After a student gives a class presentation, I’ll sometimes conduct a quick poll. I’ll ask the entire class: on a scale of 0-10, how nervous did the speaker appear? The audience might give the speaker a 2 or a 3. But the speaker? A nervous speaker might rate themselves a 7 or 9. That’s a …
As a public speaker, you’ll want your audience to understand you. You’ll want to be clear. To gain insight about your speech clarity, try this insightful and easy exercise. Take the one-minute “speech pace” exercise I posted last week. Then, upload your one-minute video sample to YouTube. Within a few moments of uploading your video, YouTube …
As I work on voice search optimization projects, I keep reading about the topic. The research fascinates me. In short – voice search is on the rise. It impacts how people find your business online. You need to think about voice search optimization. Cool. Makes sense. Most of the articles I find online offer great …
Mastodon? Mastodon? Do we really need another social network? And do we really need to name it Mastodon? That’s hard for people to spell off the top of their heads. If you’re wondering why people are talking about Mastodon and what it looks like, I give you a glib and superficial glance at this open …
Microsoft Sway is now freely available online. If you’re a story teller, check it out. Take a few minutes to watch the Microsoft tutorial video. It will give you a broad overview of what Sway is and how you might use it. Then, go monkey around with it a little. It’s at Sway.com. Whatever you do, …
I hope you never experience a crisis. But when you do, be prepared. Introducing Crisis Communication Fundamentals, my latest online course. It’s available now in the Lynda.com content library. I felt inspired to write this course because I’ve watched people struggle to figure out how to communicate when something unexpected and unpleasant strikes their organization. My aim is to …
Back in 2007, I quickly tossed up a YouTube instructional video. It took me about a half hour to make the 4:46 minute video. Today, the video will reach its 2 millionth view. But it’s not a viral video. It’s not hip or trendy. It didn’t get a big spike in viewership and then go …
Owing to global weirding, those who can are making plans to telecommute today. If you’re a writer, teacher, or communicator: you might have access to tools that allow you to do your jobs remotely. In a pinch, remote tools can often allow ‘the show to go on’. I remember speaking at an out-of-state conference a …
Watch the first televised presidential debate on YouTube. Kennedy and Nixon go head-to-head in 1960. Today, this debate is often discussed as an example of how much your personal appearance matters when it comes to an important televised presentation. Kennedy took great care to look good on camera. He wore a neatly pressed dark suit. …
You can ask Google almost anything. But at the moment, you have to use your words. Today, I can’t show Google a photo of an unknown thing and ask, “What is this thing?” For such queries, social search might be a better option. You can post a photo on your blog, on Twitter, on Facebook, …