Dahle Communication

Give People a Reason to Listen

This is a simple mantra for your speeches. Your presentation or speech, regardless of how big of an audience you are giving it to, should be important enough that people will want to be there and get something out of it. If people are sitting there asking themselves "Why am I here?" then you need to work on your speeches.

The problem with a lot of speeches that I hear is that I am asking myself that question a lot of times. Many times the speaker is droning on about something that I don't need or they are reading their slides to you. They do this even after they have given you their handouts with their slides on it. Which means I've flipped through the slides, read all the material and yet I have to sit here for another 30 minutes while you read all of your slides!

So please, take a cue from myself and Seth Godin - when you are preparring your speeches ask yourself "Are people getting something out of this speech or are they asking themselves - why am I here?" This simple guideline can help you with your speeches. Make sure that you cut out information that you don't need and make sure you are giving a speech that people are going to want to be present at.

Travis

How do you communicate with someone you disagree with?

Seth Godin posted an interesting blog this morning title "What do you call things you disagree with?" Well, since he doesn't have a comments page to discuss what we would call it, I figured I would post about it here and if anyone wants to add to the discussion they are more than welcome.

What I think is most obvious in Seth's post is his comment that when we get annoyed with something or afraid of something, we "lose eloquence and start calling things names." Evidence of this can be seen every single day if you watch any type of news commentary, read blog posts on politics or marketing or listen to AM talk radio. When people disagree with something, they get angry and just delve into name calling. While I think he is talking more about marketing, I see it more often than not in politics.

For me, I call things that I disagree with by their names. If I disagree with someone, I don't delve into name calling and trying to degrade them. What I try to do is see things from their perspective, analyze it and then disagree with them in a civilized manner. Unfortunately, people forget that they are talking to another human being when they are arguing with them and they are passionate about something. This is one of the main reasons why I got out of politics.

It is also one of the reasons that I love teaching debate. It forces students to learn how to see things from both sides of an issue and be able to defend both sides of that issue. This is also why I want to extend my knowledge and teach people that communication is about talking to another human being. They are not someone who you should throw names at and try to disparage them. Disagreeing with someone is a necessary component of our democracy...calling them facists, left-wing radicals, communists, socialists, right-wing bigots or anything in-between doesn't solve anything. All it does is create more hatred in this world.

As Seth Godin says, "there's never a shortage of boogy men available to the people in the community that you're frightening." This is true. But don't get sucked in with them. Raise above it and try to engage them in an intellectual discussion. Be civil. Most importantly, remember that they are just someone who disagrees with you...and that's okay.

Travis

Don't Wait to Improve Yourself - A lesson in trackbacking

Over the past couple of months I have gotten into blogging quite a bit. During that time I have learned a lot about the blogging world and what I need to do. For example, you want to blog on a regular basis: once a week, twice a week - whatever your schedule, try to keep it consistent. It's hard to get people to come back to your blog if they have no idea when you're going to post again. Tools such as linking to other sites, adding images and videos are useful as well. One key tool that can be very useful is the TrackBack. Referencing someone else's blog and having it posted on their site is a great way to increase traffic. I knew that this was a good thing to do, but I had yet to use it -- that was until Monday. On Monday I posted an article on Twitter vs. Facebook and had it trackbacked to a post from Seth Godin on his blog about what makes things better. Doing this increased traffic on my blog by a significant amount!

I knew something like this would help me, but since I had not used it, I was just putting it off. Now that I have seen how beneficial it can be, I will use it again and not just to help myself, but to hopefully increase traffic on someone else's site as well.

Communication can do the same thing for you. Being able to effectively communicate will increase your business prospects as much as trackbacking can help your blog. It is a tool that you need to use if you want to be successful. But don't do what I did with trackbacking and wait. Putting things off will only delay the inevitable. Unfortunately, we are creatures of habit and we don't like to change. Why should you get a speech coach or work on your presentations if you haven't in the past? The reason is that it will only help you. In this time of economic turmoil and businesses struggling and unemployment rising, you need to be able to take your speeches and presentations to the next level. Don't wait like I did - you'll only wish you would have started earlier.

Travis

Twitter vs Facebook - Why Simplicity Matters

I have essentially stopped going to facebook on a regular basis. I check things when I get a message sent to me. Once I'm done with that message I might spend a minute looking at things, but then I leave. For me, facebook has become an overgrown blob of applications that take up way too much of my time. I just don't have time to fill out every survey or application like mob wars and lil' green plants that get sent to me everyday. If I was still in college, maybe. Being 32, married with 2 kids, a real job, starting a business and trying to golf from time to time means my time is valuable and I don't want to waste it on facebook.

This sentiment seems to be growing among those of us who are social media savvy. Sam Diaz from ZDNet.com shares my thoughts on the subject. Both of us are spending a lot more time on Twitter. In fact, Twitter's growth in the past year was 1,382 percent! That's quite an increase. Facebook isn't hurting though, they saw their growth increase by 228 percent. I don't think they have to worry yet about losing people. However, I do think it is a word of caution to Facebook. Myspace was the biggest social network out there until Facebook came around and they saw a 4 percent decrease in users over the past year.

Seth Godin(who actually doesn't Twitter, but I am sure people wished he did) has a great blog this morning on what is better. He makes a great point that it is up to the consumer to decide which is "better." To me, and a lot of people who are annoyed with all of the junk that comes with facebook, Twitter is better. Granted, I can't post pictures or videos or play mob wars...but really, I don't want to. I like things that are simple, clean and easy to use and so do most people. 

A lesson in communication is a simple one: make sure your message is clean simple and easy to understand. I don't mean simple as in 'dumbed-down.' It means that your message has been stripped down to its core. If you try to put too many bells and whistles into your speech because you think it might help improve your speech or presentation...don't! It is one of PresentationZen's key tenets to presentations - simplicity! Otherwise you might find people starting to leave your speeches the way that they are leaving facebook.

Travis