How to give yourself a competitive edge, build your brand and bring in business through speaking. Deirdre Van Nest shares top speaking tips to win customers. Learn more at MarkMiletello.com. Note: “Where The Insurance Pros Meet” is an audio podcast and is meant for the ear. A transcript of the audio is provided for referencing a particular section or for you to follow along. Listen to the episode to get the most out of our show. We use both speech recognition software and human transcribers to create the transcripts so they may contain errors. If you’re going to quote us in print, please be sure to check the corresponding audio.

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TRANSCRIPT

Speaker 1:

Where the Insurance Pros Meet, episode seven.

Deirdre Van Nest:

Every time you speak you have the opportunity to attract people to you, to build up your brand, to bring in business, or the opposite.

Speaker 1:

Where the Insurance Pros Meet is a podcast that brings the greatest talent in the world together. Managers, coaches, and producers the very best experts the insurance and financial services industry has to offer. Get ready to change the way you do business to have your most successful year ever. Now here's Mark Miletello, a top one percent producer, manager, and your host of Where the Insurance Pros Meet.

Mark Miletello:

Welcome back to the show. Today is an exciting day, I promised myself and the listeners that when I started this show, in my opinion the best, the greatest platform for really investment reps or insurance agents of Where the Insurance Pros Meet anyone that's in the financial services industry that I would search out and even have brand new agents, veteran agents, top speakers, top thinkers and minds in the industry, so today we have a very, very special guest. We have someone and let me give you a little background before I give you all the goods. As you may or may not know I'm speaking in Lamp in 2018 for Gamma as a multiple line speaker and I fly in to Chicago and right before I'm going into my rehearsal where they do provide a professional speech coach I'm fortunate enough to sit next to the next speaker that arrived a little bit early and just so happens she is a professional speech coach. To me that was very lucky to build a quick friendship the few minutes we had together I knew this individual was special, I knew that she was on it and I invited her to critique and to come in and watch me, which they didn't really allow but I forced it. I want to welcome a very special guest to the show that in a few short minutes I just really felt could really help our industry in a way, welcome Deirdre Van Nest to the show.

Deirdre Van Nest:

Aw thank you, Mark.

Mark Miletello:

Deirdre you're the creator of Crazy Good Talks the Blueprint, a system that teaches financial and insurance professionals how to become crazy good speakers so that they can bring in business and build their brands using speaking. I mean I didn't really know what all that meant until I met you and within a few short minutes, you're molding me into something that's doing a lot better job at what I'm attempting to do. Welcome to the show, I'm excited to have you and what you do for our listeners here.

Deirdre Van Nest:

I'm excited to be here and it's been a pleasure to help you. You are a quick student.

Mark Miletello:

What does that mean? Are there some that are not?

Deirdre Van Nest:

Some are not, yeah. Yes, you are.

Mark Miletello:

Well thank you and like I said I just realized you're very special. Can you tell me a little bit about ... tell the listener a little bit about your background and maybe they'll get a sense for maybe what I've found in you?

Deirdre Van Nest:

Yeah you know what I first loved to do is talk for a moment about why I care about helping the industry, particularly when it comes to speaking. I firmly believe that every person, and then this is regardless of what you do for a living, but every person unless we develop a skill set of becoming a compelling speaker, the type of speaker Mark who can get other people to sit up and listen and act we will never truly reach our full potential. I'll never forget, I used to be in a networking group where ... you know those networking groups where you have to a 60 or 30 second commercial every week?

Mark Miletello:

Yep.

Deirdre Van Nest:

Ever been a part? Okay. I was in this networking group and every week I was with the same people and people would get up and they'd speak for 60 seconds and there were certain people where as soon as that person stood up everybody tuned out and it really hurt my heart, it really bothered me, because as I got to know these people I thought, well you know that person's really good at what they do and that person really cares about the people in room, but they're not conveying who they are and what they do in a way that gets other people to sit up and listen and want to take action. It didn't matter if they were an A-plus attorney or an A-plus financial adviser or A plus this or that if they're a B minus or C plus speakers it was hurting their career. Does that make sense?

Mark Miletello:

No absolutely and I think I'm learning more about you every time we meet and talk, but I guess what you do helps ... I mean you even said attorneys, I guess attorneys do a lot of public speaking in the courtroom and things like that. How do you help ... I mean what industries do you find yourself helping most and how did you end up really relating and now that you're a speaker at Lamp of course in front of every general manager, general agent across all boards of financial services and insurance. I mean how did you really connect with our industry?

Deirdre Van Nest:

Yeah that's a great question so there's a couple of touch points. When I first hung my shingle out in 2008 I just started speaking everywhere I could and the professionals that raised their hands the most saying, "Hey, we're interested in you. We want what you're doing, we want you're helping. We're financial and insurance professionals." In one sense I fell into these industries, these professions, but it's interesting Mark as I've dug deeper I've really developed a love for this industry, for these professions, and for the people in it. As I sat back, and I started thinking okay I know I feel like I've sort of fell into this, but why do I stay here and why do I love it, and why do I feel a passion around it and why is that pretty much the sole focus of anything I do from an outbound perspective? It circled back to this, and you know this you heard my story about when I was 10 years old my mom was killed in a car accident and Mark I literally was kissing her goodbye one moment for what I thought was the night and within four minutes she was gone.

Mark Miletello:

Yeah.

Deirdre Van Nest:

My dad was in the car too, we were really blessed that he didn't die, it was touch and go with him and he was out of work for several months and it took him about a year to recover from all his injuries. What that did for me was I lost my innocence in the sense that I realized from that experience and I realized early in that life can change in a snap. As I got older I became a very strong advocate for proper financial planning.

Mark Miletello:

Right.

Deirdre Van Nest:

I was the person at 30 who got pregnant with my first child and instead of running off to the fun little store to pick out outfits and furniture I'm dragging my husband to our adviser and making sure we have enough life insurance, I'm dragging him to our attorney making sure all the guardianship and beneficiary stuff is taken care of. Most people don't think like that and I didn't realize that until I started talking to my friends about it. They're like, "That wouldn't have crossed my mind."

Mark Miletello:

Yeah. Well, thank you for-

Deirdre Van Nest:

And I was like, "It doesn't?"

Mark Miletello:

Thank you for sharing your personal story with the listeners and I know that's tough, but I see now that you have a passion for what our products do and with your expertise-

Deirdre Van Nest:

Yes, I do.

Mark Miletello:

With you being the guru, you are the foremost thinker of how to speak and a teacher in that realm I mean I do see that passion come out and so I'm excited that you're connected. I'm sorry that that happened of course, but I'm excited that you're connected with our industry and it kind of leads me to another question that kind of left me thinking after meeting you is if I'm not giving a speech, a public speech on stage, would I really need someone like Deirdre Van Nest to coach me and help me and I think the answer yes and I think you've kind of ... I was able to listen, I wanted to sit through your whole rehearsal and I wasn't able to do that because of my flight, but I did catch one little, and I'm going to try to squeeze that out of you for our listeners, one little tip that you were giving maybe a couple tips, but I do think that there's some validity to increasing your ability speak, finding your voice can help you even if you're not giving a stage public speaking event. Correct?

Deirdre Van Nest:

Absolutely. This is where I feel like I'm hoping the profession will veer towards and start changing is that you speak at seminars, right? That's kind of what everyone thinks right now in the industry is, "Oh speaking is seminars," and I would like to broaden the perspective and offer that speaking is anytime you're in public. That means outside of your own home opening your mouth and talking to let's say two, three, or more people.

Mark Miletello:

Right.

Deirdre Van Nest:

Because every time you speak you have the opportunity to attract people to you, to bui