Ep. 242 What Do You Do After? PART 1

Hey there, Mark Brown. After, what do you do after? After what? After what? Yeah, whether you're delivering a presentation, delivering a high paid keynote speech, delivering a breakout session, what do you do after? It's different. It's different mindset. We never really talked about this before, so, hey, if we've never talked about it, it's time to talk about it. Let's go.

Let's do it, man.

Anyone can give a 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.

All right, Mark, let's tackle you as the presenter first. What do you do? If you gave a presentation, what do you do after?

That's a good question right now.

We just came off the heels of Game Changers. This is our big annual event. We only do it once a year when we have all the seven stage time coaches in one room. We did it this year at a new venue, the LA Comedy Club. We've never done it there. We've never been on the Strip before. But Ford said, you know, you gotta make this the Vegas experience. So we did. We were right on the Strip. We had so much fun. It was definitely our vest, our best value ever. We had some production challenges early on, but we figured that out and that was during our summit. But during Game Changers, the two day event, more bookings, higher fees. Mark, one thing for you as a presenter that I have to do, I did pretty good this year is I've got to schedule like two days off. Seriously. Because running the giving a speech is one thing, maybe a half a day off. But when I do an event, I'm all in preparation teams. I'm on the whole day. It's one thing to be on for 90 minutes or 60 minutes, another thing to be on all day. Like you and I were both on all the speakers. Like in between helping out, we had you setting up a zoom room and the breakout time for the main speaker. And Mark, I gotta say, that is one of the things I hear over and over again when we have an event for the virtual people. So when we do it hybrid, you know, it's really cool that when you're at a live event, you can talk to the speaker in the hallway, that's really cool. However, online you can't do that. So this is an idea that we did, winging it a couple years ago, but it consistently gets wows that they can actually sit down just whoever many people are online and have a conversation the rest of the event, the people live can talk to that person. But anyway, that's just like a bonus insight that we've done and gets rave reviews.

And you mentioned bonus insight. Please understand, friends, not only were we hosting the event, we were in the LA comedy club. And what happens at a comedy club every night? Well, comedy, which meant we as the team would get there two hours early, set up the room, get all the equipment in, cameras, you know, the TV screens, microphones, going with a whole team there. And at the end of the day we had to be on time. 4:15 to break room back down. We did that for three days. So understand it was not just presenting, it was preparation daily and presenting and being host to our guests as well. So a quick peek behind the curtain, that theme appeared all week. Darren behind the curtain, what we had to do. And then we have to go on stage and be on every time. Darren was on every day, multiple times, doing different pieces. My main stage talk was a closing keynote. No pressure on me after having some great speakers there. But I say all that to say when it was done, what was it? One thing we had to do after. Well, I tell you what, Darren Lacroix gave me the perfect example of what to do last summer in Bahamas, after we both were in Bahamas in Miami last month in Miami after we were serving at a major event. Darren said he took a day off after the event just to settle down. And if there's nothing else you need to understand after the pressure and the hype and the buildup, your desire to serve, we go all in full energy. You'll be surprised to know how physically drained you can be after an event, especially when you close the event. And there's nothing more valuable than a taking a day off to decompress, unwind and just relax. And thanks to your example, Darren, after game changes, I blocked the Monday on my calendar for nothing to happen. I got home Sunday. I blocked Monday for nothing to happen.

Yeah, Mark, you know what I'm thinking, let's make this a little two part series. So let's talk today in this episode about what you do after as a presenter and then we'll do one next week about what to do when you're attending a seminar after and I think that's really important. So we'll get to that, but let's focus on this because, look, especially if you have a family and young kids or a spouse, you've got to give them the time because you're probably working late hours just before you leave and then get on the plane at six in the morning. So you're, you're not honoring your partner, you're not honoring your family. And they get it, they understand it, but it's downtime, it's spouse time, it's family time. So look, you can get back to work, let's just say, like ours was over the weekend. You can get back to work on Tuesday, you get back to work on Wednesday. So two options. One, you spend more family time, more partner time, and two, you could spend an extra day at the destination, especially if your partner is with you or your family is with you. I mean, that's what I did in Miami. I scheduled it. And Mark, you and I are going to Istanbul, Turkey. Oh, yeah, guess what? I scheduled it in Spain. Next week. I'm going to be in Spain. I scheduled an extra day. They said, oh, you got to stick around. We're taking everybody to this special venue. It's a historical site. And I was like, you know what? I need to do that. I booked my flight, Mark, and then I looked at my schedule and I have to speak in Milwaukee on Friday. So I'm like, ah. So I had to rebook my flight. I had the whole week open.

Well, look, I understand that, Darren. As you know, I was in Prague, Czechia, three weeks ago, and my event was Friday, full day event. And I booked my flight on Sunday. On Saturday, I got to walk around a little bit, see, be at a castle that was nearby. But I had time to leisurely walk around, decompress, enjoy the sights, shot some videos, sent them to my family, and I literally relaxed. People may not know this, Darren, but I'm fairly introverted. And I had my meals alone. There was no pressure, there was no rush. I went to the local mall, I bought some, I bought a shirt, I bought some clothes so I could get more hip. Too many solid clothes. But that was time for me to just enjoy the sights, walk through the mall, sit down, have a meal, call my wife. I'll call her every day, two, three times a day on the road, but it was just me time. I wasn't thinking about presenting or preparing a presentation or coaching anyone. It was an extra day in a European city for me to just relax. And the car, got a car on the following day came, picked Me up, went to the airport and I flew back to Atlanta. It was wonderful. And time to just decompress. It's important. You may not think you need it, but think about this. When you invest your energy preparing, planning and then presenting, you might be surprised to know how exhausted you can feel.

By 5pm Yeah, I remember Zig Ziglar back in the early days saying that he burns more calories delivering a 90 minute speech than he does doing a full fledged workout.

And wow.

I don't remember the exact quote, but I remember that. That struck me. And now in my younger years, I might have not noticed it as much as I notice it now. And Mark, you know we used to do lady and the Champs before it was Game Changers, it was lady and the Champs and we would go out one night with the faculty and with Frip and we would go to a show because she loves the shows.

Yes, in Vegas, of course.

But guess what happened every year. I fell asleep during the shows because I thought I had the energy, but I really didn't. Now, if you're younger, you still got to take heed, okay? This is a lifestyle friendly business. If you build it as a lifestyle business friendly business. And that's what we're saying too. We're encouraging our road warriors, our friends. You know, we did a, did one last year about being a road warrior, but last week. But being a road warrior. But we got to remember that unless you're doing I know Ford and Ed Tate and our friend Kathy Kalesha, they do public seminars for seminar companies at the beginning of their career. So they're on the Craig Valentine too. Ed Tate too. They literally would go from one city to another city to another city. And that scares me because I remember the other, the old days of doing stand up comedy where my biggest dangerous part of my job was falling asleep at the wheel, not falling asleep at the wheel. And that scares me. It happened a couple times where I just kind of nodded off, but I'm like, oh, wow. But I know that there's horror stories in the public seminar company because of that, because they're going all day and then they're driving from one city, two hours to another city. So that's tough. That's tough. We're talking more if you fly in for a single keynote speech, let's say, or a two day event that you're being a part of, like you did Mark, and I'm local, you know, that's why we have it in Vegas, because I live here. So it's different there's different challenges whether you're coming in or whether you live here. But consider this. We're asking you to plan that time, to relax, whether it's to your family or in the city that you're there for. I mean, I can't tell you how many cities that I never really saw because I went into the city and I went into the Marriott that looked like every other Marriott in every other city. And I never really took time to explore. So I'm getting better at it. I'm getting better at it. And I planned. I planned to do it when I was in Spain in a week. That's not gonna happen. But I am going in two days early, Mark. I am going in two days early to get used to the time zone and to do some customizing. You know, I talk about the always be the favorite. They loved the fact that I was willing to go in early. So it allows me to go crash if I need to, like, time zone wise. And I'm showing up, I'm there on the ground. I'm listening to the conversations in the hallway. I'm looking for those little sparks like Chris McGuire talked about. Your humor detector. Listening for those little tidbits. Bam. Or the stories that I could ask. And Mark, this one in Spain is a little different where it is all CEOs. It's not YPO, but it's CEOs in the aftermarket automobile dealer industry. And usually Mark, you know, I asked to talk to people ahead of time and I get 10 names. Well, I talked to them on the pre call today, and they're like, well, you know, we really. We prefer you talk to them in person. I'm thinking about it like, yeah, I would probably never get on the schedule just before there's an event with the CEOs of all these different companies. So it made sense. So I still asked them because I'm gonna do research. I'm gonna still look at their LinkedIn, I'm gonna look at their company website. So I'm gonna get some. But here's the gold. Here's the gold. I said, I want to know if you have any personal insights into anybody that is common knowledge. Like, Bob's a horrible golfer. Jim is this big, huge guy, and he likes to crochet. Like, I want to know those inside jokes because that's going to most quickly connect me. The more connected we are, the more likely they are to be open to my content again. I digress. I went a little off target here, but I just, I think it's It's a cool insight that I'm doing from experience that might help you our listener.

Well, you mentioned Istanbul for next month, Darren. I hope one of those days on our schedule is a day to unwind because I know when we were in Ukraine years ago, we did spend some time walking around seeing some unique sites memorial that was there for sadly of course we saw the unique cars on the sidewalk. So we had some time to see the biggest burger McDonald's ever made. Was made size of my palm was the biggest Mickey D's burger ever in Kyiv, Ukraine of all places.

That was ginormous.

It was, wasn't it though? But my point being we were able to spend some time walking around the city and seeing that. And ideally, if you can do that after your presentation, it's an. It's a wonderful way to literally unwind, to decompress and take your time and say, you know what, I'm just going to rest now. That's one idea. I do have a second idea, Darren, that has to do specifically with our presentation. And sometimes I thought about it on the weekend too. It's nice to hear how wonderfully you did after your presentation. And we always believe in the debrief and some will say you want to debrief as soon as you can afterwards. However, if you do well, and hopefully you will do well every single time and you're told you're do well, I would suggest it may not be wise for you to immediately ask for evaluations and get told what the feedback is. Because sometimes you'll get an honest evaluation and you may have an individual who may not have liked something you did or said. And all the effort you put in, all the energy you expended, all the good wishes you received can get negated by one negative comment that came to you too soon after you presented.

Yeah, Fripp talks about the speaker's high. Don't ruin your speakers high. And it's okay to say no, it's okay to say send me an email. You know, she always says, would you like feedback? I will send it in two weeks. And Mark, I got this right here, my little post it debrief with Ford and the team, right about our event on how to make it better. Here's a critical insight too. If you have a client, debrief with the client because that could lead to more business. It could lead to other ways they could use you. It could lead to you referring someone else for next year or maybe a big coaching or consulting contract. Hey, you just saw me talk about better stories, better business. I really could train your people. If I had a full day or two days, I could rock their world. But if you don't debrief, you know, the debrief call is a sales call for the next one. Understand that's your opportunity. That is the time that they are the most excited about you, the, the most focused on you and have that euphoria about you if you delivered. So the sooner you can do that or they're thinking about next month's meeting or next year's convention, well, what's the prime time to set that up? Give a referral, Get a referral. Get a long term coaching contract. Make no mistake, that could be one of the most important things that you do.

Judith. Love that the debrief is going to be important. Making a note here, Darren, just to make sure I got it right. Continue.

Yeah, the other idea is reach out to everybody you met on LinkedIn. Try to connect with everyone you can. People just saw you from the stage. You are the expert on stage after you take your day of rest. Now let's connect. Let's set up those referrals, let's set up those recommendations. Now obviously if you can collect business cards, if you were booked by a bureau, those are your bureau's leads. However, you can still connect on LinkedIn to them personally, but get those leads to the bureau as soon as possible. Why? For the same reason they're hot on you now. They're excited about you now. They just saw you now, a week from now. Too late. Look, if you didn't do it yet, hey, a week is better than two weeks. But two days is much better than a week.

Yeah. Now you did say LinkedIn, Darren, and just for a second, I do want to point out there's nothing wrong with exchanging emails. It's a wonderful thing. Contact information, people have QR codes now. You can scan someone's info and a QR code, your phone number, your email, all your website is great. Some people like to do an Instagram connection. Some still use Facebook. But in my experience recently, LinkedIn has been a wonderful platform for business communication and for connecting with other people within not only an organization, but even a network. I mean, you know, we, we did a particular group recently and I've been able to connect with individuals in that organization through LinkedIn. And you and I are both finding ways now to connect with different people in different parts of the who are part of the same organization. And LinkedIn has become a tool of choice for many people. We do business with and hence, we recommend that LinkedIn is a good option for you to make these business connections.

Nice. So what you do after you got to rest, you've got to connect. You've got to, let's say, prime the pump for referrals. And if they don't rebook you or use you in a different way. I still hear the words of Fripp in my head so often. It's Patricia Fripp where she says it's our responsibility to let them know how they can use us. So there may be another presentation. You know, when I'm talking to CEOs, they didn't suggest that it didn't work into their event, but I was talking to the people in the automotive dealership, Automotive aftermarket industry in Spain. I suggested, hey, they're all CEOs. They give presentations. I'd be happy to do a breakout session for that, even if it's for no charge, for no extra charge. It allows me to teach as opposed to speak and inspire. It allows me to teach, which sets up sales for my book, etc. So now it didn't work into their event, But I asked, we need to ask. The aftermath is the important critical time where you got all this good mojo that you work so hard to get. Why would you not capitalize on that?

Definitely. And you know, Darren, as you said, as you were recapping, you said take a day off, schedule that day off. I love the fact you mentioned honor your family as well, spend time with them. That's key. And of course, not ruining a speaker as high is important. And that debrief is actually a sales call. I think it's also important after an event. Hopefully we have made those connections with other individuals. And even so, the idea of making a referral to somebody else. They will also see you as an individual who's not only a speaker or a presenter, but you may be a resource that leads to other opportunities. And they'll remember you in two different ways as a. As a resource of your own, but also a source of. For other resources. And you never know where that could lead. But these are all opportunities that we can get when we choose to think closely and carefully. What do I do after I present?

I hope that's given you some insights because Mark and I are in the aftermath right now. I'm thinking that's where we're present. What do we do? How do we do it? What can we do better? We don't have it all figured out, but we got a lot of experience to tap into so thank you for listening to this episode and join us next week when we go to Part two. When you go to a seminar as a learner as opposed to a speaker now sometimes you might go as both, which we just did. Mark. We went as speakers, but we were also sitting there taking notes as learners. We'll talk about that and how you can capitalize on that next week. Episode 243 Mark Brown Final Thoughts Listen.

My friends, when you have an event and you present, do not neglect the importance of what you do after. Because you do that well, you you'll continue to be unforgettable. We'll see you next week.

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