Isabel Walcott Draves

Storytelling for Business, Alternative Speaker Training, Giving Better Presentations

Are you good at what you do, but not good at explaining it?  Do you need to speak in front of audiences and want to improve your skills?  Do you sell something that not enough people are buying?  Does your organization need transformation?  This post is for you.

I struggled with what to call this post.  Some presentation trainers don't like to call themselves speaker coaches, and some marketing consultants don't like to talk about marketing, but if you're looking for help with public speaking or sales what else are you going to put as your search term?  I'd like people who are looking for alternatives to traditional speaker training - or even sales training - to find this post.

As anyone who has ever really thought about this topic realizes, when you speak in front of an audience, you don't want to be boring, and one great way to do that is to involve your audience in an engaging way.  The next step after that is no longer "presenter" and "audience" but a "conversation". The idea is that this is can happen in a large group setting as well as, say, if you're out for coffee sharing your passions with a trusted friend.  When you talk about yourself or your ideas, how do you make them as exciting to others as they are to you?

For example Heather Gold, an expert in teaching this subject, calls her workshops "Un-presenting":

Everything I'm doing ... gets covered experientially not abstractly. It's really important -- especially for intellectual kinds of folks -- to learn to go 'inside out'. If I give you analysis and 'insights' first, the learning and experience are diminished.

Heather makes her students learn by doing - the best way to learn.  And she doesn't call herself a speaking coach.  But I am going to ignore alternative terminology for now and share a list of public speaking speaker training, pitching, and storytelling resources with you.  Thanks to the folks on Jerry Michalski's terrific listserv for the input.

Heather Gold - Unpresenting - "Go from talking AT or TO a large group of people to talking WITH them."

Cathy Brooks - Story Navigation - "You will walk out with a well-defined personal “elevator pitch” that serves in business and can be modified for myriad uses/audiences.

Michael Margolis - Get Storied - "Your success depends on your ability to get others to believe and embrace [your] story" and his conference, Reinvention Summit, "a virtual summit on the future of storytelling."

Doug Lipman - Story Dynamics - "Stories can help people trust one another. They can lead to a sense of sharing without coercion."

Steve Denning - Radical Management - "Successful branding, marketing and selling depends on connecting and engaging with clients, which in turn depends on is founded on authentic storytelling."

Doug Stevenson - Storytelling in Business - "Transform your ability to motivate, inspire and connect with audiences, customers or employees."

 ...

If you like to meander, here are some relevant links about storytelling and unpresenting:

International Storytelling Center

Organizational Storytelling in the News

Leader's Guide to Storytelling - Mastering the Art and Discipline of Business Narrative

Storytelling Case Study with Madelyn Blair

Seth Kahan interviews John Cotter on Storytelling

Seth Kahan: Every professional has stories to tell

Tom Munnecke from 2002

Andy Goodman on Storytelling and Encore Careers

Tips Beth Kanter learned from Heather Gold's unpresenting workshop

Agile presenting with Heather Gold and John Vlismas

Mindtools Business Storytelling

Creative Keys Storytelling Power

The Orton Foundation's "Heart and Soul" project (using story to strengthen small towns)

Community Expressions - enhancing community connections through storytelling

Josh Schachter's list of storytelling resources, through a digital photography lens

 

 I'm looking forward to hearing your comments and additional links!

 

Susan Bird sees in 360

The 360 Summit is happening again.  This is a great evening event which brings together some of the most interesting and powerful women (and men, as it turns out) in the business world - internationally -and I was invited!    Thanks much to Susan and to Laura Kim, who is coordinating.

You can learn more about what the Summit is like here, on Susan's marketing company's website, wf360.com

Tropicana

Ah, thank god. I hated that new packaging.  What were they thinking?  http://consumerist.com/5158732/loyal-customer-backlash-forces-tropicana-to-abandon-new-packaging

Customer outcry to the rescue!  "it was a fraction of a percent of the people who buy the product." said their spokesman.

But it really makes me wonder... they attribute the fact that they're reverting to their old packaging to a "backlash from their loyal customers".  Companies don't spend millions on a change and then switch because of a few complaints.  I am curious to know the truth about how much their sales plummeted. It must have been huge.  Reverting had a rationale measurable in major dollars, I'm sure of it.  Customers voted with their pocketbooks, not just their voices.

Who Profited?

Why isn't anyone talking about how the 2002 United Airlines Bankruptcy article got into the "Most Popular Stories" bin in the first place?  Couldn't someone easily have "put it there" by emailing it to themselves over and over again, or by linking to it in some cheesy SEO ploy?

How easy would it be to manipulate the market to your advantage in this way... all you do is note which newspapers don't include dates on their bylines (bad, bad Sentinel! the fault lies with you not Google!) and you are off to the races.

The SEC should be checking into who profited from this massive sell-off, getting a warrant, and checking their web tracks.  And newspapers should change the algorithms so that "most popular" stories are limited to current stories, and permanently date their news.  Until that's fixed this is gonna be like taking candy from a baby.

By the way, this is a great occasion for trusted news sources like the New York Times to crow a little about the importance of professionally written, human-edited content.  It's easy to pick up and propagate a false story - just look at Swift Boat Veterans, or this near miss from Larry Ellison.  Just kidding about Larry but that's his style, isn't it?

Someone Sent Soap

So I got a little present in the mail a couple of days ago, a small forest green box, and inside nestled in purple tissue were four pretty bars of handmade soap from Voda (via eBay) -- the Laksmi box set, named for the Hindu goddess of abundance (Thanks!).  Five travel-size soaps were included as well; they have names like "Eastern Beauty" (Ok, I can see that, and thank you again!) and "Moroccan Love" (Less obvious how that fits in).  No "from" name was enclosed.  A mystery gift.

My first thought, since I am well-brought-up, was that I needed to blog this because I had to send a thank you note and didn't know who to send it to.  Perhaps the vendor simply forgot to include the sender's name, in error.  Then I would be on the hook for never sending the thank you note! Thanks for the nice gift, Anonymous!  Phew, got that out of the way.

My second thought was - what a clever way to get a bunch of people to blog about you.  Just find the addresses of some people who blog and send them something anonymously.  The chances that they wouldn't blog about it must be close to zero - I mean, we don't get anonymous gifts every day!  Is this one of the most innovating word of mouth marketing schemes yet?  Will the marketers follow up with a mysterious valentine in two weeks, and then reveal themselves dramatically in March?

Then I had a horrible thought.  Is someone trying to tell me that I am stinky, and that I need fragrant soaps to clean me up?  I have never been much for wearing special scents.  Either the person who sent these soaps didn't know that, or that's exactly what they did know, and they took issue with it. What better way to say, in the gentlest most friendly way, that your friend needs to boost her AQ (aromatic quotient) than by sending some fragrant handmade soaps?

This is the down side of sending an anonymous present.  The recipient may read into it something unintended.  I find myself wondering if the person who sent these soaps is the same person who sent, about 5-6 years ago, a large columnar floor lamp with a motorized spinning disk that changed the ambient light in the room from green to red to blue to yellow in cycles.  I wracked my brains.  Was someone trying to tell me something about my chameleon nature?   Accusing me of featuring a too-traditional decor in my apartment?  Complimenting my fun-loving psychedelic personality?

I figure now is a good time to let eager anonymous gift-givers know about my Amazon wish list.  Yes, my birthday is coming up in 3 weeks.  Nothing on there really excites me, but at least I won't wonder about motive.

Nobody ever claimed responsibility for sending the lamp.  It didn't match my lifestyle and I gave it away.  I'm going to use the soaps though.  They're a much smaller commitment, and I like them.  If the next time you see me I smell like "Nurture", you'll know why.

Why You Should Hire Real Social Media Experts

You don't have to have been involved for long in the social media movement to have heard the single most important piece of advice anyone in the know can give you: BE TRANSPARENT(pointing to JD Lasica for this since he knows of what he speaks - but I could point to any true expert saying the same thing). 

And yet, newbie agencies that are advising corporations on their social media campaigns are still ignoring this very important rule. 

The latest in the series is New York Agency drillTeam's horrific advice to members of Target's word of mouth fanclub, Rounders.  Fans were asked to promote Target on Facebook but "keep it like a secret" that they were part of a group that was compensated for their efforts.  (Since this issue is what basically killed WOMMA's credibility, they're fighting it tooth and nail now, and recently included it in their newsletter).

Why is this BE TRANSPARENT rule so important in social media?  For two reasons.

• Because the truth will come out when people talk about you -- that's how social media works. Unlike traditional media, individuals are not dependent on your goodwill to make their living, so they're not afraid to out you. 
• Because, thanks to insincerity, traditional marketing has lost so much credibility that you're now turning to social marketing for help.  So don't ruin social marketing too - then what will you do to get the word out?

I've said this before: When you hire your social media consultants, make sure you are hiring people who have actually been working with online communities and user-generated content for awhile, and not people new to the "social" scene, whose real experience base lies in corporate messaging, "interactive", or online publishing.  You may think that a company like drillTeam, with clients like Toyota, Nestle and Nike, can't steer you wrong.  You may be instinctively afraid of hiring someone with a background at a bunch of user-driven startups with no blue chip clients.  But this is a new frontier -- the experienced pioneers will be better at showing you the route.

Here's a piece of free advice for Target: Add "Always disclose that you're part of this group when you recommend us" to your "code of conduct".  Oh yeah - and fire drillTeam.

It's a Community, Stupid!

Read my lips: Terrific post by Stuart Henshall.  Conference organizers need to learn how to leverage conference bloggers, and presenters can contribute.  PR firms should be the enablers.  Stuart tells us why and how.

My favorite quote out of many great thoughts here:

"You are managing a community, not a conference".  Conference organizers need to get this.

(via the FastForward Blog)

Customer Service Starts with Hiring and Training!

Two weekends ago I was in Chicago for Steve's birthday and I stayed with Marilyn.  We went for brunch with her friend Allison, who told an interesting story about her new car shopping experience a few weeks before.  We were driving around in her new car, which was comfortable and lovely.

Allison is in sales for a well-known software company.  She doesn't look like a spoiled suburban wife with furs, botox, a personal trainer, or flashy jewelry.  She looks like a normal person, like the rest of us.  She wears sweaters and jeans on the weekend, like everyone else in Chicago.  And she decided one day to buy herself a brand-new Infiniti.

Before Allison went out to buy her Infiniti, she did her research online.  She found similar cars and figured she would do a little comparison shopping at the Lexus and BMW dealers.  She determined the right price to pay - cheap enough so that she wouldn't get taken for a ride, but enough to allow the dealership to make their profit.  She knew she wanted an Infiniti because, she figured, it had some good features and her cousin worked there and could get her the friends and family discount, save her $10,000.

Allison and Marilyn walked into the Lexus dealership, and were greeted by an older salesman.  He asked her to tell him, honestly, if she thought she would be walking off the lot today with a new car, and Allison said no.  This was the first place they looked and she had more research to do. They asked to test drive the Lexus Allison had researched, drove the car around a little.  The salesman asked for her name and phone number so he could follow up with her, and she shared it and she and Marilyn took off.

Then, they went to the Infiniti dealership where they were greeted by a young salesman.  Allison asked to test drive the Infiniti she wanted, and the young salesman looked skeptically at her and said "That's an expensive car", asked her if she was sure she could afford it.  Clearly he had already decided the answer was no.

Shocked, Allison answered yes, at which point the salesman told her to fill out a form where she had to include her personal details.  Allison looked at the form and saw that it was a credit application that required her social security number.  We're always hearing that we shouldn't share that number with just anyone. She said she wasn't comfortable giving out her social, that she just wanted to test drive the car, and that she didn't want to do a credit check yet.

The salesman told her that in that case she and her "partner" wouldn't be test driving the car today.  Her partner?  Allison realized that the salesman had just called her a lesbian to her face - incorrectly. Indignant, Allison asked the salesman if he wanted to sell a car today.  I can't remember what she told me he said, but it was something other than "of course, forgive me" -- something like "only to someone who is actually going to buy one".  Rude, and way off base.

One thing led to another -- I can't recall the gory details -- but  the salesperson continued to mock and make fun of my friends, and assume they weren't really in the market for the car.  After asking whether it was a requirement to provide a social security number before test driving a car, Marilyn found the answer was no and they went for a short drive. 

The salesman was still rude to them when they got back.  Thanking him for letting them test drive the Infiniti, Allison asked if he wanted her phone number to follow up with her about the car and the features once she'd had a chance to do some more research.  "No," he replied.  "Are you sure?" she asked. "Yep," says he.

Fuming, my friends left the dealership to talk it over.  Did Allison want to buy the Infiniti anymore?  No way.  And, as she put it, she could get it from another dealership, but she'd still need to get it serviced at the one near her house and didn't want to give them her business.  She'd rather pay ten grand more and get the Lexus from the friendly salesman.  Which is exactly what she did.

The story doesn't end there.  Allison knows a top technical executive from Nissan, which owns Infiniti.  She called him, and he put her in touch with a senior executive in Sales and Marketing there.  She received a personal call and spoke at length with him, telling him the story.  He apologized profusely and asked if there was anything he could do to get her to change her mind and buy the Infiniti. 

Allison said no way, but she'd appreciate an apology from the dealership, and she soon received a call from someone senior at the dealership to listen to the story and apologize.  "I don't know who you know, but we got a call saying we needed to contact you right away", the  representative said.  Allison is in sales, and she wanted to make sure everyone at the dealership understood that while a satisfied customer tells a few friends, an outraged customer tells all her friends (and now it's on the web).

You can bet the young salesman heard about it afterwards.  He heard she had friends in high places, despite her humble appearance.  He heard she went straight out and bought a Lexus, too.  The personal customer service from the Nissan exec and the dealership rep couldn't make up for the young man's mistakes, though Allison appreciates the effort they made.

In most cases, the parent company never hears from the annoyed would-be customer who got turned away, because the would-be customer doesn't know any executives there.  Even the dealership would have likely been unaware.  As consumers, we help companies when we go out of our way to teach them.  Salespeople at the dealership level are pretty low on the totem pole, but careful hiring, training and supervision is essential for brand reputation and shouldn't be neglected.  Apparently it's time to pay closer attention at Infiniti.

Where is Seth When You Need Him?

Now that advertisers are starting to wake up to the power of cell phones to reach people, Seth Godin needs to go on another Permission Marketing crusade - and quickly.

I followed a link today that said "Do you Look Like Johnny Depp?" to see what kind of revenue model this advertiser had.  It took me to a site called "whichcelebrityami" dot com, said it was remarkably easy to tell me which celeb I look like, and then asked me for my gender, first name, whether I liked to sing or dance, what I liked to do in my free time, and then my phone number.  My phone number?  Wait a minute, I wanted to see if I still look like that chick from Battlestar Galactica.

Of course, as soon as I see them asking for my phone number I know what their revenue model is.  My dad just bought a new cell phone that had 5 advertisements in incoming text messages before he even set up his voicemail.  So I start looking for a privacy policy and see that, if you scroll down below an expanse of blank space, there is small print.  The page looked clean and link-free - you really had to scroll down to find this small print.  And it says...

... that when you sign up for the service you will be billed $5.99/wk or $19.99/mo depending on your carrier.  Whoa!  And this happens without your even having to enter a credit card number because it bills directly to your phone.  So you might not even know this was going to happen.  From a usability perspective, I can pretty much guarantee that most people who are entering their phone number to find out which celebrity they look like won't know they'll get this charge.  And they're not likely to examine their cell phone bill to see where the charge is coming from either.

So I enter a fake cell phone number (it rejects 555-1212 as invalid) and ta-da!  Some poor soul (sorry!) has just received a special pin number to find out if they are a celebrity.  I can click to resend the pin.  Oh boy, another way to prank somebody.  And there's a small box "I accept the terms and conditions" that needs to be checked off when you enter your pin.  That's all that's alerting you to the fact that you are about to be billed $6/week for playing this little game ($7/week if you have Boost).

The site's "terms and conditions" (no mention of a privacy policy) say you have to be over 18.  But with all the questions they ask, age is not one of them.  So this site is violating COPPA, the Children's Online Privacy and Protection Act.

Then something scary happened.  I hit the back button.  And I got an interesting alert message.   "One of your MySpace friends has a crush on you.  Click here to find out which one."  Clearly targeted at the teen crowd, the sister site "myluvcrush" dot com has cartoon drawings of kids and asks similar questions.  The subscription is a love horoscope.  The privacy policy reads, in its entirety:

"At my1purelove.com we value your privacy. We will never share your mobile number with any third parties."

Not even the same URL, and not much of a promise.  Someone's figured out a way to steal - oops I mean mint - money.  Like taking candy from a baby.  Seth, where are you when we need you?

Good Word of Mouth

Who else have I spoken with at Supernova who has interesting projects underway?

Well, I really enjoyed Tim Ferriss’ brief presentation, during which he sold us on outsourcing individual work. Tim just finished a book called The Four-Hour Workweek which suggests that we can each reduce our workload professionally by farming out the boring details. This twist on the classic "get rich quick" books interests me. Make the same amount of money, but work less hard, enjoy yourself more, and spend more time with family and friends. Of course this is technically a type of Ponzi Scheme because eventually there is no poorer person to turn to for service, but it will be a while before the iniquities in the world are worked out. I’m looking forward to scanning it for useful tidbits.

Now, you might think that someone who recommends we only work 4 hours a week, while paying other people micro-amounts of money to bust their butts on our behalf, would be lazy or demonic or both. In fact, Tim seems really energetic and friendly. He likes the idea of making a financial difference in the lives of the less fortunate by hiring them for his odd jobs. The only weirdness about him is the strange sense that he could so easily start a cult and enjoy the feeling of thousands of fans gazing at him in adulation. But how is that different from any other rock star?

Tim told the story of hiring, for a small sum, some freelancers to find single women and set up 30 dates for him in three days – with mixed results. I have friends that should farm out this task. It makes so much sense from a time perspective. Then, perhaps taking a cue from Seth Godin’s advice to be remarkable, he said he’d give a free trip around the world to the person in the room who sent him the most compelling story of a personal outsourcing initiative they’d undertaken as a result of his talk. It’s a good way to keep himself on peoples’ minds.

The most important thing he did though, was give his books away at the end of the session. Supernova attendees are early adopters, innovators and connectors. Some people think you come to a group of people and make some fans so you can sell some books to them. Wrong! You give your book to fans, they read it and recommend it, and you’ve exponentially increased your word of mouth capacity by eliminating the barrier that keeps powerful viral word-of-mouth spreaders from reading your book – the act of having to pay for it.

This might seem counter-intuitive for those with a profit-making mindset, but in fact it is only counter-intuitive if you don’t really believe in your product. If you have to sell as many copies as you can because you don’t think you’ll sell quite enough copies, then you’re right, you should do what you can to sell it to as many of the people who heard your talk as possible. But if you know your book is good, when you launch it you want to get it into as many hands as possible however you can. That is what is going to make it, and you, famous, and there’s no point in slowing it down unnecessarily by building a wall between eager fans and your fame. Tim knows his book is good. The only remaining question is: Do we agree?