Celebrities can charge enormous fees because people will pay to be in the same room with them, and when an organization brings in a celebrity speaker, they look well-connected and influential.

But what about business speakers who routinely charge 5-figure fees?

Why would anyone pay someone that much money to talk for an hour?

And I know what you’re thinking:

How can I get someone to pay ME that much money to talk for an hour?

That sounds outrageously profitable!

So let’s use a million dollars or pounds as a benchmark. How do we become a million-a-year speaker?

First, figure that you’ll almost always work on weekends. You might work the day before or after but conferences happen on weekends so they don’t collide with work days.

We’ll lose a few weekends to holidays like Christmas and New Years but to keep the math easy, since there are 52 weeks in a year, let’s figure 50 working weekends.

A million divided by 50 = 20,000.

Becoming a millionaire by working only on weekends may sound glamorous and easy but…

You have to find 50 high-paying engagements each year. Finding ONE is no easy feat.

You have to get to 50 destinations … on-time … with your luggage! Add an extra day to each engagement just to make sure you show up. Add rental cars, ride-shares, and other transportation hassles.

And there’s 50 meals in hotels and restaurants. That may sound like a perk but you’ll need to add time to exercise off all that gsatronomical luxury.

But that’s just logistics.

You didn’t just magically become a speaker!

How long did it take you to become an expert in solving a problem people will recognize and spend money to solve?

How much work—blogging, publishing books, marketing, etc.—did you do to convince people that you’re the best person to go to for those solutions?

What did your demo reel and website cost?

And how about your stagecraft? Did you become a powerful performer overnight or did you spend years learning to engage an adience?

Do you have a virtual assistant or marketing team?

How about a CRM?

What about online courses, workshops, auxiliary income streams, slide design, handouts, giveaways?

How much work will you need to do to get that one hour on stage?

And then, as with any business, you have to deliver value in excess of your fee.

Why do speakers charge so much?

Why don’t they charge more?