What Should I Charge to Speak? The 3 Things That Drive Your Fee

About this episode

Dan Irvin discusses how to determine speaker fees and the factors that influence pricing in the speaking business.

"If you don't know your number before the conversation, the buyer will pick the number for you." Welcome back to The Speaker Lab Podcast! In this solo episode, host Dan Irvin tackles one of the most common — and most avoided — questions in the speaking business: what should I charge? Everyone asks it. Almost nobody answers it straight. You've probably heard "charge what you're worth" or "it depends" — which, while technically true, isn't much help when you're about to hop on a discovery call and you know the question is coming. Dan breaks it down with the three things that actually drive your speaker fee, shares the exact way he handles pricing conversations, and gets real about the moments he's had to decide whether to hold his number or adjust. Whether you're just figuring out your first fee or you've been leaving money on the table for years, this episode will help you walk into your next pricing conversation with clarity and confidence. You'll learn: The 3 things Dan always considers when setting his speaker fee: audience, budget, and outcome Why "charge what you're worth" isn't helpful — and what to think about instead The real reason most speakers underprice themselves…

People in this episode

Host: Dan Irvin

Topics covered

• speaker fees
• pricing strategy
• public speaking
• business negotiation
• audience engagement

Keywords

• speaker fee
• pricing conversation
• audience
• budget
• outcome
• discovery call
• underpricing

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