After 20+ years as a professional keynote speaker and AI technology expert, I've built countless tech startups and spoken athundreds of events worldwide. Recently, I've been exploring three different business opportunities:
A LinkedIn automation tool for B2B engagement called WhatSaysYou from an ideaI had 7 years ago.
While the LinkedIn and WhatsApp markets are massive—worthbillions globally—they come with significant challenges that don't align with my current priorities. And with Replit I am not 100% sure I can take them beyond the prototype stage…
Also from past experience, the LinkedIn automation spaceis increasingly risky due to platform policy changes (I learned this lesson the hard way with my previous Twitter-based venture FolloGro), and the WhatsAppemotional analysis market, despite its huge potential, requires extensiveAPI dependencies and complex privacy compliance that would demand a large team and significant funding.
But it wasn't until I started manually tracking my speakingengagement ROI that I discovered the most obvious business opportunityright under my nose—one that perfectly aligns with my expertise, network, and lifestyle goals.
The Problem Every Speaker Faces (But Nobody Talks About)
As motivational speakers, corporate trainers,and keynote speakers, we're brilliant at delivering value on stage. Weinspire audiences, share transformative insights, and create memorable experiences. But here's the uncomfortable truth: most of us are terrible at
measuring our speaking business success beyond the immediate fee.
I realized this during a particularly busy quarter when I'dspoken at twelve events but couldn't answer basic questions like:
Which events generated the most qualified leads?
What percentage of my audience actually took action on my content?
Which speaking topics resonated most with potential clients?
How many speaking referrals came from each engagement?
Sound familiar?
Why Traditional Speaker Tools Miss the Mark
The speaking industry has some excellent tools forbooking management and basic CRM functions. But they're designed for the transactional side of speaking, not the relationship and lead generationside that actually builds sustainable speaker businesses.
Most speaker management tools focus on:
Calendar management
Invoice tracking
Basic contact storage
Speaking fee calculations
What they don't address is the speaker marketinggoldmine happening after every presentation: the moment when audience members want to connect, learn more, or potentially hire you.
The Manual Discovery That Changed Everything
Three months ago, I started an experiment. Instead of justcollecting business cards and hoping for follow-up, I implemented a systematic approach to track every speaking engagement outcome:
QR codes linking to specific landing pages for each event
Semi automated follow-up sequences tailored to different audience types
Speaker ROI tracking across multiple touchpoints
Detailed analytics on which content drove the most engagement
The results were eye-opening. Within 90 days of manualimplementation. I had literally more testimonials than I could handle. I had over 100 downloads of my books. I increased my newsletter subscribers AND LinkedIn connections for future work.
WhySpeaker Pro Became My All-In Focus
As a technology futurist and serial entrepreneur, I've evaluated countless business opportunities. Most probably tooo many...
But Speaker Pro represents something unique: a solution born from solving my own daily pain point in an industry I deeply understand.
The professional speaking market is underserved bytechnology. We have sophisticated tools for almost every other business function, yet speaker lead generation and ROI tracking remainlargely manual processes. This creates a massive opportunity for speaking industryinnovation.
Unlike my previous ventures in AI marketing or social mediaautomation, Speaker Pro has an inherent advantage: I use it every single time I do a keynote or talk.
Every keynote presentation, every corporate training session, every conference speaking engagement becomes a real-world test case.
This customer-founder alignment provides:
Immediate feedback on feature effectiveness
Rapid iteration based on actual speaking business needs
Authentic case studies and speaker success stories
Direct access to the professional speaker community
The Bigger Vision for Speaker ROI
Speaker Pro isn't just about better tracking and better marketing and automation —it's about re-elevating the entire speaking profession. When keynote speakers can demonstrate concrete ROI metrics, we shift from being seen as "nice-to-have inspirational content" to "essential business investment."
Imagine being able to tell event organizers:
"My sessions generate an average of X qualified leads per attendee"
"Here's the measurable impact of my motivational speaking on your team"
"Companies that implement my frameworks see Y% improvement in Z metrics"
This level of speaker analytics transforms how theindustry operates and the value we can command. Now, I am not saying that SpeakerPro – in the first instance can do this – but it gets the conversation started…
TheTechnology Intersection That Made This Possible
As an AI expert who regularly discusses the futureof work and digital transformation, I recognized that speaker tools haven't evolved with available technology. The intersection of QR codeautomation, content creation, marketing analytics, and relationship management creates possibilities that didn't exist even five years ago.
We can now automate the relationship-building thatpreviously required hours of manual follow-up while providing insights that were impossible to track at scale.
And I believe this is the perfect time as the speakingindustry has rebounded strongly post-pandemic, with both virtual andin-person events reaching new levels of sophistication. Event organizersare increasingly ROI-focused, and professional speakers who candemonstrate measurable value will dominate the market.
Additionally, the rise of AI technology in businesscreates demand for speakers who understand both the human and technological sides of transformation—exactly the intersection where I operate.
The Decision to Go All-In
After building the manual process and seeing consistentresults across multiple speaking engagements, the decision becameobvious. Speaker Pro solves a real problem for a community I'm part of, using technology I understand, in a market ready for innovation.
Sometimes the best business opportunities aren't theflashiest or most complex—they're the ones that solve obvious problems in obvious ways for people you genuinely want to help.Ready to transform your keynote speaker gigs ROI?
Connect with me on LinkedIn to learn more about SpeakerPro's development journey.
Or save time and skip the queue and sign up for the waiting list here instead.