I was interviewed recently on Our Next Guest Is podcast about my journey to becoming a speaker and some of the key attributes all speakers need to have to deliver great value to clients. Listen here.
The Run Sheet – Conference + Event Newsletter
Very happy to announce the arrival of this not-so-little baby which has been brewing for many years.
The Run Sheet (same name as my podcast) is a newsletter filled with conference observations, information about speakers, venues, innovative delegate experiences and trends. View the whole thing and subscribe here.
This issue covers:
- my favourite keyboard shortcuts and my 3-step ‘social selling’ philosophy for LinkedIn.
- how to future-proof for run sheet issues such as a speaker finishing 20 minutes early
- a speaker who does a hilarious, insightful and very clever conference closing keynote
- updates from my world
LinkedIn – More than a resume
LinkedIn has become the most powerful platform B2B (business to business) people have to demonstrate their experience and build authority in their area of expertise.
I’ve been on the platform for almost 14 years. It had become quite tiresome and gloomy by the time Microsoft purchased it. Their first few developments were a little clumsy and glitchy, but this past year has seen vast improvements leading to somewhat of a LinkedIn Renaissance.
LinkedIn is compelling and vital for any person who relies on a quality network of connections for their role – think business owners, executives, leaders, sales professionals and teams.
In my keynote (and accompanying optional workshop), I uncover a 3 step philosophy to LinkedIn Success using a fishing analogy (I love fishing but don’t go enough!).
1: Bait the hook
2: Cast the line
3: Reel in the big one
Bait the hook
Ditch the resume style list of your achievements. Prepare your LinkedIn profile to ensure it illustrates your area of expertise, your level of experience and your authority in your area.
Make it more conversational – ensure you utilise the Summary section to write a 1st person introduction. Imagine you’re answering the questions:
Who are you; What is your speciality area; What led you to this point; What are you working on now?
The most recent THREE jobs are important to expand on, but anything beyond that can remain as a basic list.
Add multimedia elements to your profile such as Slideshare presentations; video; PDFs and articles.
Ask for Recommendations from recent clients and colleagues.
Cast the line
Fish where the fish are. LinkedIn Groups are the most under-utilised, endlessly useful feature of LinkedIn. Find groups related to your area of expertise and interest, join them, join conversations by commenting first then launch a conversation of your own.
People in groups get 4 x more profile views
Further to the standard search box, there’s a trick to finding great Groups to join:
Go to the profile page of a colleage, competitor or industry leader. As you scroll down their profile, you’ll find ‘Interests’, usually towards the bottom. Hit ‘See All’ at the bottom of that box, then view the Groups they have joined. Join any relevant ones yourself.
You are 70% more likely to get an appointment when citing a common group
Get into a Connections habit. After every meeting, industry event, group email, webinar or networking function go to LinkedIn and Connect with each person you met. On desktop, LinkedIn will often ask for that person’s email address. The trick is to use the LinkedIn phone app to search for that person and hit Connect. You won’t need to provide further information.
You don’t have to accept every connection request you get. If it doesn’t feel right, ignore it.
Write ARTICLES. You will notice the ‘Write an article’ button in the same location as your status updates. Articles are your way to demonstrate your thought leadership in a longer form. People searching the platform for the subject matter will find your article and connect with you.
Reel in the big one
B2B buyers are 5 x more likely to engage when outreach is through a mutual connection
The more connected you are to the right people, the more likely you’ll be the one who receives a referral when someone in your network is asked ‘do you know someone who…’.
Dale Carnegie research found 91% of customers would give a referral to potential new customer, but only 11% of people ask for it.
There’s a great technique for warming up a potential connection – someone you’re keen to connect with but don’t have any mutual connections:
- Ensure you have the default ‘can see who viewed my profile’ setting on.
- View the potential connection’s profile.
- You’ll see within a few days, they’ll view your profile.
- Send them a message and a connection request.
And finally – you know how LinkedIn lets you know when someone starts a new job? Remember this: new employees are 10 x more likely to make a buying decision! UTILISE this LinkedIn information to reach out to your connections who start new jobs – then you’re part of the BUYING process rather than the SELLING process.
For enquiries about my LinkedIn Profile Building keynote, workshop or webinar go to www.yvonneadele.com
Success with Social Media for Events
Gone are the days of being able to get away without social media platforms for our events, but the frustration is still higher than ever. As a very busy MC, I am involved in many events a year. Each event has a social presence, but event planners are struggling to get the desired engagement, and show tangible ROI. Often you can hear the tumbleweeds blowing through the blank canvas.
It’s best to expand the ‘social media’ term to ‘Online Marketing’ – which then includes your website activity in addition to the traditional social platforms.
WHY online marketing?
Online marketing is the EARNED part in your marketing landscape. You’ve also got BOUGHT (advertising) and OWNED (website, staff, building, email database).
If done ON PURPOSE, online marketing can assist you with all aspects of your event from organising it, promoting it, delegate experience through to continuity to keep the conversation going after the event.
To do it on purpose, you need to start with the end goal in mind. You’re either selling tickets to an event, or for corporate conferences full of employees: you’re looking to build the buzz. In both cases, you’ll provide a platform for delegates to begin connecting with each other before the event even begins.
Let’s break it down to BEFORE, DURING and AFTER your event:
BEFORE:
- A rich, compelling newsletter is the perfect way to keep the conversation going with potential delegates in the lead up to your event. The more relevant subscribers you have, the more people you have permission to market to. The key to getting people to sign up is to offer something irresistible in return for their email address. For example, I’ve got www.yvonneadele.com/topfive – a ‘Digital Marketing Top Five’ a download anyone can grab if they sign up. Once they have signed up, I know that type of content is relevant to them and they are now in the funnel for that topic.
- Set up Google Alerts www.google.com/alerts – You can tell Google to send you an email every time someone mentions your competitor, your industry terms, your speakers, your sponsors or you. This is a great research tool and gives me a never ending supply of content for blog posts etc.
- Begin to gather social credentials of your speakers, exhibitors, partners and create a Twitter list with them in it. You can use this to quickly see new content from those people and also share the list with your delegates.
- Create a blog post at least once a month – preferably once a fortnight. Why? To bring relevant eyeballs to your final destination : your website. Blogging provides as many roads as possible to travel to the final destination. Think of it this way: Someone is doing a Google search using terms related to your industry or event. If you’ve done one blog post every month with those search terms included.. you’ve now provided 12 roads into your website. Imagine if you’d done 3 blog posts a month.. that’s 36 roads into your website.
- CHOOSE TWO social channels only. Facebook should be the 1st one. Then choose Twitter if you’re marketing to business people or Instagram if you’re marketing to consumers.
- Have each of your speakers do a selfie-style short 1-2min video with a couple insights they’ll be sharing at the event.
- Load the videos to your YouTube Channel
- Share the videos and other relevant content about the event across your social channels
DURING
- Use a unique hashtag and ensure your event materials, your MC and your speakers mention it often.
- Encourage delegates to post highlights including video and photos by offering a prize (2 tickets to next year’s event / tickets to the gala dinner) for the best post.
- Be sure to retweet and share the best posts from your delegates.
- Do short live videos with your most valuable exhibitors/sponsors (more ROI for them!)
AFTER
- Keep the conversation going by thanking your speakers on the social channels.
- Curate a great sample of social posts from the event and put these into a newsletter for a few days later, with a special early bird offer to buy tickets for next year.
- Your Google Alerts should let you know whenever someone does a blog post or mention of your event, so you can be sure to engage with / share that content.
- TO measure the effectiveness of your hashtag, use a platform such as www.tweetreach.com
Get in touch with me to discuss having me MC your next event – as your MC I assist with social media strategy and amplification of your marketing across my own social platforms. www.yvonneadele.com
Stop Saying um and y’know
Breathing Life Back into the Full-Stop
It’s one of those things you don’t even realise you’re doing until you listen back to a recording of your voice. There it is : “My first introduction to… umm.. technology was in school when…umm.. my teacher installed our first PC”. It’s more likely you’ve found yourself quite annoyed as an audience member or listener when you’ve heard someone else do this, am I right?
As a subject-matter-expert, blogger or industry professional you will be asked to speak in front of an audience, or perhaps do an interview for a newspaper, magazine, blog, podcast or online course. For speaking engagements, it comes with the territory to be well rehearsed and spend time preparing. But – with interviews, you’re less likely to be so prepared.
In conversation, sometimes we unconsciously try to keep control of our turn to speak by adding in ‘umm’ instead of a graceful pause – because we’re not ready to give the other person their turn to speak!
First here’s the MOST important thing to remember: The full-stop deserves to live. It is a character (with feelings?) JUST like all the other characters you so lovingly enunciate. So – don’t kill it off with an ‘umm’. Take a beat… take a breath… just say “____” (nothing). This gives the audience/listener a chance to catch their thoughts too!
For interviews, follow these handy hints to ensure you’re well prepared and less likely to fill the gaps with ‘umm’:
- If you’ve followed my speaking tips for a while, you’ll be up to speed with this one : remember this isn’t about YOU. If you’re stuck in your own head, worrying about how you sound/look/come across, you’ll trip on your words and fall back on ‘um’. You’re the VEHICLE for the message you’ve been asked to talk about. SERVE the audience/listeners. Calmly and concisely.
- Ensure you know the REASON you’re doing the interview. Is it just a favour for a friend or colleague? If so, let them direct you about what insights/info they want to draw out of you. They don’t have to provide you with all the questions – because that can make an interview sound wooden – but if you understand the CONTEXT, you’ll be more prepared.
- If you’re concerned with nerves, you can boost your CONFIDENCE by remembering that you were asked to do this interview because you’re the expert in the topic! The interviewer has chosen YOU for a reason. That’s all the tick of approval you need in order to banish the negative thoughts about whether you’ll be able to answer the questions.
Download my guide to getting rid of Speaking nerves forever. - Ensure the interviewer introduces you properly. You should provide the INTRODUCTION for them which positions you perfectly as the person who is about to be interviewed. Think of the introduction as ‘earning you the right’ in the audience’s eyes to be the one being profiled in the interview.
- As mentioned before, it’s difficult to rehearse for interviews – but you CAN ask your family or colleagues to throw a few general, random questions at you and practice answering them without an UM as the start of your sentence.
What other tips would you add to let the full stop live? Join the Small Business Pow Wow group on Facebook to continue the discussion!
Confident Public Speaking
Number 1 Fear
Download a handy PDF of these tips and a whole page of extra tips from speakers from around the globe.
This is my 21st year of Professional Speaking, and when you’ve been doing something that long, people are bound to ask you questions, right? Of all the questions people ask me about Speaking, ‘how to kill nerves’ has got to be the No.1 by far. Apparently the fear of public speaking is in the top 5 fears, along with DEATH?
The first thing to do is to remember : IT IS NOT ABOUT YOU. Nervous Speakers are too often caught up in their own head, being their own worst enemy and have lost sight of the fact that they are simply a vehicle for the message they are gifting to the audience. When you remember you’re SERVING the audience and you’ve been put on the conference program by the event planner who has done their research and chosen YOU – you’ve earned the right to be on that stage.
When I’m coaching Speakers, I find a combination of breathing, preparation and strategy to be the perfect antidote to nerves….
Breathing techniques
- Totally under-rated: taking a few deep breaths as you are waiting in the wings. Speakers and Performers commonly say this is their number 1 go-to tip.
- There are Speakers who have a ritual of tribal, loud, open-mouthed screaming and jumping up and down in the bathrooms before they go on stage. Sounds a bit Tony Robbins, but it certainly works for them! I tried it once but it wasn’t for me. How about you?
- There’s a great NLP technique I learned from Colin James called Identify, Objectify, Banish where you take a moment to stop and recognise the feeling you’re having (Identify it).. then you bring it to life (Objectify) by imagining it as an object. He imagines a lizard on his shoulder. Finally you imagine the object disappearing (Banish).. you virtually flick it off your shoulder. This works to bring you back to the present and your breathing will automatically return to a calm pace.
Preparation, preparation, preparation
This sounds like a cliché but I wrote it 3 times to show how important it is. I’ve delivered over 500 talks in 21 years I’ve been Speaking and there have certainly been times where I’ve felt completely crushed about how it went. I’ve taken the stage full of nerves, stumbled through my talk, not been completely present and been determined not to take Q & A at the end in case someone stumped me.
The common denominator for every one of those talks has been a lack of preparation. I’m not talking about rehearsing your talk – if you’ve followed the 3 x 3 x 3 framework for writing a keynote you should truly be able to do a 40 minute talk without any notes at all.
To be totally prepared:
- Research the client well: their challenges, the challenges of the people in the audience, the industry. More often than not, I will ask the client to put me in touch with 3-5 people who are likely to be in the audience for my talk so I can talk directly with them about their challenges.
- Research your topic as it relates to this audience. For example if I’m talking about Social Media for Independent Cinemas, I’ll spend hours researching what Independent Cinemas are doing around the world, looking for great case studies, remarkable ideas, I’ll look outside the industry into others like Independent booksellers or boutique clothing stores to spark ideas.
- It is always my preference to arrive at the conference the night before my talk so I have a chance to attend other talks and, most importantly, mingle with the delegates at welcome parties/events or even morning tea breaks so I can understand the sorts of conversations they are having with each other and ask a few questions about their day to day challenges. I will then weave these into my speech where relevant.
Panels & Facilitated Interviews
If you’ve ticked all of the boxes above, you’re still overthinking things and unable to reduce your anxiety further, there is a magic trick you can pull out of your hat : ask the event organiser if you can be part of a Panel or if the MC can interview you instead. You can provide the MC with 5-10 questions as a guide they can use to draw out all the insights you were planning to put into your presentation. This is the fail-safe way to get you up onto that stage.
Download a handy PDF of these tips and a whole page of extra tips from speakers from around the globe, grab my guide.
Join my Facebook group Small Business Pow Wow where we discuss speaking, marketing and support each other.
INTERVIEW : John Lawson – International Speaker and Author
John Lawson is a global speaker on Social Commerce, best selling author and go-to authority. 
In this episode John Lawson describes the moment he became a proper ‘Speaker’ – when he stole the show instead of moderating a panel at an event.
John is living proof you can bring your favourite interests with you everywhere you go – even into your work. He finds a way to bring Beyonce and ‘The Force’ into his presentations in his unique storytelling style.
John and he explains his process for preparing for his talks:
* Start with a Google search. Do your research on the topic and industry.
* Read the blogs, groups, forums. Find where the people in the audience are. Hear their voice, take some of that language and put it into the presentation.
* Take your expertise and put it into their lingo.
* Remember the ‘rule of 3’ – chunk the sections THEN the content down into 3.
* Tell a story of what you need to learn. Don’t just list the things they need to learn.
* Be aware of pacing.. don’t exhaust the audience with rapid pace.
* Don’t ignore the nerves. Push it right back out to the audience and they will feel it as energy.
* Difference between Keynotes and other forms of speaking. (hint: Keynote = inspiration)
* Leave the audience wanting more by leaving the stage with style …. THEN: be there for them at the event.
* The secret for keeping the audience with you after your talk.
* Book Vs no book?
http://www.twitter.com/ColderIce
http://www.linkedin.com/in/colderice
If you like what you hear, subscribe: Apple fan- via iTunes: https://itun.es/i6YT8Bt or Android (Pocketcast or rss) – http://pca.st/1asA #therunsheet
Overcome Fear of Public Speaking
Number 1 Public Speaking Challenge
I’ve been speaking professionally for around 17 years and coaching speakers for more than 10. The most common challenge facing those speakers is dealing with nerves. I’ve developed my own techniques and tweaked those I’ve learned from speakers around the world and I have distilled them down to 3 guaranteed ways you can banish public speaking nerves forever and build your speaking and presenting confidence.
In this resource, I explain :
- How to use a breathing technique specifically to calm your nerves. Sometimes our heads are spinning, caught up in the ‘what-if’. Breathing mindfully will bring you back to the present and your anxiety will minimise.
- The sure-fire way to guarantee more confidence EVERY time you speak is to be truly PREPARED. This means doing your research about the client, industry, audience and topic. Even though I’ve been speaking for nearly 20 years I still experience nerves from time to time. Every one of those times it is due to being less prepared than I should.
- A quick and easy solution for those who want to EASE their way into speaking: ask the conference organiser if you can be on a PANEL instead of up on stage alone.
In the Banish Public Speaking Nerves Guide I expand on these 3 techniques and also include a bonus page full of tips from my most respected speaking colleagues from around the world.
Grab the ‘Banish Public Speaking Nerves‘ Guide.
Zara and Troy of Humour Australia – the low down on working together as a job-lot
In this episode, Zara and Troy take us behind the scenes of speaking and MCing as a duo.
This dynamic duo have been actors, breakfast radio broadcasters (winning best on-air team one year!), stand up comedians, Speakers, MCs, writers, producers and directors.
Zara has interviewed Chris Rock, Destiny’ Child and Heath Ledger!
We discover how Zara and Troy met, how they spend 24hrs a day together and still call each other best friends: ‘we take ourselves lightly but we take our job seriously’.
‘We have a vital role to play to make sure everybody is connected, engaged and to make sure the message lands’.
They have a Positive Psychology background which is woven through all of their work.
Things we cover in this interview:
When MCing, you have to learn a little bit about a lot of things. So many different industries.
They unveil the client research they undertake pre-engagement.
- Business status
- How the culture is created
- The sentiment of the employees
- What the business obstacles are
- What the goals are for the event – maybe to connect the spirit of the team or perhaps to incite behavioural change
- Interviewing employees to get to the heart of what’s going on
If you like what you hear, subscribe: Apple fan- via iTunes: https://itun.es/i6YT8Bt or Android (Pocketcast or rss) – http://pca.st/1asA #therunsheet
People, mindset, relationships are at the very centre of everything we do.
You have to give the client what they want, but on the day, you’ve got to give them what they NEED.
The magical power of laughter.
‘If I can get you to laugh at me, you’ll like me better. If I can get you to laugh at a particular point I make, you acknowledge its truth’ John Cleese
Whether keynote speakers should do the same amount of pre-work as MCs.
The importance of improvisation skills (impro) for performers and ANYONE who needs to make quick decisions. In fact, Zara suggests we should have impro drop-in classes just like a yoga studio or gym. Visit www.impromelbourne.com.au and join a class in the meantime!
How to get into character when storytelling on stage. How important it is to FEEL the words you’re speaking / honor the language you are using.
Giving life to the PAUSE and all the magical ways you can use it.
We hear about the ‘kit bag’ of things we COULD do, and we’ll start with our script but pull things in from the kit bag if needed.
The different mindset needed for Keynote Speaking Vs MCing.
How to handle obstacles like floorplans, seating, AV. Before and DURING the event.
‘Vulnerability brings us together. We ADMIRE people who have it all together, but we RELATE to people who have a struggle and emotional range.’
Tips for overcoming nerves.
Eckhart Tolle : nervousness is selfishness. It isn’t about YOU. Your job is to make it about the AUDIENCE. When we share stories on stage, the goal is to awaken something in the audience. To entertain a new idea. You’re using your story as a context to evoke that response in an audience.
The magic formula for having your message stick. Why ‘delivering data’ is completely ineffective compared to using a story to give your point context.
Storytelling can assist to bypass judgement from the audience.
I put Zara and Troy on the spot for a bit of role play to demonstrate the difference between ‘delivering data’ and ‘using stories’. When they are doing this, FEEL the difference yourself.
Every time you become an explorer / an interviewer in your own life, you gain knowledge and you connect faster. The message lands quicker.
The value of using webinars to add value to your speaking negotiations.
How to handle the inevitable crash speakers face after the high-energy of a multi day conference and the importance of scheduling down time.
They are living proof you don’t always need a sophisticated Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn or website presence to have a successful business.
‘We just follow the leads’.
Zara says : Understand the responsibility of being on that stage. You can put people on a path to reinventing themselves and there’s a flow on effect in the world to that.
Troy says: Do your prep. Do your research but ALSO don’t be afraid to be in the moment.
Launching my podcast: The Run Sheet
Finally
Very happy to announce the launch of my long-planned podcast called The Run Sheet. I will take you behind the scenes of the conference and event industry, speaking with Speakers, MCs, venues, event planners, AV technicians, app developers, delegate experience providers and audiences.
To start, I have interviews with Jon Yeo of TedxMelbourne and Remo Guiffre of TedxSydney, followed by the incredible team from Humour Australia, Zara and Troy.
If you’re an Apple fan, subscribe via iTunes: https://itun.es/i6YT8Bt or Android (Pocketcast or rss) – http://pca.st/1asA #therunsheet
