How powerful is the message
you are conveying?
Owning the message is not only a mindset.
It requires practice using tools for shaping messages and presentations that make an impact.
OWNING THE MESSAGE
Too many presenters give their power away by presenting content as the middle person passing it along from the natural source.
Influence comes with the ownership of your material.
This course helps you meet the needs of your audience while being your best, authentic self.
You will learn to take command of your message and speak from your experience, not your slides.
Typically this course runs 6 hours over two (2) days, with 10- 20 learners attending.
Interact helped us develop our people to become better sellers, team members, and leaders through authentic communication. The experience we had with Lou Solomon and her team has had a lasting impact on our business.
Do you know how your audience wants information?
Even if your content is on target, you risk losing us if you don’t understand our preferences. Here are three approaches to delivery:
- Bottom Line Oriented. Dominant decision-makers usually want short and outcome-focused presentations. This crowd wants you to “Be brief, be brilliant, be gone.”
- People-Oriented. Some audiences care deeply about their teams and how to improve their performance by building a culture of trust. They also enjoy being inspired and motivated.
- Analytical. The CFO and her team want you to show due diligence, attention to detail, and ROI. For this audience, feel-good goals can be off-putting. They want the facts.
DON'T JUST GIVE IT AWAY
Don't give away your leverage by presenting content as the middle person. The course helps you meet the needs of your audience. You'll learn to speak from your experience, not your slides.
Key Highlights
- Preparation and Intention: Elements that create executive presence.
- Message Map: Simple model for organizing your message.
- Pitch framework: Articulate the problem to help you pitch your strategy, sell your solutions, and win the support of stakeholders.
- Slide Decks: No non-sense guidelines for slides that develop understanding and help strengthen a message.
- Bold Brevity: Today, messages are expected to be brief and on target. Learn a formula for organizing material into clear and compelling presentations.
- Storytelling in Business: Story elements give your presentation staying power and help you shape your messages from who you are.
- Difficult Q&A: A model that will help you navigate tough questions you don’t want to answer.
Making Sense of Slides
PowerPoint and Keynote, or whatever your flavor, are the perfect companions for presentations because they are a great way to visually communicate what you want to say and amplify what you’re saying to your audience
But slides are often confusing, cluttered, and full of information.
Creating slide decks that are clear and effective requires practice. Learn the basic principles to ensure your audience gets your point, so you don't have to keep explaining yourself.
Ready to answer your questions? Let’s do this!
This course provides you with a fresh and straightforward perspective on slides, such as Rule #1:
Your Executive Summary is Your Most Important Slide
If you’re last on the agenda and wind up with 5 minutes, the Executive Summary is the only slide you’ll need. Either way, bold brevity is part of owning your message.
Many of us hamstring ourselves by thinking we must use a lackluster slide presentation filled with information to show we know what we’re talking about.
People remember and respond to that which is different and meaningful.
They are persuaded by your command of knowledge, stories, and passion during a presentation.
Here are three approaches to delivery:
- Bottom Line Oriented. Dominant decision-makers usually want short and outcome-focused presentations. This crowd wants you to “Be brief, be brilliant, be gone.”
- People-Oriented. Some audiences care deeply about their teams and how to improve their performance by building a culture of trust. They also enjoy being inspired and motivated.
- Analytical. The CFO and her team want you to show due diligence, attention to detail, and ROI. For this audience, feel-good goals can be off-putting. They want the facts.
Do you know how your audience wants information?
Even if your content is on target, you risk losing us if you don’t understand our preferences.DO YOU KNOW WHO YOUR AUDIENCE IS?
“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”
― Benjamin Franklin
Preparation is critical, and research is a central part of the process of Owning the Message.
Learn everything you can about whom you’re talking to — the problems they face and the solutions they need. Research their most recent experiences and use that information to build your message.
What your audience cares about falls into five categories.
- Ambition: Money, influence, saving time to make money
- Humanitarian: Noble causes, finding purpose, leaving a legacy
- Quality of life: Community, personal rights, family, safety
- Analytical: Accuracy, due diligence, credibility
- Experience: Entertainment, enjoyment, humor
It’s your job as the speaker to understand the audience you are speaking to and what they hope to get out of your presentation.
Knowing your audience is critical and helps bring your presentations to the next level of quality and value.
If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?
Did you say something that didn't fit in with your audience?
They aren't able to connect to what you said, so are they able to understand it?
Knowing your audience and speaking their language is what makes good communication.
You need to speak their language.
Changing your core message is not required. You need to change how you deliver it or the context in which you present it to make it more relevant to the audience you are speaking to.
When an audience varies across the organization, you must ensure your messages match everyone's personality.