Know your audience

Has it ever occurred to you? Have you ever been in a presentation where you feel so disconnected from the speaker and the subject that provokes you to get up and leave? Or have you experienced it the other way around: It is you the one that's giving the presentation but somehow you are not able to reach out and truly connect with your audience.

Let's face it. Most professionals have the responsibility to prepare presentations, but somehow fail to dedicate enough time to prepare. Sometimes you blame it on your boss. It's common to hear something like: "We have to prepare a sales pitch for this big client. The meeting is tomorrow". Does this sound familiar? And sometimes you have so much going on that you just don't have the time.

Personally I think that there are many professionals that don't give the importance they should to preparing their presentations. If they did, they would find the time to prepare. 

The base for preparing an effective presentation is to know your audience. To quote Nancy Duarte from her book Slide:ology:

"Start by building audience personas before building slides. Painting a picture of a real human with real needs helps you connect to them more effectively".

Some of the advantages you get by doing this are:

• You know how to speak to them, how to make your message get through. When you know your audience it's easier for you to decide which way to "speak" to them: do images work best or do you have to present hard data to convince them?
• You can identify what they expect from you. Remember: people are coming to see you because they are expecting you will deliver something they need or desire. You have to make sure they get it from you 
• By knowing them it's easier for you to get them to "take action". This is the final goal: to get them to buy your product or make a donation or join your community. Remember to be clear about what you want them to do

I hope you find this useful for any of your future presentations. I know your audience will appreciate it.

Leading in crisis

Just recently I had the opportunity to listen to a top Director of an important multinational company giving a speech about how 2008 was a lousy year in sales. The basic message was he wasn't going to put up with this again in 2009. He had more than 500 people listening.

Later on, in the Q&A section of the conference someone had the courage to ask a question that many people has had in their minds for a long time: "how can we stop top down directives?"

It was a brave question, but the answer was one of the worst answers any Director could ever give: "Top down decisions are not going to stop. And these won't stop because I'll make sure they keep coming. Many of them will come from me".

In a time of crisis people needs a reason to believe. People need someone to believe. People need someone that leads, someone to follow. The last thing anyone needs is to be bullied.

The only message I could get by hearing this is that people inside this organization lack real leadership and the only way to get things done is by fear.

In times like this, you need to hear what employees have to say more than ever. The best ideas always come from people who are in the trenches, working with your clients up close. If you keep thinking the only one that has all of the experience and all the answers is you let me give you some news: you are heading the wrong way. The only way to survive in today's economic environment is to change and adapt fast. Without the ideas and commitment of people working inside your company this is impossible to achieve. And to commit they need leadership not a bully.

U2 and their tribe

In the last months  there has been an effort going on in order to lead a tribe. This tribe is all the people who are U2 fans in El Salvador. And the effort is being lead by one DJ in a radio station called La Femenina.

Frankie Rivas is trying to bring together the tribe and organize it to create a movement. The goal: to make U2 come to El Salvador.

This seems unreal to many people. In fact, there are lots of people who think the effort is just pointless, that U2 is never coming, that it's just some kind of gimmick in order for the radio station boost the ratings. I think they're dead wrong.

Today, anyone can achieve the necessary leverage in order to lead a tribe, organize it, connect their members and get them to make any kind of goal come true. And i mean anyone. There's only one requirement for this to happen: you have to be willing to become a leader.

This is what La Femenina is doing. This is what Frankie Rivas is doing. He is using the leverage anyone has access to in order to make "U2 veni" ("U2 Come") come true. But the difference is he believes this can be achieved and he is willing to lead the tribe. And there are many people that think he's right. 

Sure there are those who think it's not worth their time, and those who will try to diminish it or even bring it down. But if people notice you and talk about what you do, it means that you have developed something out of the ordinary. Criticism is part of doing things in a different way.

It is possible that Bono and the gang don't show up. But what I know for sure is that we will have an answer from them. Positive or negative, we will have an answer.

I got the best birthday gift ever: Steve Vai's Guitar!

Yesterday I got the coolest birthday present: i got Steve Vai's Jem Ibanez signature guitar along with notes from some of my closest friends with congratulations on my birthday (see the pic above). This was the result of two weeks hard work of my girlfriend (and by the way: thanx my love for giving me the best present ever!).

She gave it to me early in the morning, and to be honest it brought tears to my eyes, seeing that so many people that i care about wrote something in their own unique way to congratulate me.

But the best part came afterwards when all those people that took a time from their busy schedule to write something down for me, also took some time to give me a call. This was the best part: to receive so many calls through the whole day saying "Congratulations!".

As always, there is a lesson in all of this: doing something good for someone makes you happy. Making people do good things for someone else can accomplish amazing things!

Thank you all for giving me the best birthday yet!

We are not in charge

I am currently reading Seth Godin's "All Marketers are liars" (Very good book, I highly recommend it), and I couldn't agree more on the fact that on marketing "You are not in charge".

Companies keep spending high marketing budgets on media with the sole purpose of reaching as much people as possible (TV, radio, newspapers), hoping this will get consumers because they have a product that "fits all sizes". Nothing is farther from the truth nowadays.

Consumers are looking for products or services that are relevant to them in many aspects, but when your product tells a story in which people engage and takes interest, all other aspects become less important.

Developing stories behind your brand that fits the point of view of the people you want to reach is much more important than TV ads or even pricing. The idea behind this is that if you have a great story to tell, an idea that's worth spreading, then people will make sure other people hear about it. And then you can quit this addiction to mass media or trying to be the cheapest in the market.

Don't give up... it'll come to you.

You can spend all the time in the world thinking about how people who is successful has this powerful ideas constantly. We whine thinking they are gifted and how we will never be capable of having this kind of ideas. 

Truth is, they don't get ideas from thin air. This ideas come from different sources, but only come after a lot of hard work.

If you really want to get to have great, powerful ideas don't stop looking for them. Read constantly and more important put your ideas into actions so you can learn what works and what doesn't.

Steve Jobs started studied calligraphy before having success with Apple, Stephen King wrote for his school paper and almost gives up Carrie (and thank God his wife encouraged him to finish writing it) and Michael Dell got the idea for his company (Dell inc. in case you are wondering) by breaking an Apple II computer. 

Look for your muse. Trust me, it will come to you.

Steve Jobs Stanford Commencement Speech 2005

YouTube Symphony Orchestra

YouTube Symphony Orchestra is a group of people joining to form the first online orchestra in the world. This only proves the power of having networks of people with different talents collaborating with each other to one sole purpose: playing a piece of music.

What’s most important about it is that you are welcome to participate. If you have the same interest as these people you are welcome to join even if you’re not that gifted in the performing arts of an instrument.

Tan Dun is conducting a “Tribe” of people (as taught by Seth Godin) and we will be able to watch the results on February 2009.

Care to join in?

Make your presentations worth

Yesterday I had the opportunity of attending a presentation at work. It was addressed to people who work in the field and on a daily basis has contact with our costumers (I work at NESTLÉ in El Salvador as a Trade Marketing Manager), and I believe that some of the basics of how a presentation should be handled were overlooked. Here is a brief list of some of the points you should never forget when addressing presentations with your colleagues and reports:

• Always be on time: I know this is a very obvious statement, but is more often than not overlooked
• Think about your audience: one of the most important aspects of doing a presentation is to know who you are talking to. The best way to do this is to have a little profile of the people you are speaking to in order to know what the best way to get your message through is. More information on this subject can be found in Nancy Duarte's book slide:ology.
• Keep it short and sweet: attention span from your audience is limited, so you should try to make your point as soon as possible. This doesn't mean low quality in your presentation because of lack of information, it means you have to be very specific about your message. Which brings me to the next point.
• Focus on one idea: clearly establish what the whole point of your meeting is. Again, you need to move your audience into action with your message. Give them one simple message that they have to recall and your chances of getting through to them are higher.
• Use handouts: if there is simply too much info that has to be shared, don't try to squeeze it in a 30 minute presentation, instead use handouts. Complex numbers and graphics show better in this format than on screen and your audiences has the opportunity to have a better look at them.

If you really need to get people to connect with you and move them to action, remember that your message has to be clear in order for them to remember it.

If you want more information on the subject go to Garr Reynolds Blog that has tons of info regarding presentation design, and from which some of these ideas come from.

Day 1 2009: start now!

It is day one of 2009 and i can´t think of a better time to begin. This blog is intended to provide resources to anoyone who is looking foward to improve on marketing efforts and results with clear and simple ideas from some of the most influential people, experts in multiple fields and my own experience.

Now that i´ve cleared what my intentions are, here goes the first piece of advice on the first day of 2009: it´s time to start!

The most difficult part of getting anything done is actualy starting. It´s not having a great marketing idea, it´s all about implementing that idea and putting it to work.

In the "The Art of the Start" Guy Kawasaki gives "great ideas for starting things" (i recommend Guy´s blog as well). In his book he talks about 5 ideas but to me the more relevant are these 3:

• Make meaning: you absolutly need a reason to begin. Finding meaning on what you intend to do is what drives you. You have to think about the reason why what you are doing makes your job, your campaing, your life or in the best case better.
• Make mantra: people spends lots of time trying to build mission statements that are supposed to be the beacon for their enterprises. Instead, Guy recommends you "make mantra" wich is a short phrase that refflects more specificly what is you do so people inside your organization knows where you are headed and gets everyone on the same track.
• Get going: start implementing right now! You can get feedback on the way. It´s better to get feedback from your costumers when they have tested your product/service.

I really recommend Guy´s book if you are trying to get started and don´t know where to begin.

Happy and succesful 2009!