The speaking world is full of forms and contracts – the two most important are the contract you’ll fax to the meeting planner who’s agreed to hire you and the pre-program questionnaire that you’ll send out to the planner before the event.
Your credibility is on the line with each one of these documents — they need to be highly professional.
Here is a sample booking contract:
Booking Contract
____________________________________________ (ABC Corporation) has agreed
to hire ____________________ (Mr/Ms Speaker) to speak at the convention held
at ______________ (time) _____________________________ (location)
on ___________________ (date).
Deposit & Cancellations Policy:
- An advance retainer of 50% is required with the return of signed agreement.
- In the event of program cancellation, Ms. Speaker will rebook the program on a mutually-convenient date with no penalty. Due to potential loss of income to the speaker, cancellation of this date less than 30 days prior to the event carries a penalty of the deposit being non-refundable.
Travel & Accommodation:
- All fees are as quoted, plus travel expenses. Ms. Speaker will book full coach airfare and expenses will be invoiced after the program has been completed. Airfare is always prorated when the itinerary involves multiple clients.
- Speaker’s accommodation, meals and ground transportation will be billed direct to your organization.
Support Materials:
- Please note that speaker’s materials, written, oral or visual, are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced without the written consent of the speaker.
- Participants’ handouts are billed separately.
Audio / Visual:
- No recording, audio or visual, may be made without the prior written permission of the speaker.
- The speaker reserves the right to make available books and A/V materials for sale or viewing purposes to the participants with client approval.
While it is standard practice for the client to cover travel and accommodation expenses, some speakers charge a flat fee to cover expenses where travel is involved. It makes for less paperwork and is something that the client can work into the budget ahead of time.
I recommend having a flat fee policy since it means that payment for expenses will be included in the final check you receive on the day of your speaking engagement.
Another benefit of having a flat fee policy means that there are no unpleasant surprises for the client long after the event is over and they receive a whopping bill for expenses.
However you decide to handle expenses, it’s important to let clients know up front and to be consistent with each client.
Once hired, you should send the client a pre-program questionnaire to help you customize your speech to the needs of this particular group. This questionnaire should cover such things as confirming time, date and location of your speech, Agenda of program, whether other speakers are on before or after your speech, Theme of the conference, expected number of attendees and any other information that will help you do a better job on the stage.
Professional contracts will make your work much easier and make you look highly professional — which of course you are!
Cathleen Fillmore, owner of Speakers Gold bureau, consults with speakers who want to find the money in the marketplace and maximize the returns on their talents. Cathleen is a member of MPI, a certified consultant with the American Consultant’s League and a consultant to some of North America’s top speakers. Sign up for her advanced marketing techniques newsletter ‘Speakers Gold’ at 6figurespeaker.com and get a free report on Getting Paid for Speaking. You may reprint this article provided the resource box is reprinted in its entirety.
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