08:56 The business case for talking about suicide.

Frank King: [00:08:56] I decided it was time to come out on stage on the TEDx, hyper-personalisation and tell people that story.

Frank King: [00:09:05] That enabled me to rebrand and there’s the business element. I was a comedian for two and a half decades. How do you convince people you can do something serious? I thought, I’ll do TedX and it worked. That was the beginning of my rebranding as not just a comedian, but the mental health comedian, which is my brand and it allowed me to get booked to do a serious speech with comic relief, good, organic, well-placed, tasteful personal humour.

Martin Henley: [00:09:34] Yes. Were you concerned or have you found that this puts people off or not? Because it’s such a serious subject? It is so honest, open, raw. Were you concerned that I can’t imagine they’re going to book you for a corporate gig if you’re going to stand up and start talking about suicide? Was that your expectation? Because that would be my fear is that if you are too personal then you’re going to put people off.

Frank King: [00:10:14] Well, I wasn’t worried about it. But again, let’s go to the business element.

Martin Henley: [00:10:20] Yes. I have a motivational speech. I’ve got a cardiac comedy speech because I’ve had a number of cardiac operations. I’ve got 25 minutes on cardio. I’ve got a customer networking speech. I looked around town to the most successful business people in my town, and I selected two completely different businesses and they’re both very successful. I thought, well, what do they have in common? One guy owns three radio stations. One guy owns an auto body shop. What I realised was the one thing they have in common is they do one thing and they do it extremely well. No side hustles. They are experts in their field. So I thought in speaking, they say you need to pick a lane. I think any entrepreneur needs to pick a lane, and become the go-to person in that area, whatever it is, whatever job or service you provide. So you’re no longer a commodity. You’re not just another body shop, Todd’s Body Shop, Todd’s Auto Body. They do what’s called, this is not exactly right, but it’s environmentally friendly auto paint and body. The paints are made a certain way. They take longer to cure than normal paints do because they don’t have the chemicals that enhance the drying capabilities of the paint but it’s very eco-friendly. In Eugene, Oregon this is the tree hugging capital of the world so that’s a very popular feature of Todd’s business. If you are into all things environmental, and you have an automobile accident, and you want your car fixed, and you want them to use environmentally friendly products, you’re going to see Todd.

Frank King: [00:12:16] John Malkay, three radio stations. He’s been doing radio since he was a teenager he eats, sleeps breathes it, so he is really good at it and so people seek him out. So I decided I would have to pick a lane that’d be suicide prevention speaking, just suicide prevention speaking. That’s it. If you want to hire me for the others, fine, I’ll take your money but I don’t market anything but that. Now, here’s the second step, and I think people forget this. You have to decide who are your ideal client, Who is willing to pay, Todd? Todd’s Auto Body more money for environmentally friendly paint. You have to figure out who those people are. Well, in Eugene, they’re everywhere because it’s just an environmentally friendly city. In my case, I chose six of the top ten at-risk occupations for suicide in the US, for example, construction and construction. In the US, 1000 people die by accident every year. 5000 die by suicide. You are five times more likely to jump off a building than you are to fall off a building if you’re in the construction industry. I selected and I got five more groups like that where they got a really high rate. So I don’t have to convince him suicide prevention is a good idea. They know that when they come to me, they’re just trying to decide which suicide prevention speaker they’re going to pick.

Frank King: [00:13:41] It makes marketing easier. It makes my SEO easier. If you if I put in suicide prevention speaker Agriculture in a search, an incognito search on Google, I’m going to come up on the first page. Dental, suicide prevention speaker’s dental I’ve got four listings on the first page. I’ve got at least one listing in all my six industries on page one of Google, because I have become that guy. I’ve become the expert, the thought leader. So I think but whatever business you’re in, pick a lane and own it. Then pick your ideal clients, people that are willing to pay you for what it is you do, and just a handful rather than spray and pray, marketing to everybody, pick a half a dozen,a handful. Seth Godin, marketing guru, says pick the smallest, viable group of people that can support what you do. Don’t market to everybody. Just market the people who are willing to pay you what you want them to pay you. All I do in the speaking business is associations and corporations. Not only do they hire me, but they hire me because I’ve got the lived experience gun in my mouth, suicide prevention training and the comic relief. They come looking for me because it’s a very difficult, dark topic, hard to digest but when you add that personal, comic relief makes it far more palatable, digestible. So. But I think.

Frank King: [00:15:17] The business advice is A) pick a lane, B) pick your ideal clients, don’t market to everybody.

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