If you are a leader, manager, executive, sales professional, or keynote speaker, you are more effective when you tell great stories and use good examples. These three techniques will help you turn simple stories into examples that will be remembered and repeated: Think chronologically. Use shorter sentences or phrases. Consider each visual scene. In January, […]

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Six Steps To Your Sales Success This advice is given by one of my good friends and colleagues Dr. Tony Alessandra is a Hall of Fame keynote speaker and author of 20 books. There are six steps, or phases, to any successful selling process. 1. The “Target” Stage This step helps you understand exactly what […]

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The first and last 30 seconds of your speech have the most impact, so give your opening and closing words careful consideration. If you open your presentation with an obvious and dull greeting, such as, “Ladies and Gentlemen, it is a pleasure to be here today,” you waste your precious first seconds. In this brief […]

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“Why are executive presentations so boring?” Unfortunately, I hear this question often. Corporate leaders rarely receive the honest feedback they need to become powerful and persuasive communicators. Public speaking is the number one tool of leadership. Good presentation skills are no longer a nice skill to have; they can mean the difference between career life […]

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To be powerful and persuasive, you must connect with your audience both intellectually and emotionally. Enhance your connection with your audience by customizing or personalizing your message for each specific audience.  Customization is indispensable for professional speakers. However, even if you’re not a professional speaker, you will find that taking the time to tailor your […]

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Seven strategies to become a great speaker: 1. Consider learning to speak to be a long-term goal, not a one-day seminar. 2. Learn from someone who knows more than you do on this subject. 3. Practice with safe people – your supportive friends or others with the same goals. 4. Use web-based training for repetition […]

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Last summer, I was honored to deliver the opening keynote at the annual Toastmasters International Convention in Las Vegas. In case you aren’t already familiar with Toastmasters International, Toastmasters is a non-profit educational organization teaching public speaking and leadership skills through a worldwide network. I share Toastmasters’ roundup of the most buzzworthy speeches of 2015. […]

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As an executive speech coach, people often ask me, “How do I come up with original stories to illustrate my key points?” Fortunately, you don’t have to have survived an avalanche, founded a pioneering tech company, or won a Nobel Prize to tell a good story – because audiences identify with and delight in stories […]

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A powerful, persuasive, professional presentation may appear effortless to an audience… but even an “effortless” presentation requires that you first devote time and energy to organizing your content around a strong basic structure. Presentations are comprised of content, structure, and delivery. The more you clarify your content and organize your structure, the easier it will […]

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While you might already know my brother, Robert Fripp as one of Rolling Stone’s “100 Greatest Guitarists,” you may not know him as a superb and entertaining speaker. When we deliver presentations together, it’s always a delight – both for us and for our audiences. Robert has an extraordinary ability to connect with an audience […]

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