Powerful Pointy Presentations

What if you were selected for the part of Henry V and had to give the  monolgue before the battle of Agincourt – it’s only 273 words – you could wing it. Right?

Or what if the Parents and Citizens’ Association of your child’s school decided to put on a fund raising concert and asked you to sing “Over the Rainbow”. You could wing it. Right?

And finally, what if your boss said, “We need to do a sales presentation to Acme Widgets.” You could wing it. Right?

Most people would baulk at winging the first two, but probably feel comfortable with the last. Here’s my postulation.

If you performed badly in the first two, it would be very obvious to all in the audience. They could forgive you and empathise with you for nerves, but they would be scathing in their criticism if you got it very wrong and showed a complete lack of preparation, or if you read it out from a prepared sheet. (I have a recurring nightmare where I am called in for a stage play at the last minute and have to read the lines from a book). Most people wouldn’t want to embarrass themselves, so they would put the effort into being as well prepared as possible.

Yet the same doesn’t always hold true in PowerPoint presentations. A lot of people are happy to just get the slide deck out, make a few mods, add a few dot points, happily turn up to an unfamiliar environment and pitch away.

The current Australian election campaign shows that most people have a finely tuned BS meter, a finely tuned avoidance meter and a finely tuned sincerity meter. So if you turn up to a presentation unrehearsed, people will sense it quickly and you ought to be embarrassed if you’re relying on the comfort of your dot point doona to protect you. It won’t work.

Click here for pdf

I was inspired to put this worksheet together from a discussion thread on linekdin. to quote the thread owner Tony Robinson Sales trainer, coach and consultant ;

What is it that you really sell?

Some years ago a Harley Davidson marketing executive, when asked this question, famously said..”what we sell is the ability for a 43 year old accountant to dress in black leather and ride into small towns and have people be afraid of him.”

Harley Davidson don’t sell motorcycles….they sell dreams and lifestyle…and they have been very successful at that!

Similary shovel salespersons sell holes, not shovels, so what is it you are really selling the customer?

You can clarify your offer using the worksheet. Start from the left column, your product, service or solution, plus the features and benefits you think th ecustomer may be interested in- no surprises there, it’s what most sales people have been trained to do.

Then go to the customer’s side. What is their situation? How can they gain pleasure or avoid pain or both- the two drivers for purchasing.

For example, why would anyone buy an Armani suit? They’re very expensive and made of ultrafine marino woolen fabric that wears faster than a more sturdy suit. One reason may be to gain pleasure – to have a feeling of lightness, revelling in the craftsmaship of a finely woven garment that others can’t afford. Another reason may be to avoid pain, the pain of humiliation as your merchant banker friends snigger behind your back at your lack of big city savvy.

It’s the alignment of your product benefits to the cusotmer’s pain or pleasure that helps the sales process, so it deserves some thinking time. Column 3. Then you need to decide how you are going to present it.

I hope the worksheet helps. I’m going to use it in my next Sales 101 course – thanks for the inspiration, Tony

So you’re thinking, what the hell – do you want me to sing my powerpoint presentation? Maybe yes, if you want it to be memorable, but then again it could be memorable for all the wrong reasons.

Singer and bands drag themselves above the plethora of also-rans by rehearsal: constant practice of every intro, outro, lick, riff, harmony, pause, feel against a backdrop of light and shade. It’s a long way to the top if you wanna rock’n’roll.

Tourist in NY: How do you get to Carnegie Hall?

Taxi Driver: Practice, practice, practice

^Emulate singers and bands – practice every nuance of your presentation.

Songs can transfix us in time – first love, being with friends, travelling overseas. They are a strong and powerful influence. One technique songwriters use is to incorporate musical and lyrical hooks.

Musical hooks are generally called “riffs”, a repeated musical phrase that form the essence of a song. Think of the major riffs from:

• Queen – We Will rock you : just drums
• AC/DC – Long Way to the Top: ronka ronka guitar chords
• Guns’n’Roses –Sweet Child of Mine: Rolling Stones Magazine’s best guitar riff of all times
• The Knack – My Sharona:  drums and bass

Because they’re repeated so often they become embedded in our minds. Repetition is important to the success of a song.

Similarly with lyrical hooks – repeated words you can’t get out of your mind from the beautiful to the banal:

• And I will always love you
• Simply the best, better than all the rest
• I get knocked down, I get up again
• I shot the sheriff (note the alliteration)

^Use hooks like repeated phrases or questions in your presentation to keep your audience engaged.

Most popular songs are relatively simple: simple in their message, simple in their communication and simple in their structure. Also each word is precious. The words in a song are required to convey complex emotions (or not) in a very short space. Don’t use superfluous words and keep your presentation structure simple. Don’t confuse your audience.

^Keep it Simple

A successful song not only has a subject, but also an angle or a theme. For instance the brilliant Dolly Parton Song “I Will Always Love You”, made famous by Whitney Houston has as its subject breaking up, the theme being the title of the song. Imagine the song without the theme lines. It would tell the story, but not be anywhere near as powerful.

^Consider a theme for your presentation to bring it to life.

Summary:

• Rehearse
• Find hooks to engage your audience
• Use repetition
• Keep it Simple
• Develop a theme

My presentation friend David Upton introduced me to this concept.

If it’s bleedingly obvious what the picture is, don’t put a caption on it, the audience will think you’re doubting their intelligence.

Here’s an example:

There is plenty of good information on how to apply captions here

Radio announcers use stories to unleash what’s called the “Theatre of the mind” , creating pictures in the minds of the listeners, and emotions in their hearts. They have no visual props, no PowerPoint, no video,  but they can still create the effect with just a microphone and their voice.

Orson Welles, was so good at communicating with the audience and creating the theatre of the mind, that he set a nation into panic , in 1938, with War of the Worlds, where he presented HG Welles’ novel as a simulated news broadcast. People ran into the streets with wet towels as makeshift gas masks to protect against the poison gas the radio said was headed toward them. Many were convinced it was the end of the world.

From wikipedia:

War of the Worlds

Orson Welles

Their October 30 1938 broadcast, H. G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds, brought Welles notoriety and instant fame on both a national and international level. The mixture of news bulletin format with the between-breaks dial spinning habits of listeners from the rival and far more popular Edgar Bergen/Charlie McCarthy program, created widespread confusion among late tuners. Panic spread among many listeners who believed the news reports of an actual Martian invasion. The resulting panic was duly reported around the world and disparagingly mentioned by Adolf Hitler in a public speech a few months later.Welles’s growing fame soon drew Hollywood offers, lures which the independent-minded Welles resisted at first. However, The Mercury Theatre on the Air, which had been a “sustaining show” (without sponsorship) was picked up by Campbell Soup and renamed The Campbell Playhouse.

You can download a copy of the broadcast here PS. It’s just audio.

There are lots of articles on the power of stories, because they are a powerful tool for keeping your audience engaged. They engage the listener’s mind, recreating scenes in their heads, and each will have a different picture. Ask a few of your friends what they think the Three Bears’ house looks like, inside and out, and you’ll be surprised at the different responses. Individuals create their own theatre images.

Stories should be appropriate for the topic, preferably from your own experience, short, and original. Use them to introduce or illustrate a topic.

Create the “theatre of the mind” in your audience.