Ep. 46 How to Be Unforgettable Year After Year with Jeanne Robertson

Darren Lacroix.

Can you believe this? I have waited for weeks, days, hours, months, minutes and seconds to interview our guest today for the podcast. You thought it was exciting last week. Oh, my goodness. I got to contain myself because I wonder, how does someone with many, many, many years of experience still come up with material to make every presentation engaging? Have you ever wondered about that?

Oh, man, Mark, you have no idea. Like Jeannie Robertson. Are you kidding me? Like, when I first started as a Cub in 1994, it was like. And then she talked to me.

Was old Lynn? Was she old then? Be careful, Darren.

She talked to me. She actually spoke my name. She was so kind and so generous. I remember her. And Robert Henry and like, you were just so kind, Jeannie. You like?

I.

Part of the reason I'm in business is because of your encouragement.

I thought you were cute. Good. Hi, Darren.

Well, Darren, let's get this show on the road, and let's have our audience a chance to meet the incomparable, the inimitable Jeanne Robertson. Let's hit this thing.

Let's talk about finding your funny.

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

Oh, Mark, I'm so. I still remember getting lost in the deserts of Nevada to try and find Laughlin, Nevada, to see Jeannie do her show. Oh, my gosh. With Mike Rayburn. We were lost in the desert, just seeking out more funny.

I forgot that. I forgot that you did. Trying to get to the seven shows in six days. I'll never, man.

Now, Darren, I know we have a wide variety of listeners and viewers to our podcast. And we have new and emerging speakers. We have some pros, we have pastors, we even have toastmasters, all of whom want to be better on the platform. They want to deliver unforgettable presentations. And when they find out we have the grand dom of speaking, the legend, legendary Jeanne Robertson, who has been delivering presentations for years, sometimes twice as long as some of our viewers and listeners and our clients. I am so blown away because I need to know, how in the world does grandma go viral? Where it all began, and what led from being a beauty pageant contestant in the Miss America pageant to now, decades later, thrilling the world with your stories. Jeanne, welcome, welcome, welcome. We're so glad you're here. Can you tell us how the Jeanne journey all began?

I certainly can. This is my 56th year. It's almost 57. To be paid for presentations and sign a contract. All of us did a lot of free speaking in the beginning of our careers. But to get that signed contract I still have. Every one of them has gone for 50, 56 years down. I was very lucky. I entered a beauty pageant. I had never been in anything like that at 6ft 2 inches tall. I spent all my time playing basketball when I was growing up. But I saw it on tv. I said, I'm going to do that one year. And I. And I entered it. And I won my local pageant, won the state pageant. We had 84 contestants that had each won their little town pageant and then went to the Miss America pageant. Pageants take a lot of criticism, and some of it is justified, but not all of it. And the contestant who wins. Tell my fans, go ahead. I was calling you right before it started. That's why I was on. But I will tell you that for me, it was a wonderful experience. And here's why. The winner is required for the Miss North Carolina Padgett to drop out of college for a year or take a sabbatical from her job. Now, most of them are college gradu when they win and you travel. And in one year, 12 months, I had a crash course in Toastmasters international. I made 500 speeches. A little more than 500 speeches in 12 months. I was 19 and I turned 20. And you cannot buy that kind of an opportunity. So I have to say, when people say, well, I was in a pageant, you won it. Well, for me, it was an excellent opportunity. It took me one week of making speeches to figure out that if I said things that were funny and people laughed, they liked it. And I did, too. The JCS gave me invaluable time on stage the next year, and it was all on statewide tv. I established a reputation of being funny. I crowned the next Miss North Carolina. And the following week I spoke at three conventions in North Carolina. And I never looked back. I had no idea. I remember the cassette had not been invented. Our promotional material smelled of that purple stuff on a mimeographic machine where you would sniff it in the school room. And I was teaching. I went back to Auburn University. I graduated from Auburn, but people kept asking me to speak through word of mouth. And I started writing my own material. And I'll tell you why. I had a group of little section of material that I told. But at the pageants I started when the year was over. I emceed local pageants, compare them to local talent shows. You're on stage, everything's going wrong, you've got to fill in. And I did that about every other weekend for 16 years. And the judges were often the same. And so I didn't want them to think I was a one trick pony and that I had these eight stories that I told every week. So I began to work as hard as I could on material and gathering stories. When the speaking career took off, I don't know why, there was no National Speakers association by then. I had 600 speeches under my belt within a year after getting out. And I was going ahead and people were asking me. I was getting paid $35, $50, $75, $100 and so forth. But I would go in and I would be funny and they would say that 6 foot 2 one that was in the pageant, get her. And because when I gave up the crown, I got to, on statewide TV, do about 30 minutes on TV that night, filling in. So that let me establish myself with people to say, get her to come and speak to the Rotary Club's annual banquet and that kind of thing. So in the 60s, I told stories about being a 6 foot 2 contestant in the Miss America pageant. In the 70s I grew. I told stories about emceeing the Padgett. In the 80s I had a child, a marriage. I would tell stories about traveling. Irma Bombeck owned the suburbian market. I didn't do suburbia anyway. I didn't cook, I didn't stay home. I traveled and was traveling full time. Back then, before the airline deregulation, you could do 150 programs in a year and just go 10 months because you could always take a flight out at 11 o' clock and go to the next city. And then in the next each decade. I just about completely switched the material. In the 90s on stage I said something about my husband Jerry, and then I said, well, I don't call him that. I call him LB for Left Brain. At that point, everybody in the audience laughed. I couldn't wait to get off the stage and keep writing material. So I've always had a formula for looking for my stories, working them into my speeches so that this material is uniquely Jeannie. And that's what, that's what they want. Then 10 years ago, I was approached by, you may know, Al McCreary yeah. Yeah. He thought he used to live in Nashville, and he thought that because I had gone viral on YouTube, I put up a little clip on YouTube. It went viral. Don't send a man to the grocery store. We put up. Don't bungee jump naked. It went viral. And then Al approached me. I'm giving you the speed sped up, as we would say. And said, I think you have enough name recognition to sell tickets. And selling tickets in a theater is only a cousin to being a professional speaker. They are cousins. It's the same thing in a way, but they're totally different, and it's a totally different business. So I guess it's been 11 years now. I started doing theater shows, and I must admit to you, I enjoy going out on stage with the right to tell any material that I want to. I didn't ever go the comedy club route, and I tell clean material. I'm a family. A family humorist. I do not call myself a comedian. I never have. Other people do, but I consider myself a humorist. If you want me to ever tell you the difference, I can do that. Have I talked long enough on your one question? But now I'm getting to have audiences of 2,000, 2,300. And the difference is that one of the differences is the meeting planner at a convention or a corporation hires a speaker to come in. And I love that. And I mean, I'm past president of the National Speakers Association. I love speakers. That's how I met people like y'. All. It's tremendous. But you don't have to bring anybody into the room if you're the speaker, they trust the meeting planner to have good programs. Any young speaker that thinks they all came to Las Vegas because I was on the program, no, they convention that they go to every year, and this year, it's in Vegas. So the difference is, if you're on that theater stage by yourself, do it an hour and a half to two hours. People fly in from around the country, and then you sell tickets two people at a time, not to the whole group. So your name and what you do, you have to market to get those people in the door. Not that all of them have 2,000 people. Trust me, we sit there sometime, and then we sit down and say, what happened? Why didn't we attract in this town? And we figure it out. But I love. I love the Facebook fans, and I love what I'm able to do to engage people. And every time I put up a clip on YouTube and you mentioned being a grandma going viral this week I hit 97 million hits on YouTube. And so that's a lot for just putting up clean. 97 million humorous stories and that people are looking for comedy usually stumble upon me. So that's 97. 7 million with an M. With an M. Check. What is it? There's her website.

Check it out. She mark, I have like 15,000 subscribers. She has 309,000 subscribers. That's crazy.

There are people that have a lot more than I. We have NSA members who have a lot more. SiriusXM at one point was paying me over and over, every day. I think that things have fallen in place for me. And at age 77, no way, no way, no way. I'm not 77 for another six weeks or so. But at my age now, it's the most exciting probably that it's ever been because I can just see so many things. We've done things. I mean, I can. The people who love me. If the client calls me and says, we have a group of the hottest salesforce you have ever seen, they're all under 28, I say, I'm so happy for you. You're not going to ask me to speak to them. I have found my niche. I know who loves me. And there's plenty of people to buy tickets in that market. That's very, very important to be able to do.

You just said something. A client comes and tells you the hot sales force, age 28 and under, and you said, God bless you, but I have found my niche.

You're not calling me to speak to those people. You can put teenagers in my audience and they love me. You put the whole audience of teenagers. You don't know what they're gonna do. You don't know what. So I did them all. Rotary, you know, every club, every student council. So I hope this. As my life has gone on, my material has changed. I love to talk now about aging and all the funny things that happen. And if you are aging, then you listen to now. Because I'm on YouTube so much and have gone viral and have embraced certain things that we're doing. My age has gone down. The viewers have gone down. Not mine. The viewer's age has gone down. So I can tell you exactly. My demographics is 50 and up. A lot of women, but the men love me, too. We had a weekend conference one time just for women and boy, the men were furious that they were. But I write material. I look for material. I know how to work it into speeches. And if you have a lot of people on this wonderful podcast, who give speeches. I might can give them a few tips on that kind of thing.

Well, you did say I found my niche. And I'm sure there are certainly emerging speakers who are wondering, well, how long did that take you? And how can I find my niche?

The beginning speakers, even for free speech, they just won't speak. They just want to speak and they will take things that are not right for them and then they've dug themselves in a hole. They don't get spinoffs from that speech because they weren't the best they could be at that particular speech. Let me give you an example. I speak on how to develop a sense of humor. I merely cut it down in the theater shows. Now I just talk about look for humor every day. This is not something you're gonna go out and carve in stone here. This is just the way I live life. I look for humor every day for my work, and I hope that I can use it in the speeches too. So if I know I'm good at that and I can have the audience in the palm of my hand and there's a speech at a convention that always has a break speech type thing where they want the people to be entertained but walk away with something. Or if they're coming to a theater show and they don't mind hearing you say look for hum, as long as they came to that show last. Let me tell you how it worked when I was in speaking. This may be something. So let's say a client calls me and says, we are looking for a speaker on team building. Now, there are people who speak on team building that have studied it, worked it. They could throw out all this stuff. I don't really speak on team building, but here's how we try to get that job. And I usually do. My assistant Tony, who's run my office for 42 years, will say to them, jeanne doesn't speak exactly on team building, but let me tell you how she ties in and what she can do for you now. So every member of a team has to have a sense of humor. Fortunately, it can be developed and she can show your people how, okay, I fit into the team building. All right? The next person calls and they said, we need a speaker on leadership. And Tony said, well, we've heard Jeannie's good. That's what they'll say. We've heard really get Jeannie. Jeannie doesn't really exactly speak on leadership, but let me tell you how she can tie into that for your people. Every good leader needs a sense of humor. Fortunately, Jeannie believes it can be developed and she can show your people how. I always turn it back. I got an invitation to, to speak to the North Carolina Principals association about the value for going through the North Carolina public schools. I am not a speaker on that topic. And here I had all of these potential in service meetings in front of me, but I had to do well. So we said, Jeannie doesn't speak on the value of going through the North Carolina schools. She's a product of the North Carolina public schools, but that is not her topic. However, she does love to speak on keeping a sense of humor as a school administrator. Fortunately, she believes it can be. She's going to show you how. I gotta tell you the best story. When the millennium hit years ago, see, 56 years, you've got all these. So they called and they said, we need a speaker on the new millennium. I mean, we are moving into the new millennium. Does Jeanne speak about the new millennium? See, I would look at that as a dead end speech. You work on it, work on it, work on it. How long are you going to use that speech? She said, well, I'll tell you what she can speak about that I think would be of benefit to your people. The question is, is a sense of humor important in the new millennium or not? Jeanne believes it is and fortunately she can tell your people, how do you develop it? So I'm always not over promising. I'm not saying I can speak on leadership, I can speak speak on team building. I speak on developing a sense of humor and it's hilarious. So. And I can use any stories I want to. So I've not oversold myself. I've not taken the job. I have put myself in a position to do well because that's what I do. And it's the same thing if I go on a radio show. Y' all didn't say anything a while ago. But let me tell you the difference between a comedian and a humorist. The comedian's goal, and I do love to watch them. I go to comedy clubs, I listen to them. The comedian go, the audience laugh, throw their head back and laugh at anybody's expense. The humorist doesn't want to be at anybody's expense because what you're doing, if you are in a speaking world is you're possibly losing that meeting planner, her job. Because the first thing the CEO will say to her afterwards is, had you heard this person? They're just dropping one liners. The comedian can get away with four letter words. I wouldn't feel Comfortable with four letter words anyway. But I don't do them because I grew up in the corporate market. It's the kiss of death. You think you can slip into your speech who you're for in the next election. No, you can't. People see through it and you lose half your audience. So I play it safe and then go from. From that particular angle. So the humorist may weave a longer story, but the comedian is used to that. Bada bing. Darren, you didn't. You come through the comedy at one point. You try bada bing. Bada bing. Bada bing. In your face. Where you from? In your face. I gotta. Hello, Dallas. Whatever they're doing. And the humorist, it doesn't approach it from the comedians, you can tell which one came through the comedy route. And maybe did that explain that you didn't ask it, but did it. As we say, it's a pretty good answer for some question if you want to ask.

Nice. Jeanne, I remember way back in the 90s when I first met you, the first book I bought at NSA was How the Platform Professionals Make Them Laugh.

You're the one who bought that book.

Yes.

You're the one we've been looking. We want them all back. Give us that book back. I had a new book that came out three weeks ago called Don't Bungee Jump Naked and Other. But that book was put together because I had a group of five people that. Well, not I. I was in a group of five people, the platform professionals who swapped speeches. When you finished a speech, nobody got a commission. Nobody made money off of the other one. We would say to the meeting planner. When the meeting planner would say, I don't know what we're going to do next year. You just hit a home run. I said, well, let me send you four days. I guarantee you these guys can do your job. So if you're sitting at home not working and your four friends are out giving speeches, you're gonna get four pretty good recommendations at night. There's some people that are in groups that have 20 people. I don't want to wait 20 years. Y' all want it to roll around to me as fast as it can get there. It's an interesting business and I really do love it. But I like what I'm doing now as much as anything that I've ever seen.

And Jeanne, one of the other books that I still recommend, I'm just showing your Amazon plethora of books I remember, and I still recommend don't let the Funny Stuff get away because you Create so much new content. That blows me away. A lot of people tell the same stories over and over again, and they're really good, but you create and generate so much new content. What would you tell people who want to be unforgettable and maybe find their own funny?

Well, you can find your own funny by making it a priority. Absolutely. I'm very lucky. My hobby is finding material to use. So when I find material, that also means that it financially works for me. On this over here, the people who talked to me about doing theater shows were very honest, and they said, look, Jeanne, how much material have you got? Are you. You have one speech that you do, one set that you do. How often do you. And I said, well, I have whatever number. I now have nine DVDs out, and the last one was an hour 52. And I have repeated only two stories and explained that I wanted to make them taped better. So I make it a priority to look for humor. And then I have it a way to devise to get that material in the speeches. I would say to anyone, especially if you were a Toastmaster and you wanted to go a little more pro, be out there being booked, being hired to do this. First thing you do when this show is over and be honest, is take out a big tablet and write down every illustration that you. That you use in your speeches that you've done through coming through the wonderful Toastmasters program, say. Or are you just a person that had never heard of NSA or Toastmaster Masters, but you knew that you were being asked to make speeches? You put that list down. And then after you're honest, don't put down, I think I'm going tell this one day. Put it down. Have you told it? Have you told it? You might only have five stories. That's okay, but you may have 20. And then the honest part comes is you put a star next to everyone that you create. If you're an absolute beginner, then it might be okay in the first years to use old jokes. If you tell them, well, you should not use anybody's material that they've created from their life under any circumstances, but write it down. That's not a sin. To be a beginning speaker and have material that you've seen or seen other you saw on TV gave you. But if this time next year you're still telling the exact same stories and none of you have no more that you created, you're not really interested in creating stories, in my opinion. Once you become interested in creating your own stories, I have a system that I use the speakers at NSA National Speakers association, jokingly call it Jeanne's Journal System. It can be anybody's journal system. All I do is I made it a point once to say, I'm going to find one humorous thing a day, and I can tell you the places I look that I'm going to find one humorous thing a day, keeping the notes and write it up. And one time, my husband, Left Brain, was with me, and he wouldn't go downstairs to the banquet. This was years ago because his team was on the basketball on tv. I don't feel like going back. Well, he played on that team, and he was going to watch it. When I came back in the room, he said, did you find something funny? And I said, I did. And I told him what I'd seen. Maybe 30 minutes later, I said, oh, you will not believe the woman who was sitting next to me and what she told me happened at this convention a couple years ago. And he said, did you write that one up when you got to the room? I said, no. I take my day into the 20 days of the month, but I can still do it around here. And I'll tell you how I've done it here. And I have my day down. You have this sheet of paper, and then you list down your day, and you won't find something for every day or every speech. You just don't. But you can try interaction with the driver of Uber or traffic. Oh, I get stories all the time with them and. But interaction with the flight people, getting your ticket, just doing whatever, going through tsa, then I'm just taking myself through the trip. I listen on airplanes, if I hear people laughing in the gate area, I move over where they are. I want to know what caused his family to be so hysterically laughing. And then I talk to people at the event, and I put down meeting planner, person next to me, cab back to the airport, all of it. Now, you won't get a story in every category every day. And I even say tried in conversation. Very important. I tried this in conversation. And I have a list. I'm ready to do that as I go through the day. So at the end of the year, I may have in December. I don't travel in December. I may have 400 little stories that I learned a long time ago. There is a difference in jotting down a note and writing up the story. Write it up like Reader's Digest because you forget in three months. Now, what was that so funny? Why did I write that down? You just jotted down A note, it's over. I write it up on that piece of paper. I use my dead time sitting on airports, waiting in airports, waiting to board, waiting to do. I put it in there. But I may have 400 stories. And what I do in December is I get a list of material that I think about and work on and get the punchline and I put it on material ready to try. And I start off in January with a whole list of material ready to try. And while I try it all year, I'm filling up this piece of paper for the next year. So you wind up getting a lot of stories from that. And so when I'm in the hotel room and I'm going to the theater and I say, now what am I going to try? I want to try something new in every program, at least a line of funny or whatever. So if you don't have a list of ready to try already worked out, what I found that I would do is I'll worry about it tomorrow, I'll try anything. But if you have a list of this story is ready to try, you might try it in conversation, you might try it in the program and then in my show or in my speech. Either place, I have a spot in which I can drop a new story of any background. It can be about airline, my son, it can be about growing older, whatever there is a spot. And it could be as simple as look for humor every day. Now, you don't have to be tying into eight other stories about things here. You just drop in your new story and you always have a sure fired winner behind it just in case. Oh, always have a, a good one right there. So if it falls flat, then you are ready to go. Does that make sense?

Yeah. So you're sandwiching it in between proven content.

Absolutely. But if you don't have that list that you've called and got ready and worked on then and have a way of, you know, really working on, you won't do it. I won't do it because it's just too late. I've got to get down there. I told them I'd be down at, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you just don't go, do you have a pencil at the. Of course. Doc Blakely used to say we had an NSA member that every word that was spoken in nsa, he took it down and we thought everybody said he's using other people's material. How tacky. And finally Doc Blakely said, if it's not funny enough to remember when you get to your room and write it down. Are you going to use that piece of material but have a way to make a note at the banquet, have a mate, you know, to sit there just to remind you of something. Then there's so many. Oh, go ahead, Darren. I'll say.

I was gonna say, so what. What sets off your antenna? So especially for people who are trying, you've got the habit down for new people. What makes you say who? That could be an idea.

Well, if you chuckle or if it's a good thing, I collect what could be the punchline. You have all heard me tell a story called the Baton Story. At nsa, they say this is a signature story. This is a signature story. Well, I'll tell you about what my belief is on a signature story. And you tell them, and one of them begins to grow, and the audience tells you which one they think is your signature story. You don't ever say to an audience, this is my signature story. I'm gonna tell you right now. That means if they one or they go, oh, I'm supposed to like this one more right here. So what was your question? The Internet. My Internet connection is unstable. If I smile. I knew it. There's ways to make story. First of all, I just collect a funny line, an absolute funny line. And then there's, I think, what does the audience have to know for that to be funny? Well, they have to get. I need to set it up when I stand up and then cash it in 15 minutes later. Or do I need to. If you set it up right before you give it, they'll figure you out and it'll take away the element of surprise. But that's one way to do it. You collect a funny line. I mentioned to you on the baton story. It's 17 minutes long. Once you start it, you're in there. And the punchline. And it's funny all the way through. You have this chart, but the punchline is drop dead funny. It happened at another pageant. It didn't happen with the Baton Twirler, but I didn't have a funny closer for the Baton Turtle. And I knew I couldn't tell two pageant stories, so I took it off of this one and put it on that. Another way is you have a story that goes and goes and goes, and you don't really have a clincher. I have a story called A Mother's Revenge. It happened when my son was a freshman in college. And it happened. It was so funny that I began to tell it in conversation at dinner parties and parties. They said, tell him what Beaver did. My son's name is Beaver. Tell him what he did. And then before long, I realized my friends were saying, you're telling that on stage, aren't you? And I said, it doesn't really have a closer. It doesn't have that anchor line. I kept that story 29 years, and I told it, and it would get up to here, and I'd say, can you help me think it? And I could not get along. And then his son went to college. And when his son went to college, something happened, and it gave me my. The minute it happened, I said, I got the story to go with it. But if you don't have some system for collecting the stories and working on them, and sometimes you just have to say, well, I need to give up on that. Let me tell you the difference in a humorist. So they say, jeanne Robertson, humorist is coming. I better be funny. I have told them that I am going to be funny. It's the whole, you better be funny when you do it. I tell younger speakers, don't advertise yourself as a humorist. Advertise yourself as a speaker who uses humor to illustrate points and then go on. If the story's not funny, if it doesn't work out, you just go on. The whole business is so exciting. And when you have your list of stories that we talk about timing all the time, you gotta have timing. You gotta pause, you gotta do this, you gotta do that, and it makes a speech. Everybody will tell you to know when to pause. But there's another kind of timing, and that is, how long is that story? Is that story five minutes? Is it 3:50? And here's why. You've got your speech. Your. Your speech is timed perfectly. It's so timed that you might not have a chance to ad lib because you've got it timed. And I have to worry about that later. And you're telling it, and the meeting planner comes up and says to you, we've had a problem and the meal is delayed, but the exhibitors have paid good money and they're opening up at 1:15. You gotta be out by 1:15. You gotta give me a speech with three points. And you got it timed to 45 minutes perfectly because that's what you were planning to do. Well, I have had speakers in front of me that come off the stage, tap in their watch and say, jeannie, I'm so sorry. I know I ran over. I just didn't. That just got away with me, that law. Well, it shouldn't happen To a pro. But listen, you got two ways to cut that speech. Tell one point. What's wrong with having a one point speech? Get up, slow down, illustrate one of your points. They'll bring you back to do the other two points. But you could do it another way. You could cut. If you've got to cut 15 minutes, don't ever tell me I can talk faster and pick up 15 minutes. No, you can't. No, you can't. None of us can. But if you take six minutes off the first, take out a six minute story, take out a five minute story, and take out a four minute story from each of your points. And if you know how long your stories are, you can do that and you still have three points and you walk off the stage on time. It's little, little tricks. So I have my lines and my systems and work on things. And now this Covid has stretched me. Patrick Henry's sitting here because he helped hook us up and has helped me with what I'm going to tell you about. I plan ahead. I'm not interested in current humor at all because by the time I get it perfected, it's not current anymore. It's been done. The late night comedians are going to hit it that night with their writers. And so you get into stuff like that. I want the longer story. I can tell for years and know I gotta and get the timing right on it. Everything that you need to do. So when the COVID hit, of course I came home like everybody else from that last trip and we weren't going anywhere. And I started having. I've done 16 now Facebook lives where the people write me questions and it lasts an hour. It's on Saturday. It has thrown my numbers into the ceiling. I mean, it's just been unbelievable because they asked the questions and we've worked out a system and we work. And now I realize when I answer their questions, I'm telling stories that even I have not thought about using in a speech. You can't hear them laughing. But if the people on the porch helping me are laughing, then, hey, this is a winner. So I've got 16 hours. We have now talked about it this week that I have told two or three stories I've never told in each one of those things. So that's good material to go on your list. I was just so nervous about doing the Facebook lives. And now they're not on just on Facebook. They're on YouTube and we're just calling Jeanne live from the back porch. I don't have Any questions?

Well, quick question for you regarding that. The idea of Jeanne live on the back porch and the small Covid 192 minute video that you created, where did that come from?

Well, most of my clips come off of my DVDs. As a matter of fact, what I put up on YouTube and now we're putting it on Instagram. Where am I putting them all, Patrick? Wherever we're putting them come off of my DVDs.

I know. I meant the ones where you're in your house, your granddaughter and so on.

So then Patrick Henry came up with the idea. He was here setting up this. Because I just don't know how to do all this stuff. I let somebody else do it. And after one of them, he said, why don't we do a little clip on funny things that you can. Things you can do during the virus. And that was the first one. Don't waste the virus, don't waste the quarantine. Patrick had written a funny song about quarantine and I do it. And so we were sitting out on this porch right here after the COVID We were all set up here. Tony's here taking questions off the computer and so forth. We said, well, okay. And I think one Lynn said, I've got. Do you want to knit? I can get knitting needles. And I'm sitting there knitting as fast as I can and doing the baton and bingo. This has over 500,000 hits that. It was a minute and 46 seconds. So I'm thinking, readjust my thinking, Jeanne. You don't have to bring in a film crew. Do everything, get the production get out. Because in my opinion, this is my opinion. CDs are sick and dying. There are people who buy them. But the new cars don't have CD players, folks. And DVDs their days. Everything's out there on the Internet you can download and my stuff is too. But when we finished that one and it did so well, we did another one. It's a miracle where I'm in all this pace. Then we did what the virus, the quarantine continues. And then his daughter, little Meredith is into TikTok. TikTok, TikTok. They do these exact same steps all over the world. Since I'm known as a grandma gone viral, we named that clip. And it was about two minutes, Patrick.

It was really.

That clip is grandma confronts TikTok. And it winds up at the end with me pouring a whole pail of water on her head, trying to get her to stop. I mean, we're just out here having fun and if it ever gets to where it's not fun, don't do it anymore.

Well, I tell you, the one with you playing cards, the cigar, poker face. I literally lolled it. I laughed out loud at that one. Jeannie. It was so funny. It was great.

I thought it was, too. For those who don't, we had the card table and the poker chips, and I'm all four characters. It was just fun, silly. But see, I say silly is great sometimes because we really was Patrick Henry, Jeanne Robertson sitting back here and said, well, why don't we do this? Let's do that. We. We have a couple we're gonna cut today after we cut off. So if you hit, you have people love them. So let me tell you what happened. I have great Facebook following. I answer my Facebook post, people write all the time and say, I bet you don't even read this. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I do it. If there is a Facebook post up, we call Al McCree, who's booking all the shows. We call them the Nashville people. Because at first Tony would say to me, the Nashville people have called them out. A theater show. Well, this was all new. So the Nashville people, the ones that we're talking about. What was I talking about? I have so many things I'm trying to cram in here. So I even have. If I forget in the middle of a speech, I have a way out, but I haven't had to do that yet. But why? What are we talking about? You are not paying attention.

How the whole idea of being creative and how it all began, you were doing, setting up for videos.

I got it. I got a following. I've got people, and I hate to say fans, they're more like friends, but if the Nashville people are putting on Facebook that I've had a show that's changed dates because of the virus, this and that and the other, then they will say, this is the Nashville people posting for Jeannie. So they know that it's me, it's my accent coming through on the thing, and that's what they want. They're very loyal to me and I love and I do things. But two years ago or three, I had a knee replacement first of June, and the doctor said it will take six weeks before you get us. Well, in six weeks is the Dallas NSA convention, National Speakers Association. I'll be there. But I was struck by. I'm not going to have anything to post about for six weeks. So we came up with. I attacked it. We came up with six things different to do for six weeks on Facebook with my fans. Now you can say, well, nobody uses Facebook anymore. Nobody uses. Nobody's using website. If you know your market and know where they are, you do what they want to do. So I came up with six things that we did for six weeks and got on a plane and went to Dallas. There were contests. I had contests and gave away prizes. The answers of contests came from watching a particular five YouTube clips, thus making those numbers go up, if you think about it. And so the minute the COVID Covid hit, I said, what can I do? I was thinking, five weeks. This will be over in five weeks. I said, you know, silly, I said, I'll do. I'll be live on my porch for an hour every week until this is over. It's been 16 weeks now. I could go to Christmas. We don't know. But it's really stretched me. And we've had contests and we've given away prizes. When the book came out, we gave away the book. It's just engaging the people that like what you do. And for example, to promote these theater shows, I'm on the radio all the time. One radio show that I've been on for. I remember being on it when I was actually in Nevada doing those shows that you came to. Derek, you remember, I got up at like three in the morning to be on this same guy's radio station, Neil Steele out of Gloucester, Virginia. He's hilarious. And we batter back and forth, and I go on about every six months. So in March, when the COVID started, he said, come on, I can't have the high school kids. Come on. I can't have people charities. Come on, we need people live. Will you call? And I said, sure. And on live radio, he said, look, why don't you come on every Friday with new funny stuff about what's happening in the world? And I say, I've never done World. I don't want to do World. I don't do World. I want to do material. And I said, well, I don't know. I'd have to think about that. He said, what's to think about? What else are you doing? You just said, you don't have any shows right now. They've all been postponed. So every week since then, I've gotten up and been on that show. Okay, I can do. I love to do radio. If you go, I bet you hear it at Toastmasters, and I know we hear it at the National Speakers Association. And although I wasn't a member of Toastmasters, I was thrilled when they honored me with the golden gavel, I will tell you that. But if you go to them, they will say, let me tell you the current thing for you young speakers. Get rid of your landlines. You know, it's wasted money. You do not need a landline anymore. Well, know your market, know your market, know your market. On the theater shows, I'm on local radio in the vicinity of the place where the theater will be. I'll do sometime I'll do six a day and be on the show with them. And I know how to do well on the radio. And they want me on the landline. Hear me? There's a little lag still. If you're on that cell phone when you're talking to them, they want a landline. So I know where my bread is buttered and I know I'm gonna sell tickets to my theater shows. I've got to get to the local people and I've got to have the local newscasters saying to me, you're really funny. They gotta go to your show. I'll tell you. Example. This ties in for all people who make speeches too. I found out the secret to doing well on radio. These guys are so funny. But what do I. How can I come up with every week 30 minutes or to an hour of brand new stuff for this radio show? Well, if they're on from six until 10, they're on five hours a day. I get up at five and at six I'm listening with a tablet. And by the time I'm introduced around 8, I can coattail off of everything they've talked about for two hours. It's like I was on a show in Oklahoma. And I'm listening because I'm getting ready to be on. And this was a sports show. All this is is studying your client. What's the difference in making a speech and going to a session before yours? So you can co pill off. But they were arguing in Oklahoma. Everybody was calling in, they were all upset. Apparently Oklahoma had done well in the NCAA basketball tournament. The discussion was, is Oklahoma now a basketball state or a football state? Whoa, people, people. And then they had to stop the discussion because somebody who had been in the Miss America pageant is coming. What's her name? She's coming here. You could hear the two announcers. She's coming in. She's coming in. I don't know. Janine Robertson. We'll be back in a minute. Hold your thoughts, hold your thoughts. And he got the whole state revved up, arguing over. But I knew that because I had been listening in. And he said, well, welcome, Jeanine. You're coming our way out here. And I said, football. And he was so stunned, he said, what? And I said, don't even even think you're a basketball state. I went to Auburn in Alabama. I know my football, and you're a football state. Congratulations on doing well in basketball this year. And you might for a couple, but you are a football state. Well, they just fell in love. I mean, they were so nice to me. I thought, well, we didn't even know that. And then they get in a discussion, did I know Pat Summitt, do you see? I had to let them know that I didn't know about sports. I'm a PE major, you know, so that's. That's your market. And you put the same thing into everything. I know my people listen to the radio talk shows in the morning, so.

I love the commitment. Jeanne, my last question, because again, we want to honor your time. And Mark, I'll let you recap and see if you have any other questions.

I'll tell you one thing. I did have one radio guy say to me one time, you're the only person. We asked one question and never spoke. Again.

All is wisdom.

What's your question?

Darren, it's brilliant, and thanks for being here with us. So you talked about Jeanne's journal. So starting to journal, starting to collect what you're going to do next year. If we could get everyone to do that one habit, they would find better material. Just asking yourself every day, what's the one funny thing today?

Don't journal and say where you ate supper and what you had and who you saw. Look for stories, period.

And do you have any, like three or four checklists? We've got a story. How do I make it funnier? How do we punch up a story? Do you have any insights for us?

Yes. Look at the way you word things. And if it doesn't give away the punchline, you know, and to make sure that there is a punchline, if it doesn't give away the punchline, where do you need to place that word they need to hear to get it? And the best example I have is a sentence that naturally I would say it's the end of a story. And it probably won't be as effective here. Oh, it probably won't work. But you probably, if you take us, you may put a line up here in the front, and it really needs to be at the end of your comment. Put a comment and put it at the end so the next person can coattail on it. The other thing I do is I may say funny lines all the time, but I don't want to be out there saying, so I see it and then I see it and I see it and I see it. So I just make up people. The woman across the aisle said, you know, the guy behind me said, be willing to give away the funny line. A lot of people just want to be the one that said the funny line. So it's always, I did it, I did it, I did it. No, no, no, no, no. A woman across the aisle said, made you nervous. We've got a couple of their towels. She gets the big laugh. She didn't even exist on that story. The towels, the story. My line would have been natural to say. It made me nervous when he said, the people at the Executive Inn Hotel want their room key back, but nervous is the punchline for me, and she coattails off of it. So I have to take that sentence and make it awkward to say. And instead of saying, it made me nervous when she said, I say when the people at the Executive Inn Hotel. When the man said, we executive in hotel wants their room key back, it made me nervous. The three words it made me nervous are at the end of the sentence, not at the beginning. It's natural to say it made me nervous when he said, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But you say, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, it made me nervous. Bam. Woman across the aisle says it made you nervous. We've got a couple of their towels. It's closer to remember to get a bigger laugh.

Thank you.

That is just wonderful.

Big laughs are what we want, y'.

All, and big laughs are what you get. And I cannot believe time has flown by. I know Darren has closing remarks now, how to contact Jeanne. But we have a thing called keepers. We keep track of some of the key lessons that we've learned in our conversations. I want to share a few of those with our listeners and with Eugenie. And I won't even wear my glasses. I'm going to pretend to be to be good at this. One of your key lessons for me is make finding material a priority. That's how you get 400 stories a year. Look for stories and find at least one good story a day. You have to be a content creator and remember is a difference between jotting down a note and writing out a story. That could be the difference to your success. Test your stories in conversation and keep notes of your daily interactions. Remember your audience helps you to write your material. Have fun, be creative, collect the funny lines and always study your client. Train your ears to listen, pay attention and don't give all the best lines to yourself. Be willing to give the funny lines to other characters and use punch words to create the punchline. There's so much more, but I leave that with you. I will reiterate one of them. Make finding material a priority for your career. Jeanne, thank you so much for your word of wisdom.

All right, and so, other than going to Jeanne robertson.com, which we highly recommend, check out Jeanne on YouTube. Well, thank you for being with us, Jeanne. You not only bring laughter to our lives, but you make speakers better and funnier. You have been such an amazing service. I always remember how you encouraged me when I was just getting started and I was not funny. I still haven't given up on that. But you know, anyway, thanks and thank you. Shout out to Patrick Henry. Jeanne, just such a thrill to have you here. You're amazing, friend, a legend. I could go on and on and on and on, but you've already.

Thank you so very much. Thank you for the memories you've given to me. And I can brag on people. I tell people Genie Robertson has my cell phone number and that gives me, that gives me some street cred when I can mention the name. But Jeanne, really an honor to have you online with us. And friends, if you want to be funnier, check out everything Jeanne has to offer. Because we don't want you to be just good. We want you to be totally and completely unforgettable.

Come on Facebook. And I don't get 400 complete stories. I get 400 kernels and I work on them.

Awesome.

Look for the kernels, then work on them.

All right.

Thank you. Jeannie Roberts.

Come to Facebook. I'll see them there. I'm having fun over there and I had fun here too.

Thank you, Jeannie.

Thank you.

You are unforgettable.

Make sure you subscribe to our show.

Remember to subscribe because if you miss a week, you miss a lot.

If you like this episode, please leave us a review. If you want to get more from Mark and Darren, check out Stagetime University where they provide experienced presenters a proven path and world class feedback. To become the speaker everyone is talking about, go to stagetimeuniversity.com join us next week if you're going to take the time to prepare a presentation. Make it unforgettable.