Guest speakers

Pickstar has you covered for the best guest speakers in Australia.

Guest speakers can elevate your event, conference, workshop, assembly or virtual meeting. Pickstar's guest speakers are trusted by thousands of organisations to deliver a quality performance.

Our guest speakers can speak on a number of topics including leadership, resilience, mental health, gender equality, indigenous issues, culture, diversity and inclusion and more. You can also request virtual guest speakers to join your internal meeting.

We understand the impact a dynamic guest speaker can have on any occasion. Our extensive network of experienced guest speakers offers a wide range of expertise, ensuring your event stands out. From motivational guest speakers to engaging keynote speakers, we can help you find the perfect fit for your audience. Whether you’re searching for corporate guest speakers to inspire your team, school guest speakers to motivate students, or guest speakers for conferences to set the tone, Pickstar is your source for premier guest speakers in Australia. With a quick, free booking process, finding the right guest speaker for your next event has never been easier.

How much does a guest speaker charge?
The short answer is a guest speaker fee can be anywhere from nothing right up to $100k for a guest speaking engagement.

But there are so many factors impacting that cost.

Maybe you’ve got a budget you’re working with. Maybe you just want to know a rough estimate for a guest speaker fee to help formulate your budget.

You’ve come to the right place, we’ve put together this guide to help you determine the right guest speaker fee for your business.

Factors impacting guest speaker costs
A 10-minute chat to a group of Year 10 students is going to have a very different fee when compared to a keynote speaker who will present for 90 minutes at a major conference.

You already know that, but have you considered these factors:

How much experience does the guest speaker have?
An expert in their field with years of speaking experience might command $50,000. But an up-and-coming athlete who wants to share their story with school students might be happy to work for $200.

How long the guest speaker’s commitment will be?
Not just the speech itself, but the travel to and from and any other commitments on the day.

How well-known is the guest speaker?
A celebrity guest speaker will be able to command a considerable fee as you’ll not only be engaging them for their expertise, but also for the social influence they bring to the event.

How well-aligned is the guest speaker with the occasion?
A large corporation wanting to engage clients by hiring an entertaining guest speaker can expect to pay more for the exact same guest speaker, speech length and commitment than would a charity or school. If the guest speaker is passionate about the audience they’ll be speaking to and passionate about the topic they’ll be speaking on, there’s a fair chance they’ll be prepared to speak for a lower fee.

Guest speaker fees
This is what you came here for, so let’s get down to it.

From experience at Pickstar, the following is a guide for Australian guest speaker fees, based on roughly 30-60 minutes of guest speaking, excluding flights and accommodation:

$1,000-$2,500
A quality speaker with a solid knowledge of their topic, talking about personal experiences. An example might be a former sports star talking about their challenges with mental health and how they overcame these challenges.

$2,500-$6,000
A well-known speaker with several of years of experience speaking on a few different topics. This might be a talk on goal-setting from someone who has achieved at the highest level.

$6,000-$10,000
An experienced speaker with years of experience on a topic, a high level of expertise and well known across the country.

$10,000+
A highly qualified guest speaker, renowned in their area and known in Australia and potentially around the world.

Lower budgets
Schools, sporting clubs and charities will likely be able to engage a guest speaker for under $1,000, but if the opportunity is commercial, expect $1,000 to be the starting fee.

The above guide is not exhaustive and certainly varies significantly from speaker to speaker and event to event. If a guest speaker is passionate about your organisation, they may be prepared to do it for less than they would another organisation.

Other things a guest speaker will require
Guest speakers need a level of information before they can accept or decline any opportunity. It’s a good idea to provide the following information:

• Number of attendees
• Audience demographic
• Duration of event
• Duration of speech
• Formality of event
• Presentation required (yes or no)

How long should a guest speaker talk for?
A common question we get asked at Pickstar is how long should our guest speaker talk for. And our response is usually the same: we ask questions!

How long do you have? How much do people in the room know on the topic? What’s the age group of the audience? What is planned for the rest of the day?

And then we provide guidance based on the answers to those questions.

But we’re not on the phone to you right now. And you’re looking for answers to your question: how long should a guest speaker talk for?

From our experience, here’s a bit of guidance for how long guest speakers should present for:

10-15 minutes
Perfect for a product launch or staff day. Short and sharp, get a clear, concise point across without taking up too much time.

It also works well for a guest speaker joining a team meeting - either virtually or in-person. They’re able to give some quick insights and then employees can get straight into their day.

15-30 minutes
This is still a relatively short speech, but gives the guest speaker a bit more time to delve into a topic or story, plus give some time for questions at the end. An ideal length for sporting clubs wanting athletes to come out and speak to their team.

30-45 minutes
Our experience tells us this is a good length of time for a school group. It’s typically around the length of a normal lesson and with a short Q&A added onto the end, it can be a good length for a guest speaker in this environment.

45-60 minutes
This seems to be the sweet spot for most organisations based on post-event feedback. It’s long enough to really get into some meaty topics for the guest speaker, but not so long people start to fade with concentration.

60 minutes+
For a guest speaker, this is becoming quite a long engagement. While the differences between keynote speakers and guest speakers are subtle, this length of speech is probably more suitable for a keynote speaker.

The last word
Work out how much time you’ve got for a guest speaker and work backwards from there. They might be able to create a shorter version of their normal presentation if they need to cut time. Or they might be happy to do a Q&A if you’ve got 60 minutes and their speech goes for 45 minutes. But try not to get speakers padding for time just to fulfil their allotment!

Browse guests speakers including sports stars, business leaders, celebrities, health and wellness, media, comedians and more and submit a free booking request to find out who wants to work with you.

Guest speakers are available across Australia, including Melbourne, Sydney, Newcastle, Canberra, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast, Townsville, Cairns, Perth, Adelaide, Hobart and Darwin.

You can also search for brand ambassadors, motivational speakers, keynote speakers, influencers and MCs.