In this blog, I’ve been showing you how to find speaking engagements where you can offer your products and services in the back-of-the-room at the end of your talk. Now I’m going to tell you how to actually get one.

My #1 secret for getting the gig is to be prepared with the following five things before approaching a host.

You need all five in place, because if you’re scrambling to pull them together, the host may conclude that you’re not ready to speak on their stage.

So here are the 5 things that you need to prepare in advance:

1. A talk outline. In a brief opening paragraph plus three to five bullets, list what your talk covers and what the audience will learn. When the hosts ask for mine, I literally email it while we’re talking.

2. A professional photo in digital format. You also want to be able to email this right away.

3. A bio. In a punchy way, get your credibility down on paper so that they can see you’re ready and have experience that makes you a great choice to put on stage.

4. A leveraged offer. You need to be able to serve more people than you can handle one-on-one, so you need a teleseminar, a workshop, a group program of some kind to offer from the stage if you are going to sell from the stage.

5. Confidence. You’ve got to approach hosts with confidence. And what gives you confidence is having your Signature Talk, your Irresistible Offers and all of the above ready to go!

If you show up prepared with those 5 things, your host will be confident that you can step on their stage tomorrow and make both them and you look really good!