No, it is about you because we're all, we're always the first radio station call letters is WIIFM. What's in it for me. and you absolutely are part of this. And if you ask me the hard question, you've ticked the right boxes. You've got the feathers in place. And if you wanted to get other people's stages, all you have to do is shake them. And the key, the key is, okay, he's got a book, he's branded.

30:45And Ken, is the guy going to embarrass me and hurt my reputation is issue number one from the person that reviews the potential speakers. if you don't come by referral if you don't i'm going to break that we're going to code this is decoding this is all about decoding here and i'm calling bs on that one just because there's actually a step before that because you just assumed there is this guy going to embarrass me can i trust he's going to show up which is all great i want to be very clear 100 that goes through how do you even know i'm the guy because i've referred you because i've referred you all of my gigs now when i refer to 2000 events i've produced and i've been invited to i've either spoken or referred it's all by referral but for those but for those of those that don't know you right and you're not going to be referring them where's the gap the chasm from they got all the right assets they got the book they got the publications they got their podcast but the gap between that and actually getting on the stages.

31:51And yeah, when they get the chance to get on that stage, that's up to them. You get one chance to get the next stage. Correct. One, you don't get two, you don't get three, you get one, you, you, you blow it. It's over. Well, I'll answer that. How do you get that chance? I've produced events all over. Most of the time, the speakers that I have placed, I'd say 80 % of the time have come from referrals of other speakers who say, Kayvon's great. I need a selling speaker for my event in Singapore. The last event I produced, here was the example. And I like to use examples because it explains better.

32:27I had an event with 600 people paid, ready. I had VIP and then I had general admission in Singapore at the convention center. And it was all about social media. I had my keynote guy that brought, because he was a TV show host on CNN in the Philippines came in. He talked about YouTube because at that time he had a following of about a half a million subs on YouTube. His name is Chinky Tan. So these are real people. Today he's got about 3 million. So this was right before the lockdown. So this was February of 2020. Right before the world shut down. So this was my last event. It was profitable. Almost profitable before the doors open almost.

33:13And then I knew what I would be able to sell. I had a Facebook ads person. I was the MC slash closer at the end who sold everybody's product as a mother of all offers.

33:30And each speaker was perfectly positioned based on what the audience wanted to hear about. So I I polled the audience. Who would you, what would you like to hear? And then I placed the speakers. One of the speakers earned a late spot. I had two people. One was Facebook advertising. And when one was Facebook organic without splitting hairs, it was the same platform, but I had two speakers because the Facebook advertising guy I placed, I wasn't going to have him. His name is Alaric, Alaric. Alaric. Yeah. Yeah. I know Alaric, yeah. You know him in Singapore? Oh, in Singapore. No, okay. No, not Alaric Heck.

34:12Not the YouTube guy. Okay. Totally different. No, that's another discussion I know about him. I've seen him speak. No, Alaric Ung is 40 times the speaker that Alaric Heck is. Yeah, yeah. 400 times better. Yeah. And you can't understand a word he says because he speaks Singlish so fast. He's only appropriate in that market because nobody would understand him in North America. because there's so much accent with the Singaporean English. However, I saw how well he sold. I sold on his stages in Kuala Lumpur and Johor Bahru in Malaysia. I saw the guy close the room better than me. Now, he had the right product for the audience.

34:55My product was not exactly the best fit for that audience of attendees. He did very, very well, and he was the event host. So he was what drew them in. I said, what are you doing on February 18th when you go back to Singapore? I said, I have my speaker lineup is full. I'm going to cut back time on the other speakers because they all had 90 minutes. I'm going to put up an hour. I need a space for you because you will sell into this audience. I'm going to split the category. My co-producer, her name is Surya Sparks, who was the big social media expert in Singapore. You wouldn't know her, but in that area, she was great.

35:38She shared the stage with Mark Zuckerberg in the past. Very big speaker. She was my co-producer. I said, I want to have you talk about ads. I'll convince her to split the category because she was all about Facebook. Yeah. And he added the value. He sold very well to the audience because he resonated. It was message to market match. It was clear. And he was a fellow Singaporean. he was a fellow singaporean so i brought in also all the speakers were asian except me so i wanted to bring in people that they could relate to yeah and that's an important you can say there's the one thing you know it's the right message to write mark you can't bring in somebody who will not resonate with the audience absolutely so i could not bring this man who sells very well in that part of the world, he wouldn't work in America or in Canada for that matter, because you wouldn't understand him.

36:36So fast. And I don't know if you've been to Singapore. Have you been? Okay. No, I'm not understanding them. It took me six months to get my ear tuned to what they were actually saying. I didn't even know it was English. And that's an example of you got to. Yeah. So I had a selling speaker. He didn't have a book. until I told him he needed one. And he wrote a book. And he wrote a book between that time and just so he could show it on the screen. It wasn't even published. You get that idea. Yeah. I love it. So we are coming to an end here. Where can people find you? Getinterviewedguaranteed.com.

37:20Getinterviewedguaranteed.com. Getinterviewedguaranteed.com. Mitch, it was great to have you on the show. Thank you for being with us. Thank you. And that was another episode with The Vault Unlocked, where proven builders, real strategies, and unstoppable growth happens. Subscribe now because the next unlock could be the one that rewires your business forever. This is where the playbook is revealed and The Vault is unlocked.