2024

Pre-Conference Sessions

Do you want to go deeper at the Speak Up Conference? Sign-up to attend one pre-conference session. Sessions will take place in person on July 11th at 10:00 AM. You can go through the pre-recorded sessions at your own pace.

Buy live Session $100-$200 Buy Pre-recorded $50

If you have a Plus or VIP ticket, one live pre-conference session valued at $100 is included.

In-Person Session Options

All live sessions cost $100 each; the special session opportunity for a Speaker Sizzle Reel is $200. Attendees can only attend one session. If you have purchased a Plus or VIP ticket, one pre-conference session was included.

Click on a purple title to learn more about what each session will cover!

Special Session ($200)

Create Your Speaker Sizzle Reel

$200
1-Hour Blocks with Mary R. Snyder

Feeling like your speaker video is as outdated as dial-up internet?  Do you struggle when someone asks for your video because you know it’s not your best!  Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered!

Welcome to the “Create Your Speaker Sizzle Reel” This is where your old, dusty speaker reel gets a fabulous makeover. No more dull clips that don’t do justice to your sparkling personality and your game-changing offerings.

Sign up and get ready for your close-up with a 3-minute professionally recorded and edited video! Picture this: High-quality footage that captures your best angles, your signature style, and your current offerings in all their glory. And the best part? It’s easy!  We are doing all the editing, the intro and outro music, you come with an amazing 3 minutes of content. 

Before you show up to record, you’ll have the chance to send in your video for a critique. Think of it as a dress rehearsal before the grand performance. This way, we ensure that the final cut is as perfect as your storytelling skills!

 Give your speaker video the glow-up it deserves. With our “Create Your Speaker Sizzle Reel,” you’re not just getting a video – you’re getting a ticket to increased visibility, engagement, and impact. Let’s turn up the heat on your speaker reel, one frame at a time!

SOLD OUT

Limited to only 22 slots. 

Sessions For Speakers

Up Your Speaking

$100
3 hours with Karen Porter

Take your speaking to a new level in this 3-hour practical and interactive session. Improve your message so audiences will listen. Learn how to put your notes away. Discover new ways to grab the audience’s attention at the beginning and keep them with you till your grand finale as you close. Learn how to uncover humor and what to do on stage by learning the hacks to great body language, eye contact, voice control, and using media. Reach the audience in fresh new ways and help them find the transformation God offers. In this hands-on class, each person will make a spectacular handout and devise a personal contract. We’ll talk about how to get more gigs and build a team. If you want to upgrade and elevate your stage presence, this workshop is for you.

Sessions For Writers

Book Proposal Intensive Clinic

$100
3-hour session with Dave & Cindy Lambert

This session is limited to 25 registrants

Prerequisite:

Complete and bring with you a working proposal. Please download and use one of the following templates, or you may use a proposal model you’ve found on your own.

A winning book proposal is a tool that entices seven audiences to grasp a contagious vision for a book and then equips them to successfully play their parts in placing the book into the hands of its ideal readership.

In this three-hour intensive clinic, you will be introduced to the following:

  • The business side of publishing decisions
  • The real details behind the closed doors of editors and publishing boards
  • The craftsmanship to write an enticing proposal that captures the interest of publishing professionals.

Structuring Your Nonfiction Book

$100
3 hours with Janet McHenry

This clinic will teach three different skill sets. First, you will learn how to structure five different nonfiction genres: Bible studies, devotionals, Christian living books, gift books, and memoirs. Writers hear the expression “Just write the book,” but when we understand the genre form, we not only know how to put a book together, but also save a whole lot of time in the editing process and meet the expectations of potential editors and agents. Second, you will learn how to build a chapter. We also hear the expression “Study the form.” This hands-on clinic will teach writers how to study a book’s form in a hands-on exercise using a real mentor book chapter so you can see how to weave anecdote, teaching points, scripture, exposition of scripture, examples, and more. Lastly, you will learn how to storyboard an entire book outline in a dynamic exercise using sticky notes and the help of a few friends.

Sessions For Ministry Development

Create Your Podcast Today

$100
3-hour session with Stephanie Rousselle

Attendees will leave with a LIVE podcast (if they come prepared), and/or with a 30-day schedule to get it all done.

Would you like to experience what it is like to actually manage a podcast? We invite you to become a podcaster for a day! Or, are you committed and now ready to tackle the technical side of actually publishing a podcast? We invite you to actually become a full-fledged podcaster today!

Come with your podcast concept and you will leave this workshop with a ready-to-publish podcast, registered on a hosting platform for free.

Using Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tools to Enhance and Expand Your Business/Ministry

$100
3 hours with RACHEL WOJO

Have you noticed the significant upswing in AI writing and translating tools? How can you use them creatively and successfully? You’ll leave this session with the following:

  • Understanding what AI is and how it affects you as a speaker, writer, or leader.
  • Exposure to a variety of AI tools that will spark new, efficient work methods
  • Hands-on experience with step-by-step instructions on implementing AI tools in your business or ministry

Create a Stellar Companion Product—Carol Tetzlaff (3 hours)

$100
3 hours with carol tetzlaff

Developing a product to give your reader added value as you reach your audience with the message of your book in print or the one you are currently writing. Companion products will assist in marketing your existing book or create a following to purchase a new release. Creative ways to develop a unique resource will be explored along with navigating the process so you walk away with content and a plan to get it into the hands of your reader.

  • Determine your audience and what makes them unique.
  • Develop objectives to bring value that corresponds to the message of your book.
  • Devise a plan that fits your style:course, devotional, journal,online content, video content,creative elements, or a combination.
  • Determine the writing styles needed to create the content within your plan.
  • Discover the platforms to use to reach your audience with your content.
  • Develop an outline to reach the objectives of your product including the basic content.
  • Demonstrate companion product in small groups to receive feedback for further development.
  • Develop branding for your product to coordinate with your book.
  • Discover marketing techniques to promote your products.

Create with Canva : 10 Ideas – Shannon Popkin (3 hours)

$100
3 hours with shannon popkin

Come with your laptop ready and learn some of Shannon’s favorite tips and tricks for using Canva to shape your brand and create content. She’ll be sharing 10 ideas for using Canva to streamline your efforts, save time and money, spotlight your message in a way that honors both the Lord and your time budget.

Pre-Recorded Session Options

All pre-recorded sessions cost $50 each. Pre-recorded pre-conference sessions are NOT included in the basic, plus or VIP tickets and should be purchased separately. Attendees can purchase as many pre-recorded sessions as they want.

Click on a purple title to learn more about what each session will cover!

Book Proposal Intensive Clinic

$50
3 hour session | Presented By Dave & Cindy Lambert

We’ve all heard it said, “Write to your audience, not to yourself.” Good advice! Many authors, however, may know the audience of their book but have no understanding of the true audience of their book proposal.

In this three-hour intensive clinic, you will be introduced to the business side of publishing decisions, discover what really happens behind the closed doors of editors’ meetings and publishing boards, and learn how to craft an enticing proposal that captures the interest of editors and publishers.

Broken into four segments, this hands-on interactive clinic will begin with an in-depth presentation, then offer individual time to work on and refine specific proposal elements of your own, then break into small groups for fiction and nonfiction personal feedback and critique, and finally come together again for advice and guidance to launch you into the world of meeting with editors.

How to Make a Living as a Writer

$50
Presented By Pam & Bill farrel

Prepare for your Speak Up Conference meetings with the pre-recorded video session: How to Make a Living as a Writer with Pam & Bill Farrel.

This session features the international speakers and best-selling authors of Men are Like Waffles, Women are Like Spaghetti, Pam & Bill Farrell.  You’ll learn how to take an idea, a thought, or a truth and begin building a full-time ministry around it.  Pam & Bill will share their journey from being a struggling young couple who invested their last $25 in a writers’ conference that grew into a full-time writing, speaking, and coaching ministry, along with a membership community, and both for profit and non-profit organizations.   You’ll learn many practical steps that will help to launch your ministry, along with hearing their captivating personal story.

Upon purchase, you will receive video link instructions automatically via digital download/pdf.

Writing Non-Fiction

$50
Presented By BOB HOSTETLER

Prepare for your Speak Up Conference meetings with the pre-recorded video session: Writing Non-Fiction with Bob Hostetler.

An author and literary agent of deep and wide experience offers three hours of instruction on writing all forms of nonfiction, from newspaper and magazine to book and more. Includes discussion of often overlooked opportunities for publication, what you need to know about rights, how to put your best foot forward, kinds of articles to write—and how, queries and one-sheets, and essential elements of a nonfiction book proposal. 

Upon purchase, you will receive video link instructions automatically via digital download/pdf.

The Pitch Factor

$50
Presented By Bethany Jett and Michele Medlock-Adams

Did you know that you naturally point your knees and feet toward the person you’re most interested in? Only 7% of communication is verbal, so writers must pack more in their arsenal than a long list of publication credits and a thirty-second elevator pitch. 

The tone of voice, posture, clothing choice, firmness of handshake, and body language more than communicate who we are, even at the subconscious level. Bethany Jett will offer tips and tricks for what could possibly be a life-changing 15-minute appointment with agents and editors, as well as prepare them for upcoming media appearances and speaking engagements. 

Topics covered:

  • The Do’s and Don’ts for meeting with editors and agents 
  • How to engage others with or without a formal introduction 
  • The online programs to edit your pictures professionally 
  • Social media etiquette: the good, bad, and ugly
  • How to use body language to your benefit
  • How to accurately determine the success of an interview or pitch session 

Bonus content:

  • How to create and use pitch and query letters to your benefit
  • Why the book proposal is the base for your marketing plan
  • Tips on how to create a book proposal that will capture a publisher’s attention

Upon purchase, you will receive video link instructions automatically via digital download/pdf.