Brian Giese's Blog

Top Ten Best (and Worst) Communicators of 2007

Bert Decker, one of the finest presentation coach's in the world, announced the Top 10 Best (and Worst) Communicators for 2007. Bert named Mike Huckabee the best communicator and Alberto Gonzalez the worst one. Click through to see the other winners and losers as I find his comments to be interesting and insightful. Take a look.

Last month Huckabee was on the cover of Newsweek magazine. Click here to take a look at the article.

The World's Best Presentation

Slideshare.net announced the winners of the World's Best Presentation Contest today. This presetation does what all truly great presentations are known to do. It tells a compelling "me too" story using lots of great pictures and graphics instead of using boring words. People buy visually and I'm sold on this!

The Top 5 Best Marketing Presentations

There are lots of great tech marketing presentations. I have to say that it is really hard to compile a list of only five that I believe are really great. I'd love to get your thoughts on these or if you have others to contribute I'd enjoy seeing them. Here they are:

Steve Jobs introduces MacIntosh in 1984 . Steve's presentation is the top of the greats. He, in this presentation, shows how to create powerful drama in this sales presentation. Remember, it's 1984 in this presentation. What could you do in 2006?

Guy Kawasaki's "Art of the Start" speech in 2006. Guy is a very authentic speaker (and a former Apple MacIntosh exec.). He's really a technology business evangelist that speaks plainly and is really genuinely funny. Hard to come by in a tech presentation.

Lawrence Lessig's "Free Culture" speech in 2002. This is so simple and it works really, really well. Take a look.

Malcolm Gladwell's "Blink" speech in 2005. I’ve never seen Gladwell speak but I love his books on economics and his stories about technology. He uses stories to convey ideas which is a powerful and  engaging way to draw the audience into your topics. I love his passion and energy. He's really a fantastic numbers guy and a very fast-paced, engaging speaker. Tough combination but he pulls it off.

Seth Godin's speech at Google in 2006. Seth Godin is an icon for tech marketers and a speaker you don't want to miss. Here he talks to Google about marketing (kind of a tough gig). Watch his great us of slides as he customizes his presentation to his audience and then the way he integrates these to persuade. A real master at work.

Business presentations that sell

I get a lot of questions about giving business boardroom presentations. My earlier notes on giving presentations are here and here are some more tips that come to mind…

• before the presentation, ask individuals in the audience what they want/expect to hear and write it on a whiteboard.
• put the “solution” to the problem at the beginning and the “company” stuff at the end.
• tell relevant, current stories, not what appears on a PowerPoint slide
• use pictures -- graphics and mental images -- to convey the message not text
• put yourself in the listener's shoes first, last, and always
• practice, practice, dry run, practice, revise, practice, edit, practice
• never read from notes
• talk with one member of the audience at a time
• review the whiteboard at the end and get commitment that you covered their points fully.

10 Tips for a Successful Presentation

Fear of public speaking ranks high on nearly every study of common anxieties -- higher even than the fear of death!

As someone who has delivered hundreds of presentations before groups of all kinds, and trained many people to do the same, I have some insights on this. What people really fear is not so much public speaking itself as the possibility of being unprepared for a speech.

If you prepare well, you will eliminate most of the fear. Here are the ten “MUSTS” for a successful presentation. Cover all ten, and you will be well prepared for the big event.

1. You MUST use humor to establish rapport with the audience very early on in the speech -- and preferably self-deprecating humor. (Abraham Lincoln was once accused of being two-faced. Lincoln replied, “If I had two faces, do you think this is the one I’d be wearing?” )

2. You MUST know your audience and match your content to their world.

3. You MUST know your material thoroughly. In other words, you must practice delivering the major points, in the order you want to cover them, preferably in front of people such as family or friends. (Doing this ahead of time will also help you identify what should be eliminated from the speech.) Consider making an audio or video of your speech and reviewing it closely before you deliver it to a “live” group.

4. You MUST know your own strengths and weaknesses as a speaker. Make sure you are emphasizing your strengths during the speech.

5. You MUST wear appropriate attire for the occasion.

6. You MUST project comfort and confidence to the audience. Erect posture and the ability to take deep breaths is a part of this. Do not confuse “confidence” with “arrogance”—being able to admit that you do not know something, or that you made an error about something, will usually win you attention and interest.

7. You MUST use appropriate body language – hand gestures, walking, spreading your arms – to retain visual interest from the audience.

8. You MUST speak comprehensibly. If this is a problem according to other people who listen to you practice delivering your speech, make a conscious choice to slow down and enunciate. Find ways to remind yourself of this during the speech.

9. You MUST speak loudly enough to be heard by everyone. (If you don’t have a microphone, pitch your voice so that the person in the back of the room will hear what you’re saying.)

10. You MUST speak with enthusiasm and conviction. If the audience does not believe that you believe what you’re saying, they will tune out.

For more information about this topic email me at brian@itselling.com.