Ever been unmoved by a motivational speaker? Listened to a keynote speech that didn’t unlock a door to anywhere? Endured a presentation that just didn’t snag your interest?

We’ve all been there in the audience, pulling for the speaker to give us a peg to
hang our hats on. Most speakers succeed. Many don’t. And then there are those who fail miserably.

The public speaking opportunity or “opp”— a key component of the Public Relations process — easily is the most personal and potentially most productive, most immediate means to reach an audience. You can tackle it cavalierly or go at it cleverly and in a calculated fashion.

Is a speech something you have (or would like to have) on your schedule? Should you prepare for it? Need a coach? What’s your style? Do you have a style? Highly-structured or ad lib — whatever your choice — make sure you know what you’re saying, how you’re saying it and to whom you’re saying it.

There’s no need to stress out about it. No need to memorize wholesale blocks of information. Nor should you try to make it the perfect presentation. Depending on your audience, specific strategy and approach, public speaking can be the best vehicle to make your point and help pave your road to enhanced recognition. It can also prove to be a horror show starring you. Should you or can you be yourself?

Morton C. Orman, the Maryland-based author and physician noted for his writings on the force, foibles, and forensics of public speaking may have said it best. “The best way to succeed (at public speaking) is not to consider yourself a public speaker.” ¹

Forget about Roman numeral one, part B and all the sub-sections you first had in mind. Orman suggests you study your audience, understand its diversity, consider the location, the occasion, and then develop two-to-three main points.
“The more you prepare,” wrote Orman, “the worse you will be.”

Get the audience on your side. Show them you’re human. If possible, and audience-appropriate, begin and lightly season your speech with levity.

According to Orman, the audience wants to succeed and they admire your courage. But they also want to be put at ease. Unless you’re delivering a research paper at a national convention of your peers, nobody expects you to be flawless. And the last thing a public speaking opportunity should represent is stress.

One of the most enjoyable presentations I’ve ever heard was a speech by a lithographer to a community service organization. It was entitled something like
“Advancements in modern lithography”.

The bespectacled presenter launched into an incredibly uninteresting and irrelevant (to most of the audience) history of the printing process. Five minutes later, the groaning from the audience had reached audible proportion. About then, the speaker stopped, disappeared into the coatroom and emerged wearing an accordion. He finished his program by singing and playing sea shanties to the utter delight of those assembled. He had definitely connected.

Not all of us play the accordion. Not many of us have the pipes of an Orson Welles. Nor do many of us pack the in-person charisma of Dame Judi Dench. So when we have opportunities to speak, we must be a bit more innovative. Opening with humor relevant and appropriate to the audience is often a productive way to go.

Toastmasters International offers the following speech-making tips²: involve the audience at least every eight minutes to maintain their interest; proofread what you write — don’t trust spell-check; focus on your message and its relevance to the audience; reach a conclusion. But don’t belabor it.

In a speech he delivered more than 100 times during his career, humorist Mark Twain used a unique blend of egotism and social absurdity to win over his audiences. Twain always introduced himself as follows: “The next lecture in this course will be delivered ….by Samuel L. Clemens, a gentleman whose high character and unimpeachable integrity are only equaled by his comeliness of person and grace of manner. I am the man!” ³

Look at it this way. Public speaking is your time to be you. To paraphrase Orman, be bold, compassionate, informative, be silly, helpful, witty. Anything you want.
Just keep it simple, uncomplicated and easy to follow.

But allow for the human side. If it’s humor you choose, make sure it’s related to a point you’re making, and make sure you can pull it off. Practice on a friend: a friend who will be candid. Remember. Your audience came to learn something. They expect to be informed, but they’d love to be entertained.

¹ “How to Conquer Public Speaking Fear”, Morton C. Orman, M.D., ©1996-2002
² “Will Your Speech be a Horror Story?”, Toastmasters International, February, 2008
³ “Our Fellow Savages,” Mark Twain, 1866.

So I’m in a business lunch line. I start yakking with the guy behind me. Quickly, I learn that he owns an old-line, but well-positioned, retail furniture store. Quickly, he gets that I’m in the communications biz.

Comes the quick question: “So why hasn’t the regional news media ever done a story on me?” Comes my answer: “Give me one reason why they should?”

He paused. Then, in a huff, he blurted, “Well, my store has been in Portland for decades and I have dozens of employees!”

“You expect the news media to come running merely because you exist?”, I said. “Do they owe you something?”

This was a platinum opportunity to help get a business owner’s mind right on public relations. It would take a few minutes. He appreciated candor. I was happy to help. Let’s call him “Dave”.

I asked Dave to consider the following PR thinking points:
Does your latest line of furniture represent green manufacturing? If “yes”, what does it save or protect? What’s renewable or sustainable about it?

Is your product line recommended by doctors and/or chiropractors for posture and spinal support?

Does your product line represent a significant shift in lifestyle trend? Can you document this? Has your product line received national or international awards/recognition for
distinctive style? From whom?

Does your company perform community service? Do you encourage or offer incentives to your employees to perform community service? What sort of community service?
Where? When? Who did it benefit?

What’s been your gross revenue over the last year? Three to five years?
What’s your market demographic? Who’s buying? Profile your average customer.

Dave’s eyes opened wide. He knew where I was going with this. I wanted him to
think of his operation as a continuing news story. No fluff. Was his company a leader within the industry? Was he giving back to the community? Was his company somehow connected to a national or international story already in the news?

The news media represents constant vigilance. They look for the local connection: regional stories that tie to larger stories elsewhere. They look for exclusivity, particularly if they’re a weekly. They look for stories that haven’t been published or aired in their market by a competitor or are fresh on the internet. They look for trends, breaking news, human interest, style, community service, humor and a host of other story angles.

There’s more than one way to go at the business of public relations: business or consumer news; public appearances, event sponsorship/tie-in; internet website and
targeted blog visibility to name a few. But you have to get out there. If you have a timely, newsworthy story — one with positive impact — shape it, get it straight, make it concise and tell it in all the right places. Lunch lines included.

What’s your story?

The basic rule for systemizing is ‘Systemize the routine, humanize the exception’. Effective systems can save you and your team both time and money. A system means that things are done consistently, regardless of the team member. Anything that cannot be systemized needs to be run by people. Always look at putting a system in place rather than employing more people.
The first step in systemizing your business is to record the steps required to accomplish all the important tasks of the business. The next step is automation.

Here’s what happens when an order comes in:

1. Customer calls and places an order
2. The Owner jots the order on a piece of paper.
3. The Owner writes down what materials would be required to do the job (he may forget that he needs a certain material).
4. He then proceeds to check the shelves to see if he needs to reorder any of the material.

With an automated system this is what takes place – and it happens ALL from a few keystrokes:

1. The Owner would have called up the Customer’s Name on the computer (the computer would have all the important information on the customer such as whether they have any outstanding invoices and what they ordered last time).
2. He would enter the order and the computer would tell him whether the materials needed to make the product are in stock
3. The computer would print out a list of materials to order, schedule the time on the machine required to make the product, state when the product will be ready to ship to the customer, and produce an invoice and shipping label.

Now you might be thinking that automating functions of your business would be very complicated and expensive. Not true. The price of computer equipment keeps falling and is now affordable to all businesses. We have coached many businesses to organize their steps and procedures and then automate their business functions. Business owners are amazed at how the increase in efficiency and sales, due to the consistent quality of the products or service they produce, can pay for the software in a very short period of time.

Whether you are a manager or the owner of a business, you can really affect the bottom line through systemizing processes. Then by automating the processes, you know that your business will be efficient in offering its products or services. Not only will you sleep better knowing that you do not have to be there to keep the company moving smoothly, but also that the company will be more profitable. You know a computer should not be used as a glorified typewriter when it can do so much more to help your business.

Systemizing your business can also be your competitive advantage. Customers will benefit from your business running more efficiently and producing consistent high quality products or services regardless if the owner is around. Customers that shop at your competition and who are tired of inconsistent quality will soon buy from you. All you need to do then is to COMMUNICATE to your customers and prospects about your NEW Business IMPROVEMENT that will help to serve them better.

Remember…

• Systems run your business …
• People run your systems …
• You lead your people …

If the elephant in your promotional parade broke ranks and made major deposits in the mayor’s garden, Public Relations — not advertising — would be your first call.

Damage control, reputation, image-building, and the art of assuage are only a few of the many faces of PR, a practice often underutilized, under-deployed and too often misunderstood by business and the internet marketing community.

Given the potential for effective business and social media market visibility today, especially in a service-oriented economy, PR — two letters that spell credibility and sales support in any language — should be given the same weight as advertising. It need not take a crisis.

To be sure, intelligent PR can and should be mind-bending. Do the research. Evaluate. Mix with innovation, courage, media savvy, persistence, patience, and a dollop of charm, and you have a recipe for impact. A few tips:

1. Know Your Markets. They are consumers, business owners, managers and stockholders who read, blog, net-surf, watch cable TV, listen to radio, and the human
   side in communications. You want them to trust you, your company brand, message, products and services. You need them to realize that the benefits they receive will be greater than the costs they incur.*
2. Unless you’re buying space on the Mouse World site to explain why the cam tottle on the Model 66 unit malfunctions, there are no assurances of feedback.PR targets issues, philosophies, and opinions. And it goes a long way toward altering perceptions. If you opt to involve the commercial media, know that the majority will tell your story their way, not yours. But also know that if you create a compelling case for your story, any reasonable reporter or editor will consider what you say and very possibly act on it.
3. Perceptions are Seldom Uniform. Thus, target audiences must be carved into segments. Be mindful of the “4 P’s”: 1) Develop an alluring Product ; 2) Play down the Price; 3) Ensure that the Places the target encounters the product are convenient to their lifestyle; and 4) Promote the encounter creatively via strategies and tactics designed to generate best response.
4. Measure Results. Like the electronic tools that rule our lives, the marketplace changes constantly. Watch what you’re doing. Make sure it’s working. Know your competition. Be ready to make changes, quickly.
5. Aftermarket the Good News. When the hits come — and if you’ve thoughtfully shaped your story and your market approach, they will — use the news. Post it to your site, your client’s, build a link to it (i.e., make it easy to access) for your customers and prospects. Make a product or news release from it. Do not assume that those who should have seen it/heard it actually did.

Oh, about that elephant? With the help of the Humane Society and the city groundskeeper, the PR guy convinced the mayor on the value of elephant droppings as garden fertilizer. The story made front pages and home pages around the country.
* Social Marketing Institute, 2008

Information Technology (IT) comprises a major portion of many Small and Medium Business (SMB) operating budgets. With the impetus on reducing operating costs and increasing profits, SMBs turn to cost-cutting measures in various departments. One of the most common areas to focus on is with IT costs. While the “sticker price” of computers appears to be decreasing, the increasingly complex and integrated nature of business networks necessitates experienced IT support and these labor costs can significantly out shadow hardware costs. Smaller companies, in particular, are generally in a quandary over their ongoing struggle to properly source their IT support, since they lack the in-house expertise to handle the tasks internally.

With companies gradually turning away from “traditional” methods of conducting, operating, managing and performing business functions; technology and communication systems are at the core of the entire process of sharing information and business growth. Today’s businesses are increasingly reliant on e-mail, hosted applications (e.g. SalesForce), shared databases, and networking equipment (e.g. servers and routers) in order for daily operations to function. These integrated solutions, network security, network management, infrastructure maintenance, disaster recovery, data storage, and network monitoring generally consume 60-70% of annual IT budgets for most organizations. Simply stated, this means 2/3 of IT budgets are consumed in maintaining the current IT infrastructure and only 1/3 of IT budgets are utilized for upgrading and actually improving the competitive advantage of the company.

This evolution in business processes makes companies of all sizes vulnerable to security issues such as hacking, exposure to malicious software (malware) (e.g. viruses and spyware), denial of service attacks, data compromise by both employees and hackers, spamming, and data loss due to natural and man-made incidents. Whether it leads to temporary business downtime or the loss of critical business information, SMBs need the experts and the resources to cope with these challenges.

What can business owners and managers do? There are a few key deciding factors to keep in mind:

§ Develop a business-focused IT strategy: With IT plan development, management must factor in the nature of their business, their strategic growth, and their business requirements. An IT strategy should be featured in the company’s business plan.

§ Resist the urge to react: Always consider the bigger picture. What are the driving issues for your business: changing business plan, emerging technologies, strategic vs. tactical challenges? Preventative maintenance and planned IT purchases are proven to save companies money.

§ View IT as a critical asset, not a simple tool: Formal policies and contracts are forged for how employees sign for paper clips or how they can use a company vehicle. However, most SMBs completely neglect the importance of formal IT and Information Security (IS) policies to protect their business. Without IT, businesses will fail. This severity necessitates a formal approach.

An IT strategy is really a roadmap to keep a business “on course” with managing its information assets (e.g. computers, printers, server, etc.) and its information resources (e.g. data). This is a concerted effort between management and IT staff, since both opportunities and threats constantly evolve. Where a plan benefits a company’s bottom line profitability is in reducing poorly planned purchases, improving efficiency by pairing the proper equipment with job functions, and reducing reactive maintenance costs.