10 Habits of Highly Successful Presenters

The following article is by Craig Valentine, the 1999 World Champion of Public Speaking.

10 Habits of Highly Successful Presenters

 1. Storytelling – Being able to tell a story and make a point is at the heart of public speaking. World Class Speakers become World Class storytellers by mastering the elements of storytelling and including them in every speech. Read more about the power of stories here

2. Selling – Every presentation is selling something whether it is an idea, product, service, or simply selling your audience on the benefit of listening to your message. Make sure you sell the benefits - i.e. how will the audience benefit by listening to you?

3. Process-Driven – Instead of building themselves up, World Class Speakers build up the processes (or formulas or systems) that will improve the condition of their audience members. For example, if you're giving a workshop about public speaking, instead of boasting about your speaking accomplishments, boast about the process that got you there. In this case, you might say "The system you you are about to learn today helped me become a confident speaker, and it can help you become a powerful speaker too"

4. Next Steps – World Class Speakers have a definite next step they want their audiences to take immediately following their presentation. They build their entire speech around getting their audiences to take that specific next step. Always include a specific next step that you want the audience to take.

5. Anchor-Driven – World Class Speakers realize that “what’s loose is lost” and the best way to tighten their presentations is by using various anchors (i.e. stories, analogies, acronyms, activities, videos, etc.) to make their points memorable.  

6. Begin with a Bang – World Class Speakers understand the importance of the first 30 seconds of any presentation and they constantly open with a bang.

7. Succinct – World Class Speakers realize that squeezing their information in squeezes their audience out. As a result, they never try to fit in too much information into one speech.  

8. You-focused – World Class Speakers know that it is never about what they give but always about what the audience gets. Therefore, instead of saying, “I would like to share with you…” they say, “You’re about to receive…” The focus is always on “you” (the audience).

9. Dynamic – World Class Speakers use dynamic delivery skills that keep audiences engaged, energized, and wanting more.

10. Involvement – World Class Speakers constantly get and keep their audiences involved from the beginning to the end of their presentations. They realize that people buy into what they help create and making their audience part of the process helps to sell their message.  Learn more about how the lack of audience involvement can make your presentation boring by clicking here

Final Note:

When you work on these competencies, these competencies will work on you.

About the Author
Craig Valentine is the 1999 World Champion of Public Speaking. You can take advantage of his wealth of public speaking resources on http://www.craigvalentine.com/

Foolproof Formula for Powerful Presentations

Here's a powerful public speaking 'formula' that I picked up from Craig Valentine's book, World Class Speaking. If need to deliver an important presentation, and one which 'sticks' in your listeners minds long after you've finished speaking, then use the PARTS formula - Point, Anchor, Reflection, Technique, Sale. Let's have a look at each of the elements in turn...

Point:

Give the main point/message of the speech/presentation. Boil your entire speech down to just one main point by asking yourself the following question, "If my audience was to remember only one thing I'd said today, then what would I want them to remember?" Find your most important point and state it explicitly.

Anchor:

After giving your main point, you need to "tie it down" with an anchor? "What's an anchor?" I can hear you asking. An anchor is basically a tool which will hook the Point into the listener's memory. There are four anchors that you can use. You don't need to use all of these, but make sure that you use at least one:

• Anecdote - Tell a story that illustrates your main point. A well-told story acts like a memorable testimonial. Checkout more about the power of stories in this post (click here)

• Activity - If you can create some sort of quick game/role-playing activity that will solidify your point, then be sure to include it. Just make sure that the purpose of the activity is clear to everyone.

• Acronym - Acronyms are a useful memory tool. For example, the acronym PARTS will you help you remember the public speaking formula you're learning here (Point, Anchor, Reflection, Technique, Sale)

• Analogy - Here's an example of an analogy from the book The Mars and Venus Diet and Exercise Solution by John Gray

Think of your body as an old-fashioned steam engine. You need to feed the fire with coal. When there is no coal available, the stoker slows down so that all the available fuel is not consumed. Likewise, your metabolism slows down for the rest of the day when you don’t eat breakfast.”

Reflection

After anchoring your point, you want to get the audience to reflect on the point you just made by asking them a question. Here's an example from Craig Valentine.


In one of his speeches, he talks about the power of visualization. Specifically, he talks about how he mentally stepped on the stage at least a 1000 times before he ever became a champion. To get the audience to reflect on his point, he asked the question,

"What stage are you stepping on mentally at least 1000 times?". After asking the question, allow for enough silence for them to be able to answer the question in their own minds.

Technique

If you can, then give the audience a technique that they can use to apply your main point. For example, if you're giving a speech about the importance of time-management, then you would want to make sure that you're audience can apply your point by giving them this technique: "Before you go to bed each night, take a pen and a piece of paper and write down all the things you need to accomplish the next day. List all the tasks according to importance, and when you wake up in the morning, start with the most important one first"

Sale

Finally, you've made your Point, you've Anchored it down, you've got them to Reflect, you've given them a Technique, and now you need to Sell the benefits. Remind the audience in just a few sentences the benefits they will receive from applying the technique you've just given them. Carrying on from the time-management principle above, you can say something along the lines of: "If you manage your time well by applying these techniques, then you will be more productive, experience less stress, and lead a happier life overall".

P.S. It's my birthday today! Go ahead and Share this post because it'll make me happy ;)
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Use Dialogue, Not Narration

by Craig Valentine, 1999 World Champion of Public Speaking




By far the most common mistake speakers make with their stories is having too much narration and not enough dialogue. For example, they’ll say something like the following:


“And the principal threw me out of the school and told me never to come back.” Now that’s narration. However, dialogue would go something like this:


“And the principal looked me directly in the eyes and said, ‘Mr. Valentine, you are expelled. Don’t ever step a foot back into this building.’” That’s dialogue.




3 Types of Dialogue:

Dialogue between Characters

The key to using dialogue in between characters is to set up the dialogue with a bit of narration. For example, the narration part was “I was so upset about this I called my friend Steve and I said…” That narration set up the dialogue of “Steve, you’re positive. Tell me something…". 

The other key to using dialogue between characters is to make sure we know which character is talking. To do this, you can put the recipient’s name in the line of dialogue (i.e. “Steve, tell me something…)

Inner Dialogue

Whereas dialogue between characters brings your audience into a scene, inner dialogue does something even greater. It brings your audience into your character’s mind. The key to using inner dialogue is to avoid the phrase “I thought to myself…” Whenever I hear someone use that phrase, I ask, “Well, who else are you going to think to?” Just say, “I thought…” or “I’m thinking…” Please remember that reactions tell the story

 

Audience Dialogue

This is one of the most important yet most neglected tools you can use as a speaker. Give the audience dialogue. This simply means, verbalize their thoughts in dialogue form:
For example, you might tell what seems like a crazy story and then say, “You’re probably saying, ‘Craig, that’s crazy!’”


Some of the phrases you can use to give your audience dialogue are the following:

• You’re looking at me as if to say, “Scott…(dialogue)”
• Now you might say, “Janet…(dialogue)”
• You say, “Craig…(dialogue)”

 

3 Staging Strategies to Help Your Audience Really SEE Your Speech

3 Staging Strategies to Help Your Audience Really SEE Your Speech
by Craig Valentine
http://www.craigvalentine.com/blog/

1. Let the action prompt your movements

The action in your story prompts your movement on stage. Let the action drive. If you’re telling a story about standing in line, guess what? You shouldn’t move much. In the video,  I let the action drive. When I said, “You should have been with my wife and me 7 years ago as we took our 6 month old daughter Tori to her doctor’s appointment,” you saw me physically walking into the doctor’s office. When I talked about me walking over the scale to step on it, you saw me physically walk over the where the scale was represented on stage and you saw me stand on it. It’s not enough to say it, I also had to show it.

2. Let Time Prompt your Movement on Stage

All stories involve the element of time, which means you can use the imaginary timeline on stage for greater impact. In North America we read a timeline from the left to the right. Therefore, imagine how I might move when giving this part of my speech:

Now fast-forward 10 years to today…2010. My re-hire rate has now reached above 93%.

When I say the phrase “Fast forward 10 years to today,” I physically walk from my audience’s left up the timeline to my audience’s right to symbolize the difference between the year 2000 and the year 2010. Why is this important? Two reasons:
1. It makes the scene more clear for my audience
2. It allows me to eventually do a visual AND verbal call back to places on the timeline.
For example, later in this message I say, “I’ll tell you what made the difference between my failure in 2000 and my success today. [I walk back down the timeline to my audience’s left where the year 2000 is represented]. After my embarrassment in the year 2000, I re-dedicated myself to the art of public speaking…” Then, as I explain what I did in between 2000 and 2010 (i.e. coaching, re-dedication, etc.), I slowly and subtly walk back up the timeline until I get to 2010. Make sense?
This call back is visual, verbal, emotional, and clear for my audience members all because I set the stage up as a timeline and walked it.

3. Remember where you placed everybody and everything on stage

In the video, it’s clear where my wife is represented on stage and where the scale is represented on stage. You should plan this all out ahead of time. Otherwise, you might have a situation I witnessed years ago.
Darren LaCroix (2001 World Champion of Public Speaking) and I were giving a speaking bootcamp in Vegas and we had one of our attendees rise up to make a speech. His story was very emotional and, in it, his uncle passed away. They held the funeral and had the casket on a particular spot on the stage. Later on in the story, this speaker went to that same exact spot on the stage to have lunch!  Darren and I looked at him and said, “Do you realize you’re having lunch on your uncle?!” Please know ahead of time where everything will be represented on your stage.

4. Step up to your point

After I gave my story about the scale, you saw me step forward slightly and look directly at my audience as I started asking questions and driving home my point. This subtle step forward (and the direct eye-contact with my audience) lets my audience know I’m now out of my story and into a conversation with them. Occassionally step forward to make your point. Sometimes it even helps to step out into the audience.

Final thoughts on Staging

Does staging really make that much of a difference in your speech? Yes. Here are three reasons why:

1. Good staging provides clarity to your story and your message. For example, when I have 3 points in my keynote speech, many times I’ll have each point be represented by a section on the stage. Then I can do visual/verbal call backs.
2. If you use staging correctly (i.e. visually and verbally calling back to spots and situations on the stage) it can bring forth emotions from your audience because they’ll still be able to remember what happened earlier in those spaces and scenes
3. Patricia Fripp told me (I’m paraphrasing here) that people won’t remember what you say as much as they’ll remember what they see when you say it. In other words, you have to make your speech very visual. Staging helps with this in a tremendously impactful way.

 Oh, one last thought. Everything you do staging-wise should be subtle. It should look natural and not forced. But keep this in mind, looking natural is on the far side of preparation…not the near side. When you prepare effectively, you won’t have to think about what you’re doing. It will become second-nature. In other words, it will be natural.

 Everything in speaking is about subtlety. If you’re being obvious about what you’re doing, it will break your connection with your audience. Therefore, when you move, make it subtle. I’ve seen some speakers move the entire length of the stage for their timeline. That’s not necessary. A few steps in one direction should suffice when moving to the future or back to the past. The same goes for characters in dialogue. Don’t travel so far between characters. A subtle head turn should suffice to allow us audience members to know which character is talking. Be subtle.

Stand Completely Still when Delivering Your MOST Important Phrases

However, when you get to your most important phrase (often your Foundational Phrase) it creates quite an impact when you stand  completely still, look directly at one individual in your audience, and hold his/her gaze for your entire Foundational Phrase.
For example, I scan the audience until I get to the phrase where I say, “Your dream is not for sale” and that’s when I look at one person and hold his/her gaze. Then, once I finish the phrase, I go back to scanning the room and moving if appropriate.  In other words, hold their gaze for your entire phrase.