Background

Nikolas Badminton was eight when his father bought him "The Usborne Book of the Future." It changed his life. Those pages, filled with predictions for the technologies that would inform and define our lives, ignited his passion for looking forward.

Over the years, passion turned into focus. While others discussed yesterday or today, Nikolas was looking at least a decade out. He was a futurist. And he wanted to share this way of thinking, especially with businesses. Leaning on short-term decisions is easy, but considering the long term? That, Nikolas says, is where deep impact lives.

"So it's about being able to shift our mindset to explore and embrace a longer view, to create vigilance, to be able to supercharge thinking and to put hope back at the core of business. That's because I see hope as an energy to imagine bolder futures, to make brave decisions today and motivate all to drive initiatives that transform our world," said Nikolas.

He saw professional speaking as a way to influence executives and government leadership to look further and imagine a better world.

Launch + Momentum

Nikolas had been organizing and producing his own conferences and bootcamps that explored the intersection of technology, humanity and our futures. As a part of that, he spent time on TV and radio discussing developments and ideas. This more seriously developed his ability as a futurist speaker. Eventually, Nikolas sat with the founder of a speakers bureau, and that led to his first paid speaking gig.

At that point, he was all in. But, as does everyone when entering a new industry, Nikolas still had things to learn.

"I was learning about building a speaking practice and adjusting over time," he said. "I didn't really know the rules of engagement or how agencies work, or ideas around fee integrity and consistency. I was learning through trial and error and through the experience of doing keynotes month in and out."

After a couple of years, another speaker suggested Nikolas check out ImpactEleven, which would offer learning and a supportive community, aimed at putting talented people with a powerful message in position to make an impact on the world.

"He said it could help make the business more stable, more solid, more predictable and sort of decode this crazy world of speaker bureaus and speaking and client engagements," Nikolas said. "So I flew to Detroit, and everything changed."

"I was learning through trial and error..."

Acceleration

At the first ImpactEleven Bootcamp, Nikolas learned the importance of consistent fees, or fee integrity. He was charging $1,500 on the low end for speeches and realized that he could consistently charge much more. He also found out how to structure his messaging in new ways and learned about spin, or landing new gigs from existing ones, and how that can be used to deepen agent relationships. 

"These were new concepts to me, and the immediate effect was a more consistent approach to agency relationships and my speaking business as a whole," he said. "I saw an uptick in terms of revenue that first year."

Eventually, he decided to join the ImpactEleven Community. In addition to the knowledge gained, Nikolas found value in the live quarterly Masterclasses and the Community itself. 

"The Masterclasses have been really valuable," he said. "Also, as a speaker you're a lone wolf, and suddenly, you have a community — you're able to connect with other speakers. I'm building close relationships, and I'm no longer flying solo, trying to best guess what practices to undertake. You know who's speaking to what agencies, quirks and inside knowledge of what's happening and how things work." 

Nikolas has paired this knowledge and support with a focused work ethic to achieve significant growth over time.

"I've been growing consistently 40% year on year," he said. "I've extended the reach of my practice into America significantly and into Europe, as well. So, I've got a lot more deeper agency relationships, a lot more bookings, and then overall, the quality of the work that I do has gotten better and more polished. Part of that story is the practice and the insights that you get from being a part of the ImpactEleven Community."

“I saw an uptick in terms of revenue that first year."

Today

Nikolas is now booking speeches at between $20,000 and $35,000 each and doing 40-50 keynotes per year. He is focused on making sure this volume translates to a healthy business. 

"Now it's about sustainability, working with the right people and doing good work," he said. "And I think that's a really important thing in the speaking world."

As he continues to lean on and learn from the ImpactEleven Community, Nikolas is also passionate about sharing all that he's learned so far to help other speakers. He now has two books of his own on the future and is committed to continue bringing his speaking to new audiences. Nikolas is still deeply motivated to help others build a futurist mindset underpinned by hope.

"It takes time," he said. "Nothing is guaranteed, but we have to keep consistently doing the work." 

"Nothing is guaranteed, but we have to keep consistently doing the work." 

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Interested in learning more about the ImpactEleven Community? Read more here, or schedule time to chat here.