Presentation Tips

Look around where you are presenting from and pay attention to the background noise. Is there any chance that some of that background noise might erupt into something loud close by that will transmit over your conference? Doorbells, overhead announcements, laughing co-workers, barking Schnauzers? Have you turned off your Call-Waiting? If another call comes in while you are speaking, will your phone make a beep or emit a short ring?

We’ve talked about sitting while you present but you should also try to maintain good posture while you are presenting. I know it sounds crazy, but sitting in a lazy position encourages you voice to be lazy. You will slur your words more if you slump. Sit with your back straight but be comfortable so you can also sound relaxed. You want to be able to speak in a normal conversational business-like manner, just as if you were sitting at a conference table. Notice I said “conversational”. The most frequent follow-up comment that I field from post-event surveys is: The speaker sounded like he was reading a script he had never read before. Are you reading a script that you have never read before? We’ll discuss this in more detail in a later blog but for now, make sure you have water accessible. Speaking while nervous increases dry mouth and you want to be prepared if you really need to take a drink.

Try to arrive in your web conference 15 minutes early so you don’t feel rushed, thus increasing any nervousness you might feel. I’ve read articles that suggest that fear of public speaking ranks right up there with fear of death. I’m not a psychologist but I’ve sat in on literally hundreds of web conferences and more than 60% of the time, I can hear nervousness in the voice of the speaker.
In a web conference, the speaker is usually sitting in a familiar location with familiar equipment talking to the air. Why are you nervous? I would love to hear back from anyone who wants to tell me why they are nervous. Click here to send me a note and I’ll review some of your comments in a future blog.

While I'm Not For Bigger Government...

I think someone needs to start regulating corporate usage of the term Customer Service.

Two issues in 24 hours.

1. I upgraded from an old Playstation 3 to the a Playstation 3 Slim. As someone who has bought computers and switched purchased content like iTunes from the old computer to the new one, I was stunned to learn that it is darn near impossible to transfer purchases between consoles. After hours searching the internet for answers, I found one that put me directly into Sony's customer service cross-hairs. After being told numerous times that there was nothing they could do and that they couldn't wait for my system to update because they had "other people to help", I was defacto hung up on and am now determined that I will simply return the new system to the store.

2. I needed to replace an optical drive for a company computer because the one that was sold with the computer was D.O.P. (dead on purchase). Kyle, our tech support, started a service file and simply needed my to call to authorize the credit card deposit (don't get me started on why I have to put a deposit on a new drive that they will hold until they get the defective one back).

To refocus, they needed a credit card authorization and a ship to address for an existing service file.

20 MINUTES.

Customer service is tough from a management perspective. You can invest heavily in great people who take pride in helping customers find the right answer or you can see it as an obligation with low ROI and accept that miserable service is equally miserable to that of your competition.

I feel very fortunate to work with customer service people like Shelly and Kyle. Unlike Sony or Lenovo, they take pride in helping people, not just answering the phone.

Getting Quality Audio

What's the best practice? In my opinion, get yourself on a land line. I know, I know, I love technology too. I work for a technology company and when other girls were sleeping with stuffed animals I was sleeping with my Atari but the analog telephone line it is still the most affordable, best quality audio for presenting over the Internet. It is widely and easily available in every remote part of this country and most countries of the world. If you don't have Alexander Graham Bell's brain child sitting at your conference location, go to a place where you can use one.

Then get yourself a good quality headset. In fact, round up a couple and test them to see which has the clearest sound. Borrow one from a friend who sounds really good when they call you. If you can't find a wireless headset with good quality, there is no shame in using one with a wire. It's not sexy and you don't get to walk around but that's actually a good thing. Wait, let me rephrase that, it's good to be sexy but it's not good to walk around while you are presenting.

Walking around encourages head movement which causes static on the line. Sometimes it's slight, most times it's noticeable. Waking also increases the chance that you will pick up odd and various room noises. As you walk closer to an air conditioner, ceiling fan, desk lamp, overhead projector, you pick up room noise and it may be slight but as it goes in and out with your walking action, it can be distracting. Find a comfortable chair that doesn't squeak in a quiet location and sit down to present.

Ever lost your headset in mid-sentence? You know, you are walking around, wildly gesturing with your hands, really into telling a great story and all of the sudden your headset goes flying off? For me, it’s the twisting in my chair. I use a wired headset because I prefer the consistent sound quality and sometimes when I turn my chair, the arm rest catches the cord and rips the device right off my head. See, when I tell you about things that can go wrong, I speak with a lot of experience.

The Brand

It's a heavy word, "brand," and it should be. It's a very involved subject. For most people, however, it's a nebulous one. The two most common associations with branding are the company logo and the company slogan or tagline. Now, while these are very important parts of the brand it's really only the tip of the iceberg. A brand is not the print collateral, it's not the website, it's not the products. It encompasses all those things, it uses those as vehicles to spread the brand, but they're not the brand itself.

A brand is an idea, a feeling, that is produced through the look, behavior, and level of product quality a company has. The brand lets customers know what kind of entity they're dealing with; is it a large corporate entity or a grassroots company? Does it take itself really seriously, or is it more casual? These decisions are made by identifying the target market. A successful brand immediately caters to the target market with every piece of identity the company outputs. It's not something that grows into the market over time, it entrenches itself in the middle and spreads. Nothing makes that more clear than the marketing shift to web 2.0 over the last seven years.

The purpose of web 2.0 on the advertising level is much the same as it is on a personal level. It's meant to connect with other people. The company that wants to annoy their potential customers will take this as an opportunity to spam them with offers and information across all social sites, damaging their brand identity's reputation. The intelligent company will make available, not necessarily send out, information that other people want to have. After potential customers have been hooked in by that information and are actively following the company, it can start sending out more information on their actual services because the customers become curious enough to ask for it. This ensures the brand stays healthly because the company has more to offer than products and services, it becomes a valuable part of the web 2.0 community.

Importance of Audio

How much do you think about audio when you are planning a conferencing event? You might spend days working on the PowerPoint and fine tuning dancing animations that introduce key points with movement and flair. You might type your whole script into the PowerPoint Notes field and do a spell and sentence check to make sure you have conveyed your text in a grammatically correct manner. You might read your speech to yourself, to your cat or to a co-worker that owes you a favor to try different phrasing techniques. You might practice in a conference room with co-presenters fine tuning details of who is going to speak when so it appears that you are bouncing things off one another in a natural manner. But did you do a sound check with the audio equipment you will use for your conference?

Phones are ubiquitous and we always assume when we turn the thing on, we are going to hear that, oh so familiar, dial tone. We love the phone because POTS always worked. It worked when you couldn't find your Mom after school, it worked when you were hungry and there was no pizza in the refrigerator and it even worked when the electricity went out. Even after we all got cell phones and experienced cell signals that cut out during very important communication moments, that didn't lessen our love affair.

And because love is blind, we have become very accepting of poor cell phone signals, cheap Bluetooth devices, dusty old speakerphones and soft phones that produce delays because our computer resources can't do VoIP and receive a fax at the same time. It's one thing to be accepting of this when we are having a casual conversation but when you are making a professional presentation you should tie that package up in a bow of the best sounding audio you can arrange.

Humming Phones

This week my phone developed a hum. Humming on the line is annoying to the person you are calling but they can always hang up. After a couple of hours listening to the hum, I felt like I was part of a sensory overload experiment. I heard humming even when I wasn't on the phone. I hear humming right now, as a matter of fact.

I thought it might be the equipment, so I tested using a different phone and I still heard the hum. Then I called the phone company and asked them to test my line for noise. The recorded message (that I could barely hear over the hum) told me that they would have a service technician contact me before 5 pm the following day. I limped through the next two days, borrowing other people's phones (it's a good way to find out who is a germaphobe), burning up minutes on my cell phone (I have figured out that my earrings can activate the mute button on my Blackberry touch screen) and begging my callers to please be patient, the phone company is coming to the rescue before 5 pm. At 4:49 pm, the phone company arrived and after a few minutes, I learned that my line was fine and I had two bad phones. At least I've got a new phone on order now.

So, why did I make you sit through this tale of telephony woe? To introduce the subject of audio quality on your web conference. I’ll spend my next few blog entries talking about audio and how you can take some small steps that will make a big difference.

The Twitter Engine

I will preface this by writing that it was late Saturday (actually early Sunday) and I am embarrassed that this is what passes for conversation amongst my group of friends but...

I was enjoying one of my final cocktails of the evening when the topic of Twitter came up. My friends, who I will identify by their cell phone models, iPhone 3G and Palm Centro both agreed that Twitter was pointless.

"Who cares what I am doing at 2:30 PM on a Thursday" Palm Centro blurted out.

This seems to be the most regular anti-Twitter sentiment that I encounter. The hardest part for a Twitter user like myself to admit is that they're right.

However, Twitter's real opportunity is to become the broadest reaching, most current search engine in the world.

Twitter has users at every ground zero around the world. Whether you interest is finance, fashion, or fishing, Twitter has users on trading floors, runways, and your nearest lake ready to tell you in less than 140 characters what you want to know.

Tips and Tricks to Help Your Computer Run WebEx

Kyle Jackson says:

We’ve all seen these tips and tricks things. They are almost always too wordy. So you end up sifting through the endless bloviation of some emotionless, and surely monotone, engineer from the other side of the planet, just to find out, that this Tips and Tricks Guide doesn’t apply to your OS… how lame. So here is my answer to this problem. Cadence. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised at just how easily this rhyme sticks in your head, and how effective it really is. And for those of you soulless individuals who don’t like fun, I have a more traditionally Tips and Tricks Guide below this short rhyme. Enjoy!

Here are some tips, and you shall soon see. How to keep from being an Eye Dee Ten Tee*.

But first I must know something from thee. Do you click on a fox, or a big blue ‘E’?

Avoid the fox, or some graphics look bad. Foxes make those in Bangladesh** mad.

Fox virus protection makes IT guys glad. But missing the meeting will make you feel sad.

Close down all programs, but don’t be bitter. After the conference, you can return to Twitter

Once all is closed, click on the big blue ‘E’. Then tools, Internet options, look for browsing history

It’s easy to find, this page is short and sweet. Now click on the box that says “delete”.

Deleting it all might take a while, at least delete all temporary internet files.

We’re not quite ready or done with this rhyme. Go back one screen, and click “settings” this time.

Half way down the page is a little white square. For IE 7 or 8, put a “50” in there.

For IE 6, put 500 in the box, but no really knows when it comes to the fox.

Listen to me, and not Justin Long, if you use a Mac, stuff will load wrong.

I agree with you that Microsoft’s evil, but it’s like when Frodo had to trust Sméagol.

So take my advice and do it my way. You’ll only have to use it for one hour today.

My final hint, don’t be a slacker; the host will watch you on the attention tracker!

*Eye Dee Ten Tee = “I D 10 T” spelled out. For further definition, remove spaces, ID10T.

** Bangladesh is where WebEx’s Tech support call center is located

WebEx Web Conferencing Attendee Tips
1 - Use Internet Explorer as your Browser. You can attend a meeting using Fire Fox or Safari, but sometimes odd problems arise. WebEx was designed to run on a Windows OS using IE as your browser. Firefox users don’t always see graphics properly and MAC users can’t Host a meeting with full functionality.

2 - Save and close all unnecessary applications before launching WebEx. This includes any email programs. WebEx runs cleaner and faster if it has all of your computer resources free and available; this is especially important if your Host is sharing Applications or the Internet.

3 – Clean out your cache memory. Open Internet Explorer, select your tools menu, and select Internet options. Under “Browsing History” select “delete”. If another screen appears, check the box “delete Temporary Internet Files”. Then click on “OK”.

4 – Have enough memory allowed for cache memory. Click ‘tools’ ‘internet options’ and look for the section titled ‘browsing history’ and select ‘settings’. Half way down this window is a little white box. For IE 6, enter at least 500 mg, and for IE 7 or 8, enter 50 mg,

5 – What if your meeting is unavailable? If the meeting is not available to join wait a few moments, and refresh your screen. The meeting may not be accessible until the Host starts the meeting.

6 – Leaving a Meeting. You click on the “File” menu located in the upper left hand corner of your screen and select “Leave meeting”.