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The Ultimate Sales Collaboration 3: Energy, Confidence, Body Language are keys to persuasion, according to business experts
Tuesday, November 04, 2008
Because the presidential election is the ultimate sell, we’re bringing
you the ultimate collaboration: the world’s top presentation experts
revealing the top secrets to the art of persuasion.
This is the
third in a series of four blogs where we distil analysis by 32
presentation and business experts down to simple guidelines to help
you to be persuasive in your business life.
Step Three: Use your body to communicate with energy and confidence
Your body language is absolutely critical to holding people’s attention and demonstrating authenticity, and therefore to being persuasive.
Rather than self-consciously trying to remember a laundry list of body language dos and don’ts, however, it is easier to go into your big day internalising a few simple principles.
Number one: Appear confident (even if inside you’re a nervous wreck). People are drawn to confidence, and convinced by it. Exude a calm demeanour.
Have total confidence in your views and opinions. It can help to think of famous speakers who appear calm and at ease, and imagine yourself as them.
Moderate your rhythm and tone, and don’t rush. Don’t fill in spaces with ums and ahs. If you are not a seasoned public speaker, the best way to appear confident, smooth, and convincing is to be fully prepared.
Number two: communicate with energy. Show passion, make eye contact. Use vocal variety to show empathy, or to be assertive.
To really engage the audience, you need to create a personal connection between them and your topic. Work physically with your voice and your body to convey your conviction and authenticity.
Number three: Remain aware of your body as you speak. Keep your feet still, and keep your body weight spread evenly, so you appear grounded. Don’t fidget or shift your weight from side to side.
Reach up and out to take up physical space with your gestures. Vary the rate, pitch, and volume of your voice. Be relaxed, not stiff. Take care to really open your mouth when you speak. Smile.
From the experts…
Alison Behrman, PhD: Communication is not a spectator sport. You need to work hard physically to land your message and move your listener to action.
Laura Lewis-Barr: Be energetic. Rate of speech, facial expressions, and gesture can send a message of competence and skill.
Jeff Goldberg: When speaking, speak at a moderate pace as well as speaking clearly and concisely using emphasis on key words for impact. Speak with passion.
Barbara Laskin: Image is everything. Stand up straight, listen respectfully to your competitor, and don't be peevish or arrogant.
Janet Larsen Palmer, PhD: Have a strong stance, with your body weight evenly distributed on both legs. Don’t move much at all with your feet.
Michael Souveroff: Keep a solid physical presence while speaking. Moving about is fine if you are choosing to do it, but vague movements such as pacing or excessive shifting will detract from your message.
Janet Larsen Palmer, PhD: Whenever a person’s head position is out of alignment during a high-stakes presentation, the nonverbal message is “I am uncomfortable and ill at ease. I’d rather be anywhere else than here!”
Alison Behrman, PhD: Reach forward your upper body to emphasize a point, in order to draw people in and connect. Viewers will be drawn in and, therefore, engaged in the message.
Janet Larsen Palmer, PhD: Reach out to the audience with palms-up gestures that take up as much space as you can comfortably command.
Alison Behrman, PhD: Work hard with your mouth. Open your mouth and fully form each word. It will make your voice have conviction and energy. Most people think they open their mouths but actually, they barely drop the lower jaw at all, and do not fully articulate.
Janet Larsen Palmer, PhD: Smile whenever you can to exhibit warmth and create more rapport with your audience.
Neal Larsen Palmer, PhD: Convey a sense of warmth and likeability by smiling more.
Jeff Goldberg: The biggest mistake you can make, from a persuasiveness standpoint, is to come across with a lack of confidence in their views.
Ruth Sherman: Eliminate halting syntax and non-words (uhs, ums).
Jonathan I. Ezor: Use President Clinton's trick of taking a breath instead of saying "um" or "uh", to seem more confident.
Neal Larsen Palmer, PhD: Speak in short sentences and stress key words. This form of delivery has the greatest and most lasting impact.
Dennis R Deaton: Overall, people believe what they feel not what they hear. Whenever the verbal, vocal, and visual message is inconsistent with the visceral message, the visceral message overrides and prevails.
Tom Brennan: Think of elegance and ease. Visualize those you admire for their poise, whether Churchill or JFK, and be that poise.
KimAlyse Popkave: Be professional at all times. Listeners see you even when you are not speaking.
Jeff Goldberg: The audience wants to listen to someone who knows what they're talking about. Simple things like not making eye contact or not speaking with conviction can spoil an otherwise strong presentation.
Karol Ward: If you use phrases like "I believe", or "we can do it" the audience want to hear in your tone that you do believe or that they can do it. Don't hold back on expressing your passion. The audience wants to know you can be assertive, direct and honest.
Carmine Gallo: Passion is the one consistent quality that all inspiring leaders have in common.
Karol Ward: Radiate vitality.
About the experts:
Derrick Hayes
President, WOE Enterprises
http://www.encouragementspeaker.wordpress.com
http://www.encouragementspeaker.com
Encouragement expert and creator of Derricknyms and W.O.E.
John Daly
Writer, JohnDaly.TV
http://www.johndaly.tv
TV Host and author who wrote the book on media bias and how Americans can become more informed efficiently. The book is Truth: The No BS Guide To Navigating A Media-Biased World.
Tom Brennan
Media Expert, Tom Brennan Media
http://www.tombrennanmedia.com
Have booked hundreds of clients into major media venues.
KimAlyse Popkave
President, K.a. Popkave Coaching & Consulting
http://www.Popkave-Coaching-and-Consulting.com
Creator of the Path To Power.
Steve Clements
Chief Consultant, Executive Speak/Write, Inc.
http://www.executivespeakwrite.com
Oral presentation and media trainer, distinguished professor and former television producer.
Judith E. Glaser
CEO, Benchmark Communications, Inc.
http://www.creatingwe.com
Two time best-selling author; pioneer and leading expert in the field of WE-centric leadership; founder of the Creating WE Institute; executive coach and advisor to C-suite leaders in multi-billion dollar global organizations; organizational anthropologist.
Alison Behrman, PhD
General Manager & Instructor, Speakeasy
http://www.speakeasyinc.com
Voice expert and communication coach at Speakeasy.
Jeff Goldberg
Professional Speaker, Success Coach, and Sales Trainer
http://www.jgsalespro.com
Author, speaker, coach and trainer having worked with more than 15,000 people in the last 6 years.
Deborah Shames
Co-founder, Eloqui
http://www.eloqui.biz
We've coached everyone from Dennis Tito to Paula Abdul on American Idol. We've trained teams at Mattel, Fisher Price, TD Ameritrade, Merrill Lynch, Johnson and Johnson as well as hundreds of law, accounting, insurance and financial firms.
We have one book on Amazon.com, The Speaker Survival Guide. Another book is due out in two weeks, Briefly Speaking. And we have a book contract with McGraw Hill Professional on our unique methodology. Our Eloqui method combines engagement techniques from the Entertainment Industry, cognitive science and impression management from psychology.
Barry Maher
Principal, Barry Maher & Associates
http://www.barrymaher.com
Acclaimed author, professional speaker and presentation expert.
Barbara Laskin
President, Laskin Media, Inc.
http://www.laskinmedia.com
Barbara Laskin is a nationally known public speaker, media trainer and Emmy-Award winning TV anchor and reporter. She reported on some of the most important stories of the past two decades, while interviewing the most influential newsmakers including former New York Governor Mario Cuomo, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani. She won an Emmy Award for writing and reporting in a one-hour documentary, "Scared to Death", which was broadcast nationwide. Her company, founded in 1992, has coached everyone from Fortune 100 CEOs to celebrity chefs to Hollywood heavyweights, with the goal of helping them become more compelling and confident public speakers. She is a frequent commentator for news outlets such as The New York Daily News, NBC, MSNBC, CBC-TV, and Bloomberg radio, among others.
Ruth Sherman
President, Ruth Sherman Associates LLC
http://www.ruthsherman.com
Leading communications/presentations consultant to business leaders, politicians and celebrities, best-selling author, speaker and blogger. Regularly quoted in New York Times, Washington Post, SF Chronicle and other major media.
Carmine Gallo
Communications Coach, Author, Fire Them Up
http://www.carminegallo.com
Carmine Gallo is the communications coach for the world's most admired brands.
Jonathan I. Ezor
Assistant Professor of Law and Technology, Touro Law Center
http://www.tourolaw.edu
Law professor; technology business attorney for 15 years; worldwide speaker on Internet law and business; author of award-winning Internet business law handbook Clicking Through: A Survival Guide for Bringing Your Company Online (Bloomberg Press 2000) (http://www.clickingthrough.com)
Steve Denning
http://www.stevedenning.com
Steve Denning, former World Bank executive, is the award-winning author of The Secret Language of Leadership (Jossey-Bass, 2007), and the world's leading expert on leadership storytelling.
Marianne Gobeil
Partner, Leading Communicators Inc.
http://www.leadingcommunicators.com
A trusted communications advisor to politicians, government officials and business executives.
Michael Souveroff
Presentation Coach and Owner, Natural Speech Coaching
http://www.naturalspeechcoaching.com
Corporate Presentation Coach, New York City
Ira Koretsky
CEO, The Chief Storyteller
http://www.TheChiefStoryteller.com
National and internationally-recognized speaker, columnist, and consultant on business storytelling
Dawn T. Clare
President, SPISE BLISS
http://www.spisebliss.com
I am an intuitive coach and consultant with a Harvard MBA. I predicted the Wall Street Financial crisis would happen in 2008 and that we would see the fall of the Lehman & Merrill Lynch companies. I also predicted in 2007 that Obama would get the Democratic nomination.
Karol Ward
Executive Presentation Coach and Author
http://www.karolward.com/professional/index.html
Karol Ward is an executive presentation coach, nationally recognized speaker and author of Find Your Inner Voice: Using Instinct and Intuition Through the Body-Mind Connection (Career Press, 2009)
Dennis R Deaton
Co-Founder and CEO of Quma Learning Systems, Inc.
http://www.Quma.net
http://www.DrDeatonSpeaks.com
Author and Corporate Educator to many of the Fortune 500
Janet Larsen Palmer, Ph.D.
President, Communication Excellence Institute
http://www.talk2cei.com
Nonverbal communication specialist and business presentations coach
Tiffanie Z. Lyon, MBA
President, Lyon Sales Institute, LLC
http://www.lyonsalesinstitute.com
Sales expert, sales motivator and author, inspiring non-traditional salespeople to increase their sales-confidence, grow their businesses and influence others, by helping them better understand and appreciate the concepts of "selling."
Ronald Kaufman
Seminar Leader/Executive Coach
http://www.anatomyofsuccess.com
Presentation, media, and negotiation skills coach, and author of Anatomy of Success.
Michelle Eppley
President, The Sound Center, Inc.
http://www.thesoundcenter.com
President of The Sound Center, Inc. Client list is confidential, but I've worked with broadcasters, executives, politicians, performers, and other professional voice users. People come to me to learn how deliver their message more effectively, whether that means working on vocal tone and projection, moving with confidence, phrasing and pausing, or articulation and accent. I am a trained singer and licensed, certified speech-language pathologist.
Paul Anderson
President - ProLango Consulting Inc.
http://www.prolango.com
Adviser to C-Level Executives with Fortune 500 Companies (Seattle Based). I'm also working on advising politicians on linguistics and influencing abilities.
Shel Horowitz
Blogger on politics & ethics
http://www.principledprofit.com/good-business-blog
Award-wining author of books on ethics and marketing.
Laura Lewis-Barr
Freelance trainer, Training4breakthroughs.com
http://www.training4breakthroughs.com
Award-winning writer and corporate trainer.
Richard Butterfield
Principal, Butterfield Speaks
http://www.butterfieldspeaks.com
High stakes media skills and presentation coach to business and healthcare leaders ranging from Microsoft and Gartner, eBay and IDEO, to Genentech and Cleveland Clinic. Author of It's Showtime! Butterfield Speaks on the Power of Persuasion.
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