Jay Schwedelson: We are back for Do This, NOT That! podcast. And one of the things I think we all have fear about or nervous about, feel like maybe we're not good at it in some ways is public speaking. I've done a few episodes on public speaking tips, but I wanna do another one. 'cause there's so much misinformation out there about when you're going to give a speech and it's not just public speaking, like, okay, I'm getting on a big stage, I'm gonna speak in front of hundreds or thousands of people.

Jay Schwedelson: Public speaking is also when you get on a Zoom with people. And you are the one that's leading the talk, or you're in a conference room and you're the one that's leading the talk. Maybe you have a few slides and you're trying to pitch a client. Public speaking is when you are speaking to a group of people in some capacity, big or small, it doesn't matter.

Jay Schwedelson: And when you go online or you read books or whatever about how to do public speaking, the overwhelming majority of the stuff that's out there is total trash garbage. Now, I'm not trying to say I'm cool, but I've given hundreds of speeches. In front of tens of thousands of people. And also I've given speeches in front of two to three people, and I've done this a bunch and they go relatively well.

Jay Schwedelson: So I wanna share with you what I have realized works and what doesn't work, and what best practices as it relates to public speaking are absolute embarrassing. Garbage, trash, stupid. They're stupid. What am I gonna say? Alright, so let's get into it. One that I think we all know that we shouldn't do. I hope that we know this is, don't memorize what you're going to say.

Jay Schwedelson: Please never memorize what you're going to say. That doesn't mean you shouldn't practice, but I will tell you, there is nothing more boring on Earth than watching somebody that has memorized what it is that they're saying. They're not into it. Okay? All they're doing is trying to remember the next word.

Jay Schwedelson: And the problem is when we're out there and we're trying to memorize stuff for these speeches, what do we do? We make these other mistakes. We, we practice in front of a mirror. What is that? Have you ever given a speech in front of something that reflects back to you? That is the most ridiculous, best practice?

Jay Schwedelson: Practice in front of mirror? Don't do that. That's super distracting. That makes no sense. Now, when you do practice though, don't practice in silence. Practice outside where there's trucks driving by, practice with your TV on, practice. Leave your phone ringer on when you go to speak, whether it's on that Zoom, in that conference room, on that stage, it's not gonna be silence.

Jay Schwedelson: Why would you practice in silence and never practice until you say, okay, I got it. It's perfect. It's not supposed to be perfect. Perfect is boring. The interesting parts of speeches is the stuff that's not perfect. So practice until you kind of know what you're gonna say, but don't practice until you're perfect.

Jay Schwedelson: It's annoying. All right. Probably the number one best practice as it relates to public speaking that I think is the worst is when you start whatever you're going to say, you should open with a joke. Everybody always says. Open with a joke. Well, first of all, I don't think you're Jerry Seinfeld, okay? You don't have the ability to just open with a joke, and that's not even what Jerry Seinfeld does.

Jay Schwedelson: Okay? You're not a comedian. What you do wanna do instantly, which has worked really well for me the moment I got on stage anywhere. The moment I'm gonna do a big webinar, the moment I do anything, I don't open with a joke. What I do is I open with something that is wildly relatable. In that moment, I instantly connect with whoever I'm speaking in front of in that moment.

Jay Schwedelson: What do I mean? I'll walk on a stage or on the Zoom or in a conference room, I'll be like, oh, my wife picked out this sweater for me. I haven't worn this sweater in three years. I don't even think it fits me and it smells weird 'cause it's been in a weird closet. I don't know why I am wearing it. All of a sudden everyone was like, ha ha, ha ha.

Jay Schwedelson: And it's not a joke. It's being relatable about being self-conscious about what, what it is that you're wearing, right? Or. Uh, I've said, I, I just said this on the stage 'cause it was true. I said I just had a Prime energy drink for the first time because I want to have energy for this speech and I feel really weird, like, edgy right now.

Jay Schwedelson: Instantly, everybody in the audience like, oh, I, I've tried one of those that, that messes me up or I've never tried one of those. Scare me. Whatever. You are connecting with the audience, so don't say a joke. But do something instantly relatable about something that just happened to you off stage or off camera, or last night, or, I had salmon for dinner last night and I'm still nauseous.

Jay Schwedelson: Okay. Relate to the audience and whoever you're speaking to as fast as you possibly can. Another best practice that I cannot stand is when people tell you you want to, you know, stand still, and project confidence. Make sure you stand behind a lectern if you're on a stage and really try to look, look the part.

Jay Schwedelson: Get outta here. That's so boring. All right? You need to fill the screen. If you're talking on Zoom, you need to fill the stage. If you're talking on stage, you need to fill the conference room. If you're in a conference room, stand up. Obviously don't stand up if you're on Zoom unless you have a standing desk.

Jay Schwedelson: But if you're on stage, you're in a conference room, stand up, move around. But even when you're on a Zoom, okay, move your arms, okay? Move your hands point. Do things, have energy? You have to have the energy for the entire audience that's watching you. You know you're not a physical comedian, but why are physical comedians so popular?

Jay Schwedelson: Because it adds something to it. It makes you feel like you're a part of it. You can relate to it more. It gets you to pay attention more, whether you realize it or not. You wanna always be thinking about having your hands out there filling the screen. However you can do that. Filling the stage. However you can do that, it's critically important.

Jay Schwedelson: The last one that kind of drives me bonkers is where people say, okay, when you're done with your talk, whatever it is, your presentation, your pitch, your whatever, end with a strong summary. Seriously. Okay. What do we, what? What do, do we really want that here? I just bore you to tears for the last half an hour, hour.

Jay Schwedelson: Let me recap about why this was so epically boring. Okay? And tell it to you again. Oh my goodness. Who wants that? What? Who wants this garbage? Don't do that. You don't wanna recap. Here's all you wanna do.

Jay Schwedelson: You almost wanna call people out. Say, listen, I just shared with you a bunch of stuff, but there's one thing that I want you to do. I want you to take one of these test ideas and I want you to try it, and I want you to think about right now which one of those ideas it's gonna be. Or listen, I just threw out a lot of services at you that my company does, but what is the one or two services that really stuck with you that you say, you know what?

Jay Schwedelson: That would help us out a lot. Nail it down, crunch it all down so the person in their mind is able to say, you know what? I'm gonna do this one thing, or, you know what, I got this out of this. Don't do a recap and make it epically boring. Make the person think about what they just consumed and to, to take, have a takeaway that they can actually do something with public speaking.

Jay Schwedelson: If you go on Google, what should I do for public speaking, you probably should do the opposite of whatever it is that it tells you back. Yes, I get worked up. I do, I do. I get worked up. What am I gonna tell you? All right, let's get into the portion of this podcast. It's ridiculous called, since you didn't ask, we're talking about nonsense.

Jay Schwedelson: So the nonsense is going on. Is that we just opened up actually this morning. Like right now, you're, you're hearing this before anybody's even seeing it online. We just opened up registration. I'm not telling you this for a commercial. I'm telling you this. For a reason for Guru Conference. Guru Conference is the giant.

Jay Schwedelson: Free virtual marketing event and we give out swag to people that register early. So you should probably stop listening. Go to gu GuruConference.com so you can get our crazy hoodie that we're gonna put out there. But so yesterday, 'cause we were working on, um, the plans for Guru Conference, which last year had 29,000 people, and Nicole Kim was there and I don't know what's gonna happen this year.

Jay Schwedelson: And we're like, every year we do an eating thing. Where we eat something. Like one year we ate SPAM with Joey Chestnut. Uh, this past year we ate bugs. Me and Nancy Harhut ate bugs. So we were talking about, um, what should we do? And someone's like, Hey, why don't you do like the One Chip Challenge? I'm like, what's that?

Jay Schwedelson: And they're like, it's like you eat this. Like, I dunno, hot potato chip and it's the hottest thing in the world and you can't even do it. And I was like, oh no. Is that where, by the way, I don't know that that's what we're gonna do. We're still talking about many different things. But the problem is, is that we did the hot wings, the Hot Ones challenge a couple years ago I did with Nancy Harhut and a few other people.

Jay Schwedelson: And, um, I didn't really understand these hot sauces. I'm gonna be real. And I poured them on the chicken wings. I ate them live. And yes, they were very hot in that moment. But I will tell you, why am I telling you this? I don't know.

Jay Schwedelson: That evening after I ate these, like the ultimate hot sauces, I don't know what the, you know, Inferno mania, I don't know what they're called. Whatever. I was violently Ill like, like I don't know how much weight I lost that night. And this is probably getting a little bit TMI, but I went missing an action in my house for like a few hours. Like, there were some wellness checks outside of the, of the bathroom who were like, are you all right in there?

Jay Schwedelson: And the answer's no. I was not all right in there. And I was really, I, I remember vividly being in the bathroom and saying to myself, this is how it's going to end. That's how bad I felt. I go, it's going to end with me having eaten. Uh, chicken wings live at a virtual conference and getting violently ill, and I'm going to go down for the count in this bathroom right here, right now, and that's gonna be the story.

Jay Schwedelson: And then people are gonna be on social media, be like, can you believe what happened to Jay? That is crazy. What a crazy story. I thought that was the end. Fast forward, it wasn't the end, but I, I have like, I really am having like a, a, a reaction here to thinking I have to go down this road again. I don't know what I just shared.

Jay Schwedelson: I don't know what I'm talking about. As usual, go to GuruConference.com, register for this thing, and there's a field in there when you register on crazy ideas of what we should think about doing. Put in the box when you register, whatever ridiculous ideas you have. 'cause we are trying to figure that out literally right now.

Jay Schwedelson: No ideas, too ridiculous. No eating idea. It doesn't have to just be eating. It could be anything. Alright, and hope to see you there. You're awesome and appreciate you later. Bye.