Posts tagged point of view

Tip #2 Good Public Speakers Focus on Their Audience

Apr01
2011 Leave a Comment

Written by Help Desk

Creating a good speech is like creating any other learning content. You need to start from the audience.

In most cases, people can’t judge your content based on its intrinsic quality. Instead what they do is judge your content based on its relevance to themselves.

The only way to make your content truly relevant to your audience is to start from their point of view.

Why are they interested in this content? Yes, it’s important to me but why would they care?

What do they expect to get out of this content? What should they expect to get out of this content? How will I reconcile the two? How should I present the content so they get what they expect as well as what they should expect?

How will they use this content? How will they apply it? What am I expecting them to do with it? What are they expecting to be able to do?

The only way to answer these questions is to know who you are creating your content for. You need to know their likes, their dislikes and their motivators.

In short, you need to start with a target audience and then develop your speech for your target audience.

Posted in Public Speaking - Tagged Creating, Creating Information Products, dislikes, intrinsic quality, judge, learning, motivators, public, public speakers, relevance, Speakers Focus, speech, target, target audience, Tip

Creating Information Products But Which One? Part 3 – Techniques

Jan27
2010 7 Comments

Written by Help Desk

I’ve sort of written about this topic before but for books only and from a slightly different point of view (sourcing).

When it comes to strategy there are four ways to obtain an information product or learning content (including books). You can:

Create it as an original piece
Put it together as a collection of smaller pieces
Steal it (legally of course)
Repurpose it

And of course you can combine techniques. Each of these has benefits and disadvantages.

Creating an original information product is a complex, task; the difficulty of which should not be underestimated. We discussed the relative “cost” of each format in the last blogticle so I’m not going to repeat myself. Except to state that the length of the finished product defines the level of complexity. Generally speaking, they compare as:

500-1000 word article vs a 1-1/2 hour webinar, seminar, or podcast
2500-5000 word white paper vs a 1/2 day webinar etc. or a 1-1/2 hr interview
10,000-25,000 word eBook vs a 1-2 day seminar
50,000-100,000 word Book vs a 2 day-1 week seminar

A much simpler method is to combine other pieces together. Two long white papers on a related subject can be combined into a short eBook. Or five to seven long articles or short white papers (always on a related subject) can be combined with customized introduction and summary chapters into an Executive level book. One issue to remember when estimating the cost of this technique is that articles often have a different tone to them, even when written close together. They may also have different views of the same information. This means that they need to be edited as a unit before being release otherwise they will not hang together as a unified whole.

It’s a little harder to conceive of a pre-recorded version of this. The fact that even a short recording is actually a version makes it hard to see. However, most “gurus” have a package of DVDs or CDs that they sell. Often these consist of a dozen or so DVDs or CDs with an introductory DVD and (if they are skilled information product creators) a summary DVD. Or at least a scene or two fulfilling that purpose. Most will simply combine the original pieces however, if there is a great variation in recording quality they may re-record the scripts. Exactly the same as with a written version.

There are three versions of “stealing it”. And I want to be clear that in no case am I suggesting violating copyright. I’m just exagerating.

The first version is to connect with an expert, develop a series of questions your audience would want answered and then ask the expert and record their answers. A classic interview in other words.

The second version is called PLR or Private Label Rights. Essentially you obtain (purchase) the right to resell the information product. Each information product will have different rights assigned. These can include the right to relabel the product with a different title and cover (and author’s name). It may also include the right to rewrite the product or incorporate it into another product. It may also limit your ability to sell or give away the product. And so on. The big issues with PLR information products are twofold. The first is the overall quality of the product. Sometimes these are not well done or they contain information which is incorrect. The second issue is the age of the product. This can cause the information to be out of date and inaccurate. It can also mean that the information product has made the rounds (meaning everyone’s got a copy already).

The third version of stealing is to reference someone else’s information product. You’ll notice a few days ago I recommended a YouTube video to you (Will’s Wisdom). This is an example of referencing or recommending or reviewing to create an information product (in this case the blog entry). I am constantly reading trade journals related to project management. I maintain a list of my clients and their interests. As I run into an article they might like, I add it to their list and then send it out as a bulk mail. This is probably the easiest method to create an information product there is — although the research will kill you!

Finally, you can repurpose information products into other information products. Anthony Robbins has a great example of this in his Masters of Marketing/The New Money Masters offering. With this series he takes and does an interview with an internet marketing guru. This interview is professionally videotaped (actually digitally recorded in HD but that sounds dumb), titles added and then released as a DVD. It is then reedited into an audio product and placed on CD. The interview is then sent to be transcribed. Now a key quality point here is that the transcription is then re-written and combined with an article on the subject to create a 20 page mini-book. The result is a package which is still not worth what I pay for it but is too good to lose (grrumble, grrumble, grrumble … hint for you folks in the U.S., there is no point in using International Air shipping for us Canucks. US & Canadian mail/shipping is all a mix of land and air regardless. So you’re costing me extra for nothing PLUS if sent by International Air it goes through customs as if it were worth big bucks meaning I end up paying GST & duties on the product and shipping. So the $26 bucks plus shipping ends up costing me $100. Not cool!). It’s also a package that can be split up into 3 components and resold individually, given away as a bonus or free offer or otherwise monetized.

So that’s the choices you have. The trick now is to determine how much it will cost you to create content in the various formats and using the various techniques. That’s going to be the point of our next post in this series.

Posted in Creating Information Products - Tagged Creating Information Products, ebook, executive level, gurus, IM, including books, information product, simpler method, summary chapters, white papers, word article, word book

Running Your Internet Business – Life Intrudes

Dec14
2009 2 Comments

Written by Help Desk

As you may know if you’ve been reading my posts for awhile, my father-in-law died about two months ago. (On life and death – part 1, part 2) We spent a week or so in Ottawa, making arrangements and cleaning up his apartment. At least as far as we were able. After all we are talking about 15 years or so in the same dark, mildewed basement.

When we finally overloaded the van, we had a whole mess load of stuff still to pack. At least a day or two of work yet to be done. Including leaving his ashes on his counter (immediate burial wasn’t possible).

Arrangements were made to return in December to finish cleaning up.

Everything was ready for our return … or so we thought.

Of course, we had some problems scheduling — resolved. And Lisa’s Aunt didn’t seem particularly happy that we were returning. She also was angry at us for having removed “anything of value” as she put it.

Well, on Friday, we returned. We found out why she wasn’t happy.

By the way, did I mention that this hell-hole was owned by Lisa’s Aunt? (I know I mentioned the fact that she didn’t bother to tell either of her nieces that Gerry was in the hospital dieing.)

It was a long, dangerous drive up to Ottawa in the first blizzard of winter. Okay, I exagerate. On the edge of the first blizzard. That still means that we drove by 10 car pileups from the whiteouts on the 401. For those of you not familiar with the Highway of Heroes, the McDonald Cartier Freeway has parts of it which are frankly dangerous in the winter. Especially around Gananoque the highway ices and is subject to blowing snow (aka whiteouts). So accidents are quite frequent.

Needless to say, I was not really able to navigate the stairs so my wife and her friend went down on their own. The scream from the basement was heart wrenching.

This woman and her friends had emptied the apartment. Photographs had been thrown out (we found some in the garbage). Tools belonging to Lisa’s grandfather had disappeared. As had all the small appliances, expensive knives and cooking utensils and anything smaller than a desk. Even Lisa’s father’s ashes had disappeared (fortunately found later, below blankets in his bedroom). Even the freezer had disappeared (admittedly we knew about that). The only thing left was what they felt was unimportant and the garbage.

Saturday we spent showing our friend around Ottawa. We even saw the Olympic torch run. That may seem strange but it gave Lisa’s aunt some time to call her “friends” and try to get some of the stuff back. Of course, they denied that they had taken anything. And despite a call to the police, nothing was accomplished.

On Saturday evening, I drove us back to Toronto. Staying another night was not on.

I’m writing this on Sunday (which is when I try to write my blog posts for the week). And despite being half asleep, I’m still angry. Or is it protective? Or is there a difference?

Kharma is a bitch … at least, I hope it will be.

But out of this mess, I have several weeks worth of comments on the sense of entitlement, willingness to do one’s job and other topics for the building your ebusiness portion of this blog. I’ll try to break them up.

But today (as in Monday when this post is published) is my birthday. So my posts this week will be on getting older and better (from an entrepreneur’s viewpoint). Then next week, I’ll talk about entitlement and doing one’s job and one other subject yet to be determined. Which will take us up to Christmas. *BTW Happy Hanukkah to my Jewish friends – think of your family when you light the candles tonight and the next few nights. And be thankful.

So entrepreneurs and small business people gather round and listen to me rant. And I’ll try to make it instructive.

Get Learning and Get Earning

Glen Ford

Posted in Building an eBiz - Tagged Building an eBiz, dangerous drive, highway of heroes, life and death

Creating Learning Content – Choosing Topics

Dec09
2009 23 Comments

Written by Help Desk

Okay, up to this point I’ve kind of kept to just how to books. After all, my book and course focus on how to books.

How to Write Your How To Book in 24 hrs or Less

… sort of obvious eh?

But what is a how to book? It’s just a particular form or media to carry learning content.

In other words, we happen to be using it to teach but we could as easily be using another format for teaching the same material.

In fact, we often want to.

Why?

Two principle reasons … other forms are easier to learn from and easier to generate. Duh? So why are we even bothering with books? The answer is twofold. First, some people need to have it in writing in order to learn (actually a small but important percentage). But more importantly from the entrepreneur and consultant’s point of view, people value books more. Publish a book and gain instant credibility! A book needs to be one of the cornerstones of your expert marketing effort.

But that’s not the topic of this post. (Do some hunting … I’ve discussed it before and will again later.)

The point of all that is that some of the other types of learning content are like articles and blog posts. Short and quick and easy to get out. And really, really hungry for topics!

Man they just chew topics like CRAZY!

So how do you come up with topics for these topic munchers. Now I’m not talking about the alternative forms of the material. That’s where the book is repeated in book, webinar, video and audio formats. I’m more talking about the small “articles” you’ll need around the topic for marketing purposes and blogs.

First start with your topic …. say writing how to books (self serving ain’t I?).

Then ask 7 to 9 questions about the topic that you think you’re audience might like to know. Of course, asking your audience is the best way to create this list. And easier too! But you can create your own list by adding words and deleting words. Start your questions off with How, why, when, where, what, who. Try to concentrate on the things that would be important to your customers/audience. Things like money are always important.

So let’s say I make up the following list …

How do I write how to books?
Why should I write how to books?
When should I write how to books?
Where should I write how to books?
What topics should I write how to books about?
Who should write how to books?
How can I make money writing how to books?
How can I make a difference writing how to books?

Once you’ve got that list, you’ve should be able to pick out at least 5-7 which are suitable. By suitable I mean small and reasonably tight. After all “How do I write how to books?” kind of covers the whole topic! But doing a short summary might work.

Now take that list and come up with some related questions your audience might have about the topic. Keep in mind Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

So for example, if I take “How do I write how to books?” and expand on that I might get

How do I write well
How do I develop topics
How do I determine chapters
How do I create a content map
How do I determine what my audience really wants
How do I make money with books
How do I edit books

I could go on but you get the idea. By the time you finish the second level you’ll have at least 49 topics. Now expand on those and you’ll be somewhere in the area of 343 topics.

See … there’s lots of topics. And I haven’t even mentioned the lists (top 10, 7 ways to, the 5 things you must know).

Of course, there’s one problem with this method.

Okay, two problems; the amount of work involved, and the fact that you may or may not hit the problems your reader is interested in.

If you ask your audience – and they bother to tell you — you’ll get a much better list of the problems they’re encountering. Address those problems and you’ll have a much better list of topics.

The key is getting audience involvement.

Hint, hint!