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CAPTIVATE! Publ i c Speaking Secre t s f rom TED Talks
© All rights reserved.
Akash Karia #1 Bestselling Author of “How to Deliver a Great TED Talk”
Martha Lanaghen
President of Sparrow Group
Dr. Donna Hook Public Speaking & Leadership Coach
Note: This book makes use of small portions of copyrighted material from TED in accordance with the “fair use” rule for the purposes of criticism and commentary of the speeches.
PRIVATE REVIEW COPY:
If you enjoy the book, then please submit your review here: http://amzn.to/1aF2giR
INTRODUCTION
CAPTIVATE!
UNCOVER THE KEYS TO DELIVERING A CAPTIVATING TED
TALK Captivate! Public Speaking Secrets from TED Talks is a short, invaluable guide that uncovers the secrets to delivering a captivating TED talk (or any other speech or presentation). Full of rich insights into the art of public speaking, the book breaks down the TED talks of four captivating speakers and provides a roadmap that you can use to deliver a powerfully persuasive presentation.
50+ PROVEN TOOLS FOR CAPTIVATING ANY AUDIENCE After reading this book, you will be able to:
• Give a captivating TED talk (Case study: Kelly McGonigal,
“How to Make Stress Your Friend”).
• Craft an opening that makes your audience lean in to hear more.
• Harness the power of storytelling to move your audience
emotionally.
• Connect with your audience using conversational language.
• Engage, educate and entertain your audience (Case study: Sir
Ken Robinson, “How Schools Kill Creativity”).
• Put statistics into context for your audience.
• Avoid the mistakes most speakers make.
• Create rapport by referencing common experiences and beliefs.
• Use the “magic word” to keep your audience engaged.
• Invoke emotions in your audience using Power-‐Words.
• Mesmerize your audience using the conflict in the story (Case
study: Jack Andraka, “A Promising Test for Pancreatic Cancer
from a Teenager”) .
• Create knowledge gaps that keep your audience curious.
• Add organic humor to your talk.
• Add an element of newness to your talk.
• Deliver a powerful and persuasive presentation (Case study:
Seth Godin, “How to Get Your Ideas Spread”).
• Go beyond sharing information to sharing emotion.
• Focus externally, not internally.
• Conclude using the “signal, summarize and sell” formula.
• Inspire your audience to action.
Let’s get started... Akash Karia http://AkashKaria.com
YOUR FREE GIFT
As a way of saying thank you for your purchase, I’d like to offer you a free bonus package worth $297. This bonus package contains eBooks, videos and audiotapes on how to master the art of storytelling, design sexy presentations, overcome procrastination and triple your productivity. You can download the free bonus by clicking here.
Get your free gifts worth $297 here: http://AkashKaria.com/FREE/
P.S. The bonus also contains access to a FREE 47-‐week public speaking, persuasion and peak performance course designed to help you achieve twice as much success in half the time!
RAVE REVIEWS FOR AKASH’S BOOKS “pithy and perfect...his tips coupled with a review of excellent presentations, are consumable (usable right away) and valuable!” Eric Laughton, Certified John Maxwell Trainer “...tips for energizing not only your speech, but also your audience” Angela Avery “...perfect book for those who want to dominate the art of storytelling” Alci Aguilera “Must-‐read for time starved professionals!” Sean P. Graham "The best speaking wisdom I have had in years" Sandeep Gupta "World class speaking tips that you can start using today..." Michael Davis, Certified World Class Speaking Coach “Maybe one of the clearest books on presentations I've ever read” Javier, Verified Amazon Reviewer
CHAPTER ONE
HOW TO GIVE A CAPTIVATING TED
TALK
• Case study: Kelly McGonigal, How to Make Stress Your Friend
• Expert analysis by: Akash Karia In a June 2013 TED talk titled “How to Make Stress Your Friend,” (http://bit.ly/1a1uggl) Kelly McGonigal delivered an outstanding talk that captivated her audience.
Source: TED
In this chapter, we will strategically break down different parts of Kelly’s talk so that we can uncover the tools and techniques she uses to educate, entertain and inspire her audience. Specifically, Kelly’s talk contains rich insights on:
• Building intrigue and curiosity into your presentation.
• Keeping your audience engaged (and awake) through audience involvement.
• Putting statistics into perspective.
• Using a you-‐focus to keep your talk audience-‐centered.
• Making your talk relevant to your audience.
• Inspiring your audience to change. In case you haven’t yet watched Kelly’s talk, I encourage you to do so here: http://bit.ly/1a1uggl
Craft an Opening that Makes Your Audience Lean In
Kelly begins her talk with this brilliant first line:
“I have a confession to make”
This is a great opening because it instantly creates intrigue and builds curiosity. The words “I have a confession to make” make the audience lean in to hear what Kelly has to say because the audience feels that Kelly is telling them a secret and they’re curious to know what it is. Kelly goes on to say:
“I fear that something I've been teaching for the last 10 years is doing more harm than good.”
Again, notice how Kelly is ratcheting up her audience’s curiosity. By confessing that she has been wrong about something, she is making her audience wonder what she has been wrong about. All of this serves to grab the audience’s attention and get them to pay attention to what she has to say. It is much easier to give a great talk once the audience wants to know what you have to say. As a speaker, what can you do to get your audience curious enough to want to hear what you have to say?
You don’t necessarily have to make a confession in order to get your audience’s attention. One possible (and easy) way to build curiosity is by opening with a question. A question creates a knowledge gap in your audience and gets them wanting to know the answer to your question. As we’ll see later in the chapter, Kelly is a master at using questions to keep her audience curious and interested in her presentation. Examine your opening and ask yourself these questions: “Does the opening of my presentation create intrigue? Does it make my audience curious to know what I have to say? Or is it a boring, ‘Thank you for having me’ opening line that instantly turns off my audience and makes them tune out of my presentation?”
Prolong Their Curiosity
Kelly does something that every speaker should learn from. She prolongs her audience’s curiosity. What do I mean by that? Well, let me demonstrate by giving you an example. Here’s what Kelly says:
“For years I've been telling people, stress makes you sick. It increases the risk of everything from the common cold to cardiovascular disease. Basically, I've turned stress into the enemy. But I have changed my mind about stress, and today, I want to change yours.”
After hearing the above, what do you think the audience is thinking? They’re probably thinking, “So Kelly, what is your new belief about stress?” They’re curious to find out Kelly’s new conclusion about stress. However, here’s where most average speakers would make a mistake. They would crush the audience’s curiosity by giving away too much too early. They would say something along the lines of:
“The mistake is that we see stress as a bad thing, but it’s not. It’s our belief about it that determines how stress affects us. If we believe that stress is harmful, then it will be. However, if we do not view stress as harmful, it does not harm us.”
While this isn’t terrible, you can do better by prolonging the audience’s curiosity, as Kelly does. Instead of immediately giving away her conclusion about stress, she dives into some research.
“But I have changed my mind about stress, and today, I want to change yours. Let me start with the study that made me rethink my whole approach to stress. This study tracked 30,000 adults in the United States for eight years...”
Sharing the research before sharing the conclusion has two advantages: First, it prolongs the audience’s curiosity. It teases them into wanting to know the answer. This is a much better approach than sharing the conclusion first and then revealing the research. The second advantage of sharing the research before the conclusion is that it allows Kelly’s audience to naturally and logically come to the conclusion she wants them to arrive at. As a result, they are more likely to buy into the conclusion because they were guided to it instead of it being forced upon them. As a speaker, you should always look for ways to prolong your audience’s curiosity. Once their curiosity about a certain thing ends (e.g. you answer one of the questions they were curious about), you immediately introduce a second aspect (e.g. another question) to make sure they stay curious, and therefore engaged.
Engage Your Audience with Rhetorical Questions One of the things I love about Kelly’s speech is that she keeps her audience intrigued by asking them rhetorical questions. Here are some examples:
• “Can changing how you think about stress make you healthier?”
• “But what if you viewed them instead as signs that your body was energized, was preparing you to meet this challenge?”
• “Okay, so how is knowing this side of stress going to make you healthier?”
Using rhetorical questions in your speech creates knowledge gaps in your audience and makes them curious enough to listen to what you have to say next. Plus, it gives your talk an easy-‐to-‐follow structure as you move from one question to another. Rhetorical questions are a powerful tool for gaining your audience’s interest, so use them!
Involve Your Audience in Your Presentation Less than fifteen seconds into her presentation, Kelly engages her audience by involving them in her presentation. She says:
“I want you to just raise your hand if you've experienced relatively little stress. Anyone? How about a moderate amount of stress? Who has experienced a lot of stress? Yeah. Me too.”
By asking her audience you-‐focused questions, Kelly instantly makes the topic of her talk relevant to her audience’s life. More than that, she gets them physically involved in her presentation by getting them to raise their hands. Getting your audience to raise their hands is a very simple but effective audience involvement technique you can use. It makes your audience active participants rather than passive listeners in your talk. Halfway through her talk, Kelly again gets her audience involved in her presentation with a short activity. She says:
“Okay. I want you all to count backwards from 996 in increments of seven. You're going to do this out loud as fast as you can, starting with 996. Go! Audience: (Counting) Go faster. Faster please. You're going too slow. Stop. Stop, stop, stop. That guy made a mistake. We are going to have to start all over again. (Laughter) You're not very good at this, are you? Okay, so you get the idea. Now, if you were actually in this study, you'd probably be a little stressed out.”
Kelly conducts this activity to let her audience feel what it would be like to be part of the research study she is talking about. Instead of simply telling the audience about the research, she gets them to reenact a small part of it. Not only is this more powerful than hearing about the activity, it also makes Kelly’s talk fun! The audience is engaged in the presentation and enjoying the activity! Audiences hate sitting passively and listening to a speaker drone on and on. Using short, relevant activities breaks up your talk and allows your audience to experience different mediums of learning. It keeps your audience’s attention levels high because the human brain was not designed to passively listen – it was designed to do things. What short, relevant activities can you use to keep entertain, educate and engage your audience?
Add an Element of Newness
One of the reasons many speakers struggle with keeping their audience’s attention is because the audience already knows what the speaker is going to say. Many speakers are simply giving the same advice in the same manner that audiences have already heard hundreds of times before. As a result, audiences stop paying attention. After all, if your audience already knows what you are going to say, why should they bother listening to you?
Kelly, however, adds an element of “newness” to her speech. How? First, she shares an idea that goes against conventional wisdom. Most people are used to thinking about stress as being a bad thing. Conventional wisdom says that stress is bad for your health. However, Kelly flips this and implies that stress isn’t bad:
“But I fear that something I've been teaching for the last 10 years is doing more harm than good, and it has to do with stress. For years I've been telling people, stress makes you sick. It increases the risk of everything from the common cold to cardiovascular disease. Basically, I've turned stress into the enemy. But I have changed my mind about stress, and today, I want to change yours.”
This builds more curiosity and intrigue. It also promises the audience that they are going to learn something new as opposed to hearing the same old “stress is bad” argument Kelly not only flips conventional wisdom on its head, she also uses one of the coolest presentation structures I know. I, for obvious reasons, call it “The Flip.” This is a structure where you lead your audience to believe that you’re going down one road, and then you flip the argument around and argue the opposite. It’s a very effective structure to keep the audience on its toes. As an example, consider Kelly’s opening:
“I want you to just raise your hand if you've experienced relatively little stress. Anyone? How about a moderate amount of stress? Who has experienced a lot of stress? Yeah. Me too.”
What does the opening lead the audience to believe? It leads the audience to believe that Kelly is going to be talking about the dangers of high stress. However, Kelly then flips this by saying:
“Basically, I've turned stress into the enemy. But I have changed my mind about stress...”
The flip is a surprise for the audience – it makes them more attentive – and gets them thinking, “Wow, this is going to be interesting!” That’s exactly the kind of reaction you want from your audience.
The second way Kelly adds an element of “newness” to her talk is
by sharing research that her audience probably isn’t familiar with.
“Let me start with the study that made me rethink my whole approach to stress. This study tracked 30,000 adults in the United States for eight years, and they started by asking people, "How much stress have you experienced in the last year?" They also asked, "Do you believe that stress is harmful for your health?" And then they used public death records to find out who died. (Laughter) Okay. Some bad news first. People who experienced a lot of stress in the previous year had a 43 percent increased risk of dying. But that was only true for the people who also believed that stress is harmful for your health. (Laughter) People who experienced a lot of stress but did not view stress as harmful were no more likely to die.”
Using research is a great way of backing up and providing logical support for your main points. Not only that, it can also be a great way of adding an element of “newness” to your speech, as long as the research is not well known to your audience. Malcolm Gladwell, one of my favorite speakers and the bestselling author of Blink, is a master at sharing academic research in an easy-‐to-‐understand manner with audiences who are not familiar with the research. For example, consider the “10,000 hour rule” he popularized in his book Outliers, which was based on research conducted by Dr. Anders Ericsson in the 1990s. The idea of the “10,000 hour rule” was new to many people outside the academic community, which is why it became so popular. So, even though there may not be anything new about your message, you can still add an element of “newness” to your talk by sharing
research that your audience might not have heard of. For example, in my workshops on public speaking, even though my audiences might have heard some of the tips I might be sharing, I add an element of “newness” by sharing research from the fields of brain science, persuasion and communication. I believe that this one of the reasons my workshops are so popular – because I use research to back up my points as well as keep my audiences engaged by giving them new information. Finally, if you’re unable to locate research to add novelty to your talk, use personal stories. Even though your audience might have heard the same message before, they will be hearing it through new examples and stories. Using personal stories is a great way to add an element of “newness” to your presentation. Remember, our brains seek and pay attention to novelty. What are you doing to add “newness” to your presentation?
Put Statistics into Perspective Average speakers throw statistics at the audience; master speakers such as Kelly put them into perspective. Let’s have a step-‐by-‐step look at how Kelly puts statistics into perspective for her audience. First, she shares the raw statistic:
“Now the researchers estimated that over the eight years they were tracking deaths, 182,000 Americans died prematurely, not from stress, but from the belief that stress is bad for you.”
However, 182,000 deaths over eight years is hard to comprehend. Of course, it’s a lot of deaths, but it’s hard for the human mind to comprehend the seriousness of the problem. Thus, Kelly breaks it down into the number of deaths per year:
“That is over 20,000 deaths a year.”
Again, the audience knows that’s a lot of deaths, but it’s difficult for them to put into context. This is where Kelly puts the raw statistic into context for her audience:
“Now, if that estimate is correct, that would make believing stress is bad for you the 15th largest cause of death in the United States last year, killing more people than skin cancer, HIV/AIDS and homicide.”
Wow, isn’t that powerful? By putting the statistic into context – by saying that belief about stress kills more people than HIV/AIDS – Kelly truly hammers home the importance of the statistics, whereas the figure “182,000 deaths” fails to do so. When you speak, don’t just throw raw statistics at your audience. Instead, put them into your perspective for your audience so that your audience can view them through the appropriate context.
Keep Your Audience Engaged Using a You-‐Focus As a speaker, you should always remember that your talk is about your audience, not yourself; thus, it’s important to have a you-‐focused speech as opposed to an I-‐focused speech. Kelly does a brilliant job of delivering a you-‐focused talk. Look at an example of you-‐focused speaking from Kelly’s talk:
“Now, in a typical stress response, your heart rate goes up, and your blood vessels constrict like this. And this is one of the reasons that chronic stress is sometimes associated with cardiovascular disease.”
Consider how much more powerful this is than saying, “Now, in a typical stress response, people’s heart rate goes up...” Here’s another example of you-‐focused speaking from Kelly’s talk:
“Oxytocin makes you crave physical contact with your friends and family. It enhances your empathy. It even makes you more willing to help and support the people you care about.”
Again, notice how much more powerful this is than saying, “Oxytocin makes people crave contact...” Using a you-‐focus engages the audience because it makes the speech about them.
Make it Relevant to Your Audience
As speakers, one great tip we can learn from Kelly is that we should show our audiences how our talk is relevant to them. Audience members are concerned about what they can take away from your talk –so it’s important that we clearly demonstrate to our audience how and why what we are saying will impact them. For example, consider this short portion from Kelly’s talk:
“But in the study, when participants viewed their stress response as helpful, their blood vessels stayed relaxed like this. Their heart was still pounding, but this is a much healthier cardiovascular profile. It actually looks a lot like what happens in moments of joy and courage.”
What do you think audience members are thinking while listening to the above? They’re probably thinking, “What’s in it for me? Why does this matter to me? How is it relevant to me?” Knowing this, look at how Kelly makes the research study relevant to her audience’s lives by saying the following:
“Over a lifetime of stressful experiences, this one biological change could be the difference between a stress-‐induced heart attack at age 50 and living well into your 90s.”
Kelly makes the findings relevant to her audience by suggesting that applying the results from this research could help them live longer
(which is something most people in her audience would be interested in).
How can you make your talk relevant to your audience’s life? Why should they care about what you have to say?
Tell Your Audience How to Apply Your Ideas to Their Life If you want to deliver a truly great speech, you need to go one step further than making your speech relevant to your audience: you need to show your audience not just why your talk is relevant to them, but also how to apply the ideas you’re sharing with them to their lives. This is exactly what Kelly does. She tells her audience how they should apply her ideas to their life by giving them a clear next step:
“...because hopefully the next time your heart is pounding from stress, you're going to remember this talk and you're going to think to yourself, this is my body helping me rise to this challenge.”
The audience knows exactly what they should do differently in their lives as a result of having listened to Kelly’s speech. What’s the clear next step of your speech? What should your audience do differently as a result of having listened to your talk?
Motivate Your Audience to Take Action
Sharing how your audience can apply the ideas from your talk to their life makes it more likely that they will take action on your ideas, but it’s not enough. Apart from sharing with your audience how to apply your ideas to their life, you need to share with them why they should do so: in other words,
you need to motivate them to take action on your ideas by sharing with them a benefit they will receive as a result of doing so. This is exactly what Kelly is doing when she says:
“...the next time your heart is pounding from stress, you're going to remember this talk and you're going to think to yourself, this is my body helping me rise to this challenge. And when you view stress in that way, your body believes you, and your stress
response becomes healthier.”
Why should your audience implement your ideas into their life? Share with them not only the how, but also the why of doing so; motivate them to take action on your ideas by sharing with them the major benefit they will receive because of doing so.
Don’t Just Share Data; Share Your Emotions Too
One of the things I love about Kelly’s talk is her enthusiasm and passion for her topic. You can sense this through the words she uses. For example, she says:
• “I find this amazing, that your stress response has a built-‐in mechanism for stress resilience, and that mechanism is human connection.”
• “You can see why this study freaked me out.”
• “...but the most fascinating finding to me was how their physical stress response changed.”
Using phrases like these (“the most fascinating finding to me” and “I find this amazing”), Kelly shows her interest in her topic. She doesn’t only share the findings of the research, but she also shares her feelings (“freaked me out”). She verbally shares her emotions – her enthusiasm, her interest, her passion – about the topic, which in turn keeps the audience interested in her presentation.
As a speaker, it’s important to remember that whatever emotion you’re feeling will flow to your audience. Thus, if you’re not excited about your topic, then how can you expect your audience to be? Don’t be shy about sharing your emotions about the topic.
Focus Externally, Not Internally As a public speaking coach, one of the most common questions I get asked is, “How should I move my hands? How should I gesture?” This is a good question, and my answer is that you should not practice your gestures or your facial expressions. Why? Because you want your gestures and facial expressions to appear natural and authentic, not rehearsed and robotic. When I used to participate in public speaking contests, I made the mistake of rehearsing my gestures, and the result was that I always appeared robotic. While the gestures were good, there was just something about the delivery that made it appear inauthentic. Gestures are natural – we use gestures every day without even thinking about them! You already know how to gesture, so no one needs to teach you how to use them. As with your breathing, you should never try to consciously control your gestures. However, what you might need to be taught is how to “forget about yourself” when you are on stage. This means that you should stop focusing internally and focus externally; stop focusing on yourself and focus on your audience instead. When you are on stage, make a conscious decision to change the focus from internal to external. This means that you should stop worrying about how you look, how you sound, whether your gestures are appropriate. Instead, immerse yourself completely into your talk and your audience. When you do this, your gestures will come naturally.
Signal, Summarize and Sell
The ending of your talk is crucial because if your ending is disappointing, your audience will walk out of your talk unsatisfied. Plus, due to the primacy and recency effect, people most remember the beginning and ending of a speech, so it’s important that you end in a powerful and persuasive manner. Kelly uses the “signal, summarize and sell formula” to wrap up her talk. First, she mentally prepares her audience that the end is near by signaling the conclusion:
“I want to finish by telling you about one more study.”
It’s important that you signal that you are wrapping up so that the conclusion does not come as a surprise to your audience. Next, Kelly succinctly summarizes the essence of her speech in a couple of sentences:
“How you think and how you act can transform your experience of stress. When you choose to view your stress response as helpful, you create the biology of courage. And when you choose to connect with others under stress, you can create resilience.”
In the summary, you only want to highlight one or two of the most important points from your talk. This reinforces the audience’s memory and ensures that they will remember your presentation. Finally, Kelly ends by selling her audience on the benefits of why they should take action on the ideas she has shared; she gives her audience a reason and motivation to implement her idea:
“...when you choose to view stress in this way, you're not just getting better at stress, you're actually making a pretty profound statement. You're saying that you can trust yourself to handle life's challenges, and you're remembering that you don't have to face them alone.”
End your talk by reinforcing the why of your talk – why should your audience care and why should they take action? This motivates your audience to take action on your ideas so that you’re not just giving a speech, but actually making a difference in your audience’s lives.
IN A NUTSHELL
• Craft an opening that makes your audience lean in.
• Create knowledge gaps with questions.
• Prolong your audience’s curiosity for as long as you can.
• Engage your audience with rhetorical questions.
• Involve your audience in your presentation.
• Add an element of newness to your talk.
• Put statistics into perspective for your audience.
• Engage your audience with a you-‐focus.
• Make your presentation relevant to your audience.
• Tell your audience how to apply your ideas to their life.
• Motivate your audience to take action.
• Don’t just share information; share your emotions too.
• Focus externally, not internally.
• Conclude by signaling, summarizing and selling.
*
Meet Presentation Expert Akash Karia Akash Karia is a professional speaker who has trained thousands of people worldwide, from bankers in Hong Kong to yoga teachers in Thailand to senior executives in Dubai. He is an award-‐winning trainer who has been ranked as one of the top speakers in Asia-‐Pacific. He is currently the Chief Commercial Officer of a multi-‐million dollar company in Tanzania, in which capacity he heads the sales, relations and marketing departments of the organization. If you’re looking for a coach to help you become a powerful and persuasive communicator or a speaker to unleash the excellence hidden
inside of your teams, then contact Akash on www.AkashKaria.com (or email [email protected]).
CHAPTER TWO
HOW TO ENGAGE, ENTERTAIN AND
EDUCATE YOUR AUDIENCE
• Case study: Ken Robinson, How Schools Kill Creativity
• Expert analysis by: Martha Lanaghen
Sir Ken Robinson’s presentation titled “How Schools Kill Creativity” (http://bit.ly/1gPtXNy) from the February 2006 TED Conference is, as of this writing, the most-‐viewed TED talk in history (approaching nearly 20 million views).
Source: TED
Sir Ken’s talks have been featured around the world, including a similar talk at the RSA that was edited and distributed with illustrations
through RSA Animate (video titled “RSA Animate – Changing Education Paradigms” available at www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U).
If you want to look to this speech to help you hone your own presentation skills, there are many examples to emulate, including:
• Creating a relationship with your audience.
• Entertaining and engaging your audience.
• Making your audience feel something.
Build Around a Universally Appealing Topic
On its face, you might wonder why the talk is so popular. After all, Sir Ken is not a saber-‐rattling, ground-‐stomping, action-‐packed presenter, and his message is profound, but not necessarily motivational.
It is, however, a universally appealing topic, built around a core message to which we can all connect – either because we were once in school, or because we now have children in school, or both.
This brings us to the first key takeaway from Sir Ken’s talk. Is your primary/core topic broadly appealing? Will it connect with and interest most of the people in your audience?
Begin with a Callback
Sir Ken chooses a friendly opening that quickly establishes common ground with the audience, uses humor to warm up his audience and calls back to the themes of the conference. Here’s what he says:
“Good morning. How are you? It's been great, hasn't it? I've been blown away by the whole thing. In fact, I'm leaving. (Laughter)
There have been three themes, haven't there, running through the conference, which are relevant to what I want to talk about. One is the extraordinary evidence of human creativity in all of the presentations that we've had and in all of the people here. Just the variety of it and the range of it. The second is that it's put us in a place where we have no idea what's going to happen, in terms of the future. No idea how this may play out.”
The reason this is a great opening is because it builds a connection with the audience by establishing commonality with the audience – specifically, by calling back the previous talks at the conference that both Sir Ken and the audience were a part of.
Furthermore, this gives the talk a conversational, personalized feel, showing the audience that the talk is not some off-‐the-‐shelf, memorized speech but one that is specifically tailored for them. Finally, it also sets the theme for the rest of Sir Ken’s talk.
Sir Ken also integrates callbacks into the body of his speech, saying:
• “Following off from Helen yesterday” (referencing a speech they had all heard together)
• “Al Gore spoke the other night about ecology,” (again referencing a speech he had watched with the audience)
Using callbacks is a great way of connecting with your audience and personalizing your talk, so consider integrating them into your presentation.
Use Visual Aids Only if You Have Visuals
Many speakers leverage props, illustrations, photographs and other resources to reinforce their messages and create clarity and common vision in the audience’s mind.
However, Sir Ken uses no props, nor does he use a slide presentation. Why? Because he doesn’t need it. It wouldn’t have helped his presentation, so there was no need to have any props or slides.
Most presenters use slide presentations as crutches. The slides are for the benefit of the speaker to help him or her remember what to say next, not for the benefit of the audience. These slides are boring, text-‐heavy and distract from the presentation instead of adding value to it.
The only reason to use slides is if you have visuals, such as graphs, charts and pictures to display (which is why slides are called visual aids). Otherwise, if your slides contain text, they’re going to detract from
your message because you’re going to be dividing your audience’s attention between listening to you and reading the slides.
Also, remember that your audience reads quicker than you speak, which means that if your slide says exactly the same thing that you’re saying, then your audience is going to very quickly get bored. As presentation coach Craig Valentine puts it, “If you and your slides say the same thing, one of you is not needed.”
If you’re using presentation slides, ask yourself:
• “Am I using these slides as a crutch or for the benefit of the audience?”
• “Are my slides helping my presentation? If not, what impact would it have if I eliminated them?”
Asking yourself these questions will help you figure out whether or not you really need the slides. Perhaps, like Sir Ken, you’ll discover that your presentation is better off without slides.
Entertain with Humor
One of the most endearing things about Sir Ken’s speech is his use of humor. Humor not only lightens the mood and helps the audience members enjoy themselves, it also increases alertness and thus helps the audience better absorb information.
So, what is the secret to humor? The secret to humor is to create an expectation, and then break it. In comedy, the creation of the expectation is called the “set-‐up.” The sudden breaking of the expectation is called the “punch line.”
For example, consider this humorous line from Sir Ken’s talk:
“If my wife is cooking a meal at home, which is not often... thankfully.” (audience laughs)
What’s the set-‐up portion of the line? It is “If my wife is cooking a meal at home, which is not often...” This creates the expectation that Sir Ken is going to continue the statement with “unfortunately.”
However, the punch line is the word “thankfully.” This breaks the audience’s expectations, and thus results in laughter.
Self-‐deprecation is another great form of humor. Consider this piece of self-‐deprecating humor from Sir Ken’s talk:
“I used to be on the board of the Royal Ballet in England ... as you can see.” (laughter)
The audience laughs at this piece of self-‐deprecating humor because it’s obvious that Sir Ken hasn’t done ballet (he looks out of shape and walks with a limp because he contracted polio at age 4).
What self-‐deprecating humor can you use in your talk to lighten up the mood?
The final technique Sir Ken uses to add humor to his talk is over-‐exaggeration. People laugh at obvious over-‐exaggerations, such as how Sir Ken over-‐exaggerates his wife’s ability to multi-‐task:
“If she's cooking, you know, she's dealing with people on the phone, she's talking to the kids, she's painting the ceiling, she's doing open-‐heart surgery over here” (laughter)
Here’s another example of over-‐exaggeration from the same talk by Sir Ken:
[If you are at a party and someone asks] “What do you do?” and you say you work in education, you can see the blood run from their face. They’re like, “Oh my God,” you know, “Why me? My one night out all week!” (laughter)
Tread Carefully when Using Humor
Although we cannot know how much of Sir Ken’s speech was scripted, and how much was spoken “off the cuff,” he does insert a joke about the
Bible and Mel Gibson that treads dangerously close to two areas of caution:
1) Don’t tell “insider” jokes. When only part of the audience can relate to the humor, you run the risk of alienating a significant percent of the audience. Even though Mel Gibson’s unfortunate rantings were very public, Sir Ken’s reference was off-‐topic, and not necessary.
2) Because Gibson’s rantings were so controversial and distasteful to most, Sir Ken ran the risk of offending or distracting his audience with the casual reference.
Later, Sir Ken tells a joke about a funny T-‐shirt that he saw a man wearing that said, “If a man speaks his mind in a forest, and no woman hears him, is he still wrong?” This joke can be carried by a man without seeming bitter or cynical – that said, it doesn’t further his point about our brains, nor does it contribute to his overall presentation about creativity and our schools.
Review the humor and the examples that you use in your presentation. Are any of them “insider” stories? Could any of them evoke negative emotions in your audience that would be distracting or hurt your credibility?
Connect by Speaking Conversationally
Listening to Sir Ken’s speech, it feels more like you and him are sitting in a coffee shop having a talk, as opposed to him presenting to an audience of hundreds. He uses very natural and conversational language, which makes his talk seem authentic. For example, consider when Sir Ken says:
“He was in the nativity play. Do you remember the story?”
The above sentence uses the singular you-‐focus (“Do you remember”), which creates the feeling that Sir Ken is having a one-‐on-‐one conversation with his audience. Here’s another example where Sir Ken
uses the singular you-‐focus to create the feel of a one-‐on-‐one conversation with the audience:
“But if you are, and you say to somebody, you know, they say, "What do you do?" and you say you work in education, you can see the blood run from their face. They're like, "Oh my God," you know, "Why me? My one night out all week." (Laughter) But if you ask about their education, they pin you to the wall.”
Sir Ken also seems genuinely tickled by some of his own jokes (“You’re not often at dinner parties, frankly, if you work in education. You’re not asked. And you’re never asked back, curiously.”) and appears to ad-‐lib occasionally, just as if you were chatting casually (“When my son was 4 in England – actually, he was 4 everywhere, to be honest.”). If you’re not amused by your own presentation, you can’t expect your audience to be!
Next time you are giving a presentation, don’t aim to impress – aim to connect by speaking conversationally.
Your Passion is Key
Although it is difficult to point to specific places in the speech where he illustrates his passion for the topic of creativity and the schools – you are left to understand that this is a deeply important topic for Sir Ken, and you know by his body of work, that he is influencing change related to this topic.
He doesn’t convey this passion through hand waving, or foot stomping, or even raising his voice – but you understand throughout that this is his passion. How? It resonates from his very being. When you are passionate about your topic, audience members can unconsciously sense it.
Are you passionate about the topic you are speaking on? If so, your audience members will feel it in their guts, and as a result, they’ll connect with you and your message.
Creating Rapport by Referencing Common Experiences
and Beliefs
Sir Ken Robinson establishes a relationship with his audience within the first 10 seconds of his speech when he says, “It’s been great, hasn’t it?” Immediately, he has established that he and the audience have been having a common experience – that he and his audience are alike.
He goes on to reinforce their common experiences and beliefs at these points in the presentation, where he says:
• “We’ve all agreed, nonetheless, on the really extraordinary capacities that children have – their capacities for innovation.” (It is particularly smart to say, “we’ve all agreed,” because this puts Sir Ken and the audience on the figurative same side of the table for the discussion that follows.)
• “And it’s the combination of all the things we’ve talked about.” (This reference reinforces the feeling that Sir Ken is having a personal conversation with the individuals, making it conversational, and communal.)
• “That goes deep with people. Am I right?” (This is particularly smart because he takes a rhetorical question that he knows everyone agrees with, and asks his audience to agree. Again, he is establishing the audience as sharing a common belief with him, and for many audience members you would see a physical reaction that would include them nodding their heads.)
Make Your Audience Feel Something
Sir Ken tells rich and compelling stories that evoke the audience’s emotions throughout the presentation. Furthermore, these stories reinforce his core concepts.
Perhaps the most effective and emotional moment in Sir Ken’s talk is the story of Gillian Lynne which is artfully told to an emotional conclusion.
Below is the story from Sir Ken’s talk, broken down into the elements of what makes a story compelling and emotive (Credit: I learned these
elements from Craig Valentine, the 1999 World Champion of Public Speaking):
Element 1: The Characters
Every story must have characters. In this story, Sir Ken introduces us to the main characters:
‘Anyway, Gillian and I had lunch one day and I said, "Gillian, how'd you get to be a dancer?" And she said it was interesting; when she was at school, she was really hopeless. And the school, in the '30s, wrote to her parents and said, "We think Gillian has a learning disorder." She couldn't concentrate; she was fidgeting. I think now they'd say she had ADHD. Wouldn't you? But this was the 1930s, and ADHD hadn't been invented at this point. It wasn't an available condition. (Laughter) People weren't aware they could have that.”’
Element #2: The Conflict/Challenge
The hook of any great story is the conflict – the challenge that the main character faces. The conflict is what keeps us hooked to the story. It’s what causes us to ask, “I wonder what happens next?” The struggles and the challenges the character faces arouse our emotions and get us emotionally invested in the story.
In this story, the main challenge is that Gillian seems to be having a learning disorder:
‘Anyway, she went to see this specialist. So, this oak-‐paneled room, and she was there with her mother, and she was led and sat on this chair at the end, and she sat on her hands for 20 minutes while this man talked to her mother about all the problems Gillian was having at school. And at the end of it -‐-‐ because she was disturbing people; her homework was always late; and so on, little kid of eight -‐-‐ in the end, the doctor went and sat next to Gillian and said, "Gillian, I've listened to all these things that your mother's told me, and I need to speak to her privately." He said,
"Wait here. We'll be back; we won't be very long," and they went and left her.’
Element #3: The Cure
The “Cure” refers to the person or idea – or anything for that matter – that helps the character overcome the challenge/conflict they were facing. The Cure is what allows the audience to breathe a sigh of relief when the character overcomes the conflict. In this case, the Cure is when the specialist advises Gillian’s mother to take Gillian to a dance school:
‘But as they went out the room, he turned on the radio that was sitting on his desk. And when they got out the room, he said to her mother, "Just stand and watch her." And the minute they left the room, she said, she was on her feet, moving to the music. And they watched for a few minutes and he turned to her mother and said, "Mrs. Lynne, Gillian isn't sick; she's a dancer. Take her to a dance school."
I said, "What happened?" She said, "She did. I can't tell you how wonderful it was. We walked in this room and it was full of people like me. People who couldn't sit still. People who had to move to think." Who had to move to think. They did ballet; they did tap; they did jazz; they did modern; they did contemporary.’
Element #4: Change in Character
The final element of a great story is that there must be a change in the character as a result of having overcome the conflict. In this case, Gillian goes on to dance school and eventually becomes very successful in her dance career:
‘She was eventually auditioned for the Royal Ballet School; she became a soloist; she had a wonderful career at the Royal Ballet. She eventually graduated from the Royal Ballet School and founded her own company -‐-‐ the Gillian Lynne Dance Company -‐-‐ met Andrew Lloyd Weber. She's been responsible for some of the
most successful musical theater productions in history; she's given pleasure to millions; and she's a multi-‐millionaire. Somebody else might have put her on medication and told her to calm down.’
Great stories, such as the one about Gillian, get the audience emotionally invested in the story. This is why stories are such a powerful tool for speakers – by getting the audience emotionally invested in the story, you ensure that they will hang onto every word.
What stories are you telling? Do they complement your argument and move it along? Are they relatable?
Use Words that Invoke Emotions
Another way to enrich an experience and evoke emotion is to use “juicy” words and emotive words – words and statements that elicit a response. Sir Ken uses this technique throughout:
• “… and we squander them, pretty ruthlessly.”
• “I believe this passionately…”
• “…they’re disembodied in a way…”
• “We need to radically rethink our view of intelligence.”
• “I believe our only hope for the future is…”
• “… all forms of life would flourish.”
Aim to sound conversational, but don’t be afraid to use power-‐words that elicit your audience’s emotions.
Are you using “juicy” words and phrases to elicit response and evoke emotion?
Inspire Action
If you want to make an impact on your audience, it’s important that you end your talk with a call to action. It’s important that you let your audience know exactly what you’d like them to do differently as a result of listening to your talk.
Sir Ken ends his talk with a compelling call to action that hammers his message home. Furthermore, he also cleverly links his message to the TED conference, hence using the conference as an anchor that will help the audience remember his main message:
“What TED celebrates is the gift of the human imagination. We have to be careful now that we use this gift wisely and that we avert some of the scenarios that we’ve talked about. And the only way we’ll do it is by seeing our creative capacities for the richness they are and seeing our children for the hope that they are. And our task is to educate their whole being, so they can face this future. By the way — we may not see this future, but they will. And our job is to help them make something of it. Thank you very much.”
What’s the call to action for your talk?
Make an impact on your audience by inspiring them to act on your message.
IN A NUTSHELL
• Build your talk around a universally appealing topic.
• Integrate callbacks into your presentation.
• Use visual aids only if you have visuals.
• Use self-‐deprecation and over-‐exaggeration to add humor to your talk.
• Tread carefully when using humor.
• Connect with your audience by speaking conversationally.
• Create rapport by referencing common experiences and beliefs.
• Use stories to make your audience feel something.
• Remember the four elements of a great story: Characters, Conflict/Challenge, Cure and Change in character.
• Use words that invoke emotions in your audience.
• Inspire your audience to action.
*
Meet Presentation Expert Martha Lanaghen:
Martha Lanaghen is passionate about Ken Robinson’s concepts and puts them to work in her successful consulting practice at The Sparrow Group where she focuses on improving student success in partnership with her higher education clients. Her firm serves companies and colleges that are shaping the future of higher education innovation. Martha is an entrepreneur, highly-‐rated speaker and author, and the proud parent of six creative children. She believes, as does Ken Robinson, in the profoundly creative capabilities within us all. You can find Martha at www.linkedin.com/in/MarthaLanaghen, contact her directly at [email protected], or visit her firm’s website at www.SparrowGroup.biz.
CHAPTER THREE
TED TALK TIPS...FROM A TEENAGER
• Case study: Jack Andraka, A Promising Test for Pancreatic Cancer from a Teenager
• Expert analysis by: Dr. Donna Hook Jack Andraka’s TED speech titled “A Promising Test for Pancreatic Cancer...from a Teenager,” (http://bit.ly/JVfmm4) delivered in February 2013, is full of lessons for speakers. His profound research, fueled by the loss of a close family friend, may just be the best example of channeled grief you’ll find.
Source: TED
Even though he is very young, Jack demonstrates several strong speech techniques worthy of sharing. These include:
• A thought-‐provoking opening from which the remainder of the speech is built.
• Putting statistics into context.
• Simple expression of complex ideas.
• Using personal stories with strong conflicts to keep an audience engaged.
I encourage you to watch the video of the speech here: http://bit.ly/JVfmm4
Open with a Thought-‐Provoking Question While a speech title often provides clues into the topic of a presentation, a speech opener is what truly sets the stage for an audience to gain an understanding of the frame of reference of the speaker. In the case of Jack’s TED talk entitled “A Promising Test for Pancreatic Cancer from a Teenager” you may correctly deduce the speech is delivered by a teenager, includes pancreatic cancer as the basis for the discussion, and details a promising test for this type of cancer. Yet, watching Jack deliver his thought-‐provoking opening question – and realizing that this young man of 16 is standing on a stage before a rather large TED audience – you might get a sense of the power of the question Jack asks in his opening line:
“Have you ever experienced a moment in your life that was so painful and confusing that all you wanted to do was learn as much as you could to make sense of it all?”
An opening question of this type both engages an audience and piques their curiosity enough so they want to learn more. The you-‐focused question gets the audience to reflect on their lives, creating a connection between Jack’s speech and the audience’s lives. Jack further clarifies his frame of reference and the significance of his question as he states:
“When I was 13, a close family friend who was like an uncle to me passed away from pancreatic cancer. When the disease hit so close to home, I knew I needed to learn more, so I went online to
find answers.” This opening emotionally draws the audience in, giving them a sense of the heartfelt love young Jack had for the “uncle” who passed, and offers a glimpse into the starting point for his talk. Next time you’re giving a presentation, consider opening with a you-‐focused question. This creates curiosity and gets your audience to reflect on their lives. Next, transition into sharing a short I-‐focused story that puts your question into context for your listeners.
Put Statistics in Context through Comparison
As speakers, we can learn a great lesson from Jack on how to use statistics in a speech. Jack doesn’t just give raw statistics, but puts them into context for his audience through comparison. For example, when describing carbon nanotubes, Jack says:
“...and that's just a long, thin pipe of carbon that's an atom thick and one 50 thousandth the diameter of your hair.”
By comparing a carbon nanotube to the size of a string of hair, Jack conveys the size of a carbon nanotube in terms that his audience understands. Furthermore, towards the end of his presentation Jack talks about the effectiveness of his paper sensor to the current solution by saying:
“This makes it 168 times faster, over 26,000 times less expensive, and over 400 times more sensitive than our current standard for pancreatic cancer detection.”
Again, using comparison, Jack puts his point across to his audience in a way that allows them to comprehend the significance of it. Next time you’re delivering a statistic or talking about the effectiveness of a product or idea, use comparison to put it into perspective for your audience so that they can grasp the significance of it.
Express Complex Ideas in a Simple Manner Jack's heartfelt triad of death, curiosity and liberation provided the foundation for one truly incredible story – a story we learn also takes root as a technical presentation. Inherent in all technical presentations are three main challenges for the speaker: First is understanding the knowledge level of the audience. Too often technical speeches alienate audiences, in part because the level of speech detail is out of sync with the audience. Out of sync can span the spectrum from too simple for an audience through too complex for them. Only from the vantage point of knowing your audience can a meaningful presentation be built. A second challenge of technical presentations is ensuring the speech content is relevant to the target audience. It’s not enough just to sync the level of detail for the audience. You must also find a topic relevant to your audience. The final challenge in presenting a technical speech is keeping the audience engaged as the speaker delves deeper and deeper into complex technical topics. As speakers begin to include language and terms specific to a narrower and narrower community, they run a higher risk of audience isolation and disengagement. Jack navigated through the three challenges of a technical speech beautifully. First, while the academic composite of the TED audience may not have been crystal clear to Jack, it’s public knowledge that the TED audience is well educated and, according to the TED.com website, “made up of extraordinary thought-‐leaders in an environment where they are open to
new ideas.” This public information was available for Jack to uncover. Thus, Jack confidently delivered a well thought-‐out presentation appropriate for a TED audience.
Next, the topic of Jack's speech, pancreatic cancer detection, with subcategories of the loss of a loved one and of general disease detection, certainly had mass appeal for a large audience. For example, consider how Jack made his topic relevant to his audience when he said in his closing statement:
“And so hopefully one day we can all have that one extra uncle, that one mother, that one brother, sister, we can have that one more family member to love, and that our hearts will be rid of that one disease burden that comes from pancreatic, ovarian and lung cancer, and potentially any disease...”
Finally, Jack does an exceptional job of keeping the audience engaged in the technical aspects of his speech. In fact, the part in his speech that could have been an audience-‐isolating technical moment (setting up scientific criteria for the sensor) was handled with a simple graph and a list of simple word-‐triggers:
“So I set up a scientific criteria as to what a sensor would have to look like in order to effectively diagnose pancreatic cancer. The sensor would have to be inexpensive, rapid, simple, sensitive, selective, and minimally invasive.”
Another great technique Jack uses to make his presentation easy to understand as well as memorable is that he uses similes. According to http://www.merriam-‐webster.com:
“A similie is a figure of speech comparing two unlike things that is often introduced by like or as (as in cheeks like roses)”
Using a simile, Jack highlights the significance of a key ingredient in his pancreatic cancer detection solution, carbon nanotubes:
“And despite their extremely small sizes, they have these incredible properties. They're kind of like the superheroes of material science.”
Here’s another example where Jack successfully arouses audience interest by comparing the complexities of making a cancer sensor using
carbon nanotubes and antibodies to making a familiar homemade treat:
“Making a cancer sensor out of paper is about as simple as making chocolate chip cookies, which I love. You start with some water, pour in some nanotubes, add antibodies, mix it up, take some paper, dip it, dry it, and you can detect cancer.”
Whenever possible, use similes to simplify complex topics. Not only do similes make it easier for your audience to digest the information you’re giving them, they also add variety and excitement to your presentation.
Use Conflict to Keep Your Audience Hooked
Jack is a great storyteller and keeps his audience hooked onto his every word. Stories are a powerful tool for keeping audiences engaged because people love listening to stories. We’re hardwired to listen to stories, so consider using personal stories in your presentation to add excitement to your talk. So, what is it about a story that keeps us riveted? As you read in the previous chapter, it’s the conflict in the story that keeps the audience engaged. We’re captivated by books and movies that have strong conflicts – where characters have to overcome difficult obstacles. The conflicts and difficulties in a story are the hook of the story – they’re what keep the audience curious to find out what happens next. In his TED talk, Jack keeps his audience engaged by sharing the obstacles and the conflicts he faced. For example, consider this story Jack shares about how, after reaching out to 200 different professors at Johns Hopkins and the National Institutes of Health, Jack’s expectations of wide acceptance for his idea took a turn for the worst:
“And I sat back waiting for these positive emails to be pouring in, saying, "You're a genius! You're going to save us all!"
And — (Laughter) Then reality took hold, and over the course of a month, I got 199 rejections out of those 200 emails. One professor even went through my entire procedure, painstakingly -‐-‐ I'm not really sure where he got all this time -‐-‐ and he went through and said why each and every step was like the worst mistake I could ever make.”
After being subjected to an interrogation by PhD’s and finally landing the lab space he needed, Jack shares another difficulty he faced:
“But it was shortly afterwards that I discovered my once brilliant procedure had something like a million holes in it...”
By sharing the difficulties and challenges he encounters, Jack causes audience members to ask, “I wonder how this conflict will be solved?” As a result, Jack’s audience stays curious and hooked to his talk. What stories can you share with your audience? What is the conflict in your story that will keep your audience hooked to your presentation?
IN A NUTSHELL
• Open with a thought-‐provoking question.
• Put statistics into context through comparison.
• Focus on expressing complex ideas in a simple manner.
• Use similes, analogies and metaphors to simplify complex concepts.
• Use conflict to keep your audience hooked.
*
Meet Presentation Expert Dr. Donna Hook:
Dr. Donna Hook is a trainer and mentor specializing in empowering individuals to gain confidence as a speaker and leader. She is a Distinguished Toastmaster with Fortune 100 management experience. Find out more about here: https://clarity.fm/drhook
CHAPTER FOUR
THE KEYS TO A POWERFUL AND
PERSUASIVE PRESENTATION
• Case study: Seth Godin, How to Get Your Ideas Spread
• Expert analysis by: Akash Karia Seth Godin is one of my favorite authors and speakers. He is a master storyteller who knows how to keep his readers and listeners glued to his books and his talks. In 2007, Seth Godin delivered a TED talk titled “How to get your ideas to spread” (http://bit.ly/1cnNp21). The talk is one of the most-‐viewed TED talks to date with over half a million views on YouTube. It is a great TED talk with rich insights for speakers.
Source: TED
In this chapter, we will dissect Seth’s talk so that you can discover the tools and techniques Seth uses to keep his audience hooked to his presentation. His talk contains great lessons on:
• Keeping your audience curious.
• Using stories to keep your audience engaged in your presentation.
• Building rapport through conversational language.
• Using of you-‐focused and we-‐focused language.
• Effectively utilizing the problem/solution structure.
• Offering anecdotal evidence to back up your ideas. In case you haven’t yet watched Seth’s talk, I encourage you to do so here: http://bit.ly/1cnNp21
Build Curiosity with Your Opening
If you fail to connect with your audience during your opening, they will mentally tune out of your speech and it will be very difficult to bring them back. Seth doesn’t waste any time and instead dives immediately into the essence of his speech. He begins with the following words:
“I'm going to give you four specific examples -‐-‐ and I'm going to cover at the end -‐-‐ about how a company called Silk tripled their sales by doing one thing, how an artist named Jeff Koons went from being a nobody to making a whole bunch of money and having a lot of impact, to how Frank Gehry redefined what it meant to be an architect.”
So, what makes this opening such an effective one? One of the most important things Seth does with this technique is that he hooks his audience into his talk by building their curiosity. He promises that he is going to share valuable tools with the audience, but doesn’t tell them what they are. As a result, audience members are left
asking themselves these questions:
• “What one thing did Silk do that tripled their sales?”
• “How did Jeff Koons go from being a nobody to making a whole bunch of money?”
• “How did this man named Frank Gehry redefine what it meant to be an architect?”
As soon as audience members start asking themselves these questions, they’re hooked. They are hooked into the presentation because they want to know the answers to the questions that have been raised. When crafting your presentation opening, ask yourself, “What questions am I raising in my audience’s minds?” If you’re not creating any questions in your audience’s minds, your audience has no reason to pay attention and they’re quickly going to tune out.
Implicitly Promise Value
Another reason Seth’s opening is so powerful is because it promises the audience value. Let’s examine part of the opening again:
“...how a company called Silk tripled their sales by doing one thing, how an artist named Jeff Koons went from being a nobody to making a whole bunch of money.”
If you’re an audience member listening to this presentation, what would you probably be thinking? You’d probably be thinking, “How did Silk triple their sales and how can I do the same? How did Jeff Koons go from being a nobody to making a lot of money? If I learn how he did it, perhaps I can do the same!” What value (implicit or explicit) are you promising your audience?
Keep Your Audience Engaged with Stories
Anyone who wants to master the art of public speaking must master storytelling skills. Stories are powerful because:
• They are hardwired into our brains. It’s how knowledge was passed down for millions of years before the written word. As children, we make sense of the world through stories.
• They are inherently interesting. Stories contain characters, conflicts and they involve the imagination. We cannot help but be caught up in a well-‐told story.
• They are memorable. Because stories activate our imaginations, they are easy to remember. When we remember the story, we also remember the point associated with it.
• They are relatable. We associate with characters and situations in the story, which is why stories engage us emotionally. As a result, stories are a powerful tool available to speakers to help them deepen the connection with their audience.
Seth Godin is a master storyteller, and in this TED talk he weaves in lots of stories and anecdotes to keep his audience’s interest levels high. For example, consider this short story about Otto Rohwedder:
“But this guy named Otto Rohwedder invented sliced bread, and he focused, like most inventors did, on the patent part and the making part. And the thing about the invention of sliced bread is this -‐-‐ that for the first 15 years after sliced bread was available no one bought it; no one knew about it; it was a complete and total failure.”
Here’s another short anecdote that Seth uses to help prove his point:
“This guy, Lionel Poilane, the most famous baker in the world -‐-‐ he died two and a half months ago, and he was a hero of mine and a
dear friend. He lived in Paris. Last year he sold 10 million dollars' worth of French bread.”
Here’s a personal story that Seth entertains and educates his audience with:
“I go to the deli; I'm sick; I need to buy some medicine. The brand manager for that blue product spent 100 million dollars trying to interrupt me in one year...”
Whether you’re using personal stories or stories about other people, the point is that stories are a fantastic tool to entertain as well as educate your audience members.
Use Conversational Language
Notice how Seth speaks in a very conversational manner:
“And it doesn't matter to me whether you're running a coffee shop or you're an intellectual, or you're in business, or you're flying hot air balloons. I think that all this stuff applies to everybody regardless of what we do.”
When you listen to Seth speak, you do not feel as though he is lecturing you. Nor does he seem like someone who is trying to impress you with the size of his vocabulary. He speaks naturally, and that comes off as authentic and helps him connect with his audience. Connect with your audience by speaking conversationally.
Make Your Talk Relevant to Your Audience I once attended a presentation where the speaker made some great points, but he failed to show me how the points he made were relevant to me. As a speaker, you should be aware that audience members are always going to be asking themselves, “How is this relevant to me?” It is
your job to show your audience how your points affect and impact your audience. For example, in this TED talk, Seth begins by talking about the invention of sliced bread. He says:
“...for the first 15 years after sliced bread was available no one bought it; no one knew about it; it was a complete and total failure.”
Had Seth carried on talking about sliced bread and not shown the audience how the story was relevant to them, he would have lost them. However, being the master speaker that he is, Seth showed his audience how the story was relevant and applicable to them:
“That the success of sliced bread, like the success of almost everything we've been talking about at this conference, is not always about what the patent is like, or what the factory is like -‐-‐ it's about can you get your idea to spread, or not. And I think that the way you're going to get what you want, or cause the change that you want to change, to happen, is that you've got to figure out a way to get your ideas to spread.”
No matter what stories or examples you share, always make sure that you tie them back to your audience by showing your audience how the stories and the examples are relevant to them.
Use the Magic Word: You
In public speaking, the magic word that helps you connect with your audience is the word “you.” The word “you” is regarded as one of the most powerful words in the English language. Why? Because you are interested in you! People are interested in themselves. Notice that in order to make the story of sliced bread relevant to his audience, Seth had to turn the focus from sliced bread (i.e. “other-‐focused) to audience-‐focused (i.e. “you-‐focused”):
“And I think that the way you're going to get what you want, or cause the change that you want to change, to happen, is that you've got to figure out a way to get your ideas to spread.”
Here’s another example of you-‐focused speaking from Seth’s talk: “The way the TV-‐industrial complex works, is you buy some ads -‐-‐ interrupt some people -‐-‐ that gets you distribution. You use the distribution you get to sell more products. You take the profit from that to buy more ads.”
Whenever you speak, remember that your presentation is never about you (the speaker). It’s always about the audience. Keep your presentation audience-‐centered by using you-‐focused language. Avoid the mistake of being speaker-‐centered and talking about yourself using I-‐focused language. For example, in one of the presentations I gave, I could have used the following I-‐focused description to tell my story:
“I could sense the excitement. Over four-‐hundred people sat squashed together at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center.”
While this would have been a good opening, I made it even better. I made it you-‐focused. Here’s how I started:
“You could sense the excitement. Over four-‐hundred people sat squashed together at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center.”
Do you feel the difference between the two? The first one is speaker-‐focused. The second one is audience-‐focused. It engages the audience members by placing them in my situation – they become a part of my story and become mentally engaged in my presentation. Whenever you can, look for ways to turn I-‐focused sections of your presentation into audience-‐focused sections (“you-‐focused”).
The Power of “We” There is one particular situation in which it is better to use a “we-‐focus” than it is to use a “you-‐focus.” For example, as an audience member, which one would you react more positively to? (A) “You are sometimes so afraid of failing that you never take
actions towards your goals.” or
(B) “We are sometimes so afraid of failing that we never take action towards our goals.”
I personally would react more favorably to (B). Why? Because if you tell the audience something “negative” about themselves, they will resist listening to you. They will also perceive you as being arrogant because you seem to be shoving advice down their throats. However, if you use a “we-‐focus” when sharing “negative” ideas, you are including yourself as part of the group. You are not placing yourself “above” them, and instead connecting with them on a “we” level. Consider this section of Seth’s presentation where he uses a we-‐focus:
“We're now in the fashion business, no matter what we do for a living, we're in the fashion business. And the thing is, people in the fashion business know what it's like to be in the fashion business -‐-‐ they're used to it. The rest of us have to figure out how to think that way.”
However, imagine if Seth had said this instead:
“...people in the fashion business know what it’s like to be in the fashion business – they’re used to it. You however have to figure out how to think that way.”
The latter statement would have caused psychological reactance from the audience. They would have perceived Seth as being too “pushy,” “aggressive” and “arrogant.” Whenever you’re telling the audience something negative (e.g. telling them what mistake they are making, what they should stop doing or how they should change), use a “we-‐focus” to show your humility and avoid coming across as a pushy and arrogant speaker.
Highlight the Problem before You Offer the Solution Seth makes brilliant use of the problem/solution structure. This is a very simple yet effective presentation structure where you first highlight the problem before you offer the solution. Why is this such an effective structure to use? Because – as Seth knows – people don’t care about the solution unless you first highlight the problem. During the first half of the talk, Seth talks about the problem. He intensifies the problem and the pain for the audience members until they’re desperate for a solution. Look at just some of the examples Seth uses to highlight and magnify the pain:
• “The brand manager for that blue product spent 100 million dollars trying to interrupt me in one year. 100 million dollars interrupting me with TV commercials and magazine ads and spam and coupons and shelving allowances and spiff -‐-‐ all so I could ignore every single message.”
• “Arby's is going to spend 85 million dollars promoting an oven mitt with the voice of Tom Arnold, hoping that that will get people to go to Arby's and buy a roast beef sandwich. Now, I had tried to imagine what could possibly be in an animated TV commercial
featuring Tom Arnold, that would get you to get in your car, drive across town and buy a roast beef sandwich.”
• “Consumers don't care about you at all; they just don't care. Part of the reason is -‐-‐ they've got way more choices than they used to, and way less time. And in a world where we have too many choices and too little time, the obvious thing to do is just ignore stuff.”
All the examples above highlight the problem that the old way of spreading ideas via interruption marketing just isn’t working. By highlighting the magnitude of the problem, Seth gets his audience members wanting to desperately know the solution. So, what is the solution? According to Seth, it is to be remarkable. Look at how he subtly and smoothly transitions from the problem into the solution using the purple cow analogy: “Cows are boring. Who's going to stop and pull over and say -‐-‐ oh, look, a cow. Nobody. But if the cow was purple -‐-‐ isn't that a great special effect? I could do that again if you want it. If the cow was purple, you'd notice it for a while. I mean, if all cows were purple you'd get bored with those, too. The thing that's going to decide what gets talked about, what gets done, what gets changed, what gets purchased, what gets built, is: is it remarkable? And "remarkable" is a really cool word because we think it just means neat, but it also means -‐-‐ worth making a remark about.”
After transitioning into the solution part of the presentation, Seth then spends the rest of the time highlighting the solution (the benefits of being remarkable). All the stories shift from being “problem stories” to being “success stories” such as below:
“They didn't want to buy his bread. It didn't look like "French bread." It wasn't what they expected. It was neat; it was remarkable; and slowly it spread from one person to another person until finally, it became the official bread of three-‐star
restaurants in Paris. Now he's in London, and he ships by FedEx all around the world.”
So, what can we learn from Seth regarding the use of a problem-‐solution structure for a presentation? First, present, highlight and intensify the problem for your audience. Audiences don’t care about the solution until they feel the pain of the problem. Use stories and examples to highlight the problem. Second, ensure a smooth a natural transition from the Problem phase of the presentation to the Solution phase of the presentation. Finally, only share the solution after your audience is desperate to hear it. Use plenty of success stories to demonstrate the benefits of the solution. Experiment with the problem-‐solution structure for your next presentation. It is an incredibly simple yet stunningly effective structure for winning your audience over to your way of thinking.
Use an Analogy, Metaphor or Simile Analogies, metaphors and similes make it easier for your audience to understand your arguments. In this TED talk, Seth uses the analogy of a purple cow to explain the idea of being remarkable to his audience:
“Cows are invisible. Cows are boring. Who's going to stop and pull over and say -‐-‐ oh, look, a cow. Nobody. But if the cow was purple -‐-‐ isn't that a great special effect? I could do that again if you want it. If the cow was purple, you'd notice it for a while. I mean, if all cows were purple you'd get bored with those, too. The thing that's going to decide what gets talked about, what gets done, what gets changed, what gets purchased, what gets built, is: is it remarkable?”
Analogies, metaphors and similes not only help your audience better understand your idea, they also help the audience remember the idea. Analogies, metaphors and similes activate your imagination and paint pictures in your mind, which helps you understand as well as better recall the idea in the future. What metaphors, analogies and similes can you use in your presentation?
Have as Many Stories as You Need, but Have Only One Key
Takeaway Message In his talk, Seth offers lots of anecdotal proof that being remarkable works – that it makes business sense! Here are just some of the many anecdotes and examples Seth shares in order to back up his argument:
• “This yoyo right here cost 112 dollars, but it sleeps for 12 minutes. Not everybody wants it but they don't care. They want to talk to the people who do, and maybe it'll spread.”
• “These guys make the loudest car stereo in the world. It's as loud as a 747 jet. You can't get in the car; it's got bulletproof glass on the windows because they'll blow out the windshield otherwise.”
• “Hard Candy nail polish, doesn't appeal to everybody, but to the people who love it, they talk about it like crazy.”
• “AmIHotOrNot.com -‐-‐ everyday 250,000 people go to this site, run by two volunteers, and I can tell you they are hard graders. They didn't get this way by advertising a lot. They got this way by being remarkable...”
As you can see, Seth’s talk is based on anecdotal evidence. In order to win his audience over to his way of thinking – of getting them to buy into the idea that being remarkable, even if it means targeting a smaller market, is a good strategy – Seth shares lots and lots of stories of companies that have been successful by being remarkable.
However, even though Seth shares a lot of stories, notice that he only has one key message. Each and every story in the talk is meant to reinforce his one key takeaway message. As a speaker, you should ensure that you do not overwhelm your audience with too many messages. If you try to squeeze too much information into your talk, your audience won’t remember much of it. For an eighteen-‐minute TED talk, you can use as many stories, examples, analogies and activities as you need, but you should have only one key takeaway message. The takeaway message of Seth’s talk was, “To spread your ideas, you need to be remarkable.” What is the key takeaway message of your talk?
End with a Clear Call to Action
Seth concludes his inspiring TED talk with a final example to back up his main point. He even refers back to the purple cow analogy, which is a great callback to earlier on in the speech. He says:
“The last example I want to give you. This is a map of Soap Lake, Washington. As you can see, if that's nowhere, it's in the middle of it. But they do have a lake. And people used to come from miles around to swim in the lake. They don't anymore. So the founding fathers said, "We've got some money to spend. What can we build here?" And like most committees, they were going to build something pretty safe. And then an artist came to them -‐-‐ this is a true artist's rendering -‐-‐ he wants to build a 55-‐foot tall lava lamp in the center of town. That's a purple cow; that's something worth noticing. I don't know about you but if they build it, that's where I'm going to go.”
While this is a pretty good conclusion, I believe that it could be improved by having a stronger call to action. A call to action is a statement that lets your audience members know exactly what you would like them to do next as a result of listening to you. It’s the next step that you want your audience members to take. Unfortunately, Seth misses out on this and as a result the conclusion is not as powerful and inspiring as it could be. As an example of a call to action, check out this wonderful TED talk by Amy Cuddy (http://bit.ly/13KIm7h). Amy wraps up her speech by encouraging her audience to try power-‐posing. She also gives her audience a clear next step, which is to “spread the science”:
“So I want to ask you first, you know, both to try power posing, and also I want to ask you to share the science, because this is simple. I don't have ego involved in this. (Laughter) Give it away. Share it with people, because the people who can use it the most are the ones with no resources and no technology and no status and no power. Give it to them because they can do it in private. They need their bodies, privacy and two minutes, and it can significantly change the outcomes of their life. Thank you.”
This is a clear and compelling call to action – it drives the audience members to take action and make a change, which is the point of any presentation. How will you end your talk? What’s the clear next step of your speech? What’s your call to action?
IN A NUTSHELL
• Build curiosity with your opening.
• Create questions in your audience’s minds.
• Promise value from your talk.
• Keep your audience engaged with stories.
• Connect with conversational language.
• Make your talk relevant to your audience.
• Use the magic word: “You”.
• Use a “we-‐focus” when sharing negative ideas.
• Highlight the problem before you offer the solution.
• Use an analogy, metaphor or simile.
• Include as many stories as you need, but have only one key takeaway message.
• End with a clear call to action.
CHAPTER FIVE
WRAP UP We’ve covered a lot of tools and techniques in this short book, and I hope that having analyzed the TED talks in this book has inspired you to create powerful and persuasive presentations. I believe that anyone can become a powerful speaker – that public speaking is not a talent that you’re born with, but a skill you develop. Use the following tools and techniques to help you give a great TED talk:
• Build your talk around a universally appealing topic.
• Craft an opening that makes your audience lean in.
• Create knowledge gaps with questions.
• Prolong your audience’s curiosity for as long as you can.
• Promise value from your talk.
• Engage your audience with rhetorical questions.
• Highlight the problem before you offer the solution.
• Connect with your audience by speaking conversationally.
• Create rapport by referencing common experiences and beliefs.
• Use a “we-‐focus” when sharing negative ideas.
• Use stories that make your audience feel something.
• Remember the four elements of a great story: Characters, Conflict/Challenge, Cure and Change in character.
• Include as many stories as you need, but have only one key takeaway message.
• Make your presentation relevant to your audience.
• Involve your audience in your presentation.
• Engage the audience with a you-‐focus.
• Add an element of newness to your talk.
• Use self-‐deprecation and over-‐exaggeration to add humor to your talk.
• Tread carefully when using humor.
• Put statistics into perspective for your audience.
• Tell your audience how to apply your ideas to their life.
• Don’t just share information; share your emotions too.
• Use words that invoke emotions in your audience.
• Focus externally, not internally.
• Use visual aids only if you have visuals.
• Let your passion shine through.
• Focus on expressing complex ideas in a simple manner.
• Use similes, analogies and metaphors to simplify complex concepts.
• Conclude by “signaling, summarizing and selling”.
• Motive your audience to take action.
• End with a clear call to action.
One Final Tool
I’m going to end this book by giving you one more tool. Use this tool before any speech or presentation because it will put you into a confident mind-‐set. I want you to relax, sit back and imagine yourself up on stage, sharing your message with your audience. Imagine your audience smiling and enthusiastic. Imagine them being hooked onto your every word. Imagine them totally engaged in your speech. Imagine them laughing at the humor in your speech. Imagine them spellbound by your stories. Imagine yourself enthusiastic, confident and enjoying the moment. To your speaking success, Akash Karia | Martha Lanaghen | Donna Hook
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