Ep. 192 Nine Ways to Prove Your Point - 4 20 23 9.31 AM

Prove it, Mark Brown. Prove it. Oh, my goodness. People need proof. You know what my favorite statement is? You must prove it in the minds of the audience, the jury. In the minds of the audience.

Darren, I tell you what, I can't wait for this brief discussion. When we understand how proof we give and how it can be effective, it'll transform your presentation and make it unforgettable. Let's do this.

Anyone can give a presentation. Few deliver unforgettable presentations. What's the difference? You're about to find out. Welcome to the Unforgettable presentations podcast 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.

Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness. Darren. I remember we're doing a workshop recently. One of our attendees was very puzzled. She said, I've got this great story, but is how did my story prove my presentation? And when we explained to her what we're going to explain now, I could literally see the light bulb go over her head go off. Because she understood how to prove what her story was trying to say.

Hmm. Yeah, that's the idea. That's the idea. And Mark, we want to cover at least eight ways to prove it. Now look, you're there. Part of our presentation job, whether it's a speech, a presentation, even a contest speech, our job is to change the audience's perspective. And that's not easy to do in and of itself. Like, you have to say something and they think differently as a result. That is hard. We can't just say something and they accept it. We'll just use, for example, for the sake of simplicity. If you've heard me speak before, you know, one of my points of wisdom is stage time. Stage time. Stage time. Never turn down stage time. Well, maybe. Yeah, I guess that would help. Like what goes on in the audience's mind. They're skeptical about your new perspective. They grew up with insecurities. They took other courses, they took other classes. They heard other speakers. They just have their own preconceived notions and beliefs. So, Mark Brown, what's your initial thought on this?

Well, like I said, I was pretty intrigued because this particular individual told us they had a point to make and they were confused as to how to make sure the audience got the point. And a mistake many of us make is we deliver what we think is pithy wisdom, it'll hang in the air and transform our audience. But there are those who are saying that's nice, but how can you back it up? And that's where the OO comes in. So Darren, how can we back up what we say to transform the thinking in the minds of our audience and to convince the jury in the minds of our audience?

And Mark, I just. You and I were talking before we started and I talked about eight pieces of evidence and I added another one thinking about an example I wanted to cover. So nine. So Mark, let's Nine ways to prove it. That's the title of this podcast so you're listening to. We title it sometimes after we get an idea or a subject, but nine ways to prove your point and whatever your point is. So if you followed along, if you've read our book, deliver unforgettable presentations. You know, we talk about in a 45 minute, one hour keynote speech, three points. Okay, three points. That's all you're going to be able to get across and make the point unforgettable. But we have our skeptical audience. The person who's the veteran, who's been around for years, who heard it all and knows most of it. How do we prove it to them? This new idea, this new concept, you have, the brand new person who's eager and seeking hope and needs your help. Well, they need different ideas. So we've got to come at it from different directions. Now, we're not saying for each point, here's nine ways to prove that point. What we're saying is for you, for your style, we're giving you options. We're giving you a buffet of choices of evidence. You use what works for you. And we're going to give a few examples. But we're going to go through this quickly. We love this idea and never really focused on specifically this. But how do you prove your point? Mark, your thoughts.

Well, I believe most of us use one particular technique. They may say, well, look, I know I'll tell a story, it'll prove my point. And stories can be very effective. But there are different kinds of stories that we can tell. And very often somebody finds the story of a celebrity, an athlete, an actor or somebody famous to prove their point. Problem is, not everyone in your audience can relate to somebody who's famous. So we got to modify the type of stories that we tell to be effective to our everyday audience. What do you think?

Yeah. So number one, your stories. So this is a story that happened to you, a story that happened from a teacher A coach. Mark, you tell a story, a lot of your coach in soccer, AKA football, in your world, soccer in my world. But you tell a story of your coach, so that's a personal story of yours. And yes, absolutely, you know this. We're not telling you anything new, but we've got to at least mention it so we won't spend too much time on that. But number one, your stories to help make your point in the stage time. Stage time. Stage time. I tell a couple of stories. I tell how I came across Toastmasters. I tell a story of how my comedy mentor, Vinnie told me, if you ever turn down stage time, I'll never help you again. Mark, any other thoughts on your story?

Yes. And please bear in mind you may think you don't have great stories. Your story simply has to be relatable to the audience and deliver the point in a way that they can receive it. So here's a thought for you. Go back over your life. Dig into your life. What happened to you, with you, for you that you can share with an audience to make a point more clear by reinforcing the issue you're raising before them. Trust me, you have more stories than you know.

Yeah. Number two, their stories. If you've listened to me before or listened to our podcast or you're part of Stage Time Business Mastery, you know, I talk about, I interview clients ahead of time. I. I go to the site early. I spend a whole day with them. Why? Because I have my FRIPP speech model filled out. But I know that if I can use a story from their world or from one of the participants that everybody knows, or even someone maybe they don't know, but they can relate more directly to that story because it's from their world. So Miracle Ear, one of my clients I've done a keynote for. I remember going in early and going around, sitting in on the other side sessions, looking, searching. My whole goal is to find their story. That's a better example than mine. That can more closely relate to their world. Mark, anything else?

When you use their story, particularly about their people, what can happen is you edify their staff, their team, and it also shows the audience you didn't just come with a back pocket canned speech. You do truly care about them, you understand them and you're there to serve them. So insert their story as evidence of your point and. And you'll win your audience that way.

Yeah. And make no mistake, that could be more powerful, usually will be more powerful than your own. Now you're not going to use it Again, but that's why we love the story structure, the frip structure, so that way we can know our speech. But just, oh, this time I'm going to pop this in and to that spot so it doesn't change the structure of your speech. I might update a slide. I remember when I spoke to Rotary convention and conference in Pennsylvania. They brought me in. It was so much fun. But the time I spent before them, I took a picture of someone who told me a story and popped that into my slides. Much more powerful than anything I could have done or said from my life. That's more directly to the fundraising organization that they sponsor, that they back up and help. So let's go right to number three. Number three is Exercises. This is the. This is the Ed Tate world. What are the exercises that could help make the point? Now, again, we're saying, here's nine ways you choose what is best from your style to make your point. And for Ed Tate, if you've ever seen him speak, he's a trainer. He's. He's the trainer's trainer. Well, when he does keynotes, they're like keynote trainings. He gets everybody in the audience to stand up and do something, but he's reinforcing a point. If you've ever heard him do his famous exercise where he gets everybody to stand up and say, repeat after me. So what? Who cares? What's in it for me? But it's a whole exercise. I'm just giving you the example. But it gets the whole audience involved and they're doing something and it's an exercise. But if you look at the Fripp speech model from our book Deliver Unforgettable Presentations, you'll see that's just one piece of evidence. He does that exercise. It's part of his delivery style, more so than Mark and mine. Now, when we do trainings, that's training, but we don't necessarily do that in our keynote. But for him and his style, it's part of who he is. Mark, anything else on Exercises?

One thought, please resist the temptation to do an exercise for the sake of getting people on their feet. And some people will tell a story or a joke just to get people actively moving. Everything you do must be connected and to prove the point you're trying to make. So think about why you choose that particular exercise. Maybe you will change it to something else that's more applicable, because the goal is to prove your point of wisdom. So be selective and you'll be effective.

You are the prosecutor. You have all these ideas and proof. But you can only bring in three pieces of evidence. Okay, so what is going to prove the point? And that's the question. Oh, I have these four or five. Okay, what are the three best? And sometimes we might even experiment and try one or two and then realize it's not landing the way we thought. So now we pull in the others. All right, next. Number four. Infographic. Infographic. This is an image. This is your image. This isn't somebody else's image. Don't use anything cliche, but you create a specific infographic or a picture, an image, a custom visual. I'm putting those all in the infographic category. When I make the point of you got to record yourself every time. I told people, my mentor said, record yourself. Make it a habit. But, Mark, you know my joke. Listen to yourself. I know what you're thinking. Oh, I don't want to listen to myself. I hate to listen. Well, guess what? We had to listen. And it gets a huge laugh. And it makes my point. But what really ices my point is when I show them an image of my closet. An image of VHS tapes, videotapes, literally a whole closet full of them. They were speeches that I've given and I've gone back and studied. When they say that, that is proof. Look, some people are never, ever going to do that. However, I'm not there for everyone. I'm there for the serious people that everyone will leave with that idea, but few may implement it. But those that do, they're more likely because I say, hey, here's what I've done. Not what I'm saying, but here's what I've done. Mark.

Yeah. And some people are not into infographics. I don't want to design what Darren said. He included personal photographs that you have taken that, you know, relate to your subject and topic. I can't tell you how many times, Darren, you and I have had photographs in our presentations. I have photographs from my childhood when I was 10, 11 years old. To make a point, I talk in schools to young people. They see pictures of me when I was 8, 9, 10, 12 years old. They respond to it. They laugh. But guess what? Here are these kids, I'm in my 60s, and they think I'm cool because by using that visual, they now realize I understand what it's like to have been them, Even it was 50 years ago. They still get the idea. So think about what graphic you can use, what infographic, what chart, what personalized video clip or photo can be used to reinforce a point you make and thereby connect more deeply with your audience. If it's a corporate client and they sell a certain kind of food product and you buy the food product and you use it, boom, here's my copy of the particular item, here's me at the store. Think about ways to connect with your audience in a way that they know you're proven your point, but they also see, hey, this individual cares about us and that's going to be the key.

Yeah. And for infographics, I want to go a little deeper because I realize, Mark, when I look at our list, I just combined two that are actually separate. So forgive me, but hey, we talked about it. We go in deeper and we're being real and in the moment when we record this. But an infographic helps us see a process or understand a concept that we wouldn't without it. So in one of my stories, I talk about my mentor, Dave Fitzgerald, who said, darren, stop trying to find that story that will launch your career and instead make the story so good that someone will pay to hear that. Well, that was a new perspective. But what does that mean? And then we show an infographic of either Craig Valentine's story model or my story model and showing people I was missing some elements. Here's the model, here's where it goes. So infographic, look, you don't have to spend thousands, however, you can spend 20 bucks on Fiverr or 99 designs, maybe $99. But if you have a process, it's going to help you understand it. Trying to create that infographic, what are you trying to offer them? What is the five step process? Well, could you give it a visual? So number four infographics, Number five case stories.

Case stories. What you mean case studies, Darren?

Yeah, well, if you're in corporate, that's how you think, but we're here to change how you think, to help you be unforgettable. So we say case stories. Now, this is different from client stories. Client stories is a story from people who will be in your audience that helps make your point. A case study that's in the corporate world is, is an example of before and after. And here are the numbers and here's a case we're going to look at. We teach create a case story. Take the numbers and infuse them into a story with characters. Not just here's a company, here's the numbers. Here's what was happening, here's the numbers. Here was the trend, and then here was what we changed, and here is the outcome of more numbers which aren't Relatable, abstract, right. And aren't sticky. So we teach people create a case story. So this could be of clients making the point of why you need a process to follow when we talk about one of our customers, clients in stage time, that she was trying to create a keynote speech and she came to us and she only had two days left. We said, look, go through the fripped speech model. This is a program that we created, a step by step process. She went through it, then she came out the other side and in two days she had all the ideas, she had all the information. She just didn't know what place to put each thing and blah, blah, blah. And then on the other side, boom, she said, I nailed it. So yeah, that one isn't as numbers heavy. However, we use it as a case story. Here's an example from someone who came to us with a problem maybe similar to yours, and then here's what they did and then here's the outcome they achieved because they went through that process. So call it a client story, call it a case story. But we want to change your thinking, especially if you're speaking in the corporate world or presenting in the corporate world. Don't think case studies, think case stories.

Yeah. And one thought here. I love what Ed Tate says, take the numbers and turn them back into people. We have data and very often the story is already there and what you need to do is uncover the story behind those numbers and it becomes that much more appealing. It becomes more human and more real to your audience and that's more convincing. Also as proof that your point needs to be adopted or accepted.

Nice. All right, next, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, number 6, illustrations. Illustrations is a way to demonstrate if you've ever seen my sponge keynote or example. I'm demonstrating an illustration that helps get my point across. If you've seen me do the eight year old Darren example, that's an illustration of going back and talking to your younger self. So what illustration can you come up with can you create?

I laughed because we once did a program, a game changers program, many years ago, and you asked me to talk about how we can really work on a speech. We can edit, we can refine, we can modify it. And the illustration we came up with was me as a chef in an apron on stage. And it was quite unforgettable. But that illustration was effective. So think what, what illustration can I use in my presentation to reinforce a point? And the more the illustration relates to your client, their industry, their business, what they're about, the More effective you will be with that client because they understand you use the illustration to reinforce and prove your point in a way that was very palatable and understandable and almost personalized for them. That can also be a game changer.

Going next to custom visuals, I kind of mixed up the two. But a good reminder, custom visuals. Another example was when we were talking when we were in Europe working with a client and we're in a city that they literally park their cars on the sidewalks. And it struck me. So I took a picture of it and then we went somewhere else. I took another picture of another car on a sidewalk. And later on it helped make the point of capture what captures you. So it was a custom visual. A visual that struck me. But it helps make my point about custom visuals and capturing what captures you.

You know, I tell you, Darren, I have to be careful about visuals, and I hope I'm not misunderstood here. But if we rely overly heavily on slides and pictures, and many presenters do, we may rob the audience of the experience that we have had that we can bring to them. But here's the flip side. When we use custom visuals of our own, it reinforces the personalized piece. This will happen to me in my experience. And here's how it relates to you. There has to be that connection to what the audience is needs or not needs to hear from you. But when you use a customized visual, it can relate to that. Yes, we can get stock photograph. We can get photographs from the different websites that give you photographs with a, you know, royalty free. You can do that. And I have used one or two of those in the past for. For a particular reason. But think about this. I always say your audience wants to hear you, but they really want to know you. And they get to know you through your customized visuals. Which is why people will see in my talks, 99.9% of the time, they'll see a picture of my entire family because my family is my foundation. So think about what personalized visuals can you use to help prove your point and also give the audience a chance to not only know you, but respect you for your experience and your expertise?

Yes. All right, number eight, surveys and polls. This became even more apparent when we went virtual. But is there a survey or a poll that would help take the temperature that the temperature helps make your point? So what is it? What could you survey? Could you survey ahead of time? Maybe it's showing the results of a survey. Now here's the key. The results have to be surprising while making your point. The results have to be surprising while making your point really important. This is something you could do live or ahead of time. But that again, remember what we're trying to do, prove your point. Mark.

Yeah, I've seen some of these polls being done on live, even, even in hybrid scenarios with a tool like mentimeter where you can poll the audience right there to give you the answers right there. And they give. And when you get the answers there, it gives the entire audience a bigger picture of how the organization thinks. And sometimes that result is surprising, which gives. Which puts you in a better position to reinforce the point you're trying to make as the expert, helping them to change their thinking and maybe change their process as well. So think about polls on the spot as a tool you can use with any particular given audience.

All right, number nine, final one, curious questions. Curious questions. And one of my favorite is asking the audience what is the most important part of a presentation. And that could be related to a poll. But I'm asking for a shout out. If I'm live online, I'm asking for them to say it in the chat so I could use it as a poll. But when I get that idea to come across, I always hear, well, you're opening, you're closing your message and all of these things that are correct but not most important. So it engages their thinking. Now that I say, no, those are good, but those aren't the most important. Now they lean in and they're curious, well, what is? Now they're listening. So now I say the most important part of a presentation is the thought process in the listener's mind. It's not your opening, it's how your opening affects our thoughts. It's not your closing. It's how your closing affects our thoughts. It's a powerful tool when you do the right question and you give them an answer that's unexpected. Again, our whole goal, to prove our point.

Sometimes the answer is not a yes or a no. It could be. That depends. So I guess the assignment for this particular point is this. What questions, what curious questions can you craft and ask your audience to get them to lean in and perhaps give unexpected answer, but your response takes them deeper and gives them greater insight.

All right, so your stories, number one. Number two, their stories number three. Exercises. 4. Infographic, five case stories, six. Illustration six. Seven custom visuals. Eight surveys or polls and nine curious questions. Hope this has been helpful. We will see you next week. Join us.

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