Welcome to Elevate with Elsner. Join us for inspiring conversations with individuals who have transformed their lives and are making a difference through the work that they do. And now, Welcome back to another episode of Elevate with Elsner where we elevate mindsets, business, and lives. I'm your host, Blake Elsner And today I'm sitting down with someone who's been helping people speak up and stand out for decades. The one and only Steve Sapato Whether you're a business leader, entrepreneur, or someone who wants to build stronger relationships, This episode is going to give you the keys to more confident communication, deeper influence, and a voice that actually gets heard. So Hey, good to have you here. Oh, wait, you're on mine. I'm Yes. That's right. He's got a podcast, too. So. So, hey, who That's a great question. You know, I asked myself that really every quarter type thing, cause you're always trying to reinvent yourself. Aren't you? I've been a professional speaker for almost 50 years now. And, uh, uh, that's one of those deals where when you say professional speaker, you get paid to speak. So I guess I should reduce it down for a couple of years. Cause I spoke for food for the first couple of years. Uh, somebody would say, Hey, you want to speak at our event? We'll buy you dinner. I go, I'm there. Right. And so my mid 20s, I was out speaking for food. And then I finally figured out somebody would pay me for my knowledge, my expertise and my ability to entertain. And that's what has changed my life. And I always say I'm a professional speaking coach also, because I want other people to see that just being able to be a public speaker, speak in public, let's put it that way, will absolutely change your life. It changes how people see you. It changes your confidence level. It changes how people react to you. Everything changes if Yeah, it's a, I mean, it is true. Like, and we both have podcasts and having a podcast is just a tool to help us Yeah. You know, and that's, I think that, One of the things I was just on a podcast earlier with somebody and we talked about, he said, if you keep doing it, if you do it like if you get on a podcast, you keep doing podcasts, you'll get better. And my question always goes back to no, no. The reason people hire coaches, the reason a professional ballplayer hires a coach, the reason somebody else hires a coach, the reason you've got the coaches out there is because it does take somebody else who looks at from the outside and says, improve here, do this to change that and grow this. It's not repetition. Repetition doesn't make you better. Or I'd be an absolutely phenomenal golfer instead of a, you know, a duffer because I played for years and never got any better. And my friends who would just get frustrated, wrap their clubs around a tree or throw them in the pond, you know, they were like frustrated with the game. And I would ask them, I said, when's the last time you took a lesson or you practiced on the putting green for an hour? And they go, I don't want to do that. But yet they expect to get better. That's the same with speaking. I meet boring people. Matter of fact, you'll see that up here, I've got stop boring speakers. Because so many presenters, Blake, get out there and they tell you stuff from the stage, and they tell you stuff, and they don't know how to involve or entertain the audience. To me, and I'll say to them, hey, have you ever, and they'll go, I've been speaking for decades. I'm a great speaker. I know how to do that. You're like, No, But what, and when you say like, like you don't know how, what you're doing, like dive into that a little bit, because I think like you're saying you have to, you have to entertain and you have to provide Yeah, absolutely. And I think what the problem is, is most people. As a matter of fact, one of the ladies I'm working with, she said, I'm really good in front of one or two people, but you get four or five and I get terrified. I go, why? Because what you have to understand is every time you speak, it's a conversation. As a matter of fact, I've been pushing about the last 30 days the difference between public speaking and speaking in public because it's a mental block. People think if they got to be public speaker, they're going to talk on a big stage and they're going to do that. You know, speaking of all kinds, no matter whether you're in front of 5000 people or one person is a conversation. And that's one of those deals where when you have a conversation, we usually involve the other person, we ask them questions, or we look at them and give them gestures that encourage them to participate. And most people who are speakers, whether you're leading a meeting at your office, or whether you're teaching people about your business, you tell people, I'm going to tell you this, I do this, I do that. Perfect example, if you're doing networking, business networking, and you go to a networking event, they say, you have 30 seconds to a minute to tell us about Steve Sopato. And people go, Hi, I'm Steve Sopato. I've been speaking for 45 years. And I've done this. And I do that my company's been around for this long. Nobody cares. What can you do for us is what we care about. So if I'm a plumber, I can ask the question, you know, I can tell I've been a plumbing, plumbing for 50 years, my company's been in business for nobody cares. It's Hey, have you guys ever had a plumbing problem that just made you nuts, you got a drip on your faucet, you have something that leaks? That's when you need to call me and I'm a plumber and I can help you fix your problem So whether it's speaking in public like or anything else, it's you want to be the best you can be Do you want to get more business people don't understand how? Speaking in public will get them more business because people see you with more confidence. They see you as a leader they see you as somebody who's an expert and so if I'm the expert if I'm getting up and talking in front of the Chamber of Commerce, right? It's one of those deals where Now I'm the expert on whatever topic that is. Most realtors, as a matter of fact, you've probably experienced it. Realtors, if you sat in a networking event, one realtor says, oh, I do this. And then they tell you. And I was at one. And the next realtor said, well, I do this. And the third one got up and said, I do what they do. And they sat down. And you're like, yeah, because they all said the same thing. What separates you? And people say, well, I give excellent service. Well, all of them give excellent service. Well, I do this. All of them do that. So you have to figure out what separates you from all the rest of your competition. And in your delivery of your talk, you have to be able to convey that with a positiveness and an excellence and the confidence that has people going, I That's true. And you know how you said that, how you shaped that, the plumber, the question, I guess, is it from, you know, we're used to just introducing ourselves. Is that kind of how, what that Well, yeah, all, all networking events still, I go to them today. And I tell you, I was in some in Tampa, Florida years ago, and I taught people how to give a better delivery. And you'll go back and the people are still saying, hi, I'm Steve Sopato. I'm a professional speaker and I do this. But again, nobody cares. I don't, I don't care what you do. How many times have you listened to somebody for 30 seconds to a minute in one of those pitches and literally drifted off? You were someplace else, right? Where you weren't listening to what they say, cause you've heard them before, or you thought you knew what they were going to say. That's what I tell people. Never tell people what you do. Right. So if you're in a networking thing, never. And people go, I want people to know. I go, no, you don't. If as soon as if I tell you I'm an accountant, you already think you know what an accountant does. Right. If I tell you I sell securities, you already you're bored. I don't need to buy security. I'm out. I'm already doing something else. I'm thinking of something else. But if you capture our attention like today, you say, hey, have you guys heard the stock market is just nuts? And people go, oh yeah. You go, and what have you done to make sure that you didn't lose money on the stock market? And people are like, and you go, did you leave it up to your stock broker? And they'll say, well, yeah. You go, good. Did your stock broker call you to talk to you about those investments in the last two weeks? And everybody will go, no. And that's when you go, you know what? That's the difference between a good stock broker and a great stock broker like me. I was on the phone to all my people saying, and then you can share whatever you want to say or saying, calm down or don't worry about it. Everything, you know, but that way you get to compare. You get to say, Hey, I do this differently from everybody else. So if you always say, you know, I'm a stockbroker, people, I don't need stocks. I'm out. I'm doing something else. I'm on my phone. I'm doing something else. If I tell you I'm a speaker, you guys need a speaker. No, we don't need a speaker. You know, anybody who needs a speaker? Nope. We don't know anybody who needs a speaker. Therefore they're out. They don't care what I do for a living. But if I say, Hey, how would you like to make more money in your business? People go, Whoa, yeah. You go, that's such a simple thing. You know, the most simple thing you can do to make more money in your business. And they're like, no, you go, we need to sit down and have a conversation. Now I got a, I got a program out there, Blake, that's called three minutes to yes. And it's asking a series of questions that when you get to the end, guarantees that you will be able to sit down with that person for an appointment. Guaranteed. Do you want to fill your calendar? Take that course, right? And what it says is, what's your, basically, what's your greatest problem? Well, I want more podcast guests. Okay. So what are you doing to get that? Well, I'm doing this and this. You go, is that working as good as you hoped? Nope. Well, what else can you do? Well, uh, I don't really know. So you're saying if you met somebody who could help you fill your podcast every single week, you'd Absolutely. And so I go, OK, so let's book a time because we can get that done for you. Now, you don't have any idea what I do for a living. You didn't ask me. I didn't tell you. I only tell you that I could fix your problem. And that to me is the epitome of what a professional speaker, a speaking coach, a person who teaches people how to be more more sympathetic, empathetic for the other person's plight. It's not me telling you what I do, it's me asking, how can I Yeah, you're really bridging that gap is what you're doing. And when you talk about like a stockbroker, it leads me to the part of talking about how your voice is the most valuable Oh, yeah. Yeah, because it is one of those deals. And you've heard the people. Matter of fact, I will use and I think it's Asian. I think it's Asian. I haven't worked out in the real workforce for a while, but I think it's Asian. If you have trouble understanding the Asian influx, you know, so you get on get on a phone call where somebody wants to give you help on a computer and their voice is inflected differently. You really struggle to understand what they mean just because their voice inflection is so different from ours. So if you understand the power of your voice can change from, I don't understand that person, I'm not sure I even believe that that person can help me to, oh. And so if you speak with confidence, if you speak with authority, if you speak with the knowledge that comes from, I was just watching AOC, I just posted it out on, LinkedIn today and it was a talk by AOC that somebody else had used and I just cut out the part of AOC but she was They made her look bad. Okay, but they only made her look bad because she had put in enough like, you know Like I really like I like doing things like this and I really like If you put in enough filler stuff people can lose interest in you because they lose confidence in what you're saying And if you're saying something and you don't have the expertise, she picked a topic, who knows what the topic was. But when the person interviewing her said, well, what did you mean by that? She was like, well, you know, it's kind of like. Um, if I think about it, in other words, you don't really know. Right. So, I mean, that's, if you pick something to say to somebody, you have to have the expertise and the knowledge to support what you're saying, even if they disagree and don't ever argue with people, if they disagree, ask them why they disagree. Right. So if people say, well, it's like, go back to my three minutes to yes part, which is if you meet somebody at a networking event. Whoever speaks first wins is what I say. But when I say speaks first, I always go, so Blake, tell me, what are you doing? Why are you here tonight? We're at a networking event. And then you'll proceed, like all people, to spew for two or three minutes what brought you here, what you're doing great. And then if I ask you the questions in the right way, you will tell me everything I need to know to see if you're one of my ideal clients. On the other hand, if somebody else beats me, they go, so Steve, what do you do? I go, hey, thanks for asking. I really appreciate that. It doesn't happen very often. Can I ask you a question first? And they go, well, sure. I go, I'm sorry, tell me what you do. And see, now I'm back to you. And I get to learn all about you, whether you're my ideal client. And I tell people all the time, what if they're not your ideal? People ask me, what if they're not your ideal client? I go, OK, so let's say somebody says, well, I was at an event a few years ago and the person said, I'm here looking for this kind of a person because I need a new employee who can do this. Well, I'm not an employee person, right? I don't do any of that. And I went, interesting. So I listened to him very carefully. I said, so I'll tell you what, if I hear about anybody who needs that, I will let you know. And they went, that'd be great. And they left thinking Cecil Apollo was great because he's going to help them. Honest, within the hour, I ran across somebody at that networking event who wanted a job and they had those qualifications. So I'm like, who was that guy? And I went through the crowd dragging this person behind me and introduced him right there and said, Hey, I think I found your employee and let them figure out if that was the right connection or not. But you see, even if I can't fix their problem or solve their dilemma, I might be able to meet or know somebody who can. And that way you make that connection. And again, that's what it's all about. Isn't it Blake is connections. That's why we're Yeah, that's, that's so true. And like with these podcasts, the reason why I started a podcast was because just like you're saying, my podcast coach said he solves problems of getting people that you want to talk to into the room that you're able to talk to. Like that's his, and he talks about how, you know, podcasts suck unless you have one. Right. So it's kind of, you know, when you start talking like that, you see other professional speakers and coaches like yourself who really reframe the entire mindset of the question. And it really does attract people. It's like a it's like a magnet almost. And people want to then, as they say, the CIA method. Right. They really want to get into your kitchen. They want to learn about you. And then you get to learn about them. And Well, I ask people all the time, would you rather be known as the expert in your, whatever you're doing, the expert in your area, or would you rather be known as the person who can solve all of someone's problems? Who do you call when you're in a bind? If your computer breaks down, do you call one of your friends who's an expert over here? No, you call the person who can solve, even if they're not a computer person, because you go, this person has solved my problems on everything I've had a problem with. You'll call them up and they go, oh, I don't work on computers. And their answer almost always is, but I know a guy. So, you always go to that go-to person because that go-to person will help you by finding another go-to person. And so, while I appreciate that people think, boy, Steve Sopato is one of the best professional speaking coaches out there, it's also Steve Sopato teaches companies and corporations how to increase their business and how to grow their clientele. That's Yeah, that, and I love the, uh, you know, aspect of how you create, like how you talk and create an environment that's just very welcoming. So like even myself, you know, hosting you on here, it's, it's, it's an enjoy, you know, enjoyable conversation. It's just, it's lighthearted. It's fun. Um, you provide entertainment and value and Yeah. And I want you to understand, I even do that for Cardinal fans. I grew up in, I grew up in Illinois, so I was a Oh gosh. Yeah. That's, that's no good. We don't like that. So tell me a little bit about, I'm going to like speaking, I guess you would say for business and then speaking for impact. Like, you know, can you, can you kind of dive into that a little Well, there's, and there is a difference if people hire me to speak at their organizations, at their conventions and stuff, and you have to find out what their purpose is. If their purpose is to leave people in a great mood, talking about things with still some stuff that they've learned, then you have to say, what can I talk about that will help them personally grow as an individual? So we tell people all the time when I'm teaching people how to be speakers, how to get jobs, There have to be at least three things that you give to the audience, any audience, and that's something they can work on right now, that's something that will help them right now, and that's something that will help them later. And so when you're talking about impact, that's what you have to do. When you're talking about business, you have to find out what the challenge is for the business. How can I help that business create a solution to their problem? Because I might not be the person who creates the solution, but I might be able to connect them with the people who create a solution. So when we're talking about business speaking, speaking for business, it's a matter of finding out, you know, I've been in enough brick and mortar. I've owned enough brick and mortar places myself, but I can, I just posted one about restaurants the other day, a little tweak. Matter of fact, I was just at a Bob Evans the other day and the ladies were having a contest about giving, getting rid of their blueberry breads or whatever. And so when she was all done, after we were stuffed and sitting at the table, she says, Hey, can I talk you guys into dessert or maybe some blueberry bread? We were like, no, we're all full. And then she said, well, I'm having a contest and I really want, and we're like, yeah, get lost. We didn't say that. We ended up buying two blueberry breads because we know you can take them home. But the key to that is that if you're a restaurant, you want to increase your bottom line sales. All you got to do is start off by saying, Hey, um, you know, I want you to all, no matter what you're going to order, right? So here's your server walks up and says, I don't care what you want to order. Our desserts are fabulous. And you're going to want to save room for a dessert when you're all done with dinner. And that plants the seed for those people to want dessert when they're all done. That's all you're trying to do is plant the seed. So if you can increase your bottom line by one dessert or two desserts per table because they were approached differently. And that's true on everything we do, no matter what business you're in. It's what purpose do I serve when I when I talk to people like if you're talking about people who want more loyalty, what are you offering to gain people's loyalty? What can you create for people to make sure they come back? And I ask every company, every organization. So you have everybody's phone number or email from the people who walk in the door and they're like, well, no, that's not our, that's not what we do. I go, why not? Why not? Right. That's how, that's how the big companies send us emails, right? Because they got those. And so I don't care if you offer something, literally say, Hey, you know, we're giving this away. All you got to do is put your email in here and we're off and run. People will do that every time because they're used to doing it. And that increases your opportunity to reach out and grab those people and bring them back into your store if it's a brick and mortar store. And so when we're talking business, Blake, it's a matter of finding out what does the business need or want or do and how we can really encourage them. If you're talking about business morale or business management, then you get to talk about all these wonderful things about communication skills and what it takes to be a better communicator and how you can approach people from a way that makes them feel valued and makes them feel necessary and, of course, creates that loyalty from Yeah, that's a good point. So how would you tell somebody, you know, on stage to, you know, dive in and say, let's deepen, you know, our relationships, uh, in a very, you know, obviously noisy world in a workplace where there's a lot of distractions. How do you go You're saying if I'm the speaker, how do I ask, tell them that they need Yeah. Like how in a D a deeper way, I guess. Yeah. Yeah, and I think that's important, because if I'm on stage talking to, let's say, 200 people for a corporation, and one of the big challenges is that the employee morale is low or they're not doing this, it gets back to, OK, what does everyone really want in a workplace environment? We want to feel safe. We want to feel secure. We want to know that we have confidence in there and that people believe in us. One of the greatest challenges people face when they're at a company, a corporation, Trump's got people coming back to work after they've been off for two or three years. So they have to create new relationships back at work with people they haven't seen forever. And so it's a matter of working out with everybody, what did they want? I can tell you what I want, but nobody cares what I want. So what did they want? How can we make it so that what you want works out so that I get what I want? That's how we deepen a connection at work. We create that. It's not a matter of, hey, we're all going to go out for beer after work and create that friendship. It's a matter of what can you do at work that will help me do what I do at work and improve it. And it's certainly a matter of uh, never negating somebody else's conversation. So I've had people say, no, that's stupid. That's not going to work. Um, that doesn't encourage me to, to talk again, right. Doesn't encourage me to give input again. So what you have to, and the people have to learn is how to accept criticism. um, and how to accept ideas that may be totally out of whack. I tell a story at one of my things that a friend came to me and this is going back 30 or 40 years. Uh, he came to me and he said, and I grew up in Iowa, right? So, uh, he said, Hey, I got an idea, Steve. I got a great idea. And he goes, we're going to make key chains and make a fortune. I went, what? He went, well, we're here in Iowa, you know, pig country. So we're going to make a pig key chains. And I went, no or not. He said, well, I really need support. I really need a thousand bucks so I can get this started. I went, I'm not doing that. That's silly. Right. Six months later, he comes back and he goes, I've improved it. I went, tell me. And he went, well, it's a it's a pig. Right. But if you squeeze it, poop comes out of its butt. Right. Like rubber cement. And I'm like, John, get away from me. I'm not doing that. Right. That's one of the dumbest ideas I ever heard. Honest to goodness. Two years later, I went to my first trip to Hawaii. And I go to, have you been to Hawaii Blake? I have not. Okay. If you go there, they got like what we call an ABC store every half a block. And I'm not exaggerating it. Waikiki every half block is a little trinket souvenir place called ABC stores. I walked into the ABC store and there's a big rack and they have pooping pigs, pooping cows, pooping sheep, pooping hippopotamus. And, and suddenly it hit me. I went, I wonder if John is doing that, right? Because now John's a millionaire and Steve went, that was a stupid idea. You don't know what's a good idea until you look at it more effectively and see how it might or might not work. So me poo-pooing it That's a funny, you know, I can picture those little pigs as a kid. I would play with those. I mean, yeah, like that's interesting. I mean, wow. Talk about, yeah. Yeah. That's that. That really is wild. And, you know, going back to how you said, like, When I want to touch on this, when you said Steve, like Sapato professional speaker, but Hey, they might come for you, come to you for a plumber. That's like, like, that's, that's a kick. That's a lot of value because you're a speaker, but they're going to come for you Well, because it's a, it's a no like and trust thing. If they know they can come to you for all of whatever needs, this is, you know, like, um, I, I, uh, run a music thing here at the retirement community I run. So, uh, seven months out of the year, we have bands in and we have this, and we have four or 500 people attend. So I'm the go-to guy for all of that stuff. Well, they also say, well, okay, well, Steve, if I have this problem, you know, who can help me? Oh, you'll have to talk to Barb on that. Oh, you'll have to talk to Kevin on this. Well, then it is one of those deals, whereas my wife works on the computer stuff. So she's a computer club person. And so when they have questions, they know for computer, they can come to my wife. And then if Kristen doesn't know, she's a better ask Steve. And we've got a friend in here in the park who also knows a ton of people. And if you understand that your referrals will change people's lives. and you'll always be open to other people's questions. How do I solve this? You can say, I don't know how to do that, right? Bye. Or you could say, you know what? I don't know, but let me talk to a couple of people and I'll see if I can find somebody. I got a little book out, probably been out 10 years now, called Become the Go-To Person for Your Own Success. And it was designed on a guy I know here in Tampa, who was, no matter what you went, Teo could go, oh, that's this person, you need to call them. Oh, I'll call somebody, they can help you with that, right? And now I've got a friend here in the park who every time you say, who can fix this? He goes, oh, that will be so-and-so. So now we know to call Steve, another Steve, right? We know to call Steve because he can absolutely tell us who we need to contact in order to Solve our problem and that's what we want to do in business. We want to be able to solve other people's problems So they come to us That's a really good point because we, I got a, you know, a business part and we always say never leave them without anything to come home with or to go to. Like if, you know, if you're trying to give them money and they have a bad credit score, give them somebody that can repair their credit. Right. So that way the last thing and they come back around, that's, I mean, that's exactly what Yeah, that's exactly it. And if we would all think how the world would change if Yeah, right. That's that's so true. And well, it's it's relationships. And I think, you know, like you say, standing on stage and telling people to deepen their relationships at work is just only going to help outside of work. And it's just going to improve everybody that touches that person. So I would say, you know, tips, tips for becoming a better speaker, like in a faster way, Um, it always resorts back to, I always ask the person, what's your biggest fear about speaking? And they'll almost always say, I don't want to look stupid. I don't want to feel stupid. I don't want to say the wrong things. And, and I always ask them the question, do you worry about that when you have a conversation with somebody? And they're almost always no, because everybody makes mistakes. I go, well, there's your first step. If you can really start to put it in here, in your head and your mind, that everybody makes mistakes. Now, what you don't want to do is say something that will take you out on a really big limb and get people to mistrust you. But every time you talk, it should be have a conversation. How do you get over stage fright? It's real and it is very simple. As a matter of fact, I just had one of my clients the other day say, I don't want to have to memorize stuff. I go, you should never memorize stuff. And then I qualify. I go, let's say you have a 15-minute talk you have to give, and it has to accomplish these goals. So they've given you an agenda type thing of three or four things that you have to talk about. You have to write a talk that you say, OK, these are how I pull this together. And then you write it four or five, 10 times because you're going to write it. I'll tear it apart. You write it again. I'll tear it apart. You write it again. And then you start to memorize it. I'll say I want it down so that you've got 15 minutes worth of memorization. Pretty good in your head so that you just refer to your notes. OK, now take that and throw it away. And they're like, throw it away. I go, because now it's your story. I ask people all the time, Blake, if you're telling a good story and somebody interrupts you, do you go, oh, shit, I lost my place? No, right? When somebody comes back to you and says, hey, Steve, you were telling a story, weren't you, about this? I go, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you pick up your story and you tell it. Now, did you leave part of it out? I don't know. I forgot where I really left off, right? Are you leaving part of it out over here? I don't know. Here's the key. It's your story. That's all that counts. Nobody knows if you left part out or if you didn't. Now, if you're doing that 15 minute talk, I tell people all the time, you should have those four points like right here in front of you. So people say, I, I'm not supposed to carry notes. I go, who told you that? Who said you couldn't carry notes? Cause I guarantee you, the president of United States carries notes. I guarantee you that the people who do the, uh, uh, Emmy awards have teleprompters all around the place that they can read. All the professionals have teleprompters. So you carry your notes now if you need to refer to them. So I think I've covered all I'm supposed to cover. And then you look down at your notes and there's four things and you've only covered three. You go, oh, here's the fourth one I was supposed to cover. Guess what? There's no pressure to memorize when you can have it here. So you tell your version of whatever that 15-minute story is. Then you verify that you have told everything you're supposed to tell. And then you can wrap it up and say, hey, that pretty much takes care of everything. Any questions from somebody? We're That's interesting you say that because now that I think about it, I have listened to some truly amazing speakers and they carry around a notepad. Yeah. And they circle things and and their crew. I mean, it's almost like, you know, even Grant Cardone, like I mean, some of these guys like, you know, that have learned from him, they carry around notepads and they circle things like it's kind of and it's interesting because it keeps your attention as well. Oh, yeah. So it's like when you look down and they're writing, you're like, what are they writing? Are they circling? What's the next idea? What's the next thing? What are we waiting Right. Well, and there's a thing out there called death by PowerPoint, which is talking about how people misuse PowerPoint tremendously. And there's a lot of people who use PowerPoint as their notes. So they'll put a PowerPoint slide up and then they'll turn around and read from it. And of course, that's definitely a no, no. And there's lots of reasons why you should almost never use PowerPoint. but it's just one of those deals where that's how they get their notes is they put them up on thinking, well, the people will notice that I have to read my own notes. So yeah, don't do the PowerPoint thing, but always, you know, I, I've had instances where I thought I had everything down, but I always carry my emergency backup. So I wear a sport coat. And at one point in time, I just do a blank. I mean, I've been doing this for 40, 50 years and you just go blank. Sometimes it happens like boom, gone. And you're like, uh, and so you're like, you can stand there and look stupid on stage for a few seconds, or you can go, you know what I was going to tell you. And then you reach in your pocket, which has all your notes on it. a really good story and what I'm going to, and then you look at your notes, you remember where you are and you go, you know what, I'm going to save that for another time. You guys hit me up at the cocktail party after this and I'll tell you that story. Right. And now you've got your notes and you're back off and running. Nobody knows that you lost your place or any of that stuff. So there's all kinds of secrets and things that, that you can do as a speaker, as a presenter, as somebody who can help other people. And that's what it's all about. I speak so that I can help one or two other people. If there's 500 people in my audience, all I want to do is reach the people who really need that extra help. So when I say I can, here's some information now for you, and people will go, oh, that's good. And here's something that I hope they'll be talking about when they go home. So I give them another tidbit. This is what you can talk about when you go home. And how you really make that happen is when you get home, you actually take this action. And so you've given them three things that they walk away with. That, yeah, that's, that's really good because then they continued to remember you and they continue to come back and like, yeah, that's, that's, it really is powerful how you frame that in the mindset of that. So I, I honestly, this is really powerful. Just, just the fact of, you know, the introduction part of how people can now go just to their business network or their next time they're introduced. They don't have to say, hi, I'm Steve Spado with, you know, I have a professional speaker for 58. Now they can actually say, wait, wait What you're wanting to know is. What is the biggest challenge? Again, I don't know what you want to be. What's your greatest challenge that your business solves? That's what you want to ask people. If I'm an insurance agent, and let's say we had, in fact, we just had five inches of rain here the day before yesterday. As an insurance agent, my first thing is, anybody here get flooded during this recent rain? Now, there might only be one person who raises their hand, right? I go, and then I tell them, ask them another question. Anybody get hurt in last year's hailstorm? Anybody have their car this right? So as an insurance, I ask you the problems that I know I can solve. And when you say yes, or yes, or yes, I go, great, then we should talk after this because I can show you how to fix all those kind of problems, right? They don't even know what you That's right. Dive into the policy form, right? Eventually that's, that's the power of, you know, like the, like I said, the CIA method, you're, you're asking questions and getting closer and closer to them. And it's, it's a thing that people, I guess they're, they're really attracted to that. Like people like to feel like they like their handheld in a way. Right. And that's like having a conversation when you have a powerful conversation like that, it's like, it's like almost holding their hand while you're talking in a Well, you're the knowledge, you're the expert. People love to be around experts. I don't care where you are, people crowd around experts, you know, that's what they want to do. People get their picture taken with experts, you know, so it's one of those deal. You mentioned Grant Cardone and I mean, there's Gary Vaynerchuk and there's Simon Sinek and, and those guys, honest, if you listen to them, they don't have astounding knowledge that you go, Oh my God, I've never heard that before. You go, Oh, that's, that's total common sense. That works. Oh, I've heard that before from my mom and dad. Oh, I've heard that before from this person. But because there's celebrities who are telling to telling it to you again, people want to be seen with them. And that's OK. Right there. That knowledge, that expertise makes you more Yeah, well, I guess that's why you are the most famous, unfamous Yeah, that's what I say. Real estate's the easiest, hardest money you'll ever make. That's right. I'm sure speaking is It is. It's one of those deals where once you get your foot in the door, people are like, wow. I tell a story. Way back when I first started, I went from Moline, Illinois to Lincoln, Nebraska. And they were willing to fly me out. And I was like, fly? It's like a five-hour drive. I went, why would you fly? That was before I started speaking a lot, right? So I said, I'll just drive up. But I get out there. And they put me up in a hotel. And they did all this stuff. And I was like, ooh, this is fabulous, right? And somebody introduced me and they said, and we're, and after we were done, they said, we are so blessed that we have Steve Sapato here all the way from Moline, Illinois, because we don't have anyone like him in Lincoln, Nebraska, you know, who's this greatest speaker. And all that went through my head was, you know, there's somebody back in Moline, Illinois saying, thank goodness we hired the guy from Lincoln, Nebraska to come speak because we don't have anybody in Lincoln, in Moline, Illinois, who could speak as good as this guy from Lincoln, Nebraska. You know, that's it. We just that's All perspective. I love the way that you just you coined that. That's another great point. Like, yeah, you know, something one place might be something different somewhere else. Like, it really is true. So tell me, you've been listening to Facebook and you haven't heard some of these phenomenal singers. I mean, just people with perfect voices, perfect performances, who are not rich and famous and making millions, who could really replace some of the stars of today because they're that good. So we always have somebody who can take our place. And the fact that some people get egocentric about it, It just makes me crazy because it's like, you know, you're not irreplaceable no matter what you do. Right. The movie stars of the 50s and 60s and 70s who've passed away now have all been replaced by the movie stars of today. The singers of decades ago have been replaced by the singers. So when the people get, oh, I got to have this special kind of thing or I'm not going to perform at your venue. You're like, well, I would if I still I got a friend who runs one of the venues. I said, you should just tell him, take a hike. We can get somebody on the Internet who can be as good as you. And no one's going to remember, uh, three, three months after you pass away. That's right. That's that's, that's what I always say. So just go ahead and do it. Go ahead and do it. Right. Well, no, I, I appreciate you coming on here, Steve. And, uh, honestly, this conversation's a strong, like reminder of how to, to show up in the world when a conversation and talking to people. And know that your voice is such a gift. Like that, I think is in an asset, like, and mostly being a gift and knowing that, Hey, God put you on this earth with a voice, with a purpose, use your voice. Like if you have something to say, go say Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. That's the one thing. If you, if you have a message, whether it's a message for a book, it's a message that you want to share about health and wellness. It's a message about something else that you're the expert in. please reach out and I'll be glad to help you become the expert and go speak around the nation. I don't, I don't do international myself, but speak around the nation, get paid big bucks to go out and share your gift, which is your knowledge, which is your ability to That's what it is. So go sharpen those pillars. Go sharpen those three or four pillars and come back to, uh, Mr. Spado because I'll tell you what, he, uh, he's got some knowledge and public speaking, speaking in public skills, whichever you want to be trained on, he can do it. So definitely reach out to him. There'll be all, all of his, uh, YouTube channels, all of his stuff's going to be in the show notes. So that will be there. And there's anything else, any other places that you want people to, uh, No, actually, if you go to stevesopatoseminars.com, you'll find everything about me there. If you Google me, Steve Sopato, S-A-P-A-T-O, Google Steve Sopato. I think I was there before the internet was there, so you'll find a whole lot about me Oh, yeah. You don't even need Google now. You just need Chat GPT and Oh, see? Now you're a step ahead of me. Oh, Yeah, that's right You'll come right up. It comes up with a nice biography your youtube channel and a nice picture. So yeah Google That's why I have to be learning to do that. Oh, no at my age. I don't like hurt my hand Yeah, they yeah. Hey, I I realize I have a friend imaginary friend Well, what's that saying out there that somebody said, I said something to my wife and she said, well, be careful because you don't know who's going to be listening. And I went, oh yeah, we don't know who's listening, do we? She went, no. And Siri went, no. And Chat GPT went, no. That's right. I love that. It reminds me of the time when my mom goes to my dad, a client walked up and said, hey, will your husband talk to me? I know he does a lot of real estate and she said, he'll talk to anyone. That's the truth because you never know just like the pig poop idea. You never know who you're going to talk to. That's right. That's exactly right. Who you're going to run into. We can help everybody. That's what's going on. that's the best part is to be able to help everybody. And so that, that really is awesome. Yeah, really the final word is gain confidence, change your whole life by gaining confidence and taking a public speaking course. I don't care if you take it at your local college. I taught one for seven years, way back when public speaking will change your life. Um, um, I forget his name. One of the rich guys said, a public speaking course will increase your personal value by 50%. Wow, think That's so true. That's your brand. Yeah, that is your brand. So until next time, let's keep building, elevating, and bringing that voice to the forefront. Thanks a Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you consume podcasts. This way you'll get updates as new episodes become available. 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