Aug08
18
This is a video of a recent talk I did at the exclusive Tintswalo equestrian estate (note the horse’s bum in the background) with the MasterMind Group of Professional Speakers, of which I’m a member. I decided at the last minute to ditch my PPT slides in aid of the old fashioned approach.
I am an entrepreneur, writer and professional speaker who helps companies extract real value from Web 2.0 trends and technologies to create smarter, more profitable businesses. Read more here, book me to speak at your conference here or contact me with general enquiries here.
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Mike I think that your talk hit the nail on the head. Well done. It was also quite funny and kept me engaged for the full twenty two minutes.
This post is officially bookmarked.
Hi Mike,
You spoke at a Tourism conference at the end of last year (at Kirstenbosch). I think your speech was the only one I (vaguely) remembered lol!
Just watched your vid now and have to say that you are one of the most interesting speakers I have seen. I agree with David above. Very entertaining and informative.
I’ll second that.
Mike, I’ve never seen one of your presentations before, but I found you quite engaging and informative.
I don’t think your jacket and t-shirt went together though.
@David thanks for the feedback!
@SandraKim haha - wasn’t a good preso for me - I suffered from a severe nosebleed the whole day and landed up being hospitalised at the airport! But I appreciate the feedback!
@Shaun thanks bud - needless to say style ain’t my forte. Hopefully I make up for it with content
Hi Mike – can you believe that I have never heard you talk. Which is kind of ridiculous given how long I’ve known you and how long you’ve been on the speaking scene for.
There is an upside and downside for me in terms of this talk.
On the downside (and this may depend on the audience), the concepts you are talking about are very visual and I reckon you could lose some people who struggle processing verbal information. Loads of people think visually (some almost exclusively visual – that left brain/right brain thing). I reckon by not using visuals you could cut those people out. Then at about 12 minutes into the presentation it is as if you need some kind of visual aid, and you pick up a fold to illustrate or communicate what a logo is to the audience. For me this speaks to the need to have visuals.
Then you talk quite fast (but not too fast) and pack quite a lot of information into your talk so something visual could offer a breather – or a short pause – to allow people unfamiliar with the subject matter to think and absorb the info.
I reckon you don’t have to do the PPT thing, but a flip chart or visual aids something could be useful if you don’t want to do the PPT thing.
Then people love ads and talking about ads so when you talk about the Stork Ad or other ads it would be great to show them and get some interactivity going.
Watching the presentation I wanted you to engage more with the audience – even if you walk through the audience and talk to them a bit more - mostly because there aren’t visual aids. At 16:34 that there was good bonding going on and laughing going on.
Lastly for an audience unfamiliar with the subject I would suggest take aways (summary) – sort of like:
1. Web 2.0 is the attention economy,
2. Web 2.0 is you, and you, and you..
So those are the crits – I hope they were gentle and constructive.
The up side your information is great, very interesting, and packed with nuggets. Your style is so natural and easy and spontaneous. And you have very open body language – which is awesome. Very inviting and unthreatening and engaging which I reckon is crucial for someone who speaks about geek stuff – it can be threatening to people who are not geeks.
I think you are an awesome speaker (wouldn’t be surprised if you are one of the top speakers in the country) and would love to hear you speak again.
@Mandy de Waal that’s awesome feedback thanks. Yeah I agree that some visual aids would be useful - and if I do talks 45 min or longer in length videos and slides are standard.
Even when I have visual aids I like to pick up a folder, or show the Apple logo, or ask someone in the audience to show us a logo - there are few opportunities in information-rich presos to engage and involve the audience so I try to leverage as many of them as possible. But perhaps the point could be better made with a logo on the screen
You’re a star, thanks.
Hi Mikey
Think you gave a brilliant talk. It’s never easy talking for 20min and keeping the audiences attention, especially without having notes or using some sort of visual effects.
I think you did a great job and your use of gestures, facial expressions, visual contact, illustrations, and good personal appearance worked perfectly, you also did not use to many mannerisms like UM and AH which helped keep the audience focused, you kept me listening for the entire speech which is good especially considering that it took and hour to download on my crud internet connection, but i got to watch it more than once.. So its a good thing.
I would work on a more effective conclusion though. What is said in the conclusion is often remembered the longest. It influences the effectiveness of the entire talk. I feel you may need to work on this a little
Apart from that small critique I think you did a smashing job and i can’t wait to watch your next talk.
How to pitch a social media presentation
It was very natural and interactive.
I liked the fact that you didn’t “death by PPT” it. It felt more real, more like a chat with friends. I always respond best to presentations like that.
Also - They were expecting a geek to come up with a flashy mac & a flashy presentation with funny videos. They got a passionate human being who loves what he does and wants to share his knowledge, not his PPT prowess. I don’t think they will forget that talk for a while.
The first time I saw you speak was at the 2nd Annual New Media Marketing conference at Gallagher estate this year. Your mac would not connect to the projector. That was your best presentation I have seen. I had been watching presentations all day and focusing on the slides, not the words. Then you came up and I sat up and listened!
However… When you came to speak at Standard Bank and you drew graphs… that really worked. If you are going to forgo powerpoint, maybe have somewhere you can draw the graphs you refer to.
The bit where you introduce the Stork commercial: I really like the way you made it relevant to the people there on that day by mentioning the conversation you eavesdropped on. Personalises the presentation nicely!
There are a few times you mumble the last bit of your sentence a little and then quickly say “Anyway…” (e.g.: 05:45)
At 08:56 you abandon the sentence in the middle to talk about Rupert Murdoch. Would have liked to have heard the end of the sentence.
When you make profound statements (you do quite often), maybe pause just a little bit longer to let the concept sink in.
The Radio ad exercise was awesome. Made them really realise how “old media” is irrelevant and brought it home.
(P.S. you need to change your radio station… mine doesn’t advertise Piles remedies.)
Overall - it was a good presentation. Kept my attention for the full 22 mins even though I’ve heard you speak about the concepts before.
Well done!
Just two things..
I have to agree with the comments above you do need some sort of visual aids to tie stuff toghether (ads, urls etc…) just something to keep peoples attention focused…
Also your presentation is engaging but somewhere between 13 and 14 minutes it was starting to drag a bit.. nicely picked up at 15 minutes with your story though
…
Otherwise very cool spin on the topic - very nice that you focused on the “ethos” as opposed to overwhelming your audience with technology/geek speak.
Hey Mike,
Good to listen to someone humanising what’s going on in these emerging spaces & bringing it down to earth with straight talk.
I disagree with comments above about visual aids….imnsho too often they glam up & obsfucate what are straight forward (albeit technofied) concepts.
Oh …& thank you, thank you… for *NOT* harping on hackneyed 2.0 yada yada concepts.
Next time someone talking about Soc Media hauls out the catchphrase rucksack & trots out something like “join the conversation, because you are the conversation”…I swear, I’ll digitally hurl
Good job.
..only suggestion would be to pull it together at the end instead of ending abruptly…..summarise your message with 2 or 3 key points… but still keeping straight forward & down2earth.
has anybody actually measured the impact of social networking on a brand (did stork sales go up or down more than can be explained by the advert itself)? If you are right then down, but if no difference it means that the blogshpere is not yet connecting their blogging thoughts with their actions as consumers
But I think you are absolutely right about how Advertising “creatives” are taking us away from what is real about products and services, over emphasizing the brand image (and alienating us from ourselves in the process…) , whereas entering into a conversation with one’s customers, opening up the possibility of co-production ought to offer much more the opportunity of customers “finding” something new of themselves in a company’s offering or am i dreaming?