Leveraging Thought Leadership With Peter Winick – Episode 144 – Jeffrey Hayzlett

Peter Winick

There are lots of tools for making our communities better. Do you know how to make those tools work for you? If not, you might need a mentor with a lot of know-how in community engagement!

Our guest in this episode is Jeffery Hayzeltt, primetime television host of C-Suite with Jeffrey Hayzlett and Executive Perspectives on C-Suite TV, and business podcast host of All Business with Jeffrey Hayzlett on C-Suite Radio. Jeffery shares why engagement needs to be built into your content, what marketing techniques you should avoid – and some you might want to try! He also discusses ways to make yourself more appealing as a speaker, so if you want to build your thought leadership keynote – this is the episode for you!

If you need a strategy to bring your thought leadership to market, Thought Leadership Leverage can assist you! Contact us for more information. In addition, we can help you implement marketing, research, and sales. Let us help you so you can devote yourself to what you do best.

Transcript

Peter Winick And welcome, welcome, this is Peter Winick. I’m the founder and CEO of Thought Leadership Leverage. And you’re joining us on the podcast today, which is Leveraging Thought Leadership. I’m excited to speak to our guest today, which is Jeff Hayzlett. I’ll give you Jeff’s quick bio so we can dive right in. So Jeff is a primetime television host of C-suite with Jeffrey Hazlett and executive perspectives on C-Suite TV. He also hosts a business podcast called All Business with Jeffrey Hazlett on C-suite radio. He’s the chairman of C-Suite network. He’s written multiple books, including the Mirror Test, The Hero Factor. He’s a world renowned speaker and a leading business expert in places like Forbes, Success, CEO Magazine, et cetera. So welcome aboard, Jeff. Thanks for joining us today.

Jeffery Hayzlett Hey, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.

Peter Winick So I’m just going to dive right in because you’ve got a fairly interesting perspective given all the things that you’ve gotten going on. So let’s talk about the things you’re seeing not just for yourself but others do based on your work that is working in terms of helping people get their content and thought leadership out to more people to have more impact in the instances where it’s relevant to make more money.

Jeffery Hayzlett Yeah, you know, I think the biggest, I just actually spoke in this at the national speaker’s association, talking about how we built a multimillion dollar brand using content and thought leadership and creating the C-suite network and all the entities that we have there. C-Suite radio, C-suite TV, Csuite book club, CSuite Academy, network advisors, we have them all. And, you know, the two biggest things I think people are starting to realize is the need to build their own communities, that’s one, beyond just the traditional kind of email base and beyond, you now, just the social media because we all know that we can build up hundreds of thousands of followers but it’s the engagement and the engagement comes around the content and the content is so critical for you to be able to not just create but then Place it to where people are at, step and repeat it, and then utilize it very effectively. And then also, one other thing, Peter, I think it’s really cool to do, especially a lot of our podcasters realize, and we have about 120 shows on C-suite Radio. But one of the biggest things is people used to worry about their downloads. I said, shut up and quit worrying about your downloads and worry more about who you have on the podcast and that you can utilize your interviews to get to the people you want to do business with.

Peter Winick Yeah. Well, I think that’s, you know, oftentimes I want to jump on that for a second. Someone will say, well, I’m going to do a podcast and I’m like, well why? And it’s like, everybody’s doing one. So it’s, our mothers used to say, well, if everyone jumped off the roof, right? So what are your, you’re making an investment of your time and energy. And with podcasting, money’s probably a little bit of a lesser extent. What’s the outcome? What are you looking to do? So you’re either going to build your brand.

Jeffery Hayzlett You know, Peter, that’s the key question. What is it you want to be when you grow up? And then what is, you know, what’s the end in mind? You know just to do a podcast, to do podcast, is it for fame or is it fortune? That’s the first question you should ask. Yep, totally. And then beyond that, then start figuring out, well, certainly if it’s for fortune, I always tell people go for fortune because if you make good money and you do it well, people recognize that you get the fame for free. If not, you’ll have enough money to buy it. So, uh, so is it a thought leader, which a lot of people do. There’s still a lot of people out there that do that. They do that with the New York Times list, they’ll buy it, they will, you know, in terms of being a best seller and so forth. There, there’s a lot of folks that will do that, I would advocate that. But, you know, really, to begin with the the end in mind, and the end in mine should be to grow your business and to grow your reach, grow your influence. And so if those are the key things, then what’s the best way to go

Peter Winick Yeah, no, totally agree. So you mentioned community and you mentioned content, and then you talked about the downloads. So I wanted to just touch on the downloads where I think one of the points that you were making there is metrics are important, but they shouldn’t be stupid ones. And oftentimes I see, and I’d love to get your take on this in social, oh, I got so many likes or retweets or whatever. And it’s like, okay, well, what does that metric really mean? Is that an ego metric or a business metric? So can you comment on that?

Jeffery Hayzlett I think that’s a real key thing, you know, we measure, you know, obviously, I want to know how many followers I’ve gained this week, how many I’ve lost, what’s my net, you know, raise. But, you know, I also want to know about the engagement. More importantly, I want to know if I send this tweet, if I do this thing, what will be the result? and what is it I’m trying to drive. I mean, I recently posted an Instagram gal who has like, I don’t know, two million followers, maybe 20 million followers. I don’ know. And she tried to get people to buy t-shirts and no one bought them. So she was an influencer, an Instagram influencer. Really, seriously? You can’t get two people to by a t-shirt? You have millions of followers? I guess you’re not much of an influencer. You’re a de-influencer, quite frankly. So, you know, so you have to really look at the metrics of what you were trying to buy, Give me a good example. On my own podcast, All Business with Jeffrey Hazlett on C-Suite Radio, I have the ability to see where the downloads are at, where people are downloading. I have it open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And I started to watch the second largest country or area, region outside of North America. I kind of include Canada and the U.S. in the same bucket. Sure. It was India.

Peter Winick Interesting, okay, so what does that tell you about your business then? What do you do with that?

Jeffery Hayzlett Well, one, I need to start targeting more speeches there. Two, I needed to target more potential board involvement. But more importantly, I needs to change some of the things I say to be more reflective of the population, to be considerate. So I used to say things like, hey, I’m going to go after the show, going out for a big steak. Well, probably not the coolest thing to do. with Hindus. So I calm that down a little bit. But at the same time, you can’t lose your identity, right? I have a huge Jewish following, but I still make fun about how much bacon I eat, you know? And we play that up with the tribe, so to speak. So there’s ways that you can do it, but it shows you that the metrics can help you in terms of being influential and then driving the things that you wanted to.

Peter Winick No, I love that. So I want to talk about some of the, let’s call them the new rules of content from a cadence perspective. So if you go back to the ancient days of let’s say 15 years ago, there was an unwritten rule in publishing that a typical business author would come out with a new book every 18 months, right? And then there’s various cadences and various modalities and formats, and it changes all the time. Could you comment on whether you align with that, whether you disagree with that? Because I know you’re fairly humble and it’s hard to get you out of your shell.

Jeffery Hayzlett Well, I appreciate it. I’m at least I’m transparent and, uh, you know, uh and understand, you know, the value of what I do and how I do it, I actually try to stick to a 12, 18 month schedule where we’re activating and primarily because you mentioned right off the bat, Peter. is I do a lot of keynote speaking. When I speak 150 times a year, 160 times a year, and I average 27,500 or something, that’s some good money. But I want to go back to the audiences that I’ve done a really good job for. I can’t go back with the same speech two years later. So I’ve got to have some new content, even though my core theme is the same, it’s about driving change and overcome adversities and killing the captains of NO and organizations. Sure. And so I do like that. I might jump in there with a different show or something new that we might add, but pretty much, yeah, if I could show you, I actually did this with a slide yesterday and showing people here’s my cadence of what we’ve done. And the only thing we speeded it up with was that the edition of a TV show, but the books have been pretty steady every 18 months.

Peter Winick Cool. So let’s drill into speaking for a little bit. Cause I, you know, from your perspective, from what I’m hearing is the reason to make the investment of time and energy and effort into the book is it’s, it’s in essence a quote new speech, right? Cause there’s, there’s a weirdness in the speaking business where in most businesses, the reward for doing a killer job for your customer, for your client is they will bring you back in the keynote space is already, if I already heard what you have to say, not going to bring you back again next year, I’m going to, you know, and maybe the theme changes or whatever of the event. those laws don’t apply. So I love what you’re doing there is using the book as a forcing mechanism to say, Hayzlett comes in a new flavor this year talking about something different, even though thematically it might be the same. Let’s dive into sort of the nuts and bolts of speaking. I know you just came from NSA event. That business has changed a lot. So talk about the business side of the business where the… bookings are now moving, majority of bookings are being done directly by the speakers versus the bureaus and things that you’re seeing that are working for folks. Cause people struggle, people that are great speakers struggle with the business side of it, obviously.

Jeffery Hayzlett Yeah, well, it’s not an easy business. I mean, the average speaker, you know, makes about 150 grand professional speaker. You know, and I know that we’re in the top one half of 1% in the world and the public speaking side of it. But you know the business of the business is a tough one. It’s changed. We still do about 35% through bureaus. The other 65% is us direct. And we get that ability, you know, primarily one just out of necessity. we can do a better job, you know, bureaus, I love bureaus but they’re working for the client, not necessarily me.

Peter Winick Well, but drill on that for a minute. So go deeper on that because I think a lot of speakers are delusional and think the bureau represents me. It’s like, no, they have a fiduciary responsibility to their client and you’re just a commodity. So can you talk about that? Because I think just the basic understanding of the relationship.

Jeffery Hayzlett Yeah, if the client says they want to go with someone else, they’re going to go with someone, regardless of whether they’re living with you. They’re there to sell and facilitate and serve the client. So, you know, there are some managed relationships with some bureaus or some agents, you now, but that’s a few and far between. And most speakers aren’t even going to be qualified to speak for a bureau because they don’t make enough. They’re not, then it’s not worth enough for the bureau to do it because the bureau is taking anywhere from 25. to 35% of the fee, and then sometimes are also getting paid by the actual entity itself on top of it sometimes, not all of them. But they’re there representing the client. So typically the client will say, you know, let’s say the organization or association or corporation, I mostly speak of most of the corporations, they will say hey, we’re interested in this kind of speaker and they’ll go into their roster and they look up those, you know, 25 to 50 and then they’ll submit them. And they might say they these three top ones are the ones I really look at. And then they look at your videos, they drill them down and they’ll look at a couple of your videos and they might even call you. Sometimes I’ve had numerous calls with clients where, or the bureaus, you know, so you want to help the bureau. I want to be as easy for the bureau to book and use utilize me. I want them to bill, allow them to put a whole dates on my.

Peter Winick But let’s talk about the easiness. So I want to talk about the easing is because it seems if we change the word speaker to any other business, that wouldn’t even be in discussion, right? But for some reason, there’s this prima donna factor on the speaking side that people don’t talk about where it’s like, wait a minute, you’re getting paid a boatload of money for an hour of your time. And how dare you have these ridiculous demands of, you know. the size of your hotel room and, and, you know, you only want a black car service, not an Uber and all this sort of stuff. When, when you’re actually an employee or of service to the client, it’s just so anti-client behavior.

Jeffery Hayzlett Well, that’s stupid, Peter. I mean, I always tell the, you know, especially if I get on the phone with them ahead of time, because I do a lot of calls at a time. in a big corporate setting, the last thing I wanna do is the person picking the speaker make a mistake in the CEO’s, it’s just not cool. So I always tell them, I’m going to be the least of your work, you have enough problems going on with putting the event together. I will come in early, I will be there, I will do sound checks if you want them, I hate sound checks, they’re really for the people, not for me. because I don’t care, I’m going to walk on the stage whether the lights are on or not and I’ll do what I have to do. But most of the time I find that most speakers are a pain in the ass, they rush in at the last minute throwing their thumb drive down at the tech staff and I don’ t do that. I show up well the morning before at 6 a.m. or could I be using an opening or closure

Peter Winick Sure.

Jeffery Hayzlett or the break before, or the noon meeting before, giving them plenty of time, making sure everything’s cool, that they’re happy, everything’s good.

Peter Winick Let’s talk about systems and processes, because what I find is the business side of speaking, be it what it may, is fairly transactional. Are you available on this date? Yes or no. Can you afford my fee? Yes or No. Does the theme fit? So that’s a transaction. It is what it is. However, most speakers, most thought leaders, if you’re smart, you want to use that as the beginning. of a longer term relationship. So you’ve got to have systems and processes in place. And it blows my mind when they, you know, they roll in an hour early and they’re off stage, you know, 20 minutes after their stage, they’re jumping in the car and getting out of there. That’s not how you build a relationship, right? How do you not get there the night before and say to them, listen, as long as I’m in Denver, wherever I am for your event, what else can you use me for? You have some customers you want me to have breakfast with, Do you have a? You know, your high potentials, I can do a little roundtable, you know, what can you do to give them value, assuming it’s not going to turn one day into two or something like that. There’s so few speakers that come from that mindset and those that do are killing it.

Jeffery Hayzlett Well, you know, you said it, I mean, I’ll come in like, you know, I always try to put another flight between me and harm’s way. Yeah, there’s only the backup. So I usually get in the night before there’s plenty of time for dinner. And I said, Well, do you have a VIP dinner that you’re taking your top customers to? And they say, Yes, would you like me to join it? I have to have dinner anyway, and I’d be more than happy. And then usually I become the entertainment for that dinner. Which is fine. No problem. And in fact, sometimes I say, well, how many people you got coming? Oh, you have 22 great Would you would you mind if I bring 22 books and I’ll sign them for each of your guests?

Peter Winick Sure.

Jeffery Hayzlett And of course, what’s that do for me? Well, most of those people that are coming to that event are big customers. They’re usually officers of the of their of their customers, their officers of a company. I usually pick a gig or two about that thing. I’m not stupid. And, you know, that’s a great way to be able to do those kind of things. And, I even say, hey, look, the theme of my book is, you know, or the title of my kids, would you like to use that for your theme?

Peter Winick Sure.

Jeffery Hayzlett You know, would you like the artwork? Would you like me to cut a video promo to send out to your guest? Would you like a promo or a little thank you afterwards to send to all of your attendees? You know what is it that I can do? Let me, what’s the theme for your event? You know who’s speaking before me? Who’s speaking after me? Oh my gosh, you mean your CEO is following me? Listen, let me talk to you about this. Probably not the best career move for you. Okay. And I have that discussion with them. I’m going, you don’t want your CEO following me because I’m a really good speaker. I’m Hall of Fame speaker. I will crush, I will crash him or her and it won’t be good. So, you know, so we talk about those kinds of things and they’re very appreciative.

Peter Winick I love it. So let’s, as we start to run out of time, unfortunately, give me a couple of things that you see in your work and your work with other authors and thought leaders and speakers and such, things that used to be no brainers that used to work that don’t work anymore, and things that are a little bit more cutting edge and new that people are starting to experiment with and getting great results.

Jeffery Hayzlett That’s a great, great thing. Emails don’t work like they used to. Newsletters don’t like they use to, right? You can still get some of those things if you got a relationship, but the problem with all the filters and the engagement models that Google puts in or whoever, you can’t even get through the servers. So that’s one that’s doing it. We utilize, I’m using video and video mailer.

Peter Winick Okay, tell me about that.

Jeffery Hayzlett Yeah, I’m using a tool called BombBomb. It’s a really cool little tool and I’m constantly cutting BombBombs and sending those out as video links to people saying, hey, I am going to be in such and such place. Do you have an event for me or is there something I can do for you? I just heard this. Congratulations on this or whatever. And so, and then we do a video mailer where we actually we use a company called you via us that actually does the video mailler for us that I actually record a video and we talk about the upcoming theme of the speech this year and we get it out to literally thousands and thousands and many times I’ll see that meeting planner or that CEO or head of you know whoever head of the meeting a year later and that’s still sitting on their desk.

Peter Winick That’s great. And any other nuggets to share? Because I know we could go on for hours, unfortunately.

Jeffery Hayzlett We also use call logic which is a tool that auto dials for us and so when we’re really trying to get through to people it will auto dial and if they’re not there it will leave a voicemail from me Cool. And so we’ll do a voice like, Hey, this is Jeff Hazen. I’m on the set of the TV show, but I’m just wanting to take a break because your event is one of the biggest events I’ve been wanting to do for a long time. And I’m sorry I missed you, but if you could call back my business manager, I’m supposed to be Tyler Hazen, reach him at this number. You know, I really love to be able to talk to you. He’ll find me on set and we’ll get a chance to talk and let’s talk about your next big event. So we do that. So we can, you know, those are little tiny tools that we use. And one other tool that I really loved is called Whitty Parrot. So I’m gonna check it out, folks. It’s a great way to be able to put formatted letters that you would normally clip and paste out of your draft, you know. Box and this sits over on the right-hand side of my computer and I’m constantly I can do like a hundred letters an hour Just you know dropping and clipping pasting the it’s just you just drag and drop drag and Drop and so I’ve got all kinds of different You know paragraphs or you know or full letters that I can just jump in

Peter Winick Fantastic. Well, I appreciate your time, Jeff, and I thank you for all that you’ve shared. It seems like you and I share a lot of the beliefs and seeing a lot things, but I love the service mentality and the thoughtfulness and the strategicness that you put into everything that you do. So thank you sharing it with us today.

Jeffery Hayzlett Well, I appreciate it. Thanks a lot. And you know, the biggest thing, Peter, one last thing is a bonus. Do it. Just do it yourself. Make it happen. Do it, do it, and do it.

Peter Winick Yep, love it. Thanks, man. Good talking to you. Cheers. To learn more about Thought Leadership Leverage, please visit our website at thoughtleadershipleverage.com. To reach me directly, feel free to email me at peter at thoughtledershipleverage.com and please subscribe to Leveraging Thought Leadership on iTunes or your favorite podcast app to get your weekly episode automatically.