• If everything I have done up until now was just the beginning – what is next?
• What ideally do I want my life to look like?
• What do I know I should be doing/pursuing but I just don’t have the time for?
• If I was to build my business all over again – what would I change or what would I do differently?

 
What you have done or what has happened in the past – is just that – the past! 
Growing a business is about using the past as your foundation but looking forward to new possibilities and new opportunities.
 
Your current ideas and efforts have brought you to where you are today, but if you want to produce bigger/better results or even just stop working so hard and have some time off – you need to start thinking differently & ask yourself different questions.
 
Make 2012 a great year – Your Year!  Adopt a different approach!

If you have done any speaking before, or are just starting out,  it is important for you to realise that that there is more than one type of speech or presentation to an audience.  You need to figure out which category you naturally all into and which type of speech suits your personality and you are prepared to do.

So, what are the different formats?

The first is probably the one that you will use the most.  The Business Presentation.

In this type of speech your objective is to persuade.  You want people to either buy your products from the back of the room after the speech or you want them to buy into the idea or service that you are putting forward.  To ensure a successful business presentation you want to follow a logical sequence.  The introduction, where you set up the scope of your speech.  The body of the speech where you deliver benefit statements and perhaps provide a compelling argument in favour of your solution.  Then the conculusion, where you will summarise your main points and then deliver a “call to action”.  Simple but very effective if done well.

The Product Demonstration is the practical rather than theoretical version of the business presentation.  Here you would illustrate and highlight your benefits by actually showing the features and benefits of your product.  If you can design this sort of speech to include a tactile element, it is then possible to engage more than just “listening” and it can be extremely effective.  It is a great way to show existing customers updated or new products and also in winning new clients.

If you are comfortable as a public speaker then often you will be asked to present a Lecture, Seminar or Training programme to a group.  In this situation people expect lots of detailed information on a given topic.  In some ways this format is slightly easier as you can digress and range through the topic, but it does require extra skills in facilitation.  The longer the session you are delivering the more preparation you have to do in terms of ways to keep your audience engaged and focused.

The fourth type of speech you may be asked to do is the Keynote Speech.  This is the hardest type of speech to present and professional speakers often make a living out of delivering one GREAT Keynote Speech, so that should five you some indication of just how good you need to be.  For a keynote speech you generally have an hour or less and you will need to either entertain or inspire the people in your audience.  You will need to present high content information and you can use stores, anecdotes, jokes, even prop’s or slides but they have to be purposefull and well thought out.  Keynote speakers start strong, keep the interest high and end with a powerful closing statement.  They plan and execute their speech for maximum effort and impact …… that is why they get paid so well.

So ……. What type of speaker should YOU be?

When you get asked to speak it is important that you know what sort of speech you are being asked to deliver so you know what to say “yes” to and which jobs to turn down.  You may never want to deliver a keynote address – and that is OK – besides there are far more opportunities available for the other types of speeches.

If you do aspire to become a keynote speaker, remember that you need to grow into the role …. It comes with experience and above all practice.

Good speakers will tell you that having butterflies is a good sign.  By this they mean that you haven’t become complacent or blasé and that because of that you will probably deliver a better speech.  The trick they assure us is to “get the butterflies swimming in formation”!

So ….. how do we learn to keep our nerves under control?  I think it is important to realise that nervousness seldom comes from not knowing your topic well enough.  It comes rather from the “thought” of actually presenting it to a group of people.  It is more about the fear of the unknown than anything else. 

Here are my four recommendations to help control your nerves.

1. Practice.  As we just stated most of our fears come from the “unknown” factor …. What if something goes wrong with my presentation.  What if I forget what I was saying?  What if? …… what if?  The best way to control this sort of thinking is simply to put some more practice in and don’t modify your speech too much.  You could also get someone to give you a prompt & practice starting your speech from different places within your speech.  If you can do that – you will be fine – it is then just a matter of giving yourself a mental pep-talk just before your speech.
2. Breathe.  When you are nervous, your breathing becomes more rapid and more shallow.  In some ways this physical response re-inforces your nervousness and can even intensify the symptoms.  This is how people get full blown anxiety attacks and hyperventilate.  If you think of it this way, then it is logical that you need to slow your breathing down.  The simple act of “focusing” on your breath and consciously slowing it down by taking deep, regular breaths automatically makes you feel calmer and more relaxed.  You could even build this into a routine that you follow before you get up to speak.  Deepen your breaths and feel the power and the confidence that it gives you.
3. Smile.  Once again nervous tension evidences itself in physical symptoms.  Your mouth is dry, you could lick or purse your lips, and even clench your jaw or teeth together.  This tension can cause havoc with our vocal cords when we start to speak, making our voice a little tight and squeaky or make you feel that you have a frog in your throat.  The easiest way to release this tension is a great big beaming smile.  This will not only let the audience warm to you immediately and relax them …. Some may even smile back.  It will work to release the tension in your throat and neck and allow you to start to speak with certainty and projection right from your opening words. 
4. Change your Body Language.  When we are nervous we hold the tension in our body as well.  We may fiddle with our fingers, clasp them tight or jiggle our legs.  You may tend to hunch your shoulders and lean forward a little, almost trying to curl your body into the nice, safe “foetal” position.  Needless to say, none of this presents a confident picture to the world.  The good news is that we can fool our bodies, just by changing the way we are sitting or standing.  If we simply stand up straight and tall, shoulders back and head held high you will instantly feel better and the difference in the picture you present to the world is 100%.

So, to banish your fears or at least start to control them, a combination of all 4 techniques WILL work for you.  Practice your speech, take deep regular breaths, greet your audience with a wide, beaming, genuine smile and walk tall, proud and confident to the podium!

You CAN master those butterflies and then you will “knock their socks off” with your next speech.

Just incase they lose their way …… just in case they forget what they planned to talk about next.  Nerves can play havoc with our mental faculties, so they look for something to use as their “security blanket”.  This is something that budding speakers need to work hard to eradicate.  Hugging the lecturn is considered a “cardinal sin” by seasoned or professional speakers.

One of the other “cardinal sins” often committed by presenters is that of “death by power point”.

I can almost guarantee that at some stage you have sat through a BORING presentation when the presenter has simply parroted exactly what is written on the power point screen behind them.  The power point presentation has simply become their version of their “security blanket”, their guarantee that they won’t lose their place and stumble over their speech.

The problem with this type of presentation is two-fold.

The first issue is that people read 3-4 times faster than you normally speak.  This means that as soon as the slide appears on the screen the audience starts to read the information provided.  They are finished all the points by the time you have finished the first one!  They are then sitting there bored and impatient while in their mind – you laboriously work your way through the other points on your slide.

The second downside to this “death by powerpoint” is that you “lose” your audience’s attention.  Instead of you becoming the topic expert – engaging and impressing with your wealth of knowledge the slides behind you become the “expert” imparting the knowledge.  You simply become the person slowing down the process.  In the audience’s eyes you simply become the “presenter” not the originator of the knowledge – as weird as this sounds.

I know that this distinction may seem irrelevant to you but in reality it could mean the difference between thousands of Rands/Dollars/Pounds in business and no business at all!

Does this mean that powerpoint is inherently bad to us with an audience?  No, not at all.  It should however only contain key words or phrases; clever acronyms that people may want to remember or write down; photo’s or quotations.  Your whole speech does not need to appear on them.

Remember, the reason for creating your speech in the first case is to become the recognized “expert”.  This is your chance to showcase your expertise to your audience.  To do this you should:

1. Choose your topic carefully.
2. Write, learn and practice it until you are completely comfortable with the material.
3. Design your slides carefully as intelligent and interesting prompts that enhance not detract from what you are saying.
4. Polish, refine and reap the benefits!

We simply “know” that he must be born to do this. He must find it easy as he is just so eloquent and polished. The reality is probably the complete opposite of what we believe.

Talent is not what you think it is and the reality is that you can accomplish all manner of things that you wouldn’t believe possible. In 1991 Anders Ericsson a Psychologist and two collegues conducted the most extensive investigation ever undertaken into the causes of outstanding performance. The results were just short of astounding!

They discovered that in fact “purposeful practice” was the ONLY factor that distinguished the best in their field from all the rest! There were NO exceptions to this pattern. No-one managed to reach the elite group without copious practice, and no-one who had worked their socks off EVER failed to excel!

This was a huge paradigm shift in the way excellence was understood. The bottom line is that it is practice and not talent that ultimately matters. This is great news for you and I because it means that if we put effort and energy into practicing our skills as a public speaker, we CAN become as polished as the professionals that we see on the stage delivering a great key note address.

When you interview any professional speaker and ask them for an estimation of how much practice they put into a new speech, you would be amazed. On average professional speakers spend about 1 hour practicing for every 5 minutes of their speech.

They spend this time perfecting the timing, the delivery, making the flow of the speech seem effortless. This equates to a massive 30 hours of practice for one 60 minute speech on stage.

Is it any wonder that they are good? Is it any wonder that the presentation seems effortless and natural? They have put the time in beforehand making absolutely sure that it is good. That is why a professional speaker will often keep the same keynote address, sometimes even for years with just a few minor changes to keep it interesting. Let’s face it – you wouldn’t want to have to do that sort of practice every month for a different audience.

How much time did you spend preparing for your last speech that you gave? The odds are that you gave more attention to your powerpoint slides than you did to your actual speech delivery.

Take a leaf out of the professionals book and spend more time preparing your performance and delivery on stage. Use purposeful practice to hone your skills and you will see the results in your performance. As your skill level rises, so will your reputation and the number of bookings that come your way.

Practice enough and who knows, you could be the next paid professional speaker on the block!

Now that you have decided to get in front of an audience and speak, the first obstacle that comes up is:

“How do I choose what to speak about?”

If you are like most industry experts – there is simply SO much that you could talk about.  How do you narrow it down?  How do you make it interesting and leave room for future speeches to the same audience?

Below is one technique for deciding what to speak about – using a few simple questions.

What is it that you find exciting about your topic?

What is it that you are most passionate about?

What do you think people need to know about your topic or area of expertise? 

Pick one of the questions above and use it to get your creative juices flowing.  Come up with an initial list of ideas.  It is important at this stage not to censor yourself and worry about “how” you could present it or even “if” there is enough information for a talk.  Just jot down ideas as they come to you.

Next run each idea through a filter.  Take each idea in turn and see which one o combination of ideas fit into the sentence below.

“My name is X, and I’m passionate about XYZ because ………..”

Once you find the one that “fits” easily into that sentence BINGO! You will have your very first topic for your very first speech!

You will find that “coming up with your topic” is actually the hard part of the process.  Once that is done then the rest of your talk should fall into place quite easily.

The benefit of using this technique in the beginning is that you are building the talk around your passion.  As you start to talk people will see your passion and enthusiasm shine through.  So – even if your speech is not the best speech in the world …… even if in the beginning you are not even a great public speaker ……. the fact that you are authentic and speaking with passion you will carry your audience along with you.

Your results may even surprise you!

Public speaking is no exception to this rule.  The question however is ….. to join or not to join?  Do you commit your hard earned cash to becoming a member of an association and what are the benefits?  On the whole I would say that the benefits of joining generally outweigh the financial cost of the membership, but lets go through a few of the common benefits so you can make your own mind up.

1. Credibility.

The first benefit of belonging to your industry association is that it brings instant credibility.  It doesn’t matter if you have been in business for 1 month or 10 years, becoming a member immediately levels the playing field.  This is the outward sign to the world and to the others in your industry that you are serious about what you do.  That you are a professional and that anyone who hires you will be assured of a certain minimum level of performance.  Would you rather hire a kitchen installer that was a member of the Kitchen Association or one that wasn’t? 

2. Industry Standards, Benchmarks & Ongoing Training.

Any decent association should to continue to educate its members and that in itself is a good reason for being part of an association.  Simply keeping up to date with new trends in the industry, new tools available or new methods takes up a lot of time that you don’t often have.  If someone else can do it for you and simply keep you updated from time to time – that is a real bonus!  You should also be able to get information like pricing structures used, samples of contracts and even access to industry best practices.  A commitment to on-going training should be the benchmark for any good association.

3. Promotion.

Most associations will provide a directory of their members.  This means that even if you don’t have your own company web site, you can have an easily searchable web presence.  If you do have your own web site then the benefits double.  Your industry specific listing provides an extra way for you to be found and a way for you to drive more traffic to your own site.  Search engines like google just love these sort of links and it can mean higher page rankings for you site and increased traffic and business.

4. Free Marketing.

Imagine if you were looking for a speaker for your next corporate function.  Would you rather spend days trawling the internet, following links and reading through web sites to find someone?  Or, would you rather visit one industry specific website that advertises all its members in one place and even provided a search facility to help you identify the people that speak on the topic you were looking for?  The association spends it’s time marketing and driving traffic to its site.  It’s job is to promote the wealth of talent that it’s members possess.  That is it’s reason for existing …. And one less job that you have to do yourself if you are a member.

These four points above are just some of the reasons that you should consider affiliating yourself to or joining your industry specific association and paying the small monthly fees that they charge.

The trick is to make sure that you use your membership to your advantage.  Put the association logo on all your business literature, make use of the training that they provide and create a great profile on their site.  Give them the best chance of doing a great job of promoting you and your expertise to the world.

So …… to join or not to join ….. what do you think?

From a speakers point of view it is a really easy and simple way of staying in touch with a large number of people.  You get the opportunity to show them on a regular, even daily basis that you have something interesting, unique and valuable to say.

At every talk you do, you should be encouraging people to link with you or follow you and you will be amazed and gratified to see how many actually do.  Social media is the perfect platform for staying “top of mind” with people.  It is a great tool that allows you to engage in a dialogue with potential clients, build connections and develop trust based relationships over time.

Just recently there has been a plethora of social platforms that you can belong to and take part in.  They all have their own following and “profile” in the market.  Each of them will attract a different segment of the market and a different type of person.  Below is an overview of three of the most popular that you might want to consider.

• Facebook.

 Facebook used to be more about home and family use but currently is becoming more business orientated and more and more “business pages” are being created on the platform.  It allows for a rich and dynamic conversation and easy community building.  If you are speaking to a customer base that is women/home/lifestyle/children/life stories/relationship based then this would be a great platform for you to use.

•  Linked In.

This is probably my personal favourite social network as it is all about business to business.  It is relatively easy to build a netowork and its usage seems to be growing each and every month.  If you speak on business topics and your target audience is either small business or corporates, then this is an arena you should be using.  It has easy integration with blog’s so you can showcase any articles you write on your profile as well.  You also have the ability to post events and advertise them to your following for free and once you get going it is easy to add people to your network.

• Twitter.

 Not everyone understands twitter or what to use it for.  You should think about twitter as sending SMS’s out to your tribe several times a day and you can push interesting information to your potential clients using this medium.  They can communicate with you as well, but it is not easy to have a deep conversation in 140 characters or less!  It is a good community for building a client base that thrives on information and want lots of titbits on a regular basis.  Dell computers have used this platform very successfully to rocket the sales of their 2^nd hand laptops for example with all their employees tasked with each tweeting several times a day.  Use it if you love it and will spend time on it and it will bring you rewards.

 Whichever social platform you decide to use, remember the rules for being social.

It is not about selling, selling, selling.  Engage with your tribe, give them things of value and tit bits and tips they can use and share.  Post interesting and perhaps even amusing material on a regular basis. 

 Build those relationships and develop trust ……. Relationships mean money in the bank.

In my experience there are 4 main reasons why people join a networking group.

1. They are a startup business.  Most of this group of people are desperate for new business.  They have an idea, a passion and have just started up their new business.  They have more time than clients and they want to join a networking group to get new clients FAST!  A lot of times they are operating out of desperation.
2. They want to build their business.  This group are generally more established and have a steady customer base.  They join a networking group because they want to tap into other peoples customer base and even get direct referrals.  Their aim is to get a steady stream of clients or business slowly.
3. A third group join a networking group simply because they feel lonely and isolated.  They operate a one-man business and work from home and just lack the interaction on a daily/weekly basis with people.
4. The fourth group joins a networking group because they like the camaraderie and the motivation that comes from belonging to a group.  They love the new ideas that are discussed and seeing everyone grow and develop within the group.

Four completely different reasons for belonging to a group and paying a monthly membership fee, but all the reasons are valid for the person who joins.  They get exactly what they want from the group.

What about speakers groups?  Well the same sort of thing applies here – there are lots of different reasons for joining a group like I.S.P.A.  Some of the most common are listed here for you.

1. Some people want to become speakers so that they can simply build their list.  They want to collect the information from everyone who attends so they can send them information after the talk and can stay in touch with them and at a later stage introduce them to the products and the services they provide. 
2. Some people are tired of being the best kept secret in their industry and want to use speaking as a way of becoming visable in their home town or beyond.  They want to raise their credibility and their profile and become top of mind when someone is looking for their skills.  They use speaking to demonstrate their expertise and their knowledge base.  There is no point in being the best coach, chiropractor or interior decorator if no-one knows about you.
3. Some people speak so that they can promote a specific service or product that they offer.  They may use the speaking opportunity to educate their audience about a new product, new direction, new technique.  Their speech will be cleverly crafted to be a mixture of valuable information and an “offer” to the people in the room.
4. Some people want to use speaking to generate book sales.  These days a lot of authors are self-publishing, and even the ones that aren’t need to do a lot of promotion themselves to make it worthwhile.  They will use speaking to give you a “taste” of their book and then have it for sale afterwards in the back of the room or on their web site.

People join organizations and associations for many different reasons.  If you want to join for the sense of affiliation and access to others experience and learning opportunities – welcome.

If however you want to build your reputation as a speaker – then have a look at the 4 categories above and decide which one you fall into and adjust your speech and your approach accordingly.

Then you really should be using Public Speaking as your marketing tool!

Public speaking and positioning yourself as a Topic Expert is possibly the quickest and most effective shortcut to position yourself as an expert in your industry.  I can tell you that it certainly helped me to build my coaching practice over the past 12 years.

Why is it such as great marketing tool?  Well …….. think about all the time that it takes you to find 5 new clients.  The phone calls, the emails, the time sitting face-to-face promoting your business, the follow-up’s etc.

Now imagine a different scenario.  Simply putting the word out that you will be sharing information about your speciality – your area of expertise.  A hundred people – who live and work locally – pitch up to hear you talk.  You have ½ hour to talk about your area of expertise and answer a few questions at the end.  How easy is that!  You have just impressed 100 people with your knowledge and immediately become the go-to expert in their eyes.

So …… how many of them do you think may eventually become your clients?  Or – how many other opportunities could arise from that one simple talk?  It is like doing your whole month’s marketing in the space of just 1 hour.  If you have done a good job, there should be people ready to come and chat with you further after the speech.  Ready and pre-disposed to do business with you.  Wouldn’t that be great!

Now imagine doing that on a regular basis.  No more chasing clients …. Just a short talk to a group of interested people …… then follow-up the leads that arise.

Just think of the clients that may also come to you later, even a year or so later.  They heard you talk, kept your business card or your information that you gave away at the event – just wating for the moment when they were ready and able to hire you.

So ……. If you want to become know in your Industry, want to become a “star” in your industry and build your business massively this year….. then public speaking is the way to go!

 What are you waiting for?  Make it part of your marketing this year.