Redeeming Myself After a Year
Just before taking the stage in my costume. (The hat and raincoat came off after my attention-getter!)
Almost exactly a year ago I wrote a post confessing about how I had a really off day while keynoting at an event. Lots of kind people came to my defense and many audience members who had never seen me speak before did not even notice it. However I can count on my good friends to be honest (painfully so, sometimes!), and they agreed it wasn’t my best performance.
Well, last Saturday on the same Atlanta stage at David Perdew’s Niche Affiliate Marketing System 8 (NAMS) Event, I redeemed myself!
Last year I listed the things I did wrong and what I could do to improve.
I thought this year I’d share what I remembered to do right so my performance could be greatly improved — even with another brand new speech!
- Planned Ahead: I knew for at least 6 months I’d be back on the NAMS stage. I also knew the reason I was going was to give myself the deadline to write my new keynote speech, Kill the Elevator Speech. I didn’t wait to work on the speech.
- Got Help: Even the best performers need help sometimes, just like the top Olympic athletes need their coaches. I realize that and I reached out to my smart and creative colleagues and friends to help me come up with some ideas about how to present my speech, props I could use, how to start and more. Big thanks especially to my weekly accountability partner, Shannon Cherry who gave me the idea to use the Dragnet Theme — I used it as my attention getter. Also big thanks to my buddy coach, Kamin Bell Samuel, who worked through my entire plan with me and helped me figure out what my “deputy” buttons were going to say (they turned out great, BTW!).
- Had Personal Motivation: I told you this was a new speech. I knew I needed a deadline that was set in stone, what Paul Evans called during his speech an “immoveable deadline” to get the speech done. My new book, Kill the Elevator Speech: Stop Selling, Start Connecting is coming out soon – and this speech motivated me to finish the book, too! In addition, I knew I’d need new marketing materials to promote the upcoming book and keynote speech and that my dear friend and gifted photographer, Tony Laidig would be there willing to record my entire presentation. If the speech sucked, so would my marketing materials and I couldn’t have THAT!
- Went Against the Grain and Stuck to My Guns: Yet again all the other daily opening and closing keynote speakers used PowerPoint presentations. If you’ll recall, last year I felt the pressure to conform and so slapped a PPT together at the last minute. This year, even though I had a brand new speech and honestly could have used a PPT to remind me of what I wanted to say next, I chose to skip it altogether in favor of using props to add a visual element to my speech. As a result, I got to be creative and many audience members commented specifically on the props I used and how much they enjoyed them.
- Practiced: I’ll admit, I did not practice as much as I would normally recommend to my clients, but I did practice important bits of my speech so I’d know how they would sound and feel when I delivered them for reals. I also had a captive audience in my publisher, friend and roomie for the event, Kristen Eckstein who graciously listened to me practice at 1 AM after being out dancing and singing karaoke. (Oh, I don’t actually recommend you go out and party all night when you have an 8:30 AM speech, but I knew I was prepared and I couldn’t resist spending that quality fun time with my good friends! Plus I drank only water and only sang one group song so my voice wouldn’t be shot and I wouldn’t wake up with a screaming headache!)
- Visualized: I knew the layout of the room and I worked on seeing myself walking in, on the stage and knocking it out of the park.
- Prayed: This is how I center myself moments before I go on stage. Whatever you can do to calm down and get grounded, do it: breathe, meditate for a moment, get quiet and get focused.
- Worked From a Full Word-for-Word Script: I know this may come as a surprise because when I teach my Signature Speech (TM) students to prepare their speeches, I recommend using only an outline rather than writing the speech out verbatim. However, there are a number of things different about this. First a keynote, which is a product in an of itself, is drastically different than a Signature Speech (TM), which is marketing tool. Also, to start I’ll be charging $15,000 per speech for my keynote, which I will deliver again and again, likely for years to come. Having a script will allow me to tweak it over time. This speech had props, jokes, and stories I wanted to get right. I put all the stage direction into the script so I would remember my plan. Finally, I printed my script and actually used it as a prop during the speech, so it worked well for a first time (and by the time I deliver it again it will be fully memorized
).
So, that’s what all came together to make this year’s speech go very well. I feel like I can hold my head high with pride now with the NAMS community.
Oh- and if you want to hear my speech, you can access it and all the NAMS8 recordings right here.
Speaking to Serve and Raise Funds – One of the 21 Ways to Make Money Speaking
Looking at the displays in the stores, it’s obviously back to school time!
Soon kids everywhere will be sporting new wardrobes, sharpening new pencils, choosing their favorite folders and heading back to write essays about what they did this summer.
Not long after, we parents will receive the inevitable fundraising package from school where we can have the luxury of buying overpriced wrapping paper and cardboard-like frozen pizzas, while being asked to bug neighbors (who also have kids with the same fundraisers), extended family members, and colleagues at work to also take part in the never-ending quest of raising funds for schools.
But there are better, more creative ways, that are also less offensive to the taste buds and pocketbook.
For example, one interesting and more fun alternative to holding the same old fundraisers I’ve recently heard about is to raise funds through bingo events. My friend Shannon Cherry actually did her own version of bingo at her live event. And that got me to thinking about how you can use your skills to do something community-building and fun to raise funds for your favorite group
In my best-selling book, 21 Ways to Make Money Speaking, Way 6 is Speak to Help a Charity. When school begins this year, you can get in 
touch with the fundraising chairperson – almost always a volunteer eager for ideas and help – and offer your services as a speaker to hold a fundraising event where you either donate your services in full, or, for you to make some money too, split the ticket sales 50/50 with the school. The book has a few more strategies in that Way for you to bring in some additional cash for the school and for you as well.
Then all you need to do is come up with a speech topic that is both relevant to your expertise and relevant to the parents at school (remember – school is about the kids, but fundraisers have to appeal to the parents, who hold the money).
For example, in my business I teach public speaking and communication skills to celebrities, experts, and entrepreneurs. Obviously that’s not going to appeal to all the parents at any given school. But in my days before my business, while teaching public speaking classes at the college level, I also taught interpersonal communication courses and male-female communication courses. I could easily pull together a fun 60-minute program on how parents can better communicate in their marriages and with their children using interactive exercises and more.
Remember, your goal here is to get paid to speak (so you can add “professional speaker” to your repertoire and bring in some cash) and to help others by serving from the stage at the same time, in this case specifically in raising funds for a school. But you can also have a display set up where you sell your books and offer your business cards, brochures and other marketing to those who attend who might be interested in working with you later, therefore turning the fundraising speaking event into a lead-generation tool for you as well.
So what do you think? Will you give this a try this at school year instead of being forced to buy a bunch of sub-par stuff – and do your part to serve from the stage? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
Speakers Beware: Avoid the Scammers, Jerks, and Those Who Would Rip You Off
Felicia Slattery becomes the Mama Bear of the speaking industry to protect speakers from scammers, jerks, and con artists
I’m sick of it.
And I’m about to get all Mama Bear for the speaking industry. (Thanks to Dr. Mollie Marti for the comparison!)
**Fair warning…. I don’t usually use potty words, but the language in this post may end up being rated PG13 or worse. I’m that upset and sometimes “nicer” words simply don’t cut it to describe some people and situations. If you are easily offended by PG13 language, it’s best you stop reading now.**
Too many times this year and at least three times THIS WEEK I’ve heard of scams, jerks, con artists, and rip offs trying to benefit from the hard work and good name of professional speakers by taking advantage of them and trying to trick them, the industry, and the marketplace.
THE MADNESS HAS TO STOP!!!!
Here’s what happened:
First, a long-time client forwarded me an email exchange she had with a supposed event planner in Malaysia. This “event planner” had offered her a speaking gig at a leadership conference for $3,000USD payable AFTER the event. (Something already smells fishy to me.) She had an uneasy feeling about it and contacted me for my opinion. After a quick Google search, I found that the same event and meeting planners with a similar name had at least one other speaker present a weekend training and never paid his fee. I’m going to keep digging for her.
Next, the same client was contacted by another party, with a similar-too-good-to-be-true sounding offer. (More later on why she may be a target for scammers).
Then last night I heard about a shockingly extra scuzzbaggy idiot scammer, who literally STOLE the images of many of my friends in the speaker training industry for his crappy “telesummit,” created fake fan pages using their names and images, and started commenting on other people’s walls, pretending to be them — and blatantly doing it as if they’d never find out. He created a sales page with all their images as if they had agreed to be part of his event he was charging $297 for admission to; when in reality, at least one of them never even spoke to the scammer, let alone agreed to be part of anything. And beyond ALL that– this Scammer McScammy Pants changed his name (and not to Scammer McScammy Pants because that would have been too easy to tell something wasn’t quite right).
These true experts, several of whom are people I have shared meals with, spent time with and consider friends, as well as colleagues, have been marketing using the Internet for many years and (1) know very quickly when their names are being used anywhere online and (2) have massive followings of fans and friends who watch their backs. Why this douchebag of a human being thought he could even get away with using their names and creating fake pages and personas pretending to be them I will never know.
I found out about this scam from a Facebook post by Dave Lakhani, a force to be reckoned with when he’s in a good mood and happy– but piss
Don't let that smile fool you. Dave Lakhani is a force to be reckoned with and stands for the highest ethics in the speaker world.
him off and seriously… watch out. Dave Lakhani has been one of my speaking heroes since I met him in 2008 when I was emcee of an event where he started his speech by saying something like: “If you refuse to turn off your technology while I am speaking, I will physically take it from you and crush it. I will crush your technology. This message is that important and you must give me your full attention.” Guess what? Everyone gave him their full attention.
A few months later he invited me to be his guest at an exclusive weekend speaker training he did for a handful of national celebrities and other professional speakers, where I got to know him up close and personal. And although at an imposing 6’5″ (or more?), with definite strong opinions and a general inherent and amazing personal power, I found Dave Lakhani to be warm, sincere, and inspiring to learn from and watch. Above all, Dave Lakhani does business with the highest ethics and integrity, treats people with respect – including those he disagrees with- and is more than willing to call out crap when he sees it.
What Dave Lakhani did after finding out someone stole his identity to market their illegitimate online event is nothing less than brilliant.
Dave describes what he did next in one of the (to date) 94 comments on the thread:
“This scambag (name withheld here because I don’t want my blog associated with him in any way, but you can see who it is on the Facebook post) created a bunch of fan pages using the names and likeness of a bunch of speakers and then started commenting as those people on other pages as if all of these people were excited about his event for the purpose of getting traffic from people reading the comments and then clicking to the page. Once he heard that I’d threatened his breakfast cereal, he immediately phoned me and left a message saying that he was only trying to honor me and wanted to promote my products on the back end of his seminar (presumably because they are not good enough for the front end). He then left me his phone number and assured me he’d take my call, he of course did not answer the phone when I called back and covered his butt by saying that it was 7:30am in Thailand and he had to get some sleep sometime because he had been up all night with his summit.
“If I were him I’d be more worried about me getting in touch with the CEO of Infusionsoft Clate Mask and letting them know that they are sponsoring the event of an identity thief or at minimum one of the most unethical promoters around. He has mentioned to several people who have reached out to me on his behalf that of course it wasn’t his fault, he had a “team” of people who did it and they “forgot” to let the people know whose identities they hijacked that they were doing it to honor them and to sell their products on the back end.
“The problem with this is the problem with much of Internet Marketing and Biz Op generally. The lack of morals and ethics is astounding. It is why I’ve quit speaking on those stages and why I’m more focused on building brick and mortar businesses and just writing and selling books. The only goal of too many of these promoters is simply to separate people from their money regardless of how well the information works. I’ve always threatened to write a book about all the conversations I had with drunk speakers and promoters who could only talk about how they systematically sucked money out of people’s pockets and how stupid people were and how easy they made it. Then, the next day before they speak they have prayer circles with the attendees asking God to bless their talk so that they can really reach people. Things like this make me really reconsider that book idea. There are good speakers and good promoters out there but they often get overshadowed by the idiots like this guy. And, virtually all of the bad ones say they are the only ones doing it right and ethically.
“So, what am I doing next? Well, first I’m waiting for (the guy) to call me back and see what he has to say for himself when we speak in person, that will be fun and I will likely record it. Second, I’ll be reporting him to Facebook, The FTC, and the Attorney General’s Office. I’ve also called all the speakers I know personally who are on the platform to back out. I’m glad to hear that JP Maroney, Bill Walsh and Stephanie Frank have already made the decision to pull out, I expect to see more pull out as well.”
Then I replied:
“Whew… This is just so terribly upsetting! … I think what happened to you & others we know in this situation sucks big time AND I worry about more eager and less savvy/experienced speakers who can easily be taken advantage of. Mollie Marti is right– I feel very Mama Bear about those people who really do want to speak & share their messages and make an honest living doing it like we have.
For me, my whole life has revolved around teaching and coaching speech. It was my profession as a college prof for more than a decade & I LOVE it. Plus doing the info marketing thing keeps me with my family to raise my girls in person instead of having to be on the road 100+ days a year on stages. Someday I’ll do that when they’re in college & grown up.
Anyway I think we seriously need to put our heads together and create something for our industry that seeks to protect them. You are right… There are far too many jerks teaching speaking & marketing. I bet Joel Comm might be on board to add a guest post (we could probably ask his permission to grab a post he’s already written… I know I’ve read a couple scathing posts from him about the underbelly of IM).
I am doing this protecting speakers blog series. Anyone who wants to contribute with a guest post is welcome. I’m not selling anything attached to it. It’ll be a week-long or month-long PSA for the speaking community.
Who’s in?”
I already have at least one commitment from Thom Scott who replied almost immediately. Thom Scott will write a guest post on contract structures and material rights. I know as I reach out personally I’ll have more guests willing to share their stories, experiences and best tips on how speakers can avoid scams in the speaking industry. I plan to invite Christian speaker Leesa Barnes, who earlier this year was almost scammed out of thousands of dollars by a group pretending to be with a church in England (and who I hope forgives me for the PG13 language in this post!). I also plan to invite Tom Antion, who called out a very famous speaker trainer who he knew to be telling lies and taking people’s money. My friend and accountability partner Shannon Cherry might have a thing or two to share since she regularly posts Cherry Bombs on her blog calling out unethical business marketing practices and advocating for her readers. Friends like New York Times best-selling author Joel Comm might want to weigh in, as he has effectually left the Internet Marketing space because he was so disheartened by the lying, manipulation, and regurgitating of ideas being sold as new innovations.
All of these people and more are advocates for entrepreneurs and business owners. I am standing up today to be counted as the Mama Bear of professional speakers and emerging speakers.
Overall, I won’t be naming names of the unethical ones here on this blog because I don’t want to have my name or blog associated with them. Plus, really, it’s not about the scam artists. It’s about YOU, my dear readers and speakers everywhere who need to know what kinds of scams are out there and best practices on how to avoid them. And you should learn how the industry really does work for insiders who work in meetings all the time.
Why are emerging speakers like my client a ripe target for scammers? Because they are so eager and excited to get their messages out to the world they want to believe there are people who will pay them to do that. And there are plenty of legitimate event planners around the world who are willing to do just that. But those meeting planners, many of whom are members of the prestigious Meeting Planners International and others as members of the American Society of Training and Development who all work in an entirely different way than the scammers do. Yet sadly, because of their inexperience with ethical meeting planners for real meetings that do need excellent, well-qualified, trained speakers, new and emerging professional speakers can easily become a target. And as we saw with my friend Dave Lakhani, even those who are well-respected in the industry can become targets of unethical business practices as well.
The aim of this Public Service Announcement Series for Speakers is to help arm you with the tools you need to recognize scams and give you the tools you need to build a successful, income-generating speaking business (Hint: no it won’t be overnight. Yes, it takes work. And, sorry, but no, international groups are NOT going to contact you out of the blue, not tell you how they heard of you, never have even one phone conversation with you, and offer to hire you via email or Facebook private message sight unseen).
Stay tuned and come back for more very soon. In the meantime, do you have any scams that should be exposed? Ideas or thoughts on the issue? Please share in the comments below.
Writing a Book? Write Something Else First…
Having written two full-length books with another under contract, a handful of ebooks, and thousands of articles and blog posts, I know what it’s like sitting with a blinking cursor in front of you on a blank screen, almost mocking you. It’s not like you don’t have ideas. It’s not like you don’t know your stuff. But golly… when it comes time to put your butt in the chair and roll up your sleeves, something can overcome even the most accomplished, brilliant expert like you.
Call it writer’s block. Call it performance anxiety. Call it procrastination. Whatever it is, if writing a book is on your list of goals for 2012, the name of what’s stopping you from reaching your goal doesn’t matter — you gotta get past it and git ‘er done!
Enter: Public speaking.
If you are an author or want to be an author, one of the easiest places to start is with the speech you’ll give to talk about your book. I call it your Signature Speech™ for Authors and it can help you do a number of things:
1. Clarify your thoughts: when you have a bunch of ideas all rumbling around in your head, for many of us it often helps to talk your ideas out. One way I’ve found to be useful is to put together a list of questions I’d want someone to ask me about my book. Then I can come up with my answers.
2. Determine the hot topics: Yes, your entire book will be filled with useful information that is important to advancing your field, helping your readers, and in general sharing a bit of yours and others’ expertise. However, there will be parts of your book that will get readers extra excited—whether that is a new development in your field, a contrary opinion you have backed up by data, or a new way of looking at or doing something. People will be talking. Putting together your speech will illuminate for you what that will be because in any speech you want to serve from the stage with details that get your audience excited about their experience of listening to you.
3. Think in user-friendly chunks: Writing an entire book can be overwhelming. But when you write a speech, typically you start with the body of the speech, which should contain from 3-5 main distinct points, presented clearly for your audience. Each main point will be chunked into sections. Your book outline can then quickly spring from those sections.
4. Determine your goal for the book: Most savvy authors know it’s not the sale of your book that will make you money. It’s what you do to capitalize on the content from your book (use the buzz word “leverage” if you like) that will bring you the greatest cash flow. When you pull back from the blinking cursor and look at your book from a 20,000 foot view as a cog in a wheel of content and opportunities for you, what details belong in the book become clearer. When you develop your speech first, you can easily see what content needs to be more fully elaborated on in your book and then further in programs, mastermind groups, and membership sites, all of which lead to more money in your pocket, in addition to being paid to deliver the speech itself!
5. Get feedback from audiences BEFORE your book is in print: Making changes in your book after it’s been published can be an expensive and daunting task (trust me… I’m writing the 2nd edition of my first book.). When you present the content of your book to live audiences you get the huge benefit of hearing their feedback on parts they liked best, parts they want to hear more about and parts they don’t care much about at all. You can deliver your speech to live audiences in person, but also think about teleseminars, webinars, being a guest on a blog radio talk show, presenting a podcast or other creative ideas to get your content in front of audiences to get that vital feedback.
If you are an author or want to be, you can pick up a free 24-minute video about getting started writing your own Signature Speech ™ for Authors at http://signaturespeechforauthors.com/.
Finally! He Dressed the Part!
In July 2008, I attended my first Internet marketing conference. That was my introduction to a whole new world, live and in person.
Because of events that happened at that 3-day conference in Chicago, within a couple weeks I was quickly propelled to success in the Internet marketing crowd, being interviewed on radio shows by some of the biggest name “gurus,” being promoted by others, and began speaking on stages across the country about communication and public speaking. Effective communication is a skill you need in any business and Internet marketing is certainly no different.
It was a very exciting time. Except over and over again, I kept hitting a brick wall in that marketplace. His name is Frank Kern.
Frank Kern has created a persona of himself as “laid back surfer dude done good.” He’s built a wildly successful Internet empire based on his solid concepts and content, which honestly is always good, but isn’t exactly rocket science or anything new. However, because he packages it well and is a master at selling himself, his persona, and his products, Mr. Frank Kern has become a very wealthy and successful man. Good for him.
Along with that success, over the years Kern has accepted many invitations to speak on stage to his marketplace, and has recorded dozens of talking head videos. As he should, he maintained his “surfer dude” persona while onstage or on video, typically wearing shorts, t-shirt, ruffled hair and an unkempt beard. And, even though I’ve never met the man personally, he caused all kind of headaches for ME.
As a public speaking consultant, I talk to my clients and audiences all the time about the importance of looking the part of a successful business owner and dressing to that image of success. Then here comes Frank Kern, who, dressed in whatever he wore to bed the night before and cursing at his audiences, is hugely successful with a large following.
The most savvy of business owners in his market realized all along he was dressed that way and speaking in that manner because it worked for his persona. Keeping up that image was a large part of his success, with the implicit message to others just beginning their Internet businesses, “You can do this too.” That led to an interesting phenomenon.
Thousands of 20-something young men believed they could curse and dress like slobs all the way to millionaire status success, because Frank Kern did it. Never mind that persona was completely orchestrated. Like a theme for a party or special event, Frank Kern stayed true to character and his fans ate it up.
Until last week.
Last week, Frank Kern released what he calls his State of the Internet Address. As you can see from the screen capture of the video, Frank Kern has cleaned up a lot. He’s wearing a custom-made suit. He’s trimmed his beard, cut his hair, and is sitting behind a desk in a large office. As of this writing more than 1,900 people have clicked “Like” on Facebook for the video.
In a subsequent post to his Facebook fan page, he talked about how a few people gave him some flack about the new look, but the overwhelming majority of comments were all about how pleased his audience members are to see him cleaned up and dressing the part of a wealthy and successful business owner.
Even in our “occupy movement” world, business owners want to look up to someone who is successful. And that means looking the part.
So this is a public thank you to Mr. Frank Kern. You just made my job a whole lot easier. Here’s what Frank Kern did with this video that made me smile and that you can emulate for your business communication while speaking on video:
- He dressed the part. Finally a guy who’s making millions looks like more than a surfer dude, even if only for one video.
- He used a “Talking Head” video. With all the resources at his disposal, Kern could have chosen to produce ANY kind of video and had it look and sound like Hollywood quality. In fact, he actually employed the services of an Emmy-award winning editor, but at its essence, this is a basic talking head video in a location that screams, “Professional who knows what he’s talking about. Take notice and listen.”
- He was deliberate in his communication decisions and it showed. Here’s the thing: I may not have ever met him, but I’m personal friends with one of Frank Kern’s business partners, and I can assure you, Kern’s decisions about his persona and communication have always been deliberate. But now, with the release of this video, those deliberate decisions are obvious.
So what do you think? How do you “look the part” when you speak? Do you think your appearance matters when communicating credibility?
How to Speak to Your Audience No Matter Where They Are
In 1962, communication researcher Marshall McLuhan began to popularize the term “global village.” At the time, he was talking about the implications of the “modern” mass media and technology, such as televisions and telephones, for creating the kind of world where connecting with other people and cultures around the globe was possible. All that then allowed the average person sitting in their homes to communicate with people no matter where they are and to see how they live through the images on the TV right in their homes.
Fast forward to today when we now can take the global village with us on our smart phones, tablet devices, and few well-selected apps, and suddenly any expert or entrepreneur has the capability of reaching out to the world.
Pretty exciting stuff!
In fact, what’s most exciting for folks like us is that if you want to speak, you can easily be in touch with your market. Using video online you can create a feeling of intimacy of being face-to-face while never leaving your own home or office.
So now that you know you can reach your audience ANYWHERE what would you say and how would you say it?
One of the best and easiest ways is with video. Here are just a few of the ways you can use a simple yet powerful way to connect that is just like you face-to-face over a cup of coffee with your viewers:
1. Instructional/Promotional Videos on Free Sharing Sites: Think YouTube. Be careful here. The best uses of videos on sites like YouTube, Viddler and Vimeo, just to name a few is to entertain or provide useful info (or both!). Record a series of videos that are a glossary of terms your market needs to know or one video per frequently asked question. Here’s an example of public speaking tip I put up on YouTube.
2. Welcome Video on Your Website: If you have a more brochure-style website you can use a quick video to welcome visitors and telling them about your site and what you’d like them to do while they are visiting. See the example of how I do this on http://FeliciaSlattery.com.
3. Squeeze Page AKA Opt-In Video Invitation: As you’re building your community of subscribers, record a quick personal invitation to sign up to receive a free report, e-course, white paper, or ….
4. …Video Training Series: After a new subscriber opts in, you could provide a longer video training with some greater details in it.
5. Testimonial Video: When you are thrilled with a product or service or even an ezine, ahem (hint, hint, wink, wink, nudge nudge…), you could record a video to let others know about your good experience, especially if it relates in some way to what you do for others. It shows you’re keeping up-to-date in your field and working to better yourself, just like you’re likely encouraging your clients and prospects to do as well. People are more likely to buy from you or connect with you when they see you modeling the same behavior. Put these videos on your blog, Facebook, or YouTube (or all three!).
You can see many of the various types of talking head videos and others I have made on my YouTube Channel. None of them are perfect, but they are all out there working for me & my business.
I would love to hear from you. What are some creative ways that you have used to reach your audience? Please share in the comments!
Public Speaking to Market Your Business – Search Video
I coulda kicked myself.
Last weekend I missed it. But I wasn’t about to this weekend.
No, I’m not talking about March Madness and the NCAA basketball tournament. I’m happy to miss THAT.
I’m talking about Bob the Teacher’s SIMPLE3 event. I was on Bob’s faculty at his first SIMPLE event (you can kind of make out the PowerPoint slide in the background from when I was on stage there), but just have not been able to make it back. Well, last weekend I missed out on a great one. He called it Video Velocity and by the end of the weekend everyone in attendance had created spiffy new videos for their businesses — you can see how awesome those are on this page. After I saw those, I was SO bummed I missed out.
Then Bob offered a second chance. A way to get access to the same speakers and same content as last weekend all LIVE again — well virtual, via webinar. Which for me as a busy Mom is a perfect fit.
Bob challenged everyone attending to get a video posted on to our blogs. He said we’d get a gold star if we got it done. I want one of those gold stars, darn it. I’m an over achiever/teacher’s pet that way; what can I say?
Soon I’ll be re-opening my Signature Speech Mastery program to teach business owners all about how to use public speaking to market a business. It’s about effective communication on stage. It’s about dynamic public speaking. It’s about building your list. It’s about making money with public speaking (ka-ching!). And it’s about doing it either in your community or to online webinar or teleseminar groups — FOR FREE.
So I created this fun video:
Ok fellow Video Velocity classmates… who’s posted to your blog? And what do you think of mine? It was fun to do! Add your link or comments below now.
How Committed Are You to Your Message?
Last weekend was our town’s annual Christmas Walk, where they shut down Main Street, have all sorts of family fun activities, food vendors line the streets, and local merchants keep their doors open later than usual.
One of the shops in out town was hosting a group of eight Tibetan Buddhist monks. These guys were all ordained by the Dalai Lama himself and typically live together with about 2,000 brothers in their monastery near the Himalayan Mountains.
These eight monks didn’t go rogue or want to find some good deals on holiday gifts… they’re on a mission to accomplish three goals and they came all the way to the US to do it:
- To spread their message of peace and harmony across all cultures, countries, and religions.
- To bring awareness of their struggle to Free Tibet from the tyranny and human rights violations of communist China.
- To raise funds to support their cause to provide basic needs to the monks back in the monastery.
In order to achieve their goals, the monks are visiting cities across the US during their 10-month tour where they spend the
ir days praying, selling small trinkets for fund raising, and creating beautiful sand art known as a mandala. As you can see a mandala is a beautiful piece of circular artwork that is designed for a purpose. The purpose of the mandala created in my town was to promote world peace. Each of the sections of the mandala have a special meaning all related to their purpose. The grains of colored sand are laid down using a precise tool that allows them to create fine lines and words.
Here’s what I found most interesting: after the monks create the mandala, working on this particular piece for eight hours per day for three days in a row, they then destroy the art and return the sand to the earth where it came from.
Wow. All that work literally washed away in the river.
As the monks shared their message, I started thinking about their level of commitment to their message. Think about what they are doing to spread their message and ask yourself if you would do the same. They:
- Left the safety and familiarity of their home and their country to travel to the other side of the globe.
- Are going to be gone from home, friends, and country for a total of 10 months.
- Had to learn a new and vastly different language in order to communicate effectively.
Here they are, delivering their own Signature Speech — the leader being interpreted by a fellow monk who learned a bit more English, and they are committed to getting their message out to the world.
When you are passionate about your message and committed to having as many people know about you and what you do as possible, public speaking is THE WAY to make sure you are heard.
Lucky for you, you don’t have to travel half way around the world in order to find those who need to hear your message. You can do it in your own and local towns by creating your unique Signature Speech. Is your Signature Speech ready to deliver at a moment’s notice so when you get your chance to spread your message you can take it? If you are truly committed to your message, you’ll find a way to share it. Public speaking allows you to do that quickly and efficiently.
This week I am launching a brand new version of my trademark, Signature Speech training called Signature Speech Mastery. If you’re not sure what a Signature Speech is or to find out how to get started with one TODAY visit www.SignatureSpeechSecrets.com and download a free mp3 to find out more. You’ll also be on the priority notification list for all program details.
Because when you’re committed to your message and you use public speaking to get the word out… you have a powerful combination indeed! Just ask the monks.
Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize Based on Public Speaking
If you know me at all, you know I tend to steer FAR clear of any talk of politics. Even with friends & family (right JAM? 
). I leave that kind of talk to those who are far more knowledgeable about the issues than I am.
But… one issue that I can confidently comment on is the communication style and public speaking skills of anyone “out there” in the public eye. I like to do so in a way that is relevant to the small, home-based, or micro-business owner.
Whether you agree or not with the Nobel Peace Prize committee’s choice of US President Barack Obama as the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner, there is one thing that is certain: as with the national election, public speaking played a major role in why Obama won.
In fact, according to multiple reports, speeches made by President Obama were the primary reason why Obama won. The Associated Press Reports on Yahoo News that, “The Nobel committee said it paid special attention to Obama’s vision of a nuclear-free world, laid out in a speech in Prague and in April and at the United Nations last month.” (My italics for emphasis!)
If his speeches are responsible in large part for Barack Obama winning a Nobel Peace Prize, the power of public speaking is far-reaching.
So, if we bring this to the level of the small business owners, home-based business owners, micro-business owners, and entrepreneurs everywhere it becomes clear: a speech is a powerful mode of communicating your message so you can influence more people. When you have effective communication skills and dynamic public speaking skills, you’ll be able to win more of what you want: more prospects, more clients, and more cash flow now.
Do you have a speech ready to deliver now? Is it polished? Is it getting you results? Discover the Signature Speech and what it can do for your business. I’m starting what just may be the final Signature Speech Solutions Group telecourse in a few weeks.
Twitter Party Follow Up! The Winners Are…
Whew!! Now THAT was a fun party
It took me a day to recover — but now I’m back & ready to make sure everyone gets their prizes they won at the party!
Below you’ll see the list of prizes along with the names and/or Twitter IDs of the people who won each.
You may be wondering…. so, Felicia, how did it all go? Was it worth the effort?
My answer: absolutely!
During the time of the party I added 100 new registrants for my Signature Speech Secrets teleseminar happening tomorrow night. I also got quite a bit of buzz going on Twitter, added a bunch of new followers (something I honestly did NOT expect!), and helped a whole lot of folks with nuggets of public speaking throughout the party. Plus it really was FUN!
I’ll definitely do it again.
Now on to the prize announcements:
Bob Burg, amazing speaker and networker extraordinaire, is giving away one autographed copy of his New York Times best-selling book, The Go Giver. <~ This prize was won by @MarkShilensky
Andrew Poletto, The E-Course Guru, is giving away one Ecourse Bedtime Stories, an audio collection of success stories to give you hope, to give you ideas, to give you the green light to go ahead with your idea or concept. If this collection doesn’t give you a chuckle, a smile, an “I don’t believe that was possible” thought, maybe you’re just not the right kind of person to be selling ANYTHING!<~This prize was won by @RoseyDow2
Tim Fahndrich, consultant, trainer, speaker and author is giving away one copy of his blockbuster 2008 Summer Success Summit audio series featuring many successful business owners including Carrie Wilkerson, The Barefoot Executive and me. <~This prize was won by Jennifer Haubein @JHaubein
Lynne Lee, who is a Christian Life Coach and to market her business learned to be an outstanding SEO expert, will spend 20 minutes of her valuable time doing a website consultation with one lucky winner to identify simple changes that will make a big difference to your search engine ranking and website conversion. <~This prize was won by @DonnaK4
Micheal Savoie, full time internet marketing guy, event tech to the stars, and my fellow Impact Action Teammate, is offering one free month in his MyBloggingSchool.com where he’ll show you how to become a professional blog installer so you can add an extra stream of income to your VA, internet marketing, or other business — even if you don’t know how to do register a domain or upload a file! <~ This prize was won by @LifeAccelerated
Cheri Sigmon, one of the highest-ranking IT professionals in the United States will help you with her “Securing Your Communication” PenTest package. WHAT IS a “PenTest?” Plain English version: With pre-approved coordination and the WRITTEN *permission* from the lucky winner, she will donate a free “penetration test” of your website’s baseline security posture. In other words, just how hard is it to hack your website? This prize includes a free, *customized* report for your site which describes any vulnerabilities found, along with recommended fixes. VALUE: Minimum $1,270 (each pentest) <~This prize was won by @Rosella76
John Allen Mollenhauer, creator of PerformanceLifestyle.com. MyTrainer.com, and NutrientRich.com. and author of the upcomong book Curse of the Capable, let me twist his arm into giving away a free copy of his Performance Lifestyle Manifesto. John Allen’s work has the power to change your life. Yes, really. <~This prize was won by @QuickReply Andrea Chin
Jimmy D. Brown is a king of Internet marketing. And he has some AMAZING gifts for anyone who is using the Internet to build your business. Three winners will each get to choose one report from Jimmy’s business success reports here. AND one winner will get a One Year Membership to Jimmy’s Outsource Weekly.com. <~ This prize had 3 winners! @QuickReply @LotusAmy @AStrongerBond
Nicole Dean, affiliate marketing GENIUS and super fun mega successful business owner is doing something for our party that no one else is doing. She has a gift for EVERYONE at the party tonight. WHOA! You can grab her gift — no opt-in needed– and get her brilliance delivered right to your screen now. <~A BIG thanks to Nicole — everyonehas access to this prize. Woo-hoo!
Aaron Foster, one of my fabulous mastermind partners, and host of his weekly Ustream show all about helping business onwers make a living online, has kicked in a gift he says is valued at $22,579.00. Well, I’m not so sure about THAT (Aaron’s a jokster – just click on his name and you’ll see what I mean) but he does have a generous gift for one lucky winner and that’s a free pass to his 101 Traffic Tactics Teleseminar coming up at the beginning of May. <~This prize was won by @Tina_Williams
I’ll be contacting all winners & those who donated prizes today!
Connect with Felicia
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