Ep. 104 Virtual is Not Going Away!

All right, guys, thanks for joining me. I'm here with Mike Davis and Mark Brown. I am just frustrated. So this might be a therapy episode for me, and I'm okay with that. But I just talked to Jennifer Joseph Leir. She's a speaker agent. She is the one who books me, and she said, okay, look, virtual is not going away. A lot of the big conventions and conferences, 1000, 2000, 3000, some of them are rescheduling. The smaller ones are making it happen, and we're going hybrid. But I was just on a meeting with some other professional speakers, and I'm like, what are you guys doing? Are you kidding me? Like, do you want to do this for a living? Like, this is your stage. I see closet behind and, you know, a little tiny banner set up in the background where it's, like, hanging from on two strings. I'm like, look, Darren, look, look.

I can tell you what, Darren, take a breather. Let's roll the credits, take a breath, and we'll come back and explain with Michael Davis why what Virtual is not going away and how we can fix that right away.

Anyone can give a presentation. Few deliver unforgettable presentations. What's the difference? You're about to find out. Welcome Unforgettable Presentations podcasts with your hosts, world champion speakers and coaches, Mark Brown. Mark Brown.

Your life tells a story, and there's someone out there who needs to hear it.

And Darren Lacroix. And Darren Lacroix.

Stage time. Stage time. Stage time.

Ready for some powerful presentation. Ahas. Let's dive right in.

All right.

There's some people out there that I just want to pull them aside and say, suck it up, buttercup. Come on. Are you kidding me?

You.

What's in the background? Your lighting. Look. And if you're just getting started, if you're an emerging presenter and listen to that, no worries, but do it anyway. Start looking like a professional, because guess what? Some people are judging you. I remember, Mark, we heard Ed Tate tell us a story where there's a speaker bureau that he had visited in person, and he went in there and in the board of directors, where they were reviewing demo tapes, there's a pile of tapes that they're going through, and they take them for a walk, they bring them out back, and they show him the dumpster where all the rest of them go. I just. Even though we don't send tapes anymore, the idea is the same, is that people are judging you in the first five or ten seconds, and guess what? They're judging you on how's your lighting? What's your background look like? And if you're gonna have a virtual, there's nothing wrong with it, but your lighting better be so good that I'm not sure if it's virtual or not. I'm gonna breathe for a second. And Mike, thanks for joining us.

My pleasure. Darren. This may be the most important podcast I've done because my friend and mentor clearly is distressed. So what I want you to do is take some chamomile tea, sit on the couch, just lay back.

We will help you through this after I. After I smoke a cigarette, which I don't.

You don't even start smoking just so you can relax.

I just, I need to get it out. Like, it just. I don't understand why they don't see the importance. And if you're listening to this and if you're not sure if this is you or not, if you're not high fiving me in the air, I'm talking to you. If you're high fiving me, you get it because you're equally frustrated and don't understand. But guess what? I hope you never upgrade your background if I'm in the same. If I'm up against you for another speech. Because if you don't upgrade your background, I'm going to get it just based on my background. And mine's not like, unbelievable. It's not perfect, but, man, we got to look professional. Mark, I think I'll let you talk.

I believe some people will say, well, look, I can't afford a professional studio. Darren's got the monitor behind him on his tv. He's got his coaching chair, his banner. He's got blue track lighting. It's so awesome. I am going bare bones right now. I can't afford to do all that stuff. Well, Michael, help me here. You don't need to be elaborate to look professional. I mean, you went through several iterations. And Michael, you were very kind to allow us to talk about you and your original grandfather.

Guess why you got invited.

It was a marvelous basement background with the window behind you and the wood paneling and the whiteboard. And you were so kind to let us use that over and over again. But help us, Michael. What are some simple ways that anyone watching and listening can upgrade their background to look professional without spending ten grand? What are ideas for us?

Well, the first idea is to go back to what Darren said. Accept this. This is not going away. When we go back to life. And I listen to what Jennifer said last year, guys, meeting planners want you to be good at both forever. So I took that to heart. It was about a year ago I started to invest in my basement office. And to Mark and Darren, your points. That beautiful 70s wood paneling is still here. You just don't see. What I did is I started first of all with a standing desk. I went and bought a. And don't get a motorized standing desk because as soon as the motor breaks down, your desk is done. But I stand for all of our core calls, for all of my coaching, my speeches. I stand. It's a personal preference. So invest in one of those. It's less than 200 bucks if you do that. Get a standing pad, by the way, which is great for 58 year old knees and hips. I have one too. They're fantastic. The second thing I did was, and this was a suggestion Darren had made is get the aural ax. You can't see it here, but I've got the sound absorption aural ax on the side and above because this room has quite an echo impact. So I've got it all around me. Pads behind me really are 2 inch thick sound absorption panels.

So is that good for venting about your. Your other half too?

No, it's when my friends and mentors come on and vent about virtual presentation just being sucked into this.

Well, we don't want to say that our friend Mike Davis is in a padded room, but if he says it, then that's fine.

I thought you'd catch that. Mark. Yes, I am in a padded cell, which some people think I belong. Now, bottom line with all this, I didn't do it in one week, but I for about two months in it and it cost me less than $1,000.

Wow.

If you're serious about speaking and you won't invest $1,000 to become look good on virtual, I don't think you're serious.

Again, we understand if you have a budget, if you have a limited budget, but what can you do with what you have where you're at? That wall I tried doing like the Mike Davis thing that was the color of my regular paint on the wall. And I just midd Caucasian guy on taupe background. I was a shirt. That's all I was. And I get it. But guess what, how much that paint cost. So that is blue paint on my wall. And I know Mark. Who was it that we were talking to? No, I was talking to Mark LeBlanc and he actually painted his back wall. It's a whiteboard paint. So he uses his wall as a whiteboard. But Check this out. So he had whiteboard paint, which is not that costly.

And.

And then I went and got these cabinet lights, which you get at Home Depot. I think they were like 29 bucks. I will. You see the difference? And it's just an accent light. So I have it behind the tv, the monitor. It's based on a usb, so you can get a USB version. So one is a plug in version, one is the USB version. And then even under the trophy, that is also the cabinet lights. But I strung them back and forth and back and forth, forth and just put the trophy on top of it. Look, I had to experiment. I didn't know what I was doing. If you know me, I am not that handy. But eventually, with trial and error, you can make it look good. And some advice from friends who Maureen Zapala knows how to paint.

Oh, yeah, she's your resident DIYer that you have there.

Quick background story. I didn't know you did this at Home Depot. I'm kind of. It's her nirvana, but we took the.

Did you say background story?

Oh, man. Gotcha. Thank you. Mark had to do one.

Had to do one.

Nine minutes.

Nine minutes. Thanks for testing. I'm slow on the sound effects this morning, so I took that sign off the wall and I brought the sign to Home Depot and they matched the color of the blue on the sign for the paint.

Right.

And then the coaches chairs that we. Mike has and I have and Mark has not now, but that go coaches chairs. So it's a director chair we use for our live event. And I thought I just bought the chairs before the pandemic. So at our events, we could have a VIP chair and three or two coaches chairs. And I was like, we have them sitting here. Oh, subtly. I could sell that. You know, we do some coaching and it's just a chair sitting there. And if you look close, you would see that the stagetime logo is embroidered in blue. So it's just all it is. Plain director share. 68 bucks on Amazon. We took the back off and we brought it to a place to be embroidered. We're not talking a lot of money here. Couple of lights. I use the newer lights. I like them because you can adjust the yellow balance and the amber and the white. There's Mark's chair. So we're not talking tons of money. Your microphone, your voice. If you're going to change your voice and inflect like we talked about this before. But it's over here. You can still hear me. But that would be tiresome to Listen to a keynote. Event planners expect more.

Yeah, and I know some people are listening now. You can't see Darren's sign. It's a beautiful silver sign with Stage Chime University in a particular blue and Home Depot. They match the blue on the sign to his walls. And we talk about these director's chairs. They're really nice props as well. He found a way to use them practically as part of our background. Here's the idea. If you're going to be virtual, it's a simple solution. We use zoom as our platform of choice. But even if you don't, whatever platform you use, all you have to do is to put your camera, get your camera going, record yourself where you are for a few seconds, play it back and watch yourself critically. Oh, I didn't realize I had my Valentine heart boxes hanging behind me on the door handle over there. And I have seen elf on the shelf in the background. I have seen people set up their workspace in front of a refrigerator with 85 magnets on it where half the face is dark because light comes through one window and the other blank wall beside them. And they seem to have no clue that when someone looks at them, all they're wondering is, oh, they went to Prince Edward Island. That's a cute. What is that picture of who's. And they're turning their head sideways trying to look what's behind you. They're not hearing a word that you say. I've seen individuals in a nice room, they get a white wall, they've got some cutters and the cutters half open and you got the clothes hanging down. And they seem oblivious. I've seen others where they present, the camera is at their chest. You're seeing their nose here and their double chin. And you're saying you want to compete on the world stage for paid engagements. This is not hard to do. If you simply record yourself and watch it from the perspective of the AUD member or the meeting planner, that'll quickly transform the way you see yourself. Because if you can't sell that to yourself, you have very limited chances of selling that to a meeting planner or to a corporate exec who wants to bring you in. As great as your message may be, your quote unquote demo video may end up in the quote unquote dumpster in the back.

Michael, I'm going to update some wisdom that my dear friend Darren gave to me when he first started working with me almost 20 years ago. And he said, record yourself and watch it. And I said, darren, I hate the Sound of my voice. I don't like watching myself. And he said, oh, that's, that's really too bad. Guess what? We had to watch you.

Even funny coming from you.

His question to me was, you know, are you serious? If other. If you're not willing to watch yourself, then why should anyone else? And it applies here, Mark, with your suggestion, I think this boils down to, and we've seen this in the professional world, people have left because they couldn't deal with this major shift they were so focused on. I have to stand in front of an audience. That's the only way I can present. Anybody who has that mindset, I think has lost connection with why we do this. It's not how we get people the message. It's not. Yeah, that's not what's important. It's the message has to get to them. If our ego so caught up in I have to be on stage, we've forgotten why we're speaking.

Yep. And you know, Michael, you had three words just now that Darren continually drills into people's heads. We're all quoting Darren today. But the three words are, are you serious? If you are serious about this, you have to understand, yes, you may get hybrid. But Darren, I was in Vegas. I didn't get to go to the National Speakers association convention this year. It was all cheers, woo hoo. We're back open. We're live again. And I understand, understand that the aftermath was not so positive, but with the delta variant coming. So now they're walking back, opening up convention centers and they're going back to virtual and hybrid events. So what we're saying is we thought it may last a few months. A year and a half ago, we're going into a new wave now. If it's a year and a half in, if you haven't gotten your act together and jumped in on the virtual train, you may be so far behind. When we do open up fully, we don't want you to suffer from this. If you're new and emerging, understand that this is vital. And one more thing we always want people to understand is right now, as virtual presenters, we are in competition with the iPhone and the Galaxy S21 and Netflix and Hulu and Peacock and Sling TV and everything else and Disney plus and Paramount. We are being viewed in the same way people view media. If they don't like what they see, they will change the channel. They will change the channel and cut us off. We have to present well professionally, but honestly, give them something to look at. I confess I'm not the most handsome guy in the world, but I keep my background very, very simple. And you don't need to be elaborate to be effective. And Darren mentioned getting some lights before I got my newer lights. Well, they're kind of older now, but before I got my newer lights at N E E W E R some.

People can't stop himself. I've accepted this.

My wife got me a lamp with a secondary gooseneck piece as my backlighting. It's real simple. And she bought it at like Staples or Home Depot. I got a gooseneck here. I can modify that one. And I put some daylight light bulbs in. I put some daylight light bulbs in and I got some good backlighting. Right, but you don't need to spend a whole lot to look professional. I gave a keynote for a very, very large franchise in America here in the USA a few couple of weeks ago. I told him not to worry. I've got a green screen. Send your company, your company corporate backdrop. I'll do it. Lighting was up. We did a retest and we did a tech check and their tech expert was very, very happy with what I had. Real simple, not elaborate. But they were quite pleased. It'll look good, record it and send the MP4 to us. We'll be happy. And they were thrilled. I didn't panic. I'm going to get flowers and this and I'm going to be Darren Lacroix. You're going to get a studio like our good friend Dan Thurman and you know, does, you know, you don't need all that. If you got the value in your program and you at least look professional and presentable, that's gonna work for you. I'm talking major franchise in the USA here. I did a recording for them early August and they loved it. So I'm saying just think about what you have. And the key is to look at what the audience will see. I remember one coaching call we had Mike, we had a coaching call, stagetime from Canada and he was doing his program. His lights were so amber, he looked jaundiced. I said, oh, by the way, do you know behind you on the doorknob, do you see what's hanging there? He says what? He had no idea because he did not record himself. And watch. Darren is now trying to not hyperventilate so I'll give him a chance to breathe and throw it back at you. Darren.

Yeah. If you're listening to this, let this episode be your decision. Time Decide, decide to be world class if you want to be A world class speaker. Well, guess what? You could put yourself ahead of other presenters in your niche market because you upgraded your microphone, you upgraded your background, you look professional. So here's your opportunity to leapfrog. Jennifer. Joseph Lear even said that it's the opportunity to jump ahead. It kind of leveled the playing field for us to compete with 20 and $25,000 presenters. So. So why not do it? Let this episode make that decision right now. If you're listening, okay, and if you have the mindset, it's good enough. Thank you for being less competition. I'm just saying, look, it's a choice. Let Amazon be your friend, just like Mike said. Mike, I love what you said. It took you two months, but a little trial and error. Trial and error. Trial. Order two things. Order two microphones, test it, record it. Send back the one that you know. Amazon will give you credit right away. Send back the one that wasn't so great. If you need some help, B and H audio. B and H Audio. If you're not sure, go to their website. I call them. I said, okay, I have this connector, this computer, and I'm trying to connect to these speakers. What do I need? Because the cable I had wasn't working, even though the ends fit in both places. And they told me, and it's free. They give you expert help for free. The side effect is you buy from them. Catholic guilt is a good thing for business, but it worked. And so what I didn't realize is I needed a shielded cord. Like something like that. You just don't know. Go to the experts. It's free advice. Get some help. Look, this is your career, this is your message. And as we're saying, virtual is not going away.

Mike sounds like we're being preachy and we're irritated. We are.

We are. It's unanimous.

Because keep it. Not only and I. Darren says it jokingly, but as a professional speaker. Go ahead, keep. Keep speaking in the dark. It's going to help the rest of us. However, we are also audience members on a regular basis and we're getting tired. You both have brought up some great points I want to bring up. Mark, what you said about Netflix and esp and we are competing with all that. Not only are we competing with them, we have to learn to grab their attention just the way ESPN and Netflix and everything else does. If we are standing in front of a very fuzzy background and we are talking like this, like we are on stage, they're onto the next program. That's the first thing. Darren, you mentioned how you started making changes last year, that's what inspired me. If you're listening to this, I cannot tell you how important it is to surround yourself with world class people. I've been involved in stage time as a coach and host now for four years.

Wow.

I've gotten a lot better just through osmosis.

Amen, brother. Amen.

Listening to each of you week after week after week, I decided they'd given me this opportunity. I better take advantage of it. And a big part of that is do what your mentors say. Don't argue. The only time I ever argued with Darren, and it was a short argument, is when he called me up four years ago and said, I want you to host the weekly coaching calls. And I said, no. You never say no to me. What's up? I said, first of all, I'm afraid I'm going to embarrass the university because I got no idea what this Zoom is. What Zoom? I had no idea. Three years ago, Darren, you were preparing me for a pandemic. And I don't think you did either.

But you don't know that. You don't know that.

I'm going to pretend we got to bring you down a little bit. But what was important about that, not just from a speaking and coaching standpoint, is it also helped me see the reality of the world. Because back in 2019, I was going to networking events and I would say to people, you know, you should really think about doing Zoom or some kind of virtual meeting. It's very time efficient. And what do you think? Everybody said to me, oh, no, I could never meet somebody online. I have to be in person. And I said, well, it's coming. It may be 10 years, of course, not knowing what was about to hit us. It's coming. So what this has helped me do is to be able to look forward. What's the next trend? Listen to people like Jennifer and Ford. Sakes a brilliant business mind. What's coming and what's not going is virtual. It is staying with us. And think about what Jim Cathcart said on the podcast we did last week. He said, guys, we've got no more excuse to be in elementary school on this. We're in high school now. We cannot use the pandemic as an excuse anymore.

It's been a year and a half. Yeah, that was, that was episode one or two with Jim Cathcart and Mike talking about when things go wrong. Look, you just, you gotta step it up when we're talking about this. I'm just I have these visions in my head of the people that I've been in meetings with, and it just. I scratch my head. But then I realized they didn't make the decision. We're asking you to make the decision to be in the process of World Class. The reason we asked Mike to host the calls is we saw him. We saw his heart. Okay, we saw his heart and his willingness to stretch himself and eventually caught up and surpassed us. And he's a better host than Mark and I are. And it's a beautiful thing. But literally, it's a decision, it's a choice. And yeah, it might be uncomfortable again, if your inner dialogue is, my background's good enough. Nobody World Class thinks they're good enough. One more thing, One more thing. Could I add one thing? Could I change one thing? But you don't want it distracting. You just want it. It clean and professional. Mine is probably a little too busy having the words on the screen and stuff like that. But this is for the podcast. I get it. It's a choice. It's a little busy. It's not as clean as Mark's. Mark's and Mike's is cleaner. I'm okay with that. I get it. But I chose to be a little too much for that being said, Mark.

Yeah. And if you can't, if you're listening that, you can't really see our screens, we're going to put it on YouTube eventually. But Michael, Darren and I have simple background logos that identify who we are, what we do. It's not elaborate, it's not fancy. It's up in a corner of our screens, not right behind our head, so we're not wearing a halo or a crown. But it's off behind, up in a corner. So it can really distract. Here's the thing. If you are doing virtual meetings, perhaps with a Toastmasters Club or in the NSA group right now, it'll behoove you to critically assess not only your peers in the meeting regarding what their screen looks like, their lighting, their backdrop. Are their glasses reflecting the ring light in front of them. But critically assess yourselves. You need to be honest with each other. If you are serious and you want to be successful as a presenter, know two truths. One, you look at our websites now, we talk about being able to present virtually as well as in person, because that's what's happening. They want to know, are you a virtual presenter? Get certified virtual. And to get certified, they're going to check your backdrop, they're going to check your light, they're going to check your microphone. They're going to check all of those things to see how you handle being in a virtual space. Can you stand and deliver virtually? Can you sit and deliver virtually? Can you perform virtually? All of these things are critical for the industry right now. So be gut level, honest and ask people you trust to assess your backdrop, assess your lighting, assess your volume, assess your camera. If your camera's on auto focus, you may move in and out and you go fuzzy, clear, fuzzy, clear. It'll fre. You do not want to give anyone in your audience any reason to look away. Do not give them a reason to take a detour. Darren.

We also teach mastering virtual presentations. Mark, you, me and Ed. And we always have a new one on the schedule. And it's three days focusing with us. And it's not just the background and things like that. It's more the techniques, the using. We call them pace elements. So you have to change up your pace elements every three to four minutes, meaning you may go talking head for three minutes and then we switch over. And now I show a slide and I'm talking over that slide and then I show a video and then I ask a question and then I take a poll. But they're all strategic. It's not just changing for the sake of changing, but the changing is to keep pulling people in and keep their brain engaged. So it's intentional. But, but we can't cover everything in this short podcast. But we really want to emphasize that, look, virtual is not going away. You've got to have a microphone that's got some bass to it. So we feel. So we.

Oh yeah, that's right. Oh yeah.

So we feel your emotions when you're in a character, when the character changes voice, when they get excited, when they get serious, like when you're emphasizing points. So that's the other reason. And the microphone is so important because of the emotional connection. So guys, as we wind it down, our goal is just to get people to suck it up. Buttercup. And realize it's not going away. We've got to be more professional than the person next to us. When I'm teaching speakers how to get paid, we look at demo videos, we talk about demo videos. And if you're a $500 speaker, you're trying to become a thousand dollar speaker. Well, look at the $5,000 demos and what do they look like? And even if you can't make it exactly to that point, strive for that. Strive for that. I love what Patricia Fripp says. The definition of a hero Is a hero. Is an imperfect person striving to be heroic. A world class presenter. Is an imperfect presenter striving to be world class. We're asking you to strive.

Final thoughts, guys, Again, I half jokingly said we're preachy and we're frustrated. We are. Please don't take that to mean that we think that we've got it all figured out because this arena is changing so fast. I mean, Mark can testify twice a month. I make mistakes every single time. However, audiences are forgiving, acknowledge it and move on. But you put yourself in a position to do that by doing it over and over again. Being willing to invest in yourself, in your space so you look professional. People are very forgiving if they see that you've put in the effort to be professional and do the best you can.

And the last question I want you to ask yourself as you review your backdrop, your audio, your lighting, your camera, all of the above. Ask yourself honestly, if you are serious, would I hire that person to talk to my organization and pay them 5 or $10,000 for their presentation? And you have to answer that question honestly. If you don't, you will not become unforgettable. We are striving towards it. We are by no means perfect. But please hear our hearts. We're not angry at you. We just want you to do well. We want you to survive. We want you to understand that virtual is not going away. The pie is big enough for us all to get a big enough peace if we do what is necessary to become unforgettable. Darren. Yeah.

If your message matters, if your audience matters, please make the decision. I know we're kind of having fun and I'm kind of going over the top, but I am truly frustrated because you want to open people's hearts and get them to lean in, to want to hear what they're saying. And if I see your closet door in the background, I think you don't care about me. You don't care about me as the listener. So please, even if you're attending a meeting and you know you're going to be on screen, show up. Because you never know who is in that meeting with you, who could recommend you, your background, your lighting, your microphone matter, your hair, or lack thereof. So I'm gonna go smoke a cigarette. I gotta go first.

No, you're not.

Buy a pack because I don't have any. But seriously, guys, thanks for joining me. I'm glad I'm not alone. You know, that's the support group for virtual presentation. Bad background. Thanks for joining us. Check out by the way, check out Rena Romano if you hadn't already. We sat down with her last week to talk about her unforgettable story.

Wow.

She also has this great story that she was willing to be transparent about where she worried about the wrong things and what you've got to hear that story. It's the only podcast episode we've had, episode 103 where all three of us cried with that. See you next week.

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