I think of it as a ladder that you progress through as a speaker. This reduces risk for the organizers, but it's also good for your growth as a speaker. If you think you can just hop right into a conference talk with no warmup, then the earlier steps should be a breeze.

- Short meetup talk (10-20 minutes).

- Long meetup talk (20-40 minutes)

- Conference talk.

The only gotcha is that most meetups are not recorded. That makes it difficult to apply for conferences outside of your hometown.