SPECIAL SERIES ==> Public Speaking Secrets! (These WORK!) <== | BATHROOM Break #71 COLLAB: The Marketing Millennials + Do This, Not That

0:01Welcome to a new special series called The Bathroom Break. That extra 10 minutes, you either have to listen to marketing tips or use the bathroom or both. But I don't recommend both, but that's your choice. This collab is going to be super fun. We have Daniel Murray from the Marketing Millennials and me, Jay Schwetelson, from the Do This Not That podcast and SubjectLine.com. Each episode in the series, we are going to go over quick tips about different marketing topics. And if you want to be in the bathroom, fine. Just don't tell us about it. Thanks for checking it out. we are back with another episode of the marketing millennials podcast and today i'm here with best-selling author jay schwedelson um he just recently wrote a book he also just recently got shouted out by the ceo of hubspot for being a great inbound speaker because we're gonna speak about speaking today but how does it feel to have a best-selling book i it's just achievement man.

0:57I will tell you the book is called stupider people. I've done it. It's up for presale. You can all, all proceeds, all net proceeds are going to charity, the V foundation for cancer research. That's really the only reason I'm doing it. I don't think I've ever had more, uh, imposter syndrome. I felt more uncomfortable about doing something in my life than doing this book because I'm borderline illiterate and, um, I don't even know. So we'll see how it goes, but what about you? Would you ever write a book? I've thought about it, but I, again, illiterate like you. So, it's probably going to take me years to write a book the thing about jay you should know is that if he has an idea he just like does it and like right if it if it works it works if it does it does it so like he's like i'm gonna write a book okay let me just write a book and just let me do a hundred other things as well as write a book so yeah it's a horrendous idea i'm not i'm not gonna lie this was um uh this was more than i anticipated but whatever it's an experience screw it um so let's talk about public speaking.

1:57So both of us have sessions coming up at the inbound conference, which is giant 12 ,000 person event that HubSpot puts on. We both have sessions. So we're going to rattle off some public speaking, must do's, never do's, how we approach a session. So Daniel, you got your session coming up. What do you do? How do you approach a session? How do you, how do you make it not suck? I always practice my speech the day of. So I know I've already completed that's the speech on the day so i'm not nervous to do it the first time that day so i'll run through it the morning of so it's kind of a mental walkthrough so i know hey my speech has already been completed this day instead of doing the night before i always run through it a good dry run before i go on stage um so that's something i think more and more people should do is once you have that mental block that you completed that day, I feel it's much easier to get on stage.

2:53Yeah, I'll tell you a couple of things that I do and that I don't do. First off, if I'm going to practice my session, I always practice it with a lot of noise going on. People make the mistake, they'll practice it in a quiet room. I need to be quiet and practice my speech. It's ridiculous because when you do actually speak somewhere, and again, this is not just for a big speech. It could be on a Zoom with five people. It could be in a conference room with 10 people. Everybody publicly speaks. when you practice what you're going to say, you practice it with the TV on. You practice it with people in the room or whatever.

3:22Because when you ultimately do speak on that Zoom or the conference room or a big speech somewhere, it's not going to be a perfect setup. People are going to be on their phones. They're going to be walking around. There's going to be noise. So you want to have an environment that's a little bit more similar to reality. What else do you think about? I like that advice of the noise. I never thought of it. But we used to actually in football, the week of a loud game, they used to like put on the speakers like loud music the whole time. And if it was a rainy day, a rainy game, they used to soak the footballs in water.

3:57So you need to be as close to the conditions on the field, like they say, in sports as possible. Another thing I like to do is I don't like to memorize speeches. I like to have word cues in that is that I know that are built into the deck or on the notes just to say like, hey, I need to hit these these points because memorizing, I feel if you in a flow and then you forget something, there's nothing to go off of. But at least if you have word cues, you can always go to the next word in your head and come up with something, because if you practice enough, this something will come out. I don't believe you're probably going to say a different speech 20 different times, but if you at least practice and have some word cues, it helps you have a flow, help you not get stuck if you get stuck in the middle of a speech.

4:53Oh, my God. I couldn't agree with that more. I think memorize. The problem with memorizing a speech is two parts. You as the speaker, and again, it could be for a small group. It doesn't matter. You as the speaker screw yourself up because if you miss a word or sentence, you're like, oh, wait a minute. Where am I? And that's a horrendous situation. There's nothing more boring than watching somebody or listening to somebody that has memorized something say it. They're not invested in it. They're just trying to get through it. Speaking of boring, I'll tell you the one thing that I will never do that most people do when they're doing a presentation at their company or whatever.

5:28Their first slide or two has a list. These are the seven things I'm going to take you through. Okay? They put that slide up. And instantly when you're there on that Zoom in the conference room or whatever, as an attendee, as a listener, you're like, oh, God, this is going to be terrible. Can we just get to number seven? We have to get through all of these? Horrendous. You're telling people it's going to be boring. It's going to suck. I know people tell you to tell them what you're going to say. And then you say it again. And whatever that stupid saying is, don't do that. Stop being boring out of the gate.

5:57Don't show them the list of the crap that you're going to say, because that is when you lose everybody. I also think for me, it's speeches go faster than you think. So what I like to do is concise, the amount of tips I'm going to give just because you only have enough time and you think it's going to go shorter. So if you have like 15 tips, try to get it down to 10 to eight tips and just go for the best eight tips because you're going to get on stage. And the worst thing to do on stage is having to rush to the end of the deck. So it's better to finish early, I believe, in a speech than late in a speech.

6:37So always try to concise your talk a little bit into smaller chunks, because even if you're in smaller chunks, I guarantee you'll probably get close to that time on stage. Dude, I needed that advice a few weeks ago before I submitted my deck for inbound because I'm doing an email tip session. It's a 45-minute session. I have 101 slides. I mean, it is so, it is going to be like, I'm going to be on like 12 Celsius or Celsius or whatever the hell you say. It is not going to be a good situation at all. The other thing I'll tell you, one last tip from me, is cater to the lowest common denominator in your audience.

7:17I am never shocked because now it's happened to me so many times. I'll talk or I'll be on a Zoom or in a conference room, whatever, and a Huff slides up and I'll say something like, and this is for DTC marketers or this is for ABM. And I won't actually say what the acronym is. And then invariably, people will come and be afterwards, what's DTC? I totally missed that, whatever. And you make people feel stupid, even though they're not stupid. Not everybody knows. I don't know all the acronyms. I have no idea what they mean. Never make somebody feel stupid in the audience. You want everyone to feel as comfortable as they can.

7:53So if you say, oh, DTC, oh, that's direct to consumer marketing. ABM, that's account-based marketing. Say what it is that you're saying. Cater to the person who might not know because if not, there's nothing that's a bigger turnoff. Yeah, that's actually something hard for a lot of people. I think you try to go on stage and try to act like an expert in something, but the way to become an expert is teach it simply. And you learn this in social and all marketing. try to get to simplify the talk to as much as possible. I think that's a big mistake I always think about is even in like newsletters and stuff like that, I always say like, even if it says like call to action, like CTA, I always have to say call to action CTA.

8:35So people know that at least they understanding this because they'll get lost in. So that's a really good point is spell things out because people don't know. So, all right. Now it's just on a human level. Now you're getting ready to do a session. Do you like talk to people like, like the 10 minutes before you give a talk, right? It's always so awkward. Like everyone's sitting there in the audience. You're kind of there. What's your move? Do you just stand there on stage like a big goober? Or do you go into the audience and talk to people and try to connect with people? Like, what do you do? I tried to not have a panic attack.

9:08So I'm like, I'm like trying to breathe, like center myself. Like I swear the times I've been on stage, I'm like this close to being like, I'm out before I get on stage. Jay's a completely different. I see Jay before he goes on stage. He's like, he's like double fisting two Celsius is like hyped up talking to 18 people gets on stage and literally me. I'm like sweating profusely before I'm getting on stage. So it's two different types of people out there. That's amazing. You know what I always try to do? And I think this is good to do again, a zoom, a conference room, a big speech doesn't want to matter, whatever.

9:48I try to connect with at least one human being like have a normal conversation. Oh, where are you from? Oh, I'm from Nashville. Oh my God. I was at this restaurant, blah, blah, blah. Because the second that you can humanize whoever it is that you're about to speak to you, it puts you at ease. You're like, Oh, they're people. They want me to do a good job. I want to do a good job. This is not that complicated. And that's, and by the way, everybody gets nervous. If you think, I'm not a good public speaker. I get nervous. Don't label yourself that way. Everybody is nervous. If they say they're not, they are full of it.

10:19So don't ever label yourself that you can't publicly speak. That stinks. But you know what doesn't stink? This podcast doesn't stink, even though it's called Bathroom Break. And bathrooms stink. I don't know what I'm talking about. This has been an incredible episode as usual. Listen, everybody go subscribe to Daniel's show. And by the way, if you mention this show and you tag us on Instagram at the Marketing Millennials and at Jay Schwedelson, we will put you on our story, which is very exciting. So we appreciate you and thanks for being here. Thank you.

10:55Daniel, come on, man. I got to get back to work. Get out of there. All right. While he's still in there, this is Jay. Check out my podcast, Do This, Not That for marketers. Each week we share really quick tips on stuff that can improve your marketing and hope you give it a try oh here's daniel he's finally out back from my bathroom break this is daniel go follow the mark and the podcast but also tune into this series it's once a week the bathroom break we talk about marking tips that we just spew out and it could be anything from email subject line to any marking tips in the world we'll talk about it just give us a shout on linkedin and tell us what you want here.

11:32Peace out. Later.