The Good Listening To Show: Stories of Distinction & Genius

Good Books: Maria Franzoni, Speakers' Advocate & Coach and Author of 'The Bookability Formula', on How The Top 1% of Speakers Get Booked

• Chris Grimes - Facilitator. Coach. Motivational Comedian

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Only a tiny proportion of Professional Speakers are able to land the best stages again-and-again-and-again - and it is not always the celebrities. I’m joined by Maria Franzoni, Speakers' Advocate, Speaker Coach and former Speaker Bureau Owner, to dig into what actually drives paid Speaking engagements, repeat bookings, and higher Keynote Speaker fees. If you’ve ever wondered why brilliant talks still struggle to sell, Maria brings the Agent’s-eye view that cuts through noise and gives you practical clarity. 

We start with the story behind the strategist: growing up British Italian, learning to navigate culture and language, and inheriting a serious work ethic from parents who built stability through sheer persistence. That personal foundation matters, because the stage is never only about slides and scripts. We also talk openly about gender assumptions, what it means to choose a childfree life, and how those experiences shape confidence, boundaries, and message. 

Then we get into the heart of it: Maria’s "Bookability Formula" and what the top 1% of bookable Speakers do. We break down the four pillars the market rewards most: being relevant to a paying market, being known for one clear thing, being memorable to audiences and bookers, and being easy to find and easy to work with. We also explore the multiplier of value (ROI, outcomes, change) and the role of ego, which can help you step on stage but can also undermine trust if it grows too big. 

If you want a sharper speaker positioning, a more commercial topic, and a clearer route to getting booked more often, this conversation gives you a grounded framework to act on. Subscribe, share this with a speaker friend, and leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts.

Tune in next week for more stories of 'Distinction & Genius' from The Good Listening To Show 'Clearing'.  If you would like to be my Guest too then you can find out HOW via the different 'series strands' at 'The Good Listening To Show' website.

Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW wherever you get your Podcasts :)

Thanks for listening! 

Welcome To The Clearing

Chris Grimes

Welcome to another episode of the Good Listening to Show. Your life and times with me, Chris Grimes, the storytelling show that features the clearing, where all good questions come to get asked, and all good stories come to be told. And where all my guests have two things in common. They're all creative individuals and all with an interesting story to tell. There are some lovely storytelling metaphors. A clearing, a tree, a juicy storytelling exercise called 54321, some alchemy, some gold, a cheeky bit of Shakespeare, and a cake. So it's all to play for. So yes, welcome to the Good Listening2 Show, your life and times with me, Chris Grimes. Are you sitting comfortably? Then we shall begin. Boom! Welcome. I'm Chris Grimes, Watcher Story. This is the Good Listening2 Show Stories of Distinction and Genius, where my guests come to a clearing or serious happy place of their choosing to all share with us their stories of distinction and genius. I'm absolutely thrilled and delighted to welcome to a founder story good books hybrid series strand episode of the show. Maria Franzoni, who has the most gorgeous name from the get-go. I know you're first generation British Italian, but just talk us through the Franzoni derivation and I'll just blow a tiny bit more of happy smoke. You're a speaker, advocate, and coach, and a speaking industry thought leader. You're credited with giving incredible value and slap your head insights. And I know that you've cut your chops, Maria, earning your stripes as a former industry leader of a speaker bureau. You're an agent, and I love the fact that you had 25 years, not to ages both, but two and a half decades of booking speakers worldwide. You've even helped put a man on the stage because you've had Neil Armstrong back in the day. So not only the moon, but also on the stage that you curated. So Bob Geldoff, Richard Branson, just to sort of name drop butterfew. Welcome to the Good Listening to show, Maria Franzoni.

SPEAKER_01

Thank you so much, Chris. I feel I should have a t-shirt with something on it too. So you've, I mean, those who are watching can see you've got a lovely. I need a t-shirt.

House Staging And Expert Help

Chris Grimes

And I've been told I should have a cap, a baseball cap that says what you need is a damn good listening to. I like that. This is what this show is all about. So I know that what's really powerful and profound about what you do is the speaker advocacy, because you've you've turned your silky skills of all that experience into now your world-renowned book, which is called The Bookability Formula. I'm just blowing happy smoke. There's a very exciting book at the end called Show As Your Kioko, please, where we're going to point people to exactly where we can go and find your book and go and buy it to. So, uh yes, how's morale and what's your story of the day, first of all, Maria? Well, my story of the day.

SPEAKER_01

Morale is good. My story of the day is that if you are trying to sell your house, get the stages in because it makes such a difference. And I'm probably going to share a bit more about that on LinkedIn at some point. Um, we've been trying to sell for a while, and I I read the book, read a fantastic book by a stager and applied all of her knowledge. And then I thought, you know, we still didn't sell the house. So I thought I'm gonna bring her team in. Brought the team in, transformed the house. Every viewing has gone brilliantly. So I suppose the moral of the story is read the book, but then bring in the expert because they it's still not enough. And uh, I shall share some fantastic pictures of my staging and all the incredible cushions I've now got.

Chris Grimes

Well, let's buff up the cushions and get you on the open road. And uh, it's not a phrase I'm familiar with, get the stages in. Will you just unpack that slightly?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, so when you know, when you go and visit, I don't know if you have ever viewed a brand new home. Um, what happens is with these new homes, people bring expert stages to furnish and uh do the interior decorating, if you like, um, which involves a lot of um a lot of throws, bedspreads, cushions, uh, lovely chairs, um, lots of colour, paintings, um, accessories. So bringing the stages in was bringing them in to accessorize and change. And I thought our house looked really good. And then when they did all this, it was like, wow. And people were saying, this looks like a hotel, you know? So very impressed with that. So, yeah, that's that's my story of the day. Bring the stages in if you are trying to sell your house. And if you want a recommendation, I'll let you know who they are.

Chris Grimes

Please do, and what a wonderful bit of happy smoke to blow at them, too. You also need to get the waft of cooked bread, I gather, wafting in through your kitchen as well, don't you, with baked bread.

SPEAKER_01

That's so funny and so timely. So we live in the middle of the countryside, surrounded by fields, and we had a viewing planned for yesterday afternoon, which took place. And the day before, the um uh there's a changeover, there's cattle in the field for a few months, and then they change over and they prepare to put corn. And what they do in preparation is they spread muck. Yes, silage, I think you'll find. Yeah, so there's a so that there wasn't an aroma of cooked bread or fresh coffee, there was an aroma of shall we say, yes, we're all thinking it. Let's all say that's as a young friend of mine used to say, sugar honey iced tea. Yes, I love that. Sugar honey iced tea. 12-year-old. Isn't that brilliant? I brilliant a way of saying it. Sugar honey iced tea. Yeah, that's what it's called like. They still loved it, and they're coming back on anyway. Let's stop talking house.

Choosing A Clearing In Nature

Chris Grimes

I heard another brilliant way using an acronym, um, which was when when you've had when you're listening to someone you don't quite understand, you just need to go, there we are then, which is a subtle way, acronym, a bit like C next Tuesday, there we are then, is a subtle way of going, so there we are. Oh, I like that. I'm learning so much, Chris. Thank you. I'm I'm gonna I'm writing that one down. And what a good segue into learning so much, because I'm delighted to have you here to get on the open road of what the bookability formula is all about. You poised some really wonderful questions. Do you want to get booked more often as a speaker? And do you want higher fees? Now that's a brilliant no-brainer couple of questions there, but I know that as we'll get on to that, the bookability formula is really following a five-point plan. Again, this is for you to unpack, but it gets you to understand your market, decide what your differentiating factor is as a speaker, develop your speech, and then of course get representation ultimately as well. So there's lots to talk about and great expertise to be unpacked. With your permission, I'm gonna get you on the open road of the show. If you've not seen this show before, where have you been? We're about 280 monkeys in. And this is the show in which I invite movers, makers, shakers, mavericks, influencers, and also personal heroes into a clearing or serious happy place of my guests' choosing. There's gonna be a clearing, a tree, a lovely juicy storytelling exercise called 54321. There's gonna be some alchemy, some gold, a couple of random squirrels, a cheeky bit of Shakespeare, a golden batten, and a cake. So it's absolutely all to play for. So uh Maria Franzoni, author of the bookability formula, where is what is a clearing for you? Where do you go to get clutter-free, inspirational, and able to think?

SPEAKER_01

I have two, but I'm gonna share my favorite one because one is one of them is in solitude and one is in company. I'm gonna go with the company one. And it's usually, in fact, I do this every day, actually. It's walking with my husband with our two dogs. And at the moment we live in the middle of the countryside, so our walks are beautiful in the countryside. They're on amazing, huge common uh with lots of sand on it, actually, which is lovely, especially when it's raining. And the dogs just love it, and we love it, especially on a sunny day. The views are just incredible, and you just it's just you're out in nature. It's so lovely. When we move, or when I hope to move, we'll be on a beach walking with the dogs and then hopefully heading to a pub lunch afterwards. So I tend not to do a pub lunch at the moment because I usually come back and do some work, but that's that's the dream is to work mornings, pub walk the dogs, pub lunches, and a little snooze in the afternoon.

Chris Grimes

That sounds like my perfect day. Um everyone's going, yes, please, where are we moving? And let's do it fast. You did mention as we joined that your husband is, as you enigmatically put, on dog barking duty today. Yes.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. We have the dog, one of them has a bit of dementia. And so every now and then he likes to just start barking randomly. We don't understand what he's saying. He speaks dog, uh, but then of course, then he starts the other one off. So it becomes a lovely, so he has to sort of nip it in the bud quickly, otherwise, that's all we're going to hear.

Chris Grimes

It's not so much who let the dogs out as who set the dogs off, and then your husband. I'm assuming you're not talking about your husband who's barking. No, no, he's very good at calming the dog. Just in terms of geography, because I'm about to arrive with a tree in your wonderful clearing. You mentioned there was a sort of more private clearing as well. Where would that be?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I don't think you want to plant a tree in my private clearing if you don't mind, because it's I love a hot bath with candles, with lovely scented oils, and a glass, depending on what time of day, either a glass of vino or a or a cup of tea, because I'll have a bath at any time of day. I love soaking in a hot bath, which is probably not great, is it in terms of water usage? But I do stay there a long time and I really enjoy it. So yeah, I don't want any trees in my bath, please.

Chris Grimes

Fine. So we'll be outside in the sort of sandscape, which is getting more sandy, is what I'm gathering. Do you mind if we go for a bit of a what three words geography? Whereabouts in the country are we in the UK?

SPEAKER_01

Uh well, uh yes, I'm actually in Surrey in the middle of the countryside in Surrey, in a little village. So let's leave it at that.

Roots, Language, And Work Ethic

Chris Grimes

We don't really want to come around your house where the shrubbery is good. No. And are you moving uh to similar geography? It's we want moving to Dorset to the fine, fine. Gosh, this is you're beginning to further live the dream. Yes, absolutely. So, where do you want your tree? Outside your front door in Surrey or in Dorset, please. Let's have it here on the common. So I'm going to plant a tree which is a bit deliberately waiting for Goddo-esque because of my hecting background. It's a bit existential, a bit Samuel Becketty. And I'm going to shake your tree to see which storytelling apples fall out. How'd you like these apples? To borrow a bit of an Al Pacino line there. And this is where you've been kind enough, now you've identified where your clearing or clearings are, to have thought about four things that have shaped you, three things that inspire you, two things that never fail to grab your attention, and that's where I'll talk about squirrels borrowed from the film up. And then the one is a quirky or unusual fact about you, Maria Franzoni. We couldn't possibly know about you until you tell us. It's not a memory test. I'll curate you through it. So over to you to shake the canopy of your tree as you see fit.

SPEAKER_01

So you mentioned one earlier in the fact that I'm first generation British. I was actually born here. My parents met in the UK. They come from two different parts of Italy. And if you know Italy, every area of Italy has its own dialect. So because they were from two different areas, they had to speak to each other in Italian and not in dialect, which meant I grew up hearing Italian. In fact, when I was quite young, my parents decided to go back to Italy to have some support. So my first language was Italian. And they came back to the UK because one, they didn't get the support they thought they were going to get, but secondly, life was a lot tougher in those days. It was a lot easier here to make a living and to progress and have a good future. Being brought up where, you know, I've got a different culture at home and a different language at home, and a family who cannot, could not guide me through the education system, could not guide me through how to grow up in the UK, was I didn't realise how much it had shaped me, but it really, really did shape me.

Chris Grimes

That was one. It sounds very Romeo and Juliet, about Capulet and Montague, meeting from different dialect parts, you know, the dark side of the tracks, the right side of the tracks. Quite Roman, it's it's quite uh evocative of what we the romance of Italy is how we are it's making me think. And what does your mum or dad do?

SPEAKER_01

They both came over for work because there wasn't any work in Italy. My father came over and he was a butler. And on the cook's day off, he was the cook, so he could cook and you know, he so that was quite cool. My mother um was working in a house as a housemaid, a chambermaid cleaning the house, and they met because there was an Italian community, they happened to be both working in houses, private houses in the same area, and the only time they had off was Sunday afternoons, and they all the Italians got together on a Sunday afternoon. Mum and dad met there through the group. My dad, it was love at first sight. My dad's a huge romantic. My mother took a lot of convincing, but she came round, thank goodness, otherwise I wouldn't be here. And is it just you or do you have siblings as well, Maria? I have a younger sister who's now moved to Portugal to be in the sunshine. So uh yeah, younger sister who's married and in Portugal now. And may I ask, are your parents still with us? They are. We celebrated my father's 92nd birthday last week, and my mother hopefully will be celebrating her 90th this autumn.

Chris Grimes

Well, many, many congratulations to all of you. And in fact, I'll I'll I'll wibble on about something called legacy life reflections at the very end as well. Wonderful. That's the first bit of shape. What's your shapage number two, please? I also have a bell. Shapage number two, please. Oh gosh, I want a bell. I want a bell and a t-shirt now.

SPEAKER_01

I don't know. I feel I feel FOMO, FOMO. Um so again, it's my parents and it was their work ethic and their approach. They never ever asked for help in terms of financial help. They were always, they always had a job, they always had a way of making money. And they put that into me as well. It made me incredibly independent. So I have always been financially independent in my life, and I have always had that work ethic, even when I, you know, working for myself when I couldn't, you know, this is the first time in my life where I'm saying I'm only going to work mornings and I'm going to take afternoons off. And even then, I don't know if I'll stick to it because this is, it's just, I love work and I love making money, actually, Chris, if I'm honest about it. So they really instilled that in me. I saw how hard they worked, I saw how important it was for them to, you know, always have a reserve in case something went wrong. And I've lived that way too. And if I may, it sounds very upstairs, downstairs, but you've all succeeded in in getting upstairs using it. They managed to get upstairs, they did. Yeah, my father, when he retired, was a director of a large wholesale electrical company, so he did very well. Uh, my mother stopped working when we were born and looked after us and raised us, and she had part-time jobs then when when we were old enough. So she never really pursued a career. She always wanted a career. So she pushed me and my sister to study, to find a career, to find something, because that's what she'd always wanted. But in Italy, I'd you pay for school quite early on in your teen years, and she had two brothers and Italian mum and dad. They said, Well, look, you know, you're going to get married, they need to look after the family, we'll pay for their education. You can go work in a house as a housemaid, which always galled her because my mother was so intelligent and could have done so many things. So she pushed me and my sister to do as much as we could.

Chris Grimes

What a lovely thing to say about your mum. She's so intelligent. I love that. Fantastic. Well, both parents, actually.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. I unfortunately I didn't get as much from them as I really need, but yeah, now I had two very, very intelligent parents who both of them did not have the benefit of much education. I mean, my father ended up in an orphanage at one point. So they've had a tough life.

Chris Grimes

Yes, which is often the sort of the generation before us have had that type of experience and life, life path and trajectory.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

Entrepreneurship And Starting Again

Chris Grimes

Shapage number three now, please.

SPEAKER_01

Well, I sort of again I keep hinting, I didn't realise I'm hinting these things. Having my own business, running my own business. I run my own business now, and I got a taste for it quite early on, actually. So I started working at the age of 20. I because I was always it's sort of a year younger than everybody. Once I finally learnt English, I had to catch up. Um, so I was working at the age of 20, and by the age of 24, I was a co-founder of a business with my then romantic partner, and that was a good lesson to learn, actually, because when that relationship broke up um six years later, I then had no business and no relationship. So I had no work, and so I had to start again. Um, and that was that was quite scary. So I think running my own business then taught me a lot, and it gave me that actually, I love that freedom of making my own decisions about my destiny, about how I work, what I work, and what I do. And I've had several businesses since, and this now I've been in business since 1998. I was employed when I started in my first Speaker Bureau, but with the next Speaker Bureau, I made sure that I was self-employed. So from 2002, 2003, I've been self-employed or running my own business.

Chris Grimes

Very much a sort of control your own destiny or others will control it for you as a sort of life imperative and purpose. Control freak is the word. I wasn't trying to hinge at that, but it's true, it's true.

SPEAKER_01

I do like to control the controllables, definitely. Control those controllables.

Chris Grimes

Which is part of what you're offering as advice to speakers as well, because it's all about regaining control in a market that's completely overwhelmed and saturated. And how do you find your differentiating factor and your unique voice? I know is part of what you instruct speakers of the world on. Oh, you're good. Carry on. Well, thanks very much.

Choosing Not To Have Children

SPEAKER_01

Shape it number four now. Well, this is one I don't talk about very often. I actually mentioned it on LinkedIn for the first time recently and got such a reaction I thought I'm gonna mention it. I chose not to have children, and it has affected every part of my life, quite interestingly, and it's it has definitely shaped me. I don't regret it at all, but it affected every relationship because early on I needed to let my partner know that actually I don't want children, and it's amazing how 99% of men do want children. And and what happened was what I discovered was that many would say, No, I'm cool, that's fine, you know, when actually they didn't mean it because they thought I would change my mind. They thought that the clock would set in, that it would start ticking, and the hormones would take over. And I remember sitting next to somebody uh on a plane once and we struck up a conversation. He was talking about how many children he had and this, that, and the other. And he said, What about you? I said, Oh no, I don't have any, I actually don't want any children. Um, and um he said to me, uh, and this was quite a long time ago, he said, I bet you're a million pounds, but by the time you're 40, you will have had children. I don't remember who he was, I didn't take his details, but I that that million pounds those years ago, that would have been quite useful. So that shaped me there. It also shapes, you know, when you're having conversations with your girlfriends who are your age, they're all talking about children and you can't discuss it. If you express an opinion, you're told you can't have an opinion because you don't understand because you haven't had children. And actually, the the most interesting situation. So I this I'm on my this is my second and final marriage. I was married young and divorced very young. And when I was married young, I was I was the highest earner in our relationship. And in those days, they used to do um three times the high earner and one times the the lower earner more to work out the mortgage. Yeah. And we went to see the bank, and the bank said, uh, well, we're not prepared to do it this way because you're you're you've just you're you're recently married and you're likely to get pregnant. And again, I thought, how rude, how dare you! And this was a woman saying this to me. And I said, first of all, you've assumed that we want children, which we don't. Secondly, you've assumed that we can have children, which even we don't know, right? Thirdly, we're married, you've assumed we're having sex. You've made three incredible assumptions. Um, so yeah, that really irritated me again. So you're constantly faced with challenges. But the I think the hardest thing as well is being challenged to defend your decision. When I think most people are never challenged when they choose to have children to defend the decision to have children. So it's it's I think it's a delicate subject, but that has definitely shaped me.

Chris Grimes

And it's about addressing gender stereotypes in society, which is of itself worth speaking about because that's a topic which is often buried somehow.

SPEAKER_01

I do have one regret because I didn't know until it was too late that you could donate your eggs. Had I known that, I would have helped somebody who didn't have children. And I I found out when I was when when my apparently my eggs were stale by that point, but I would would have loved to have helped someone.

Chris Grimes

So that's my one regret. Beautifully put, very eloquent indeed. Thank you. So that's four shapages. Now we're on to three things that inspire you, Maria. We're obviously definitely here to talk about the bookability formula. Rest assured that's coming with bells, whistles, and knobs on, but three things that inspire you now.

SPEAKER_01

It's interesting because I've gone very personal with you rather than talking very much about business, isn't it? But hey, you've you've you've unleashed some stuff that I have never shared.

Chris Grimes

Anyway. I'm much more interested in the story behind the story because the book the book is a given and it's fantastic, and we are going to talk about that. You won't be surprised by the first one that inspires me.

SPEAKER_01

A great speech. A great speech, great speaker, and I love a great speech. Don't like a bad speech, but I I really, really enjoy a great speech, and it's just I just relish it and I just smile ear to ear while I'm watching it, and I just love it. Love, love, love. So, yeah, you won't be surprised by that.

Chris Grimes

And when was the last time you saw a good speech?

What Great Speeches Have In Common

SPEAKER_01

The last time I saw one where I was smiling ear to ear was actually last year in April. And I know this particular speaker will be speaking again at the same conference this year in April. And I was one of the people who said you've got to bring him back. So I'm going to I'm preparing I'm preparing my smiley chops.

Chris Grimes

I love that. Also, that again is your own stripes as a speaker advocate. What a lucky person for them to have you in their corner. Because apparently you've been credited with having you in your corner is like having a speaking superpower. That's nice. That's really nice. Thank you. And any favourite speeches of old that you always think that's a good speech. I know we've all got the I Have a Dream and you know some Shakespeare ones. So any ones that you particularly default to?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, let me give you a few that people can look up actually, because they can listen to them and enjoy. So one that everybody, I hope, has watched is Sir Ken Robinson, who I had the pleasure of working with, and his TED talk, which is just a masterclass in how to deliver a speech. I love humour, by the way. So if somebody's funny, adding to the speech rather than just telling jokes that are irrelevant. So that's one of the reasons I absolutely loved Ken Robinson. So that's one. The other one who people might not have seen, and sadly, sadly both people have passed because Sir Ken's gone as well, is Dame Stephanie Shirley, who, when I was working with her, we used to call her Steve, because she, when she founded her her tech business, she couldn't be Stephanie, nobody would take her seriously. So she changed her name to Steve when she wrote addresses. And her speech, again, it's a TED talk, and it's about why ambitious women have flat heads. I think that's the right title. And it's not about the glass ceiling, it's really interesting. And she breaks all of the rules that somebody, a speaker coach, will tell you because it says, you know, the speaker coach will say, Don't sit on a stage. And she's sitting on a stage clearly because she needs to. So she's sitting on a stage, says don't use cue cards. She's using cue cards. And she is fantastic. Yeah. A brilliant storyteller.

Chris Grimes

And it plays into that be yourself because everyone else is taken. Whatever you need to do to be your best authentic self on stage is obviously the best advice. As you say, if you need, I like to call them idiot boards or idiot cards. If you need them, just use them. Doesn't make you an idiot, just makes you clear about success.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So those are two of my standout favourites that I love to go back and watch again and again. And I mean there's many others, but they're two of the greats.

Chris Grimes

And so Ken Robinson had such a mellifluous voice as well. He was just a you could just drink him in with the tone that he would have as well. Yeah. And was there another gender stereotype where you said that Stephanie wasn't taken seriously until she was called Steve? Was that that sort of choice as well?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So when she was writing to uh businesses to try and get work for her company that she set up, she had to change her name to Steve in order for people to read and respond to the letters, which is sad, really.

Chris Grimes

Ironic how much people need to swim upstream to find the stage and the platform where they can then share their wisdom.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. I didn't realize we were going to be talking so much about gender.

Chris Grimes

It's quite interesting, isn't it? Well, it's it's called the good listening to. You started it, so I'm just giving you reflective listening. Now we're on to the third inspiration, please.

SPEAKER_01

A good box set. This is something I'd never done before, binge watched things until 2020. Um and and I think we all started doing that. And one of the programs I what I binge watched in 2020, I absolutely loved it. And there's a couple I'd like to share that I really thoroughly enjoyed. One was Breaking Bad, and I had the pleasure of going to see uh Brian Cranston be interviewed uh recently by Arimesh Ranganathan. Were you there as well?

Chris Grimes

No, I just seen all my sons about two weeks before that.

Box Sets And Story Arcs

SPEAKER_01

Brilliant, absolutely brilliant. But Breaking Bad for me was so clever, such so, so clever. In fact, we ended up um listing Vince Gilligan, who was the uh producer director on our books because it of what he did so cleverly that he what he did is he took somebody and made us like him. He gave him cancer and he was a death sentence, and we still liked him. And then he thought, well, let's make him do something a little bit naughty, and let's see if the audience is still with him and we're still with him. Then, actually, very early by series two, let's have him kill someone and are we still with him?

Chris Grimes

And so we were actually following somebody turning into a psychopath, yes, and we're still rooting for him, which is scary, and very, very politic of now as well about how evil pervades. Also, yes, I completely concur. It's got the the most perfect story arc I've ever experienced. And I I left a card, I was sort of punching above my weight. I left a card for Brian Cranston after seeing the show, trying to get him to see if he'd be on the show. In a universe of who knows, he could say yes further down the line. Can I give you a second one as well?

SPEAKER_01

Because that one breaking bad is a whole series, a whole story. It is not, you know, whereas this one is actually individuals you can watch a single episode, and it again it's an old one, 2009, Lie to Me, starring Tim Roth. Have you seen that? No, he's a human lie detector. And what I love is you're actually watching and you're learning how to detect when someone's lying. I can now, I'm gonna whisper, I can now tell when my husband's lying. Fantastic. That's really useful. And I sort of like grin at him and said, Okay, you did take the rubbish out. Okay.

Chris Grimes

If that's what you think, yeah, love that. So you're doing a bit of people whispering, so yeah, it's very useful for that. And also, dogs are brilliant to be people whisperers because a lot of people judge whether somebody should deserve to be likable based on what their logs, their dogs think quite often.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah.

Chris Grimes

You know, when your dog just suddenly starts growling at someone, you think, hang on a minute, they've seen something I haven't.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, um, my my little dog adores our estate agent. Oh my god, she absolutely loves him.

Chris Grimes

That could be a good way to sell your house, getting a dog to hump the state estate agent's legs.

SPEAKER_01

She doesn't do that, she doesn't do that. She doesn't she just squeals as soon as she sees him and runs around in circles. It's quite sweet.

Gadgets, AI, And Business Books

Chris Grimes

And also, dogs are brilliant at being in the clock of now. You know, the idea of presence when you talk about presence on stage, how dogs are brilliant because they're in the clock of now, now, now, now, now, now. Yeah. All good stuff. Yeah. Wonderful inspirations. And now, uh, hopefully you'll enjoy this. This is the two squirrels borrowed from the film up. When the dog goes, Oh, squirrels, what are your two monsters of distraction, sometimes called your shiny object syndrome? What two things never fail to stop you, Maria Franzoni, in your tracks, irrespective of anything else that's going on for you? People who know me know this.

SPEAKER_01

I love a gadget, whether it's a physical gadget or a tech gadget or piece of software, something that helps me do something better. I my house is full of gadgets. I've got all sorts of software, all sorts of AI. I'm always playing with things. And if you know, if I'm scrolling on Facebook or LinkedIn and somebody's promoting a new app that does something, I'm there. I've everything's stopped. I've got to try this app. Oh, it's terrible. And what's the what's the gadget of the moment, please? I've never asked that question before. The gadget of the moment, well, the one that I've been trying at the moment, which is quite useful actually, it's called Whisper Flow, and it allows you to talk on any app, whether it's on your phone or on your computer, and you just talk and it will type, but it will also do all of the spacing, it will do all of the correction of any spelling. If you make a if you say something wrong, it will correct that as it goes, and it's like saving me so much time, it's ridiculous. What a great topastic tip.

Chris Grimes

I know I love toctastic tips, and as an act of reciprocity, have you heard? And I've got no, I wish they were sponsoring me, but they're not. But have you heard of applaud? Sorry, P-L-A-U-D, applaud AI. I've got it. I had it when it first came out. Of course you did, because you like your gadgets. No, that's changed my life, but thank you for the whisper flow. I'm gonna go check that monkey out. Love that.

SPEAKER_01

I did tell you I was gadget queen, right? So you know, I've got Plaud, of course I have.

Chris Grimes

You're a Franzoni, the gadget queen. We love that. Um, so that's a great squirrel, thank you.

SPEAKER_01

And a second squirrel? Second squirrel is a good business book. Oh my god, I love business books. So um I'm one of my team when I had my speaker bureau said to me, Oh, what books are you taking on holiday? And I'd have three business books. And she says, Aren't you taking a novel or a story? And I said, No, and I'd I devour business books. I now actually listen to audiobooks as well, which I've only recently got into because we've because we've been driving up and down looking at houses, so we're listening to audiobooks. But I've got so many books, and when they are good, I can't let go of them. I have to keep them. You wouldn't you would not believe I've got thousands of books, and I've got a pile of those that I need to read. I've got a pile of those that are my favourites, and my favourites, I know they're favourites because they've got pages turned down, I've written in them, I've highlighted pieces. Love a business book. And what's your business book at the moment, please? Well, actually, in the back of my book, I listed 10 that I absolutely love, so I can choose one from there. Because we're, you know, we're talking about speakers. The one I always recommend and is always of the moment, and I don't think it's going to be very difficult to beat it. I love The Referable Speaker by Andrew Davis and Michael Port, especially for somebody who's doing that journey where they want to go from you know, starting out, becoming an expert, and then becoming that visionary, highly paid speaker. The journey is just a brilliant book. It's the book I wish I could have written, but was not capable of doing. Which is completely different. But I did send a copy to Andrew.

Blessed By A Saint

Chris Grimes

I hope he said thank you, and he's recommending yours on a podcast somewhere else in the world as we speak. Wonderful squirrels. And now a the one is a quirky or unusual fact about you, Maria Franzoni. We couldn't possibly know about you until you tell us.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, I don't know how many people can say this, but I have actually been blessed by a saint. Oh, yes. Tell us more, please. Yes, you're thinking she's gone mad. I haven't. I was blessed by John Paul II, and I had sort of like a special audience with him because I was working with the Vatican at the time. Not me or my own, there were about 75 of us, but he went round and blessed us all. Um in Italy, when you're a child, you're given a necklace with your saint on it. So I took that with me and I had it in my hands, and he blessed that. And when he died, he was canonized, he was made a saint. So I've been blessed by a saint.

Chris Grimes

In all my circuit episodes, that's the most extraordinary, quirky or unusual fact. You'd be delighted to know that nobody be yourself, because everyone else is taken, no one has else yet has been blessed by a saint. Great answer. We have shaken your tree, Maria Franzoni. Now we stay in the clearing, move away from the tree. Next we talk about alchemy and gold. When you are at purpose and in flow, what are you absolutely happiest doing in what you're here to reveal to the world?

Coaching Speakers Into Clarity

SPEAKER_01

I'm at my happiest, honestly, when I am working one-to-one with a speaker on Zoom. I prefer it on Zoom because I like to have a recording and also because otherwise we'd end up never finishing if we were in person, I think. I absolutely love it. I do find it because I'm in flow and often I'm doing a lot of the heavy lifting because I'm I'm coming up with trying to come up with, you know, what's the positioning going to be? How do you promote yourself? Who you're going to cut. So I'm doing a lot of the thinking. So by the end of it, I'm completely drained. But while I'm in it, I love it. And the part that I love the best is when someone comes back, even after a consultation, sometimes they'll come back and say, Wow, you know, I can't believe how clear I am now and how much, how much more confident. Because a lot of it, I think, a lot of speakers don't need somebody else who's been on the other side to give them the confidence and clarity to say, actually, what you're doing is really great. I had a call before this this morning with a speaker, and she was telling me about her background and the things she was talking about. And I said to her, she said something, and I said, That's what you should be talking about. And she stopped in her tracks and she said, thinking that, but I wasn't sure. Wow. Yes. And it just, she said, right, you know, I now know which direction to go in, because most people have too many topics and too much um, too much experience in many ways, and they need to narrow it down. And I said, That's the one that's commercial. That's the one that's going to get you paid.

Chris Grimes

And I totally understand where that's come from. That's 25 plus years of super objective perspective to then go, Bosh, that's the thing you need to be speaking about.

SPEAKER_01

Well, listen, when you're an agent and you're a bureau, you only get paid when someone's booked and you get paid on commission. So the people you you want people who are really commercially relevant and who are like really easy to sell. And I think I don't know who said it that you know, sometimes we're sitting in the jar and we're trying to read the label from the inside. It might have been Grant Baldwin who said it. And I think that's what happens with speakers is that they're in the jar of their experience and expertise, but they can't look from the outside to see actually what is it that it should say on that label.

Chris Grimes

That's so resonant because during the pandemic I was on a bike ride, and that's when I was attributed the title by a friend I bumped into who called me a motivational comedian. Because his son said, Who was that? As they were pissed off because they were supposed to be on a bike ride. And he went, Oh, that's Chris Grimes. And then I was still in earshot. What does he do? Oh, what is he? He's a he's a he's a motivational comedian, and then off they squeaked. But I had no idea, I wouldn't have come up with that myself. That was a sort of super objective and helpful way of just saying, Well, that's something different.

SPEAKER_01

But yeah, brilliant, and it's a great title.

Cake, Quotes, And Younger Self Advice

Chris Grimes

Wonderful insight so far. Now we're on to awarding you with a piece of cake. Well, no, not a piece of cake, you can have a whole cake. So, do you like cake, uh, Maria Franzoni, first of all? I love cake. Can I have two cakes, please? Very greedy, but yes, you can.

SPEAKER_01

I'd like a black forest gatto and a lemon drizzle.

Chris Grimes

I love that with a cheeky chappy chaser. I love this. One's got cream and nom nom nom and dark. And I do you know what? That's a perfect combo. I think on the same plate. Why not? Yeah. Yes, and presumably furnished and and shown up to you straight after your bath because you're gonna live the dream now. That's great. Okay, so you're gonna get to put a cherry on your two cakes, greedy thing, now, and this is where um the cherry on the cake is what's a favorite inspirational quote, first of all, that's always given you sucker and pulled you towards your future.

SPEAKER_01

Oh my goodness. My favorite quote actually is from Philip Hesketh, who people probably won't necessarily know. He's a persuasion and influence expert, and I quote him a lot, actually. He says, Do what you say you're going to do. And it's actually a piece of advice he gave me. So I'm sort of answering. I know you've got an next another question where he's saying, What's the best piece of advice? It was actually probably also my best piece of advice. When I went into starting my own business from the bureau, and I decided to run my own bureau, and I'd been working with Philip, and I said to him, You know, you've been really successful. What advice would you give me as a uh somebody starting a new venture? And he said, Do what you say you're gonna do because so many people don't. And it differentiates you, and I see it all the time. You know, someone will say, I'll come back to you on Monday with that information, and then they don't. Or let me make sure that I get that arranged for you, and then they don't. So either don't say anything or do what you say you're gonna do. That's my favorite quote and my best bit of advice. So I'm sort of cheating a bit and answering two questions there.

Chris Grimes

Thank you for that, Clarity. And I love the fact that they they are both one and the same. That's fantastic. With the gift of hindsight, what notes, help, or advice might you proffer to a younger version of Maria Franzoni? And you can decide how old you are as you return to your own past, wrap your own arms around your shoulder, and whisper some sage-like whisperings in your own ear. Do you know?

SPEAKER_01

I don't think I'd probably listen to myself, unfortunately, because I thought I knew it all. Uh, this is in my early 20s. I thought I knew it all. So I would say to myself, really define what it is that you want. Because I didn't. It was very vague. I had a very vague definition of what wanted and ended up in many situations that I didn't want and had to sort of, you know, relationships that weren't great or scenarios that weren't weren't right for me. I certainly, although uh my husband, who sadly is no, my first husband is sadly no longer with us, a wonderful, wonderful man, I was too young. I didn't know myself. So I think it's you know, be really clear on what it is that you want. And before you make that decision, know yourself so that you know what you want. Because I I made a lot of decisions when I was too young, thinking I knew it all, and I knew nothing. My mother kept telling me this, but I wasn't listening to her either.

Passing The Golden Baton

Chris Grimes

There is that parenting stereotype. Please leave home now whilst you still know everything. Yeah. It's a stereotype. Yeah, so to thine own self be true. And and I I love that advice, very sage to yourself, even though, as you say, you probably wouldn't have listened, but you know now. And we're gradually now working up to talk about Shakespeare in a moment, but just before we get there, this is something called pass the golden baton moment, please. Now you've experienced this from within. Who might you like to pass the golden baton along to in order to keep the golden thread of the storytelling going?

SPEAKER_01

I'd love to pass the golden baton on to Mary Tilson Wharton, who actually helped me in the beginning to create the bookability formula. She was, in fact, one of my clients. I met her very early on, I think in the late 1990s when I'd started in the industry. And she was a client of mine, she booked speakers with me, and we just clicked and we we always said we want to do something together. When I had my bureau, I brought her in to work with my speakers because she'd been on the other side to work with them. She's very good on the content side. And now with um the bureau work here, she works with speakers on creating the speech, crafting it with that corporate knowledge of scoping and getting it right. She's a fascinating woman because she used to be a private investigator and she's six foot two and used to wear like one of those pink lycra uh suits, running, going running around, hiding behind trees, following people. So she's got some crazy stories, which I'd love to hear. Very hiding in plain sight. If you've got a bright pink suit and trying to hide behind trees, that's like a really dog with her, so people didn't think, you know, people when you're walking going around with a dog, nobody really looks at you, she said. There was a great way to hide. Hiding in plain sight in a bright pink jumpsuit.

Chris Grimes

I'd with a labrador, sorry, or a retriever, I think it was. And did you say it had a Walton on the end as well? Maria Tilson Walton. Mary Tilson Wharton. Wharton. Yeah. And I know that she I she's part of your five-point plan, I noticed in working up the research about you, in developing your speech as you said. Okay, inspired by Shakespeare, all the world's stage at all the red wibbid billy players. This is again because of my hecting background. When all is said and done, Maria Franzoni, how would you most like to be remembered? Okay, I'm a bit controversial here.

SPEAKER_01

I'm not particularly worried about being remembered because I'm not going to be here to know that I've been remembered. So I think I would have had children had I wanted to be remembered. Um, so it's not, it's not something that's I've ever really thought about. I would rather make an impact while I'm here. Maybe it's the Leo thing that I want to know that I've had an effect. I want, I want people to say, thank you so much. I want to hear it. So I didn't want to do it now while I'm here, and I want people to tell me now if I've I've helped them. And when I realized that actually, again it was a speaker, and um, we were working together, and he contacted me and he said, I just want to say to you that you and your team have helped me pay off my mortgage very early on, right? Because he and he was quite young. And I suddenly thought, My God, we're changing lives. We're not just booking speakers, we're actually allowing people to have a great lifestyle. So if I can help people have a better lifestyle, I'd love to know about it now. But I suppose that would be my legacy if I'm being less if I'm it's a living legacy.

The Bookability Formula Explained

Chris Grimes

I want a living legacy, yes. In pursuance of do you want to get booked more often? Do you want to get booked for higher fees? Yes, yes, and then get in touch with Maria. Yeah. This is a brilliant moment now to overtly show your book to the screen. So just tell us the story behind the story of the bookability formula, who it's for, and how it can help.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, the story behind the story. So I was reading a book, a business book, because you know it's one of my shiny objects, one of the things I love. And the book is uh the book called is 8020 principle by uh Richard Koch. And that is how you pronounce it, by the way. I asked him, he said it rhymes with posh and dosh. I said, Great, I'll remember that. I'll never forget that. And what he was saying, which I didn't think, I'd never thought about, but he said that the 8020 principle is fractal. So you can apply 8020 to 8020. And I thought, well, if you do that, you end up with 64.4. If you do it again, you end up with 51.1. And I thought, I wonder if 1% of actions actually do give you more than 50% of the outcome. And I sort of thought, well, let me look at my speakers in my bureau and let me see how many of those brought in the business.

Chris Grimes

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Thinking it's going to be 20% bringing in 80%. When I actually looked at the numbers and I looked at the numbers for London Speaker Bureau, which is like one of the biggest bureaus on the planet, had a business relationship with them. The time, I found that 1% of the speakers were bringing in 80% of the bookings and over 50% of the revenue, which is like, whoa. Which is where the subtitle comes from, by the way, or the 1% most book speakers do. And so I wanted to understand why. Was it that they were the most famous? Was it that they were the celebrities? Was it that they were the most expensive because they were bringing in over 50? And it wasn't. What happened was they were actually in the five to$20,000 price point, which is immensely achievable for anybody. And they were names you would not have heard of unless you were in the industry. Yeah. You just wouldn't know who they were. So Mary and I started looking at what was it that these individuals had in common. So it was 45 speakers, just to give you some perspective, being booked globally by the 25 offices around the world of London Speaker Bureau, again and again and again, out of 4,489 on the roster. And we discovered they had they had four main key areas they excelled in. And then what I did is I took those four key areas and I then turned it into a formula because there were um aspects that would affect those areas both positively and negatively. Yeah. So hence the bookability formula, which is four pillars, I'm thinking. Yeah. So the four the four key areas that they excelled in were one that they were relevant to a current paying market. Really important because you're not going to get booked and paid if you're not, right? So they were dealing with a pressing problem. The second stats are. Second K, they were known for one thing, one topic, right? If you think of Simon Synix, start with Y. Yeah, that level of relatability and recognition and by the right people, so they were known in the industry. You don't need to be known outside of the industry necessarily, although Simon is, of course. Then you're memorable so that the speech is memorable to the audience, that they can repeat some of the content, but memorable to the booker because of how you work with them and the outcome you deliver. And then E, which is the one that most people don't think about, is easy to find, first of all, easy to book and work with, and then easy to listen to because not everybody is, right?

Chris Grimes

I don't know why you whispered that. Not everybody is.

SPEAKER_01

Not everybody is. So those are the four keys, and then the formula we put the we add those up, put them in brackets, and then what we have is those four keys are to the power of V. In the book, I say multiplied by because I don't want to lose too many people. I've already got algebra in there, but it's to the power of V, V being value. That's your return on investment, your intern on time, your intern on an objective. That the value you deliver multiplies it dramatically.

Chris Grimes

Yes.

SPEAKER_01

And then all of it is underlined by a little e that every speaker needs to get onto stage. But if that gets too big, you're in trouble. And that little e is ego. So that's the bookability formula.

Where To Buy And Final CTAs

Chris Grimes

And that's a wonderful segue now into this lovely section, which is called Show Us Your QR code, please. So I think we should go chuntering in straight away to this is where, if you're watching, you can scan the QR code now. So where can we go if you're just listening and not watching Maria to buy your book and get a signed copy, even as well? So where do we go and get it?

SPEAKER_01

Well, you've got the QR code, but of course you can buy Amazon, Amazon any in any country, I believe. And if you can't get it on Amazon in your country, let me know and I'll send you one. If you want a signed copy, do go to my website, which is Mariafranzoni.me, and I will send you a signed copy.

Chris Grimes

So just to reincorporate Mariafranzoni.me and the book, as we now know, obviously, is called the Bookability Formula. And just explain what's in the bubble again. It's the 1% element.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, this so the subtitle is what the 1% most book speakers do, and you can too. I'm a poet.

Chris Grimes

Ooh booby do. Love that. If you'd like to connect with Maria on LinkedIn, this is the second QR code. So when we go and find you on LinkedIn, what can we find out about you else, Maria?

SPEAKER_01

You can find out about all my services on LinkedIn, also on my website, of course. But um, I like to have a chat and on LinkedIn. So if I've done a post about something, please do have a chat with me in the comments. I love that. I do tend to sort of share some very recent stories because I I feel I get inspired by the speakers that I'm working with.

Chris Grimes

I don't I don't always reveal who they are, of course. Of course. So that's how to connect with Maria Franzoni on LinkedIn. I'm going to come back to you in just a moment, just a couple of announcements. If you have enjoyed listening to this show, if you want to have a conversation about guesting too, the website for my show is thegoodlistening to show.com. Very excitingly, the show also syndicates to UK Health Radio, Brushwood Media, and just in the last month to iHeartRadio. So the idea is that there are tens of millions of potential listeners listening to you as you tell your story here in the clearing. Very, very excitingly, also there are a number of different series strands. Today has been a hybrid of founder stories and also good books. But very excitingly, also and a bit more existentially deliberately, there's a series strand using exactly the same curated structure that Maria and I have been exploring together, which is called Legacy Life Reflections with its own website.com. But it's a series strand to tell life stories for posterity, lest we forget before it's too late. So uh back to you, Maria Franzoni, author of the bookability formula speaker advocate. As this has been your moment in the sunshine in the good listening to show Stories of Distinction and Genius, is there anything else you'd like to say, Maria?

SPEAKER_01

Well, I just what a really interesting experience has been, Chris. This has been a very, very unique podcast. I don't think I've ever experienced anything like this.

Chris Grimes

Thank you very much. I'm delighted to hear it. And of course, all the syndication is the idea that this isn't just a and other podcast. This is now a storytelling platform that can help you grow as you amplify and tell your story. And we can find out very importantly where to buy. The bookability formula has been the whole point. So thank you very much indeed for listening. I've been Chris Grimes. This has been Maria. I want you to leave with the last words, Maria. So is there anything else else you'd like to say? Just to check, we've rung out the sponge and you've said everything you wanted to say.

SPEAKER_01

I think no, all I'm going to say is I'm going to get the dogs ready. We're going to go for a walk.

Chris Grimes

We're going to go to my clearing. Boom. Have a wonderful rest of the day. And I'll be in touch, if I may, a little bit further down the path to talk to you about the human advantage in the AI world, which is acting intelligence, where I'm crafting a talk about the advent of AI and how we cope with this sort of tsunami of overwhelm. We have discovered that you like WhisperFlow and I like flawed AI. There's many, many, many brilliant good things about AI, but it's also potentially overwhelming as well. Wonderful. Thank you very much indeed. Thanks for listening and goodbye. You've been listening to the Good Listening2 Show with me, Chris Grimes. If you'd like to be in the show too, or indeed gift an episode to capture the story of someone else with me as your host, then you can find out how.com website. And one of the series strands is called Good Books. If you've written a good book and you'd like more people to know about it, then a large audience awaits you in the clearing as you tell us all about it. You also get to put your good book on a metaphorical plinth within the clearing, plus read an extract from it too, and then very importantly, we find out exactly where we can come and find your good book to buy it from you. Tune in next week for more stories from the clearing, and don't forget to subscribe and review wherever you get your podcasts.