Fearless Presentations

A few years ago, my wife and I went to see the movie Bohemian Rhapsody. When I was a kid, I remember hearing Another One Bites the Dust and We Are the Champions, but I was by no means a Queen fan. I was surprised, though, how many songs from the movie I knew every word to.But, I have to admit, the most surprising thing to me was that Freddie Mercury was a Persian Indian man who lived in England. When I listened to the songs, there was no Persian accent. No Indian accent. And there was no British accent. It reminded me of a conversation I had with one of my instructors who specialized in accent reduction.She told me that, “Music is the secret weapon for accent reduction. When people sing, everyone sounds like they speak American English with no accent.”English is a musical language. If it were a band, it wouldn’t be a quiet little string quartet. It would be a jazz ensemble — bold, abrasive, and filled to the brim with rhythm and melody changes. And to speak American English fluently, you have to master those rhythmic and melodic changes.There are three main components that influence your accent:-- Vowel Sounds (consonant and vowel pronunciation)-- Rhythm (stress patterns between words and syllables)--Intonation (the rise and fall of pitch in a sentence)Music mimics all three of these elements, and trains your ears and mouth at the same time. So, on this episode, I'm going to break each of these three items down and look at how real language learners have used music and speech techniques to achieve clearer communication.By the way, although this episode is focusing on the non-native English speaker, the tips can help anyone who wants to become a better presenter. If you think of great speakers like MLK, one of the reasons why he was so popular was that he spoke with a rhythm.You can do something similar to captivate your audiences as well.Show Notes: Music 101: A Musical Guide to Accent Reduction(https://www.fearlesspresentations.com/music-101-the-key-to-accent-reduction/)

One of the more challenging parts of any presentation is the very first part. If you are wondering how to introduce yourself before starting your presentation, you are in good company. For most of us, once we get the first few sentences out, our nervousness will diminish pretty significantly. So, this initial self-introduction is really important. If we struggle here, our nervousness will increase. In addition, the old adage, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression” is very true.In this post, we are going to cover the best way, a very simple three-step process that will help you introduce yourself in a presentation. A summary of the steps is below.Start with your name and company (or organization or school).Tell your audience what problem you can solve for them.Share some type of proof (social proof works best) that you can solve this problem.I will break down each step into a simple-to-follow process on this episode. When you get real good at this type of introduction, your public speaking fear will drop significantly because your audience will be more engaged. You'll get better feedback from them.Show Notes: How to Introduce Yourself in a Presentation [with Examples](https://www.fearlesspresentations.com/how-to-introduce-yourself-before-starting-any-presentation/)

After years of presentation coaching, one of the major things that I have realized is that many of the things presenters do to reduce nervousness actually cause nervousness. And because most business presenters deliver presentations so infrequently, those bad ideas get repeated over and over. Eventually, they become habits.So, on this episode, I'll give you the seven presentation habits that actually cause public speaking fear. They are:1) Writing Your Presentation Word-for-Word2) Designing Your PowerPoint Slideshow First3) Relying on Notes4) Asking for Critiques from Friends/Coworkers5) Practicing Alone6) Videoing Your Presentation and Reviewing It Alone7) Cognitive DissonanceIf you can eliminate these habits, you'll increase your confidence pretty quickly.Show Notes: 7 Presentation Habits that Cause You to Become a More Nervous Speaker(https://www.fearlesspresentations.com/7-presentation-habits-that-cause-you-to-become-a-more-nervous-speaker/)

If you practice great presentation skills, and focus on designing your presentations on what your audience needs and wants, the last thing you will have trouble with is hecklers. However, it only takes a single mad-at-the-world heckler to quickly turn your presentation masterpiece into modern art. So, when you are rudely interrupted in front of an audience of strangers, you will want to have a strategy for how to handle hecklers.That is, one that calms the heckler and makes you continue to look like the expert in the room. Throughout my years of experience in public speaking, I’ve had my share of hecklers, and one of the most important things you can do is to remember that you’re a professional speaker. Rather than getting worked up and losing your cool, the best thing you can do is respond professionally and with class.One of the more recent occurrences in social media is the birth of “internet trolls.” While internet trolls and hecklers have a couple of things in common, such as offensive language and negative comments, internet trolls are able to hide their real identity in fake online accounts. The majority of them aren’t really mean in real life. Hecklers, on the other hand, are braver in a way that they’re confident in attracting negative attention to themselves without masking their identity.Online trolls can be ignored. Ignoring a heckler while giving a speech is not so easy, though, and can cause you to lose credibility in front of your audience. So, on this episode, I cover four strategies for handling hecklers while giving a speech.Show Notes: 4 Tips on How to Handle Hecklers (Like A Professional)(https://www.fearlesspresentations.com/4-strategies-for-handling-hecklers-while-giving-a-speech/)

Welcome to 30 Tips in 30 Days! Over the entire month of November, I will be releasing a short, bite sized episode of Fearless Presentations every morning covering things that are absolutely essential to being a better presenter. Whether you've been speaking professionally for years and years or are looking to just start your public speaking journey, applying just these 30 tips I cover here will instantly and easily make you improve as a speaker. You've done it! You've reached the end of the 30 Tips in 30 Days series and with it, you have learned a pile of simple, easily applicable ideas you can start including in your presentations to instantly improve them. Thank you so much for sticking around! The very last tip is the most important. Almost every single tip I have talked about in the last 29 days has been centered around upping the engagement of your presentations. Making them more entertaining to watch and listen to, and whenever it comes to engagement, energy is the thing that does 90% of the work. If you have nothing else but contagious, addicting energy, people will instantly fall in love with your speech more quickly than applying anything else we've taught you to this point. Thank you again for listening, check out the YouTube channel to see some reels of this series along with longer versions of almost every tip in this series, as well as make sure to check out the blog post 101 tips below. That is where all these tips are pulled from and there are 3 times more tips to learn from. See you next Monday!Show Notes: 101 Public Speaking Tips For Delivering Your Best Speech(https://www.fearlesspresentations.com/101-public-speaking-tips-for-delivering-your-best-speech/)