How to Run Seminars and Workshops. Jolles Robert L.

use a distributor? Use a distributor because book sales can count toward these best-seller lists. Let me tell you how these lists work. When a book makes a best-seller list, it doesn't necessarily mean it has sold more than any book of its kind. It means it has sold more than any book of its kind from the major book chains that make up the count. It's almost like watching television from a TV with a Nielsen box on top of it. Those ratings don't track how many TVs are watching a certain program. They track how many TVs with Nielsen boxes on them are watching a certain program.

      What you potentially give up in book sales, you make up in seminar fees. When a book hits the Business Best-Seller List or the New York Times Best-Seller List, it is the equivalent of receiving an Academy Award. When an actor is nominated, the cost of hiring that actor goes up. When an actor wins the award, the cost goes up even higher. You do the math. When you are marketing your services, which sounds better, “Please welcome author Glenn Faulkner” or “Please welcome best-selling author Glenn Faulkner”?

      Write the book. Ultimately, it's your decision whom to sell your book to and whom you buy your books from. For me it's an easy decision. I strongly recommend you try to sell your book to a publisher. If your selling is unsuccessful, you can always move to self-publishing. There are plenty of stories of those who self-published their book, had it sell well, and then had a publisher offer to publish and distribute their book.

      Most important, write the book.

      Speakers' Bureaus

      Once you have your book in hand, another marketing approach you might want to consider is establishing a relationship with various speakers' bureaus. You won't be the only speaker they represent. However, the easier you make it for them to sell your services, the more seminars they will sell for you.

      The speakers' bureaus will want that book of yours, and they'll want a clear sense of your particular branding. There's also one other thing they will want, and that's a speaker's tape. They will want that tape because it will be their primary tool to help sell your services.

      For years I avoided creating a speaker's tape because I felt it was a terrible way for me to sell my services. Eleven years later I still believe this. Almost all the seminars I sell for myself are sold based on an existing relationship, someone who has seen a seminar I've delivered, or on a referral.

      However, in the world of the speakers' bureaus, almost all their sales of speakers go to clients who have no idea who you are. That means they have to see you in action. Clients who call speakers' bureaus looking for speakers are already prepared to receive links and watch YouTube videos of the speakers they intend to contract.