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Rand Fishkin Dec 22, 2022

NEW post: https://sparktoro.com/blog/should-you-raise-your-rates-and-only-take-paid-speaking-gigs-not-so-fast/

Alongside coauthors @amandanat and @wilreynolds, we tackled the problematic but oft-given advice in the consulting & speaking worlds:

"Raise your rates!"
"Never speak for free!"

We mostly disagree.

Should You Raise Your Rates and Only Take Paid Speaking Gigs? Not So Fast… - SparkToro

Over on Mastodon, SparkToro CEO Rand Fishkin and Seer Interactive CEO Wil Reynolds were chatting about the blind advice of "Raise your rates!" and "Don't

SparkToro

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Andi Jarvis Dec 22, 2022

@randfish @amandanat @wilreynolds my main gripe about speaking for free is that everyone else involved in the event is getting paid, but not the content provided from stage. It just seems weird. Venue? Paid. AV? Paid. Security (if it’s a big enough event)? Paid. Bar staff? Paid. Event organiser? Paid. Speakers… ah, we don’t have budget for that. Really… or you don’t want to spend your budget on that?

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Rand Fishkin Dec 22, 2022

@andijarvis I hear you! I'm hoping this blog post helps explain why that happens, i.e. AV, security, bar staff don't get value from volunteering to do their jobs, and wouldn't offer to do it for free in exchange for the stage time, but many speakers do. @amandanat @wilreynolds

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Andi Jarvis Dec 22, 2022

@randfish @amandanat @wilreynolds absolutely. And I do most of my events for free. But I feel the value proposition is the wrong way round. The bar tenders don’t get value for doing their job for free, but the audience would be fine without them. The value comes from the venue, the av, the speakers and the host… all of them get paid except 1. Just seems weird.
To be clear, I’d probably turn down 90% of payment offers! Just strange they don’t come

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Amanda Natividad Dec 22, 2022

@andijarvis @randfish @wilreynolds I see your point (and appreciate the discussion here!) but it’s faulty to compare paid AV & hospitality workers to free speakers.

Speakers benefit from PR, content mktg, lead gen, networking. AV/hospitality do not get any of these benefits. They also have to spend $ to do their job. (Bartender has to buy alcohol & mixers.)

And if a speaker doesn’t think there are any mktg benefits to a given event, they shouldn’t speak there.

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Rand Fishkin

@amandanat @andijarvis @wilreynolds I'd also say it's not about whether an individual speaker gets value, but a supply and demand thing.

E.G. TikTok doesn't have to recruit/pay content creators. Millions will happily pour countless unpaid hours into content creation for TikTok in the hopes of getting exposure/reach.

Is it ethical that newspapers didn't pay for editorials in the 20th Century? Or that journalists don't pay their interview sources? IDK. But that's how exposure-giving fields work.