Are Your Presentations Moving with the Times?

March 31, 2010 By 1 Comment

For the next few weeks, I’m focusing my posts on public speaking
because it’s key to changing the world. Today, I want to send you
over to an eye-opening video on YouTube that has, on the surface,
nothing to do with speaking–and yet nothing we do in any part of
our lives is exempt from the message contained in this video. 

The video tell us “We are living in exponential times“–and it
then proceeds to make its point: in 2006, there were 2.7 billion
Google searchs. Two years later, there were 31 billion!! Did you
read that right? In 1984 there were 1,000 internet devices. In
’92, there were 1 million. In ’08–1 trillion. Exponential times.

A company in Japan is testing a fiber optic cable that can send 
14 trillion bits of information per second down a single strand
of fiber…this is equal to 210 millon phone calls per second.

Ever heard for an exabyte? It’s (4 x10 ^19). Equal to 1 billion
gigabytes. It looks like this: 1,000,000,000,000,000,000. The
video estimated that in ’08, 4 exabytes of unique information
would be generated. More than in the previous 5,000 years.

We are living in exponential times. The world is humming at 
frequencies never known before. Obsolescence is occuring some-
where every second. With this mind-boggling upsurge in speed,
our brains are being rewired; we are thinking differently and 
learning differently. The brain is plastic; it changes and grows
and the way we integrated information twenty years ago in
high school doesn’t apply. And it doesn’t apply for those we’re
teaching and coaching.

Are your current attempts at knowledge-transfer (ie. your pre-
sentations) humming as fast as the rest of the world? Are they
provocative enough to capture the attention of minds fractured
by constant stumuli? Are they as new as the latest App? Are
the ideas you’re presenting “escaping the wannabees” and gener-
ating exponential growth?

Maybe those are high standards for a single presentation. But
I’m not one to wrap myself up in cozy excuses and I bet you
aren’t either.  I believe if we are worth our salt as leaders and as
conveyors of information, we must measure the quality of our
content against the pace of the world–and that of course, begins 
with the big-picture question, Is my business keeping up with
the breath-stealing acceleration of the times we’re in? If not,
what must I do? If so, how do I ensure my presentations do the
same?

I teach a “new paradigm”
of audience leadership–
but this video got me
asking the question,
How can it be even
newer? How can I speed
up what I’m teaching to
meet the frequency of the
world’s vibration?

I’m giving a free 90-minute teleclass on the “old paradigm” of
public speaking, and its replacement: the new paradigm based on
the latest brain research. I’m sending you away to watch the
YouTube video–but before you go, I invite you to sign up for the
teleclass on April 7th. It’s provocative and will shift how you think
about speaking in public You can read all about it here.

Then go check out the video I’ve talked about today, Did You Know?

Filed Under: Escaping the wanna bees Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Chris Daughtry Review: How to Give a Brain-Sticky Concert

March 25, 2010 By Leave a Comment

I love Chris Daughtry. I love that he triumphed magnificently
after being voted off of American Idol at number 5. That his debut
album was the fastest selling debut rock album in Soundscan his-
tory. That it has been certified 4 times platinum by RIAA and has
sold more than 5 million copies.

And I love his music—or should I say his first album. Every
single song rocks and, well, I’ve listened to them on my iPod so
many times, I honestly don’t know what was a hit single on the
radio and what wasn’t; they’re all hit songs to me.

It was with that great appreciation and admiration that I excitedly
took my seat at the Prudential Center Sunday night to see Daughtry
live. I write about my experience now because it so nicely parallels
the experience any of us has when we are in an audience, and gives
clues to what we need to do when we’re in front of an audience.

Granted, Daughtry is no Paul Rogers–my true rock idol and
THE rock legend, who knows precisely how to energize an audi-
ence and keep them energized, even when he’s singing new music.
But Daughtry should have known that he has to open with a song
that spikes endorphins in his audience, a crowd-pleaser that takes
the energy in the stadium from 0-60 in seconds. Paul started a
concert I saw two years ago with “Feel Like Making Love.” What
state of mind and spirit do you think that put his fans into,
hearing that song right out of the gate? Daughtry played a new
song—which, come on, let’s get real,the audience doesn’t want to
hear. Not yet. Those amazing chemicals released from our brains
that make us feel “high” and dizzy with excitement…weren’t
released And that is a  bad mistake. It sets the stage for what’s to come—and not come.
And it’s a mistake presenters make all the time.

I noticed, in spite of myself, that at the half-hour mark, I wasn’t
jumping up and down. In fact, I was sitting. In fact, most every-
one was sitting. Unless you’re watching Luciano Pavoratti, or
bluegrass or any other “listening music”—there is no worse sign
at a rock concert than an audience sitting down. It means
there’s not enough energy coursing through them to get to their
feet. Nothing impelling them to rise and move or clap or shout or
sing. It’s rare to see anyone singing passionately at a rock concert
while sitting down. No, we rise to our feet because the energy in
us is too big and powerful for the constrained sitting position. If
we’re reclining, our brains are, too. And that spells death for a
rock star (and presenter).

Why was everyone sitting? Because Daughtry was playing one
new song after another. And they’re mainly ballads—and not great
ones, at that. This is akin to giving a presentation in a flat monotone,
with nothing but Power Point, and referencing very little that is of
interest to us. Last week in the blog posts, I wrote about the brain’s
need for relevancy–what’s in it for me, and for emotion! Neither
was happening thirty-minutes into the concert. And then Chris
said something so true, and I’m wondering if he realized their mis-
take as it was unfolding (if you’re professional at all in front of a
group, you are masterful at measuring energy.) He said, “Let’s
get you guys back into familiarity.”

My brain jumped back to my blog post from last Friday, where
I talked about the brain’s need for familiarity. And low and
behold, as they started to play the very first notes of a song from
their first album, bodies began to rise instantly, instinctively. Soon,
the whole room was standing again because the familiarity of a
song they loved shot a cascade of feel-good chemicals from their
brain into their body and brought them to their feet because
sitting down was too small a feeling for what was burgeoning
within them. The band managed to keep us standing for a few
more songs, but then dropped the ball again. Lost their control
of the room’s energy. Like presenters do constantly.

This is something iconic Paul never does. Of course, he’s been
doing this forty years longer than Daughtry. But he knows
that alternating between old favorites and new ones keeps the
energy at a constant high. He also knows that the audience needs
to experience the biggest high of the night as they are walking
out. He knows he needs to build the energy to a crescendo in his
encores, until the last song he sings tips everyone over the edge.
The last song must be an all-time favorite—not one most of the
room doesn’t know.

Energy is what causes an audience to want more, tell
others about their experience, and come back for more.
If it dips for a few minutes, that’s understandable and it can be
saved. But if it dips more than once, you begin to lose your audi-
ence. Daughtry let it dip too often, and near the end, we all slid
off the cliff. Countless seats had been abandoned by the beginning
of his encore. Just as so many presentations, classrooms and
churches experience a mass exodus near the end.

Brain-Food for Thought: Do you manage the energy in your
presentations, so that your audience is feeling familiar with
your content but also energized by the content they’ve never
heard? Are you causing them to feel so they figuratively (and
literally!) “rise to their feet”? Or do they stay (figuratively and
literally) sedately in their seats because nothing you are saying
grabs at them, heart and soul, causing the chemicals of emotion
to burst through them?

If you want to hear more on this topic, be sure to sign up for my
upcoming 90-minute free teleclass on the new paradigm of public
speaking that “talks to the brains” of audiences. The next one is
April 7th. Click here to learn more.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Being Meaningful to Your Prospects’ Brains

March 19, 2010 By 1 Comment

Have you ever attempted to walk or ride your bike through
uncharted woods? You push your way through brambles, knock
aside branches, cross over fallen trees, mounds of twigs and pine
needles. How far do you get, ultimately? Unless you’re a diehard
explorer with intense motivation, you would typically give up
and turn around for more familiar ground. 

This is what your prospects and audiences do when your articulation
about your business’s value, or your delivery of your material in
a presentation, is vague, confusing and meaningless. Their
brains attempt to furrow through your words, but quickly give up
because it’s too much work. 

The brain is always looking to match stimuli coming in with
information that it already has stored in its neuronal circuits.
(This is called “pattern recognition”.) These “paths” in the brain
are checking out sensory stimuli to see if they’re familiar. If they
are, a match occurs, and we say, “Oh! That makes sense!” That
incoming stimuli has meaning to us. It’s akin to seeing a solid path
in the woods after going round and round in circles, aimlessly.

“Meaning” is the key factor in influencing whether the brain’s
attention is sustained or not. 

What if there’s no match? The brain will attend to the meaning-
less information for a short time because of what I wrote in Monday’s
post (novelty grabs attention), but if it can’t make sense of it, the
brain will turn around and give up. It will not process that stimuli
anymore. 

That’s when you see the eyes of your audience or prospect
glaze over. Sustained attention on something we can’t figure out
is boring and virtually impossible. Just like trying to plod your
way through a mess of trees and branches. And yet, this is what
presenters do to their audiences on a regular basis—and businesses
do in their communications. They lure their listeners into a mean-
ingless forest and ask them to work too hard to get their way out. 

The brain can’t reconstruct or reactivate a neural circuit if it was
never activated in the first place. You can’t run fast and effortlessly
through that forest if there isn’t a path there. You can’t expect someone
to understand you if they have no previous experience with what you’re
saying.

So how do you create meaning for your audiences or cus-
tomers? You need to know what paths are in their brain currently,
and activate those. Don’t start talking about things they’ve never
heard of or using jargon. I remember years and years ago, a friend
of mine kept referring to his weekly sessions with his “coach.” I had
no neuronal pathways already laid down in my brain for “coach.”
Or anything like “coach.” The word was meaningless and there-
fore, so was everything else he said about it. I couldn’t attend to his
comments, or process them. So, draw analogies to what you’re
presenting, or to your new business concept, that activate familiar
territory in the brains of your listeners. 

I always tell my clients to use words that “bring pictures” to the
mind. When you’re speaking vaguely, using airy, ungrounded
descriptions of what you do, putting forth concepts that bring no
pictures to mind, the brain is in the same situation: having to
work too hard to find pictures it already has and fitting them with
your wispy lanuguage. That’s when they turn around and go home. 

Our species has not survived by attending to and storing meaning-
less information. Make everything out of your mouth clear, visual
and most of all familiar to the person listening. Know your audience,
and parallel your new information to whatever they already know.
This requires  “empathy”—stepping into the neuronal circuits inside
their brain and walking a mile or two in them before you open your mouth.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

“Your Prospects’ Brains Need to Feel”

March 17, 2010 By Leave a Comment

It’s Brain-Awareness week, according to the Dana Foundation,
and as the Brain-Sticky Communications trainer, I’m honoring
the advancement of neuroscience this week with relevant
information for entrepreneurs–who have to grab the attention
of their prospects, or die.   

Brain Attention-Grabber #1 from Monday was “novelty.” Your
business must be different and new! Brain Attention-Grabber #2
was “relevancy”–your prospects need to know “what’s in it for them”
right from the start. And what’s Brain-Attention-Grabber #3? Emotion.

You must stir emotion in your prospects or die. The sooner
you do  it, the faster you grab their attention. But at any point that
you stir emotion, you begin the critical process of creating neuronal
connections in their brain (i.e. learning and processing begins),
which means they “get” you and remember you. “Emotion” and
“memory” are inexplicably tied.

 

This is Aunt Ug, our ancestor. She’s just rubbed 2 sticks together
and is rather excited about her new find and is running to tell her
tribe about it. The emotion she feels creates a cascade of hormones
that allows one brain cell to talk to another, or in other words,
allows learning to occur. 

If she observed the fire merely intellectually, stripped of emotion,
those hormones would not be released abundantly and the likelihood
that she would forget her world-changing invention 3 weeks later is 
increased many-fold. Emotion creates memory.   

Then she returns to her tribe, and because of mirror neurons in
their brains, her emotion is contagious. They feel what she’s feeling,
so as she explains how she created fire, her words are Brain-Sticky.
Neurotransmitters (those hormones) are released from one
neuron in their brain to the next, fusing the neurons
together and creating a pathway of learning and memory. 

Uncle Ug and all others in her tribe will remember how to make
fire because emotion sent critical chemicals through their body,
imbedding the lesson. 

You are “teaching” your prospects about your business
whenever you speak about it. They’re not going to remember
unless they’re FEELING something. The neurotransmitters just
won’t be released. 

How do you get them feeling? Start by feeling yourself! See Aunt Ug
up there? Imitate her! Be passionate about what you’ve got to offer.
Your emotion is (a scientific fact) contagious. If you’re passionate,
their brains will make them passionate–whether they want to be or not! 

Another key emotion to stir, of course, is pain. Your prospects will
be more interested in you if you solve their problems. So it’s your
job to get them connected to how they FEEL with their problem.
If only their intellect is stimulated–no emotion is attached –they won’t
remember that you are their solution. 

My favorite emotion to tap is inspiration and hope and I believe
it is one of the most Brain-Sticky emotions of all. It’s worked with my
prospects and clients time and time again. They feel my inspired,
impassioned promise and it gets transferred to them–and they
remember me and want more. 

Today’s Challenge: What emotions are you stirring in your
prospects? Are you speaking very “intellectually”–thus stimulating
only the intellect in them–thus releasing virtually none of those
Brain-Sticky hormones? Think about it. And share below! I’d love
to hear your experiences!

Filed Under: Uncategorized

“Your Prospects’ Brains Need to Know WIIFM’!”

March 17, 2010 By Leave a Comment

As I said yesterday, several attention-getting biological
mechanisms are built into the brain–one is motion (we
immediately attend to anything that moves.) The one I wrote
about yesterday was “novelty.” The brain automatically pays
attention to what’s new. Today, we’re addressing the third: relevancy.

The brain cares about one thing: survival. Survival of the
species, and survival of the body it inhabits. It’s incredibly
self-centered and wants to know–especially when learning
something new–what’s in it for me. If it doesn’t get an answer,
it tunes out and starts looking for something that’s relevant.
This is the #1 cause of boredom in classrooms and boardrooms
and presentations: listeners don’t know how the information
relates to them!

So, when you are talking about your business–don’t talk about
you. Your prospects’ brains are trolling for “what’s in it for them.”
Their brains are literally scanning for that information. If it
isn’t there instantly, that brain is going to attend to something else
in a nanosecond. Talk about them and the issues in their life.

As I said, this is the biggest mistake that presenters make.
They begin their presentations with a story, for instance, rather
than with something that either suggests the relevancy, or asks a
question that supports the relevancy. For instance, I once saw
Seth Godin begin a talk by saying, “I think I know what you
want.” And proceeded to tell us. He was right, of course, because
he knew his audience. We all settled in comfortably after that,
knowing what we were there for and that it’s what we wanted.

I teach the participants of my 2-day public speaking training
to ask a question that will enroll the audience, get nearly
100% of the room raising their hands right away. From the very
start. After all, their brains are sitting there with their arms folded
across their chests, waiting to find out why the heck they should
be sitting there when they have so much else to do.

If you want “raving-fan” clients, you’d better tell them why being
in the room with you is the most valuable use of their time.
Be sure the “relevancy” is very clear. And then, don’t stop! Through-
out the entire presentation, ask questions such as, “How can you use
what I just said?” to keep them constantly aware of how this benefits
them. Or ask consistently, “Is this helpful?” The mere answering of
that question keeps their brains alert.

So today’s challenge: Do you make it clear how you are relevant
to your listeners’ brains during your 30-second elevator pitch?
The video on your homepage? The text on your website? When
you’re giving a live presentation? Or are you slipping into your
own brain’s natural tendency toward self-absorption?

I’m giving a talk at a great university here in New Jersey tonight,
Seton Hall. I can’t wait to bring the new generation into a bold,
new style of “audience leadership”! The talk is nearly identical to
the free teleclass I’m giving this Thursday at noon. Check it out here.
It’s a paradigm-shifter.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Your Customer’s Brain Needs Your Business to Be Different

March 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Well, you need your business to be different–for your prospects
to pay attention and buy. Duh. But what’s the brain got to do with it?

Several attention-getting biological mechanisms are built
into the human brain, all having to do with survival. The first is
“motion.” The brain instantly is drawn to any movement. So, if
you can do a tap-dance while you give your 30-second elevator pitch,
you’re ahead of the game.

But the second is novelty. What is different and unexpected gets
the brain’s attention. According to Arnold Scheibel, director of the
Brain Research Institute at UCLA, “the brain stem has an area called
the reticular formation. It’s wired to respond selectively to the new
and exotic. This was a survival mechanism when we were on the
lookout for predators. Now, new challenges activate your reticular
formation and stimulate the growth of dendrites (strands that
connect the neurons).”

This automatic attending to what’s new is hard-wired in us.

Russell Poldrack is a neuroscientist and researcher at the University
of Texas at Austin and writes a blog for the Huffington Post. Last
October (on my birthday) he wrote a blog post about multi-tasking
and novelty.

“Novelty is probably one of the most powerful signals to determine
what we pay attention to in the world….Researchers have found
that novelty causes a number of brain systems to become activated,
and foremost among these is the dopamine system. This system,
which lives deep in the brain stem, sends the neurotransmitter
dopamine to locations across the brain…research has shown that
blocking dopamine in rats’ brains reduces the rats’ motivation,
turning them into rodent slackers.”

You can’t afford to have “buying slackers” for your business!
Dopamine needs to flow uninhibited in their brains–which will
only happen if your business is different, you speak about it
differently, you promote it differently, you look different, sound
different, go out on a limb, do what others are too afraid to do–in
other words, if you escape the wannabees!

You also need to be different when you’re delivering your world-
changing messages from the platform. Visionary entrepreneurs
love to speak for the most part (or at least recognize they need to
speak to grow their businesses)…but I have met very, very few
who give presentations and seminars that are “out of the box.”

For 3 years, I’ve made it my mission to banish mediocrity from
the stage–and for some who’ve attended my trainings, it’s a
challenge because it requires them to release very old, entrenched, 
and even lauded speaking styles. But the fact is, they have to stand
out from the crowd, rise above the din–no matter how
uncomfortable it might be at first. It’s especially necessary
because not only does novelty grab the attention of their audiences,
the “New Paradigm of Audience Leadership” accelerates learning
in the brain. So, I tell them, you need to overcome your discomfort
with “leaving the hive” because this new style gets results, it
stimulates neuronal growth in the brain–and that’s what you’re
there to do! That has to matter more than your own comfort.

To read more about The Brains of Your Audience, you can download
that report at my website, as well as The 10 Brain-Antagonistic Blunders
Businesses Make With Their Audiences. I’m also giving a free teleclass
this Thursday and April 7 on the New Paradigm of Audience leadership–
how to be NEW, attention-grabbing and EFFECTIVE with audiences,
based on the latest brain research.

Until then: here’s my question for the day–How is your business different
from everyone else who does what you do? And this one is harder–How is
it different from everyone else, period?

TOMORROW: The 2nd attention-grabbing mechanism wired into the brain… 

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Let the Games Begin! Thanks Bea Fields!

March 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment

So this is it. I’ve finally taken the plunge into the blogging world! And before I start writing anything of life-altering significance, I absolutely must acknowledge the person who has moved me out of procrastination on this, Bea Fields. I am almost finished with her uber-comprehensive, step-by-step 12-week blogging course. If I hadn’t heard of her from Louise Crooks, my blog template would still be suspended in cyberspace, collecting dust. If you can relate and want to jump on board her next 12-week Become a Blogging Maniac course (so reasonably priced your jaw will drop) that begins in April, then I highly recommend you go here and read more about it. Bea is sweet and patient. You’ll love her. Here’s a shout-out to you, Bea! I would never be here without you!

I am so excited to be launching my blog on the first day of Brain Awareness week! I am known as the “Brain-Sticky” Communication Trainer, who helps coaches and other visionary entrepreneurs “grab the attention of the brains” of their prospects. I am an avid student of neuroscience and am thrilled to be bringing you information about the brain this week–and how it relates to your business. For now, you can check out the festivities that are going on in the field of neuroscience this week right here.

I look forward to this exciting journey with you!

Filed Under: Uncategorized
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