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I’m a big fan of great public speaking, and I know it to be an excellent marketing tactic. But I’m not sure it’s the best approach for top sales performance, unless it approximates another approach—that of the conversation.

Let me explain.

First, I’m defining a public speech as an extended monologue. That’s not good for sales, since it’s widely known that the number one mistake we make in sales is that we talk too much.

When you’re giving a speech, the audience usually has to sit on its hands and hold questions to the end. That’s not good for selling, since the second biggest mistake that we make as sales people is not asking enough questions.

And of course, while you’re giving your speech, you tend to be listening to the sound of your own voice. That’s not good for sales, because the third major mistake we make in sales is not listening to what our prospects are saying.

Finally, when giving a public speech in a sales situation, you’re probably talking about how cool your product, service or company is—all about its features, functions, and benefits. That’s not good for sales, because the fourth major error we make in sales is being too quick to push our product, service, or company as the solution of choice.

However, this does not mean that public speaking is bad for sales, especially if your speech is about the salient concerns of the prospect, attempts to define their actual problem, allows for ongoing interaction and debate, proposes your solution, considers the pros and cons of other solutions, and allows you to shine as facilitator, problem solver, and trusted advisor.

Only as it approximates substantive conversation can public speaking have significant impact on top sales performance.

Executive speech coach, Sims Wyeth, helps dissect the nature of Barack Obama’s public speaking skills to show others how they can enhance their own on-stage performance.  Sims Wyeth is a noted resource in the world of high stakes presenting, providing training and coaching to some of businesses top executives for almost 20 years. 

According to Wyeth, “Obama is a master at grabbing and keeping his audience’s attention, which is the number one goal of any public speaker. “  In a recent article published by Sims Wyeth, Wyeth offers public speakers five key lessons from Obama’s rhetorical playbook, and tips to master his style. 

The article was posted on Bnet.com

Sims Wyeth helps individuals and companies succeed by providing tools and training on the principles and practices of effective, persuasive communication – those approaches that have been proven to work across history and cultures.  His work is not only a collection of do’s and don’ts; his knowledge and teaching is based on the science and psychology of how audiences absorb information.

Sims Wyeth & Co. offers customized presentation skills and public speaking seminars, as well as executive speech coaching. Sims assists high stakes presenters with speech writing, effective use of PowerPoint, presenting data, increasing sales, relating to diverse or difficult audiences, improving personal style, confidence, and image.

 ”The greats all learn from other greats,” says Wyeth, “so don’t hesitate to study Obama’s repertoire, and use what you can to improve your own public speaking.”

Read the full article online at http://www.bnet.com/2403-13074_23-290100.html?tag=homeCar

Blaise Pascal was a 17th century French mathematical genius who spelled out the laws of probability more clearly than anyone before him.  This was a watershed moment, because for the first time humanity had a systematic way of thinking about the future.

Pascal was both a gambler and a religious zealot.  He wanted to know if God really exists, which is knowledge not easily acquired.  So the next question was, “Should I act as if God exists, or should I act as if He does not exist?”

Suppose, said Pascal, that we lead a life of virtue and self-restraint, and when the day of reckoning comes, we discover there is no God.  Well, life was not too bad being good.  Maybe  life could have been a little more fun, but … this is a consequence that most people could accept.

Suppose however,  we bet that God does not exist, and lead a life of lust, violence, and depravity, only to discover that God really does exist.  Suddenly we’re looking at some serious time in the furnace of the underworld.  Pascal was not willing to take this chance.

Pascal’s wager is helpful for speakers.  When recommending a course of action to an audience that seeks GOG (greed, opportunity, and glory) a speaker should spend time exploring the possible downsides.  Risk is always present, no matter how close the goal appears.

For instance, hedge fund managers often make a huge bet, and then borrow even more money to put down on the bet to increase their potential earnings.  They do this because their data tells them that it’s practically a sure thing.  The problem arises when their data, which is about the past, does not apply to the future.  And if they have borrowed more money than they can easily pay back, their creditors close them down, and their clients lose their money.

A persuasive speaker, when advocating for a course of action, will ask the question, “How will we deal with surprises?  What are the consequences if we are wrong in our assumptions? “  Risk is the eternal possibility of being wrong–not always in an adverse direction.  Sometimes you’re wrong and things turn out better than expected.

When recommending a decision to an audience, it is wise to explore the consequences of your being wrong.   Sometimes the consequences are trivial (lead a good life but get no prize in Heaven), and sometimes they are not (lead a bad life and cook slowly forever.)

Rather than let the audience try to poke holes in your argument, you should do it yourself.  Give your presentation a pressure test, and see if it holds up.

Effective persuasion starts with the recognition that any forecast can be wrong, then weighs the consequences of being wrong.   Even if success will lead to fame, wealth and glory, you will be more credible if you surface the negative possibilities, and can honestly dismiss them as trivial.

On June 20th in the Wall Street Journal, in response to the media coverage of Tim Russert’s untimely death, Peggy Noonan wrote in her Declarations column, “When somebody dies we tell his story and try to define and isolate what was special about it–what it was he brought to the party, how he enhanced life by showing up. In this way we educate ourselves about what really matters.”

“In a way, the world is a great liar. It shows you it worships and admires money, but at the end of the day it doesn’t. It says it adores fame and celebrity, but it doesn’t, not really. The world admires, and wants to hold on to, and not lose, goodness. It admires virtue. [...] That’s what we talk about in eulogies, because that’s what’s important.”

Reading this, it struck me that we could say the same thing about public speaking. We make a show of admiring speakers who are clever, rich with data slides, equipped with approved platform behaviors and polished texts. But in the end, what we really like in speakers is character.

Character traits that appeal to audiences are varied, but certainly confidence is one, tempered, we hope, with humility. Genuine interest in the audience is another, or at least an empathetic understanding of their needs and concerns.

Finally, I myself like speakers who appear to be authentic, true to themselves, not working too hard to please me, but are nevertheless skilled at holding my attention.

Think about this. When a speech or presentation is over, which do you remember the longest: what the speaker said, or the impression the speaker created?

Decision makers rarely undertake an important project without first hearing the project leader explain it to them. They are listening for two things–grasp of the material, and the requisite character needed to overcome the inevitable obstacles any large project will encounter.

When a presentation is over, and listeners gather to discuss it and pass judgment, the speaker’s expertise is the dimension they consider overtly. But deep down, their decisions are informed by their perceptions of the speaker’s character.

In a political revolution, insurgents quickly target the media outlets. Their reasoning? He who controls the language controls the thinking.

Now comes another study to suggest that insurgents may have it right. In this experiment, one group of volunteers was shown a shade of yellow on a strip of white paper for a few seconds. The group was then shown another strip of paper with several shades of yellow (including the first) and asked to identify the original color. In this group, 73% were able to identify the original shade of yellow.

A second group was shown the same shade of yellow, told to describe the color aloud, and then were asked to identify the original color from a strip containing multiple shades. Only 33% of the “describers” were able to accurately identify the original color.

How do we account for this difference between the two groups? Scientists think that the language we use to describe our experience overwrites or distorts our actual experience. In the case of the “describers” mentioned above, they ended up remembering not what they had experienced but what they had said about what they experienced. And what they had said about what they experienced was not clear and precise enough to help them recognize it when they saw it again thirty seconds later.

Our own political parties fight over language. Should it be “global warming” or “climate change”? The “estate tax” or the “death tax”? “Starvation” or “calorie deficiency”? These word choices soften or sharpen the impact of what they describe, and thus have a profound impact on how we think about the underlying phenomena.

One of the functions of language is to help us extract and remember the important features of our experiences so that we can analyze and communicate them later. The New York Times online film archive stores critical synopses of films rather than the films themselves, which would take up far too much space and be far too difficult to search. Experiences are even more complex than movies, and were our brains to store the full-length movie of our lives, our skulls would have to expand.

So words have power, and savvy presenters use them carefully. For instance, avoid business jargon unless you want to be seen as talking much and saying little. Because we hear business jargon all the time (visions, missions, strategic objectives) it sounds to many of us like verbal oatmeal–its meaning is not clear–so the words have no snap, crackle or pop.

We should be careful to make concrete that which is abstract. Instead of saying, “We need to occasion customer loyalty to avoid competitive intrusion,” we should say, “Let’s get ‘em hooked on our cookies before the other guys start cooking theirs.”

The take away? Stick your thoughts into the minds of your audience with vivid language, as Martin Luther did when he nailed his theses to the door of the church.

If you don’t assert your story well, another story will prevail.