Speaker Hub uses necessary cookies for secure accounts. With your permission, first party analytics help us improve signup and onboarding. We do not use advertising or cross site tracking cookies. Read the Cookie Policy.
Bureaus do not find you work until you are already getting work. Here is what they actually do, what they take, and when the answer changes.
•6 min read
New speakers hear about bureaus and assume that is how you turn speaking into a business. Get signed, they find you work.
It runs the other way round.
What a bureau actually is
A bureau is a sales channel between event buyers and speakers. A company wants a keynote for a sales conference, does not know who to book, and calls a bureau, which suggests three speakers from its roster.
The important detail: the bureau's client is frequently the buyer, not you. They are solving the buyer's problem, which is choosing safely, and you are inventory.
That is not cynical and it is not a criticism. It explains everything about how they behave, including why they are uninterested in a speaker with no fee history. They are not a talent development service, and expecting one to build your career is the source of most disappointment.
What they take
Commission is commonly in the region of 20 to 30 percent, though terms vary widely and are negotiable at the top end.
Two structures exist. The commission comes out of your fee, or it is added on top of what you charge. The second sounds better and can price you out of a booking without you knowing it happened.
Ask which. Then ask the four questions that matter more than the percentage:
Is it exclusive? An exclusive agreement means every enquiry you get, including ones from people who found you directly, routes through them. That can be worth it and you should know you are agreeing to it.
How long does it run, and how do you exit?
Who owns a client afterwards? If a company books you through the bureau and wants you back next year, is that a bureau booking forever?
What do they actually do for you? Some do genuine marketing. Some list you on a page and wait for the phone.
When a bureau makes sense
Three conditions, and you generally want all three.
You have a fee. A real one, that people have paid, more than once. Bureaus take a percentage, so a low fee is not worth their time, and they will say so.
You have a record. Video, past events, testimonials. They are recommending you to a client whose trust they depend on, and they will not risk it on someone unproven.
Enquiries have become the bottleneck. If you are turning down work or your calendar is filling, another channel makes sense. If you are not, the bottleneck is not enquiry handling.
Miss those and a bureau either says no or signs you and does nothing, which is common. Being on a roster is not a booking.
What to do instead, first
The route to being worth signing is the same route to not needing to be.
Get the evidence. Footage, references, a list of past events. Everything in how to get speaking engagements is aimed at this.
Start charging. Not a large number, a real one. A speaker who has been paid £750 three times is in a different category from one who has never invoiced, and it is the category bureaus check. How to become a paid speaker covers the transition.
Build the direct channel. Chairs, past clients, and the pitch process in how to pitch yourself as a speaker. This is the one that keeps paying, because a direct relationship has no commission attached and repeat bookings are where the money in speaking actually is.
Signals of a bureau worth avoiding
A few clear ones.
They charge you to join. Legitimate bureaus take commission on bookings. A listing fee is a directory, and a directory is not a bureau however it describes itself.
They guarantee bookings. Nobody can, because they do not control who buys.
They will not answer the exclusivity question directly.
There is no contract, or the contract is one page and vague about client ownership.
The honest summary
For most speakers reading this, the answer is not yet, and that is not a setback.
Bureaus amplify an existing business. They do not create one. A speaker with three paid bookings, footage and a clear topic will find bureaus interested. A speaker without those will find the effort of chasing them was time not spent on the thing that makes them interesting.
Spend the six months on the evidence. The conversation gets much easier, and by the time you can have it you may find you want a smaller share of the work going through anyone else.
It represents speakers to event buyers, handles the enquiry, negotiates the fee and the contract, and takes a commission. It is a sales channel serving the buyer as much as the speaker, since its client is often the organisation booking, not the person speaking.
How much commission do speakers bureaus take?
Commonly around 20 to 30 percent of the speaking fee, sometimes added on top of your fee rather than deducted from it. Terms vary and the important questions are whether the arrangement is exclusive, how long it runs, and who owns the relationship with a client afterwards.
Will a bureau take me on as a new speaker?
Usually not. Bureaus make money on repeat, higher fee bookings, so they sign speakers with a demonstrated fee, a record of delivering, and video. If you are not yet charging, a bureau has nothing to sell, and the effort is better spent getting the bookings that make you signable.
Stage Finder returns four different kinds of answers from one search: events worth pitching, live open calls, where your admired speakers appear, and who to watch at your level. Here is which ones want a click and which are just reference.
Stage Finder's Open Calls list is ranked by topic overlap and deadline pressure, not by when a listing was added. Here is what actually moves a call to the top, and what to do with the ones sitting in the middle.
