You want to be a speaker. But what are you going to talk about?
So you want to start speaking publicly about your work. Maybe it’s a TED Talk. Or a conference. Or a mastermind workshop. Or podcasts.
Maybe you love the idea of sharing your work and your message on a stage. Or maybe you just like the idea of a marketing channel that’s not social media.
Either way, you can see why it makes sense. Speaking gets you in front of new audiences. It builds credibility. It puts a real, human face to your work in a way that a social post simply can't.
But then someone asks: ‘So what are you going to talk about?’
And suddenly it feels a lot like staring at a blank page.
Because you know it can't just be about your work. You're not interested in feeling like a sales pitch wearing a nametag. But it does have to connect back to what you do. Otherwise you're just doing someone a favour and hoping for the best.
This tension — between being genuinely interesting and strategically relevant — is exactly what lots of aspiring speakers get stuck on. And it's entirely solvable. It just requires a small but important shift in how you think about what speaking is actually for.
Expand your audience by capturing, rewarding and respecting their attention
{Photo credit Luigi Ritchie on Unsplash}
Speaking Is Content Marketing. But Not the Way You Might Think.
Speaking is one of the oldest forms of content marketing. Long before social media, before blogs, before the algorithm decided what you were allowed to say and to whom — people built reputations, relationships and businesses by getting up and saying something worth hearing.
What makes it especially powerful now is exactly what makes it different from a post or an email: you deliver your message with your voice, your presence, your personality. You're there in person, and that creates a kind of trust and connection that digital content rarely can.
But here's where a lot of people go wrong: they think if they’re talking about their work, they have to talk about their business. Their services. Their process. Their credentials.
Not at all.
Speaking isn't about telling people what you do. It's about inviting them into WHY it matters. Not your elevator pitch. Your worldview.
There's a difference between a talk that makes people think ‘oh, interesting’ and a talk that makes people think ‘she completely gets it — I need to talk to her.’
The first is a presentation. The second is a signal.
Taking It Up a Level
Think about the brands that do this best.
Apple's most iconic campaign wasn't about computers. It was about the kind of people who used them — the misfits, the rebels, the ones who see things differently. The product was almost incidental. What Apple was really selling was an identity, a set of values, a way of seeing the world.
Patagonia doesn't just sell outdoor gear. They sell a commitment to the planet. Dove doesn't just sell soap. They sell an everyday rebellion against narrow beauty standards.
Now, you don't need to start a global movement with your speaking topics. (Though you could.) But the same principle applies at any scale: the most compelling speakers aren't the ones who talk about what they do. They're the ones who talk about why it matters — and make their audience feel that.
What This Looks Like in Practice
I gave a talk recently called ‘Build a World with Your Words.’ It was about the power of being intentional in the way we speak — to our clients, our colleagues, our children, ourselves.
My day-to-day work is brand strategy and messaging for solopreneurs. I help people figure out what to say about what they do, then build the tools to say it well. I mentioned that in passing, as one supporting point among many.
But the talk itself pulled from parenting, from psychology, from pop culture, from the way words shape how we see ourselves and each other. Things that are universally relatable, not industry-specific.
The result? The topic was broadly interesting to a room full of people in very different businesses. And because it was clearly rooted in my worldview — in what I actually believe about communication and its power — it said everything it needed to say about my work without ever sounding like a pitch.
If you post on LinkedIn, you've probably noticed a version of this already. The posts that get the widest reach aren't usually the topical ones. They're the ones about burnout, or identity, or a moment that made you rethink something. That's not a coincidence. It's the same principle: the more broadly relatable the opening, the more welcoming the invitation.
You're not talking about the day-to-day of your work. You're talking about why it's important. The context. Why it matters in the world. And THAT is what gets people excited to hear more.
It's not that you’re trying to appeal to everyone. You still want to resonate most with your ideal audience. You’re just finding the angle that catches your people in the earliest stages of awareness about your work.
The Speaker Sweet Spot
Here's a useful way to think about where you’ll find you ideal speaking topic. I call it the Speaker Sweet Spot, and it sits at the intersection of three things:
• REASON: What do you care about so deeply that you'd talk about it for free? What parts of your work feel genuinely meaningful, beyond the income? This is your WHY.
• RELEVANCE: What naturally connects to your area of expertise? It doesn't have to be a how-to. It just has to be honest — a topic that you can speak about with real authority.
• RESONANCE: What is your audience genuinely curious about, challenged by, or hoping to understand better? What opens a door into your world for them?
When a topic hits all three, something interesting happens: your value as an expert is implied rather than stated. You don't have to tell people you're credible. They feel it. And they want to know more.
Some examples, to make this concrete.
A nutritionist whose deeper WHY is about being present and energised for the life you want might speak about the relationship between food, energy and showing up fully.
A leadership coach whose real purpose is about helping people reclaim a sense of agency might speak about the moments in a career when we outsource our confidence without realising it.
A financial adviser who genuinely believes money is a tool for living intentionally might speak about the stories we inherit about money and how to rewrite them.
None of those are sales pitches. All of them are signals to the right people.
How to Actually Find Your WHY
The reason you might be tempted to skip this step is that it requires a kind of thinking most people aren’t used to doing about their work. It's not strategic planning. It's not market research. It's something closer to reflection. It’s the good kind of hard that surfaces answers that are inside you but you haven’t put the words to yet.
A few questions to start with:
What parts of your work would you do for free? Not because you should, but because they genuinely light you up?
Beyond what you tangibly deliver, what do you actually offer people? What does working with you give them that goes beyond the invoice?
Is there something about your industry that bothers you? Something you do differently, or a misconception you keep having to correct?
In what ways does your specific expertise actually apply to everyone's daily life — even people who'd never hire you?
How do you want people to feel after they've heard you speak? What do you want them to go and do, or see differently?
These questions are the beginning. They're designed to move you from ‘what I do’ to ‘why it matters’ — which is exactly the shift that makes a speaking topic go from serviceable to genuinely compelling.
Remember, you don’t have to shout to be heard. That often backfires. If you really want people to listen, it’s better to be meaningful – deeply, intentionally, specifically relevant and resonant. The right topic, said the right way, in the right room, is worth 100 posts shouting into the void.
One simple technique that works wonders: The 5 Whys.
Ask yourself why your work matters. Then ask why THAT matters. Then why that matters. Keep going, five times.
You'll be surprised how quickly you get from ‘I help consultants with their websites’ to something that resonates on a much deeper level. Toddlers really are onto something.
You don’t have to figure it all out at once
If you read through those questions and felt a little overwhelmed, that's normal. Finding your WHY isn't a ten-minute exercise. It's a process of excavation — and it's one of the most valuable things you can do for your business, not just your speaking.
The best speaking topics don’t make people think about your business. They make people think about their lives — and then associate that feeling with you. That’s not a trick. That’s what it looks like when your WHY is clear and compelling enough to carry a talk on stage.
Because here's what tends to happen when you do this work: you don't just end up with a speaking topic. You end up with a clearer sense of your brand purpose. And that clarity changes how you talk about your work everywhere — on your website, in conversations, in the room before you even get on stage.
So whether you're ready to pitch yourself for speaking engagements next month or you're still at the ‘this is a vague idea I'm warming up to’ stage — the work is the same. Start with the questions. Follow the thread. See where it takes you.
For support with your Speaker Sweet Spot
That’s exactly the kind of thing we work through in the Signal Finder — a brand audit, assessment and roadmap that helps you get clear on what you stand for, what you should be saying, and how all of your marketing (including speaking) can work together more intentionally.→ FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE SIGNAL FINDER
