Your personal brand is literally the fastest way of manifesting your dream life. I used to say that everything you want is on the other side of courage, and I still stand by that! But now I think you all want the step that comes after having courage, which is strategy. So I went back and studied what I did to build a profitable personal brand and how you can replicate it for your own personal brand. 

The next step is what a lot of people are afraid of – public speaking. Public speaking is a great way to solidify your brand because it makes you an expert. You don’t have to be THE EXPERT on any given topic to talk about it; you just have to have valuable knowledge and the life experience to back it up. Don’t believe me? I’ve made $10k in one speaking engagement, when the most I’ve made speaking was $3k MAX.

In this week’s episode, we’re talking about the BTS of paid speaking engagements. If getting paid to speak is on your vision board, we can make it happen in 2026. Tune in to hear the blueprint I created to help you build up your speaking portfolio from scratch and how to start charging what you’re worth.

How to work with Erika:

Attract 7+ Paid Opportunities Through Your Personal Brand — Without Being Salesy with the free Magnetic CEO Method | Monday, May 4th, 5:00 PM – 6:30 PM PT

Claim your limited-time-only spot in Erika’s 90-Min one-on-one Personal Branding Intensive 

Join the waitlist for the Courage Driven Latina program here!

Join the waitlist for the Magnetic Mastermind here!

Resources Mentioned:
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Podcast production for this episode was provided by CCST, an Afro-Latina-owned boutique podcast production and copywriting studio. 

Episode Transcript:

Erika: Hello. Hello friends. Welcome back to the second episode of the Profitable Personal Brand Series. Today I am sharing the behind the scenes of how I got started getting paid for speaking opportunities. And as you can imagine by the title, it’s all because of. My personal brand. So one of the biggest shifts that really occurred in my business is when I started getting paid to speak because this wasn’t something that I was looking [00:01:00] for.

This some wasn’t. Something that I knew was really possible for me. I always was interested in it, but I felt like I wasn’t an expert enough and I didn’t have enough to share. And I wanna address that before I tell you the rest of my story because. You can either sell some type of offer or you can speak on your lived experience.

On a skill that you already have because you’re just naturally good at it. Or, um, maybe you’ve taught yourself something or maybe you work in that department. So let’s say that you work in HR and there is a job fair and they want you to speak on a panel that makes so much sense, right? Because you already have that lived experience and skill.

And then the last one is. Overall just lived experience. Maybe you were never paid for it, but you helped yourself go from A to B and other people come to you for that. So maybe you have gone through, um, postpartum [00:02:00] and you found a method that allowed you to honor your own feelings, but still be present with your kids, or you’re going to teach other women how to do that.

Or My favorite example about this is my client, Eileen, who was diagnosed with breast cancer. And this happened about 10 years ago, I believe, when she learned about her diagnoses and she, it changed her, it completely changed the way that she viewed life. It changed the way that she showed up in her, in the workplace with her family.

And now she’s helping other women navigate the cancer journey. So that is an example of lived experience. She couldn’t go to school for that, right? It it, she had to go through that experience. So if you’re sitting there thinking, okay, there’s no way I could get paid to speak about something, if you are working a job or if you have been through something, or if you have trained yourself, like maybe you’ve really learned how to, um, do investments, right?

Like maybe you’ve taught yourself personal finance, but you don’t have a finance degree, but you’ve [00:03:00] been able to grow your own investments. You are qualified to talk on that based on your lived experience. So as I go through the rest of this, present, this presentation, apparently I’m doing a, a workshop right now, which is one of the ways in which you, you can get paid for speaking.

Um, but as I go through the rest of this podcast, I want you to keep that in mind that you don’t have to, it’s not required for you to have a degree to be able to do a speaking engagement. You can just have the lived experience from your job, lived experience from your life. Or something that you have delved deep into because you’re simply interested in it. And back to my story in 2020 when I began to show up. I did not call myself a speaker. Now, if you go to my Instagram, or if you go to my LinkedIn, it says keynote speaker at the top, or on Instagram it just says speaker. I didn’t even have this on my mind, but what I was doing was I was showing up on TikTok and I was showing up consistently.

I was [00:04:00] showing up at least once a day, sometimes twice a day, sometimes three times a day. And before you roll your eyes at me and think, oh, that’s, you know, that’s not possible for me. Erica, I do wanna say that this was during the pandemic and my company at the time that I was working at, they sent us all home.

So we were all suddenly virtual. So as soon as I was done with my work, I would just create content and there was nowhere to go because it was right in the middle of the pandemic. Now I, it’s difficult for me to get one piece of content out every day. I’m also running a business, you know, life is.

Happening. There’s a lot of in-person stuff. I’m doing my best to build relationships in my personal life. Take my dog Paloma on walks, she’s next to me. So I was trying to see if she would react, but no, she apparently knows when I’m using those words at her, because as soon as she hears the walk word, she loses it.

Anyway, back to my story. And that is why I was posting so consistently. So if you, whatever consistent is for you. [00:05:00] Whether that’s three times a week, four times a week, stick with that. Just decide what that’s going to be. And of course, sometimes life happens. We have to take breaks. I’m not saying don’t be so disciplined that you would neglect yourself.

That’s not what I’m saying at all. There’s a difference between hustling and discipline, and I do have a podcast episode on that. I might need a refresher, but I’ll just give you a quick little. Description. Right now, hustling is coming from almost lack energy while discipline is coming from abundance energy.

So the difference between hustle and discipline is almost like the intention and the feeling behind it. We wanna be disciplined. We do not want to hustle to the point where we are neglecting our wellbeing. Okay? Show up as consistently as you can. And I was actually creating content. On TikTok about my meditation journey and how helpful it had been for me.

And then I get an email from Harvard asking me if I [00:06:00] could come do workshops where I lead meditations for their first gen group. And it was not a huge amount that I was paid. It was, I think like $500 or something like that. But it was everything I needed to show my brain that it was possible to get paid for something.

And then meditation is one of those things where I did not have a degree in that. I had been practicing it myself. This was one of my passions that I was getting paid for, and it ended up being a great result. I did it, I think for four months we would meet like, oh no, not four months, maybe it was for two months.

Or was it for one month? I don’t know. I actually don’t remember the logistics. That doesn’t really matter. The point is I proved to my brain that I could get paid through hosting a workshop, and this was all virtual because it was during the pandemic. And as you know, Harvard is not on the west coast like I am.

So I was getting up at like five in the morning to do these meditations because they were morning meditations for them. But it was so worth it, and even just being [00:07:00] able to say, yeah, I worked with Harvard. How great is that? Then I started getting more opportunities from community colleges. One of them was a local community college, and I, my cousin actually works at that one. But the reason that they ended up, because I had already done a free Oh yeah. Oh my goodness. Look at that as I’m recounting all of this. Bear with me, y’all.

It’s been, it’s been some years. We’re in 2026 and this all happened at the end of 2020, beginning of 2021. So I had already done a free workshop for a local community college because my cousin works there, and it was a mindset workshop, and I didn’t get paid. I didn’t even try to get paid. I just wanted the experience.

And that was the first thing I did. And it felt so amazing to lead a workshop and to speak. And again, this was all on Zoom. It was all virtual. And then after that, that’s when Harvard happened. Well, because I continued to grow my personal brand and I did. I would like to say a good job on the first, [00:08:00] it was a, a, it was a workshop on imposter syndrome for the students and obviously as you know, first gen students.

It was, I was talking to first gen students both at the community college and at Harvard, and students will go through their own doubt. It’s very common. So they invited me back the next semester, the local community college did, and they paid me for it that time. But I think it was also because of my personal brand.

So the students started following me, the other staff started following me, and they invited me back. They wanted me to, to come back and do another workshop. But I want to mention that none of this came from me pitching. I didn’t go seek these opportunities out. These opportunities sought me and it came because I was showing up consistently and allowing myself to be visible in 2022.

That’s when things started really amping up for me. I think I made about 21,000 from speaking that year. And in total, so far, I’ve made over $128,700 from [00:09:00] speaking, and this really became one of the ways that I started to diversify my income. And the reason I, and again, none of these were things I really pitched myself for. I think there was only one speaking engagement that I pitched myself for, and it was simply because I was already going to the conference and my friend was speaking and I said, Hey, if I’m already going to be there. Do you wanna ask them if they need another speaker?

Because I was like, I’m already there. I’m already taking the flight to New York. And I ended up doing a course on how, or a workshop on how TikTok supported me in fighting my purpose. And that’s what we ended up doing the workshop on, I’m sorry, the speaking engagement on, and it was such a wonderful experience.

And that one was not paid because I offered it because I said, Hey, if I’m already there. Doing the speaking engagement is going to give me way more visibility than just sitting in the audience. I’ll do it for free because I’m already going to be there anyway, and it was great. I ended up meeting future clients there and it [00:10:00] ended up being such a great, great opportunity.

And it’s not that I’m against pitching yourself, and I’ll talk more about this in a moment. The reason I’ve had success with speaking is because I have made myself so visible and I’ve positioned myself in a way where I’m talking about certain things. Notice when I was talking about meditation, what opportunity came my way?

Meditation. The other thing is that I was already doing these free workshops. That was that were selling my, my courses, so I was already putting up these free workshops on my own. I didn’t wait for somebody to come say, Hey, I think you might be a good speaker. Do you wanna come speak? No, I already was showing up as a speaker, and for that reason, so many opportunities started coming my way.

Once I launched the podcast, somebody heard a podcast, the podcast on Maria Nismo that I have it, it’s. I don’t know. I don’t know what [00:11:00] episode it is. It’s far back though, where I was talking about the difference between machismo and Maria Ismo, and they asked me to come speak at their company and they were like, but our budget’s only $10,000.

And at that moment, I think the max I had gotten paid for a speaking engagement was like 3000. So I was like, oh yeah, I can totally make that work. Mind you, inside, I’m like, is this even really happening? I can’t even believe this. So from simply creating a podcast episode that resonated with somebody, a speaking engagement game from that. And what I want you to take away from this is that your personal brand isn’t just creating content. It’s a magnet for opportunities. And the way that you position yourself is the key to how many opportunities you are going to end up getting. So if I was to start over and what I would tell you, I would say replicate my formula.

And mind you, you might not be able to create as much content. You may not have the [00:12:00] advantage of being on a new platform like TikTok. It was new at the time, so I ended up with a lot more visibility. Now your content has to be more specific. It has to be way, it has to be a lot clearer. I was going to say more clear.

Oh wait, no, that would more clearer. That’s what I was going to say. I was like, my English is not functioning today. You’ll have to bear with me. I am going on a trip. 

 tomorrow I’m going to a conference in LA and I get to see all of my closest business friends. I’m so excited about that. So, okay, back to the podcast episode. If I was starting all over today, and maybe I didn’t have the amount of time I had back in 2020, right?

Or the Advantage, I still think this formula works. It may not be an overnight success, which is totally fine. Mine was not an overnight success either. But the step one would be I would pick a really clear message. What is it that you want to be known for? And I would pick it from one of those places, [00:13:00] your lived experience, a skill you have, or a passion that you have.

[00:14:00] 

Erika: And if you don’t know where were you just five years ago or seven years ago, or even three years ago? And where are you now? So like if the version of you got to speak to the past version of you, what would the version of you now support the past version of you with? And that kind of can become your message or your transformation.

The next step would be that I would start to speak before you get paid. How do you do this? Instagram lives, TikTok lives. If you have [00:15:00] that capability. Small workshops where that are completely free and you invite people if you’re in person or do virtual ones like I did. Um, I didn’t mention earlier, but I was going live all the time and my audience really started to get to know me because I was doing these trainings and it wasn’t even crazy trainings.

It was like, oh my goodness, I read this in the book. What’s that book called? Atomic Habits. I read this in the book and I thought I’d share it with you all, and then I would talk about that and I would talk about how I implemented it in my life. So it wasn’t all brand new things I was coming up with. It was more that I was, I loved learning and I love self-development, so that is what I ended up talking about.

And even now, right, like with. Personal branding. This is a way of further developing yourself, allowing yourself to be visible takes a tremendous amount of courage. So I still consider myself in that self-development space with a little bit of business and marketing infused with it as well [00:16:00] as manifestation because what I’m telling you right now, I’m pretty much sharing the magnetic method with you.

How you have to start showing up as as this version of yourself before you are that version. Because let me tell you something that most people won’t tell you or maybe don’t realize. As we think about manifestation, your personal brand is literally the fastest way of manifesting your dream life. Why?

Because we’ve never in history before this time of social media had the opportunity to show up and present ourselves in the way that we want. In the past, it was all about, okay, well if you land. On a media outlet, right? Or if a reporter writes on you, or your visibility was pretty much dictated by somebody else, now your visibility is up to you.

You get to present yourself in whatever way you want, and if manifestation is setting the intention and the vision and then bringing that [00:17:00] into reality, that’s what you’re doing with your personal brand. So when I’m telling you, you have to start speaking before you’re getting paid to speak with. Small workshops with Instagram lives.

If you have a podcast with speaking on your podcast or another one, offering to do free workshops for your local community colleges or free speaking engagements. And it’s all about getting the reps in, so showing your nervous system that it’s possible that you can stand in front of people and you’re going to survive because it feels like, what if I mess up?

It feels like the end of the world. It really does. So it’s about getting your nervous system comfortable with that, because let’s be honest, if you’ve never had a speaking engagement and tomorrow you get Google saying, Hey, we want you to come speak to all of our employees, would you say, yeah, your nervous system is so not capable of that even?

I would be freaked out about that. I don’t even know if I’m ready for that capacity just yet, but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had. Friends or [00:18:00] clients who wanna be on certain podcasts, and then they get the invite and then they freak out and they delay respon responding. And then they come to me and they’re asking Erica, why am I self sabotaging? What’s happening here? And it’s simply because your nervous system doesn’t feel safe. So by you starting before you’re getting paid to speak again, doing these Instagram lives. Speaking in, in small groups, inviting people to an A Zoom meeting for training.

Like, Hey, I’m gonna be talking about. The three steps to, I should come up with my examples before I start recording, but here I am doing it on the fly. Here are the three steps to improve your quality of sleep. If you are a high achieving woman who has a lot of work that you have to bring home, that is something I would even wanna attend, right?

I wanna improve my quality of sleep. ’cause why am I tired when I wake up the next day? And you do this even in a small group just to prove to yourself. I’m good at this. I know how to do this.I have valuable things that I can offer. [00:19:00] I can transform people’s lives, and it really starts to train your nervous system.

So internally, you’re feeling safe doing it. But what’s also happening is people are watching you do this, and they’re already thinking about you as a speaker. So again, if I was brand new, step one is figure out what I’m gonna be known for. And it doesn’t have to be super specific, like the thing that I’m currently, really my, my current message is building a personal brand as a fastest way to manifest your dream life.

Like I’m all behind that message. Before I would say my message was, everything you want is on the other side of courage. And that still feels true, but I feel like I kind of outgrew that a little bit. And so did my audience, like how, how often can I keep talking about the exact same thing? And this still requires courage, as I said.

So for you, maybe it’s like, oh, it’s never too late to get started on your dreams. Or maybe it is. Um. I dunno, I can’t think of anything else right now because I’m, again, just thinking about these on the fly. But the next step is starting to [00:20:00] speak before you get paid. So this could be, again, those Instagram lives.

You could, if you know there’s a, um, community college nearby or a conference coming up, you can even offer, Hey, do you want me. Not, do you want me, don’t ever say it like that. You can offer, Hey, I’m, I’m interested in leading a workshop. Let me know if this would resonate with your, with your audience, and come with a proposal.

And this is different than cold pitching yourself, right? Because you’re offering to do something for free. So you really wanna think about where can you bring value. Maybe even being a guest speaker at a coaching program would be a great way of starting to get your toes wet. And then what I would do. Is as I’m doing these Instagram lives, as I’m doing these workshops, as I’m doing these paid ones, I would take photo and video and document the entire journey and then put that on my social, because what does that now do?

That shows the audience that you are a speaker already. They don’t have to think about you as a speaker. You’re visually already showing [00:21:00] them that you are a speaker. The next step would be that you use your content as your stage. So again, I already mentioned like the Instagram lives doing workshops and communities, but also showing up in your content.

Think about that as your stage all the time because as you’re building your personal brand, speaking engagements will come if you, as long as you’re positioning yourself in the correct way. And if you are share sharing that you’re already doing speaking engagements, you will get some. And even if you do decide to reach out to somebody, the fact that you’re already showing up as that gives you way more credibility. Like imagine if somebody sent you an email and said, Hey, I really want to come speak at your work, or, I really want to come speak to your group coaching program if you have one.

And then you go and look, look them up online and there’s no evidence of them speaking at all, and you’re like, Hmm, probably not gonna hire this person because I, I don’t know who they are. I don’t know what they sound like. But now imagine that somebody sends you an email and says, Hey, I know that Women’s History Month is [00:22:00] coming up and you work at X, Y, and Z company.

I’m wondering if you have an employee resource group that has speakers come in. And then they, you say, here’s some of my work, and you send them an Instagram live, and then they can see you speaking about women empowerment. That is a completely different experience, right? One of ’em is a cold pitch where you’re almost waiting for that person to validate you, and the other one is not a cold pitch.

It’s like, Hey, I already know my worth. I already know that what I bring to the table is valuable. Let me know if this is aligned with you and if you want to do this very different energy. The next step is going to be to position yourself as an authority. So teach share frameworks and repeat your message. You think that you can’t say the same thing over and over, but not everybody’s watching every piece of content. Maybe you’re an avid listener of this podcast, or maybe you just kind of skip around and you listen to what is interesting to you in that moment.

But if we think about content, people are kind of scrolling. All day. They don’t just follow you, they follow a [00:23:00] lot of people. So you have to repeat your message because that is how you are gonna going to be known for that message. How many times have you heard me talk about a personal brand? Literally like the last 20 episodes.

I think I.And then the last step is to charge sooner than you think. Rather than waiting until you feel ready, you just have to decide that you’re ready. Once you have a few free ones under your belt. Then it is a good idea. Even if you’re just charging a hundred dollars, $200, even $50 to get started, you just have to train your brain that it is safe to make money from this. And if you have a personal brand and you would love to turn it into speaking opportunities, paid collaborations, as well as coaching or having a specific offer, I’m hosting my free workshop called the Magnetic CEO method. It’s happening on May 4th at five o’clock Pacific time. I’ll have the link down below.

I can’t wait to see you there, and I’ll see you in the next episode. [00:24:00]