# How to Book a Keynote Speaker in Melbourne Source: https://speakersbureaus.directory/guides/book-a-keynote-speaker-melbourne/ Author: David Caruso (https://davidcaruso.com.au) Last updated: 2026-09-21 Publisher: Speakers Bureaus Directory, an independent directory. Nobody pays to appear and a listing is not an endorsement. Eighteen of Australia's seventy speaker organisations are in Melbourne, more than any other city. Half of them sell comedians. Here is how to use that rather than trip over it. Melbourne is where Australian speaking actually lives. It is also the market most likely to sell you a comedian when you asked for a keynote, and whether that is a problem or the best decision you make depends on knowing it in advance. ## Melbourne is the biggest and it is not close | City | Organisations | Publish fees | Exclusive management | Entertainment agencies | |---|---:|---:|---:|---:| | **Melbourne** | **18** | **7** | **2** | **9** | | Sydney | 14 | 5 | 3 | 6 | | Brisbane | 7 | 2 | 0 | 3 | | Perth | 5 | 1 | 0 | 2 | Eighteen of the seventy Australian organisations in this directory are headquartered in Melbourne. The national industry body, Professional Speakers Australia, runs from here too, as does the Melbourne Convention Bureau partnership programme. If you are running an event anywhere in Australia and want the widest search, Melbourne is where to start. Being in Melbourne is not a requirement: 63 of the 70 Australian organisations work nationally. ## Half the market is entertainment This is the thing to understand about Melbourne before you send a brief. 9 of the 18 Melbourne organisations list comedy as a speaker category. Nine of the eighteen are entertainment agencies with a speakers roster attached, rather than speaker bureaus that also do entertainment. Comedians is the single most common specialism in Melbourne, ahead of business, leadership and motivation. That is not an accident in a city that hosts the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. It is also distinctly Australian. Comedy as a bookable speaker category barely exists in North America. | Market | Bureaus listing comedy | Share | |---|---:|---:| | Australia | 23 of 70 | 33% | | New Zealand | 3 of 11 | 27% | | Ireland | 2 of 8 | 25% | | United Kingdom | 5 of 20 | 25% | | United States | 0 of 18 | 0% | | Canada | 0 of 11 | 0% | | Singapore | 0 of 7 | 0% | Not one American, Canadian or Singaporean bureau in this directory lists comedy at all. In Australia a third do. The same pattern shows up with after-dinner speaking, which is a British and Irish institution with no North American equivalent. The practical consequence: **an Australian agency will read "we want someone engaging" as an invitation to send you comedians.** If you want research-backed content, say so in the brief. If you want the room laughing, you are in the right city. ## Saxton and the big rosters **Saxton Speakers has run from Melbourne since 1965.** That makes it the oldest Australian organisation in this directory, and the third oldest of all 145 across seven countries, behind only the Harry Walker Agency in New York from 1946 and the Gordon Poole Agency in Britain from 1963. It carries more than a thousand keynote speakers, MCs and entertainers, and it operates in New Zealand under the same name. Three others carry the volume: **ICMI Speakers & Entertainers** sits in Prahran as part of the Launchd Group, with one of the broadest topic lists anywhere in Australia. **Keynote Entertainment** works out of Surrey Hills and claims 2,057 presenters. **Platinum Speakers and Entertainers** is the independent among the big names and one of the few Australian bureaus that publishes a fee band at all, starting around AUD 2,000 plus GST. ## Seventeen speakers or two thousand Melbourne contains both ends of the market, and the gap is the widest of any Australian city. | Organisation | Roster as published | |---|---| | Instinct Music | claims 3,000+ entertainers | | Keynote Entertainment | claims 2,057 presenters | | Saxton Speakers | over 1,000 speakers, MCs and entertainers | | Speaking Out | approximately 350 | | Token | 43 artists on its keynote page | | Artist Bookings | 18+ First Nations MCs and comedians | | Speakers Solutions | 17 speakers | Those are different products, not different sizes of the same product. A roster of two thousand means somebody will be available on your date and the shortlist comes from a database. A roster of seventeen means a person has hand-picked every name and will tell you honestly if none of them fits. Speakers Solutions in Croydon has run since 1997 with seventeen speakers, which is a deliberate choice rather than a lack of ambition. Work out which you want before you enquire. If you have an unusual brief, the small curated agencies are worth the call. If you have a difficult date, the big rosters are. ## Booking a comedian as your keynote Melbourne makes this easy, and it goes wrong in predictable ways. **Token manages comedians as keynote speakers**, which is a genuinely different proposition from booking a comedian to do their stand-up set at your dinner. A comedian working as a keynote builds a talk around a theme. A comedian doing a set performs their material. Ask which you are buying. The price is usually similar and the outcome is not. **Four questions worth asking:** 1. **Is this a keynote or a set?** If it is a set, it will not reference your business, your year or your theme. 2. **What is the material like for a corporate room?** Ask directly about language and subject matter, and be specific about who is in the audience. 3. **Will they customise?** Some will spend an hour on the phone learning your business and weave it through. Others will not. Both are legitimate and the price should differ. 4. **Where in the day are they going?** Comedy after dinner works. Comedy as an opening keynote at 9am is a much harder job and not everyone can do it. A comedian who can genuinely carry a business theme is one of the most effective bookings available. One who was booked to be funny and asked to be insightful is an expensive mistake. ## What a speaker costs in Melbourne No organisation in this directory prices by city, so there is no Melbourne rate. There is an Australian picture, and Melbourne holds seven of the country's fee publishers, the most of any city. Platinum Speakers starts around AUD 2,000 plus GST. Ovations, in Sydney, opens its bands at AUD 3,500 to 5,000. Bark.com publishes a guide of AUD 3,650 to 8,000. Instinct Music, in Melbourne, guides corporate keynotes at AUD 10,000 and up. Our [fee guide](/guides/what-a-keynote-speaker-costs/) sets out the full picture across seven countries. Check whether quotes are stated plus GST, because not everyone says. ## Dates that will cost you Six to twelve months for a conference keynote, as everywhere. Melbourne adds some local pressure points, and these are about hotels, venues and traffic as much as speakers. - **Melbourne International Comedy Festival, 24 March to 18 April 2027.** Directly relevant here, because comedians are half this market and the festival is where they are. Book comedy talent early around those dates, or work around them. - **The AFL Grand Final, late September.** The eve is a public holiday in Victoria. Accommodation and venues tighten across the week. - **Spring Racing Carnival, through October into the Melbourne Cup on the first Tuesday in November.** Melbourne Cup Day is a public holiday in metropolitan Melbourne and the surrounding weeks are among the busiest of the corporate year. - **The Australian Open in January**, which collides with the quiet season for corporate events but not for hotels. - **Mid-December to late January** is slow for confirmations everywhere in Australia. Lock February events before the break. ## Who to call first **If you want the widest possible search:** Saxton or ICMI. Deep rosters, national reach, and they will come back with a real shortlist from a proper brief. **If you want a price signal before you talk to anyone:** Platinum publishes a band. Seven Melbourne organisations publish something, which is more than any other Australian city. **If your brief is unusual or values-led:** the small curated agencies. Speaking Out and Booked Out in South Yarra are sister agencies splitting community, schools and social-issues work from corporate. **If you want a comedian who can carry a theme:** Token, and ask the four questions above. **If you want an MC and entertainment in the same call:** nine of the eighteen are entertainment agencies, which is exactly what they are built for. **If you want to find a speaker with no agency at all:** Professional Speakers Australia runs its Find a Speaker directory from Melbourne. It is the industry body rather than a bureau, so you contact the speaker directly and no commission sits in the middle. Professional Membership requires verified speaking income of AUD 50,000 in the past twelve months, so it is a filter you get for free. ## Where these numbers come from The city counts, roster figures, comedy shares and founding years all come from this directory's own data, with every organisation checked on its own website in September 2026. Roster sizes are as each organisation publishes them, which is why some read "claims": we report the number they state, not one we have counted. Founding years are counted only where an organisation publishes one, which 22 of the 145 do. Saxton being third oldest is therefore third among those that say. The festival dates are from the Melbourne International Comedy Festival's own site. The other calendar notes are well-known Victorian fixtures included as practical context, not directory data. Nobody pays to appear here. The underlying data is free to use with attribution, as [JSON](/api/bureaus.json) or as [plain markdown](/llms.txt). --- Directory data as JSON: https://speakersbureaus.directory/api/bureaus.json Method: https://speakersbureaus.directory/methodology/ Free to use and cite with attribution to speakersbureaus.directory.