Expert Builder - How do you get into universities

[AlanDonegan]

Can you help?

In Tim's Expert Builder on page 159 he has 5 steps to becoming an expert.


Join two or three trade related organiations
Read the top three best selling books
Give one free 1 - 3 hour seminar
offer to write one to two articles for trade magazines
join profnet


I am stuck on step 3. I am President of Guildford speakers club, member of Toastmasters (step 1), I have read the books and know my subject backwards (step 2) but am stuck getting into universities.

Tim says "Give one free 1 - 3 hour seminar at the closest well know university, using posters to advertise."

Has anyone conquered this step before?

Does anyone who exactly what Tim means by this?

Do you have any tips on how to build my credibility?

Do you know of a UK version of "Profnet"?

Any help would be greatly appreciated, I feel I have great knowledge that would be useful to a lot of people but have not found a way to get it out there!

Thanks Alan
www.addynamics.co.uk

[kamakiri]

Public speaking is far more about marketing yourself than any group membership. In fact credentials hurt you in most cases. You are welcome to take this any way you want it, but "Guildford speakers club" means nothing to me, and most of the people who I know who are involved in toastmasters can't speak at all (that is why they joined you know).

If Tim's book is the only resource you have read about the subject, then you need to study a bit more before you venture out any way. Getting things done by poster is a good way to waste your most precious resource (time), and also a very good way to face plant. The decision makers talk. As you get to be more of a speaker you will soon find that 70-80% of your gigs are referrals. Putting up posters is like cold calling, and your response will be similar. It is also like putting up a web site with a calendar tab with no events.

Buy Speak and grow rich (http://www.amazon.com/Speak-Grow-Rich-Dottie-Walters/dp/0134904001) and Money Talks (http://www.amazon.com/Money-Talks-Make-Million-Speaker/dp/0070696152/ref=pd_sim_b_1) from Amazon today and read them before making one more step in the direction you are going.

[AlanDonegan]

Dear Kamakiri,

Thank you for your advice and information. I will invest in the books and think further about this.

I agree with your advice about speaches coming from referrals and mine do seem to have come from that source. I did two paid speaches last weekend and both came from other engagements. Although nothing has come from them yet!

I wanted to become an Expert as Tim says in his book and start getting involved with the media and promoting myself through PR. THis is the area which I wanted to get a start towards and Tim's five step plan is meant to take you towards it. I was unclear about how to do step three that I wrote out in my previous email.

You are right about Toastmasters being a club that people join to improve their speaking and they do improve rapidly.

I will have a look at the books you reccomended and see where they tak me.