It seems there is a rash of talented people who have spent years, time, energy and their own money to build their knowledge, connections and skills enough to provide value who are constantly being asked to transfer all those knowledge, connections and skills along to others for free. I know this because: a. many of them are friends and people whose work I admire and have spoken out, b. I am one of them.
Some who approach me even have the balls to say, “You’ll get alot of Whuffie out of it!”
Um. That’s why I built up my whuffie in the first place, dude.
I think it’s useful to explain the process of how and why someone would work for whuffie and then at what point one gets paid in earth dollars and why (although the why should be obvious).
Why work for whuffie?
- Your name isn’t widely known and you need to build your reputation. By speaking or doing pro bono work, you will start to build up that valuable whuffie that is needed to get the paid work you need to cover your bills at the end of each month.
- Your name is widely known in one vertical, but the conference or cause that has approached you can give you exposure in another vertical you are highly interested in building a name for yourself.
- You really, really believe in the cause or the conference. It’s something you are crazy passionate about.
- In the case of a conference, you were 100% going to be there anyway (like SXSW Interactive).
- You are good friends and you know that friend will have your back anytime you ask in the future.
- Doing this could land you a gazillion more paid gigs (like speaking at TED or PopTech).
- You are pretty much guaranteed of being compensated another way – selling books, CDs, seminars, etc. (but this one is tough – I’ve asked the conference to pony up for a minimum number of books to give away in lieu of a fee).
That’s pretty much it. Free tickets aren’t payment. I’ve actually been offered a free ticket only the DAY ON WHICH I’M SPEAKING, which means they are saying, “Sure, we’ll let you in to talk, but then you need to pay to come back.” Wow.
After you have built a name for yourself, you should be charging. And even if it’s a friend’s conference, they need to pay to get you there and put you up for it. Your friend should also buy you a beer or two and recommend you to other conference organizers (who will pay you). Really good friends will actually pay you. Money coming out of your pocket to help someone else’s event (or business in the case of consulting or a workshop) rock is not sustainable. If you continue to do this after you’ve built a name for yourself, you have completely squandered the reason for you building your reputation in the first place! Really. If you will continue to work for free, why not just spend nothing and go nowhere? It’s more sustainable.
Why? (and here is obvious part)
Because your landlord/bank won’t let you pay your rent/mortgage with whuffie. The grocery store won’t take whuffie either. Neither will your utility companies, clothing stores, universities for your kids, bookstores for your reading materials or the many other realities of day to day bill collections. At some point, you need to cash in on some of that whuffie and put some money in the bank.
So, the bottom line for me is: I will work for whuffie if I really believe in something, but I will work for cash if it is for your benefit. And I will do the same for others. I pride myself on making sure that people get paid when I benefit more from their labor than they do. And I won’t ask if I don’t think I can pay them.
And personally, I think that conferences that pay their speakers are better. The speakers feel valued and transfer that feeling onto the audience, who also feel valued. Very few exceptions exist and where there are exceptions, there are HUGE benefits to the speakers (not empty promises) for speaking there.
As a sidenote, I’m pretty sure that perceived value also works into the scenario of working for free as well. Once you say yes to it, you lose value in the eyes of the client or conference organizer. In the words of Don Draper: “I don’t think you’d be in the presidential suite right now if you worked for free.”
October 6th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
Thanks Tara for this post. I’m still years away from commanding money for anything I do. I’m just starting out and have so much to learn so that’s why I don’t call myself an expert or even “consultant” I’m just a guy who’s learning as I go and help out friends because I enjoy it.
Despite that, I do still turn things down simply because I can’t afford to travel all over the place w/o some kind of compensation. If it’s local, then yes, I’m there!
October 6th, 2009 at 1:34 pm
Thanks Tara for this post, and for linking to my post. I agree, conferences should pay their speakers. I for one could potentially wave my speaking fee, but I’m going to be very careful of who I’d give that benefit. \
Excellent post!
October 6th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
I think the outcome of anyones work is to finally get paid, for the exact reasons you post there…we need to pay the bills. Of course there are certain occasions in which getting paid won’t be good. Like in helping someone develop a new conference where there’s not much cash available, but of course you could expect that if it’s a goodone next year you’ll get paid.
I agree you need to get paid and a lot, some people don’t charge for talking because maybe they have another business that provides the cashflow. The idea is to make a living. And paying is part of saying ‘ You rock, so I’ll help you pay your bills you can continue rockin’.
This post puts things really in perspective….thanks for posting Tara
October 6th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
What an excellent post. Thank you for writing this. This struck a chord with me: “Really good friends will actually pay you.” Because you know what? Requests from friends are the hardest to turn down. I’ve been put in this position so many times, and I’m left wondering whether that friend doesn’t think I’m worth paying, or that they’re not really my friends for not even thinking that I actually do have bills to pay and although I give to charities, money don’t grow on trees.
October 6th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
I just broke down what a conference ‘costs’ me in real/estimated costs:
Real:
$25/day Doggie Sitting (x2 days min) $50
Airline Ticket avg $500
Hotel room (at least one night, two if I’m going to do any networking) avg $250
$25-50 iStock photo licensing
$25-50 books/research
Estimated:
100hrs (average) x $200/hr costs = $20,000 (for my time to put together the presentation, practice it plus the time spent at the conference itself and en route)
Total estimated costs = $21,000
Considering I charge about $10-15k per talk (plus travel costs), I’m still losing money at the end of the day.
October 6th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
Excellent post! I’m going strong with building my brand and speaking business. I was wondering if I should speak for free vs. fee but I guess for now, I will do free so I can build up my experience and status.
Thanks for helping me with my decision!
October 6th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
miss rouge, your total estimated costs are only valid if you would have to give up paid work at $200/hr to go to the conference. If you don’t already have paid work lined up, then you’re only talking about theoretical opportunity cost.
It’s pretty obvious that if someone is offering you $15K plus travel to speak and you already have $20K in paid work lined up for the same time slot, that you’d turn down the conference.
October 6th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Hi Tara,
Interesting “thought virus” going around the blogosphere lately. I picked up on it too and wrote a similar article to yours a few weeks ago:
http://www.erica.biz/2009/to-free-or-not-to-free/
My post was partially prompted by your Tweet about a client not paying you.
I’d be interested in a post on how you find conferences to speak at. “Build [a blog] and they will come” does not necessarily seem to apply in the case of people paying 5 figures for you to speak.
-Erica
October 6th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
How in heck do you sell conference organizers on the notion of paying you $10,000 to speak?
October 6th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
@ari I have an agent…believe me. I’m cheap compared with my associates. Super cheap. I won’t even begin to name who goes for $50k, $75k and $100k. You know them.
I have been speaking for >4 years and have over 60 conferences under my belt. I bring in many paid tickets.
@nick If I’m doing work for someone, the rate is $200/hr. Since I’m doing work for these conferences, it is time I spend doing work for a client. So yes. I think it applies whether or not I have to give up other work. I could be doing a great deal of paid and unpaid work (towards writing my next book, etc.)
October 6th, 2009 at 7:37 pm
Wasn’t it Guy Kawasaki who suggested that one should try to be either: a) free or very cheap; or b) very expensive – and never anything inbetween.
October 6th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
Well 10,000 for speaking…for me sounds like a lot. But maybe that’s because I’m on the other side of the road, just starting to build a business and learning all I can, working for the whuffie. Though sometimes I also need to get some money to pay the bills.
Now for example if I had 10,000 for any conference I will bring Tara. I think in her case her content ’sells’ her as a speaker, cause she has interesting things to say. The same happens with Guy Kawasaki and others.
October 7th, 2009 at 3:21 am
Thanks Tara. A good focus. The problem often is that you love the things you do more than the money you could get for it. The fact is that you will grow to be more valuable when you start to charge for what you do.
From my CSR perspective you can’t build a sustainable business that’s not also economical sustainable.
Regards
@Havspappan
October 7th, 2009 at 7:23 am
Hehe great post Tara. As I always tell people now, “Thank you’s are nice but they don’t pay the bills”. I’ve totally cut down on certain volunteer community work because I’ve done it over a long while and most of the time it usually doesn’t lead to additional work. Instead people just expect you to continue to give advice / knowledge for free which to me doesn’t equate to a good relationship.
Instead I probably get more people contacting me for work because of something I’ve written on a blog comment somewhere. In effect, it’s my attitude and approach to things, not so much my knowledge, that attracts them to me. For example, my last client approached me because of my thoughts on culture and it’s value in business.
“Well 10,000 for speaking…for me sounds like a lot.”
Jorge, the money value is irrelevant. It’s more about the ratio that matters. For example if Tara brings in $200,000 in tickets sales because of her appearance there, $10K is a drop in the bucket. Therefore to the event organizers, they are “investing” in her (i.e. $10K) and reaping a substantial payout because of it (i.e. $200K). Of course, it is up to each event organizer to decide if the investment is worthwhile or not, just the same way as it is up to each speaker to determine if attending the event will be a worthy investment and payout for them in terms of exposure (which in turn hopefully leads to book sales and contract work).
October 7th, 2009 at 10:02 am
Tara – great post. True entrepreneurs will always find a way to monetize their Whuffie. The best entrepreneurs find ways to monetize AND build Whuffie at the same time (you, Gary Vaynerchuk, Brogan et al). The people who complain about those entrepreneurs, and think that everything should be free because “that’s the social web” have missed the boat. Unless, of course, I missed the memo and we are actually living in the Magic Kingdom.
October 7th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Tara,
Thank you for writing what many of us are saying, but (until now) too wimpy to discuss openly. I have gotten a free social media education and phenomenal connections from doing things for free to build “Whuffie”. Now that I have the knowledge and relationships to deliver value, I am drawing the line. Each person has their own definition, but for me that means:
-NOT paying to attend conferences or events, although I would make an exception for TED and the like (ha!)
-Interviewing for roles that pay well – shows an appreciation for the position. Also avoiding semi-free, i.e. full-time, low pay, no challenge or room for advancement.
-Taking on consulting roles that pay what I am worth – when we drop prices we are doing a disservice to ourselves and the industry
Exceptions:
-Volunteerism – I will always work for free for causes I care about. More volunteerism will be possible when my income increases – yay!
-Social spends – I have no problem paying my way for purely social events.
-Those FEW people who “get it”-they understand everything you wrote in your blog and reciprocate in ways that blow me away.
You prompted me to put my rules in writing, so thank you for the post. It was long overdue.
Liza
—
Liza Sperling
http://www.wordpress.lizasperling.com
http://www.twitter.com/lizasperling
October 7th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
Great thoughts Tara and thanks for sharing. It’s something I’m wrestling with as of late when people start asking “how much do you charge to speak…”
Interesting to read all of the different sides.
October 7th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
I remember your preso at AdTech SF (or Web 2.0 Expo) this past spring…”Give it away until you go broke. Be sure to pay the rent and buy groceries.”
I was adequately compensated in my former corporate life and feel called to help people (I serve the unemployed Boomer market to become biztech savvy).
Reality sets in when I get home and the spouse asks, “So how much did you make today?”
It’s a balancing act.
October 9th, 2009 at 9:04 am
Hey Tara,
This seems somewhat parallel with the “hustling” post from last week, which I also agreed with. There’s something inherently “hustled” about conferences where the majority of speakers are speaking for free, and thus promoting their own work/site/technology/name under the guise of shared knowledge to justify the time and expense.
October 16th, 2009 at 8:17 am
New to the site.
Turned off by:
‘A lot’ is two words, not one.
What the hell is ‘whuffie’?
October 16th, 2009 at 9:22 am
Hi there Chelsea
Tara of course should answer this but since I am here I start
Whuffie is basically social capital and also the name of her book (see above for link)and also the reason why we stalk hear:-) It is an really interesting as aconcept when we talk about the driving force in on line interaction. The word come from the science fiction novel “Down and out in the magic kingdom”
Regards
Bengt
October 16th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Ha, $15,000 would last me three years.
I guess the bigger question is, how long did it take you to get where you are? I’m too young to comprehend it!
Here’s to progress.
October 19th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
I read this at the absolute perfect time. Just finished a conference call with several of my speaking agents about rates and 2010 gigs and what I will and will not do. Thanks so much for clearly stating the case that just because social media is “free” booking expert speakers shouldn’t be. See you at SXSW. Cuz we’d be there anyway
October 22nd, 2009 at 2:33 pm
great post, thanks for telling it like it is, I nodded all the way through. I have finally learned this month that what you don’t charge for in blogging, writing and guestposting, is really just undoing your hard work. So often I have rushed to produce a guest post, Only to find they were slack in putting it up or put it up with a broken link to my blog, the link love would have been the only payback if it worked. Now I build my own brand, learned that from @garyvee ,and ill do almost anything for free for charity, but thats it. Love to tweet and support other’s success stories that are my mentors I link to them often in posts too and comment on others blogs. i believe in karma..
“When you undercut yourself, you undercut the whole industry”
October 24th, 2009 at 8:36 am
RE: “If you will continue to work for free, why not just spend nothing and go nowhere? It’s more sustainable”
Excellent blog, and important topic, Miss Hunt. These principles applies to most self-employed/entrepreneur. It’s a difficult move for anybody new to the self-employment to step up and ask for the proper rate for services to be rendered. One could be met with a lots of rejection at first, as so many people will be seeking to hire you for almost nothing, advancing their own pursuits with minimum impact to their cash flow.
Like the old adage: “Know who your real friends are”
Cheers! pj