HOW LONG SHOULD IT TAKE TO WRITE A GREAT TALK?

This time last week I presented at B2B Marketing Live UK in Manchester. I was REALLY nervous.

It was the first time in 7 months I'd presented anything after being off work and having brain surgery in February.

You don't need a major event to get nervous. We all get nervous.

According to National Institute of Mental Health about 74% of us suffer from "glossophobia" on some level - the fear of public speaking. Some of their studies suggest that around 30% of us have a significant fear of presenting at work. Even if it's just a small presentation to your team.

When I'm building a new presentation I usually work to around 1 hour per minute. 35 minute presentation? 35 hours to build.

But that's not how I beat my nerves...

Because as Tony Robbins once told me (at Dreamforce in 2015), "Don't practice until you get it right, practice until you can NEVER get it wrong."

This is why I use Terry Szuplat's 50-25-25 rule from his brilliant book "Say It Well":

🔎 Spend 50% of your time researching your presentation & audience.

🖋️ 25% Writing your presentation.

🎤 25% Re-writing & rehearsing.

And that's what I did for my B2B Manchester presentation:

🔎 Over the last few months I'd spent 80-100 hours brain-storming and researching a new presentation with a new point of view.

🖋️ I spent around 30-40 hours crafting my presentation.

🎤 And all-in, I spent around a week rehearsing it. (Watch one of my rehearsals here if you want to see!)

I know 160 hours sounds like a lot (it was over several months) - but it was time well spent because this is a presentation I'll break into various formats over the rest of 2026. I just wanted to share with you how much hard work I put into it, because many business folks radically under-estimate how long it takes to write a good talk.

"It usually takes more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech." - Mark Twain (maybe 🤷🏻‍♂️)

I've been told by some of the team at TED that their most popular talks average 10 hours work per minute presenting. That's 180+ hours total for an 18-minute talk. (Up to 90 hours research, 45 hours writing, 45 hours re-writing & rehearsing). 😳 Think Simon, Amy, Brené, Tim, Julian, Waldinger...

So the next time someone asks you to craft an important 30-minute presentation at work, you might want to ask them - "Do you want something good? Or do you want something GREAT?"

And then split your time accordingly.