Public Speaking Advice & Resources

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Feeling ‘Chicken’ About Speaking? Try This….

Jun 2, 2019 | Connect with Every Audience, Develop a Dynamic Delivery, Overcome Fear of Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

How to Manage Speaking Nerves One of the most common questions I hear is: “Michael, how do I get rid of my nerves?” I understand the purpose of the question, but it's the wrong one to ask. My response is always, “You don't want to get rid of nerves.” Some of the...

How to Deliver a Presentation – Don’t Be a Polished Speaker

May 17, 2019 | Business Presentations, Connect with Every Audience, Develop a Dynamic Delivery, Public Speaking Tips, Speaking Tip, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Uncategorized

How is Furniture Polish Relevant to Being a Speaker? What is this picture? You're right, it's a can of furniture Polish. What does this have to do with speaking? Many years ago when I first started speaking to audiences, I was convinced that effective speaking...

Networking Tip – How To Make a Positive Impact in 13 Seconds

May 12, 2019 | Business Presentations, Networking, Public Speaking Tips, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip

The Pain of Traditional Networking Picture the scene. You're at a networking event. It’s time for each attendee to stand up and introduce himself. The first person stands up and says, “Hi. I’m John with Acme Financial. We offer life insurance, IRAs and tax planning...

Presentation Tip – Are You Making This Common Rehearsal Mistake?

May 6, 2019 | Develop a Dynamic Delivery, Overcome Fear of Speaking, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Speaking Mistakes, Speaking Tip, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point

A Common Presentation Rehearsal Mistake Imagine you’re practicing a presentation. Five minutes into your rehearsal, you get interrupted. After dealing with the interruption, you go back to your talk. Where do you restart your practice? If you’re like most people,...

Use These Questions to Connect With Your Audience

Apr 29, 2019 | Connect with Every Audience, Make Your Point, Persuasion, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Speaking Tip, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

Why Use Questions to Connect? A common challenge for most presenters is how to capture their best ideas that will quickly gain audience attention. An obvious reason for this is that people are easily distracted today. We must capture their attention with our first...

Communication Skills – How a Wounded Soldier Connected With Me

Apr 21, 2019 | Connect with Every Audience, Public Speaking Tips, Speaking Tip, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point, Uncategorized, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

How do you connect with an audience when you don’t seem to have anything in common with them? I was reminded of this question a few months ago when I was invited to Tampa, Florida to do some work with one of my past clients, retired Green Beret Lieutenant Colonel...

How to Keep Your Audience From Getting Lost in Thought

Jan 6, 2019 | Connect with Every Audience, Overcome Fear of Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Speaking Mistakes, Speaking Tip, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Uncategorized, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

One of the most important lessons we teach speakers is this: Your goal is to change the way audiences Think, Feel or Act. One of the biggest mistakes speakers make is that they often cause people to think too much. Huh? Isn’t that a contradiction? At first glance,...

How to Help Your Audience See the ‘Big Picture’

Dec 26, 2018 | Connect with Every Audience, Persuasion, Public Speaking Tips, Speaking Tip, Speech Writing, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

Audiences often have ‘blind spots’ about the topics we speak about. One of the roles of speakers is to help audiences see the world in a different light.

Speakers: Make an Impression – Ignore This Myth

Oct 7, 2018 | Connect with Every Audience, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point

Why Speakers and Storytellers Need to Ignore This Common Myth Ron and I were chatting over breakfast. He said, “I was recently told that speakers should never talk about themselves on stage.” This was the fourth time in a month someone had said that to me about...

How to Make Audiences Think ‘I Want That’ Every Time You Speak

Oct 2, 2018 | Advanced Public Speaking Skills, Connect with Every Audience, Marketing, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

How to Create Impact Every Time You Speak. Want to compel audiences to seek you out after you speak? Then use the sixth and final step of scriptwriter Michael Hauge's proven storytelling process. The formula introduces: The Setup in which you introduce a compelling...

The Magic Number for Public Speaking Success

Sep 3, 2018 | Advanced Public Speaking Skills, Connect with Every Audience, Inspirational Speeches, Overcome Fear of Speaking, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Toastmasters International

A Simple Lesson From the World Championship of Public Speaking It was the night before the World Championship of Public Speaking. If you're not familiar with this competition, think American Idol for speakers. It's an annual contest hosted by Toastmasters...

Use Tension to Increase Audience Attention

Aug 22, 2018 | Connect with Every Audience, Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point

Create Deeper Levels of Audience Engagement In the last three posts, you've read about how to set up your story to and create audience interest. Introduce a compelling character in relatable circumstances. Then show your hero pursuing a worthwhile goal. These steps...

Create Deeper Connection in Your Story

Aug 17, 2018 | Advanced Public Speaking Skills, Connect with Every Audience, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point

"In your story, give listeners the emotional experience of working with your company or your product — and succeeding!” ~ Michael Hauge In the last two blogs, you read about the first two steps of Michael Hauge’s story creation process: 1. Talk about the everyday...

Create Edge of Their Seats Moments in Your Stories

Aug 11, 2018 | Connect with Every Audience, Professional Speaking, Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

How to Tap Into Your Audiences Emotions With Your Stories Last week you read about the first step of Michael Hauge's process - the Setup in your stories. This process is highlighted in great detail in Michael's Book 'Storytelling Made Easy.' Today, you'll pick up the...

How to Create Stories Like Hollywood

Aug 5, 2018 | Public Speaking Tips, Sell with a Story, Speech Writing, Stand OUT! Speaking Tip, Tell a Story, Make Your Point, Write a Meaningful & Memorable Message

How to Tell Stories That Create an Instant Bond Michael Hauge is a long-time screenwriting and story consultant in Hollywood. Each month, I have the privilege of co-hosting a webinar with Michael. We teach storytelling skills to speakers. Actually, Michael teaches...

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"Michael transformed our everyday managers into conference presenters by coaching them and by challenging the traditional methods they were using to present. The outcome was phenomenal.

Our conference was elevated to a new level of professionalism. Michael will be retained to help make our trainers become better communicators, both visually and verbally and to assist us with next year’s conference. We highly recommend him and Speaking CPR to assist with your next event."

Robert Gerbus, President, Trans Ash, Inc.

5.0

2018-05-10T09:44:06-04:00

Robert Gerbus, President, Trans Ash, Inc.

"Michael transformed our everyday managers into conference presenters by coaching them and by challenging the traditional methods they were using to present. The outcome was phenomenal. Our conference was elevated to a new level of professionalism. Michael will be retained to help make our trainers become better communicators, both visually and verbally and to assist us with next year’s conference. We highly recommend him and Speaking CPR to assist with your next event."

https://speakingcpr.com/testimonials/robert-gerbus/

“As a former Green Beret and professional storyteller, I give dozens of speeches every year. I am very selective about who trains me.

Michael Davis exceeded every expectation and was one of the best coaches I ever worked with. His quiet professionalism, and unsurpassed knowledge of storytelling helped make my Ted X Cincinnati talk extremely powerful.
I would recommend Michael, as a story and speaking coach to anyone with a high stakes talk to give. Michael will help you take your speech from good to great!”

LTC (Ret.) Scott Mann, Green Beret, Storyteller, Trainer, Coach, Author

5.0

2018-05-10T09:45:38-04:00

LTC (Ret.) Scott Mann, Green Beret, Storyteller, Trainer, Coach, Author

“As a former Green Beret and professional storyteller, I give dozens of speeches every year. I am very selective about who trains me. Michael Davis exceeded every expectation and was one of the best coaches I ever worked with. His quiet professionalism, and unsurpassed knowledge of storytelling helped make my Ted X Cincinnati talk extremely powerful. I would recommend Michael, as a story and speaking coach to anyone with a high stakes talk to give. Michael will help you take your speech from good to great!”

https://speakingcpr.com/testimonials/ltc-ret-scott-mann/

“We are privileged to have Michael Davis of Speaking CPR as one of the Speaker Coaches for our TED x Cincinnati event. I had the opportunity to be on several of the calls with Michael as he worked his craft with his speakers. I was impressed with how genuine, exuberant, and in touch he was with each speaker.

He truly has a gift in connecting with the heart of each person he works with and helping them to unleash their story into their talk. All of the speakers raved about his work with them. Each of them has had broad experience in speaking, but they all felt that working with Michael raised the bar on their ability to speak. You can listen to all of his speakers, Anthony Munoz, Richard Bernstein and Graeme Joffe, at http://www.tedxcincinnati.com/talks/.”

Allison Wonders Gars
Speaker Coach Manager, TED x Cincinnati

5.0

2018-03-20T17:08:04-04:00

Allison Wonders Gars
Speaker Coach Manager, TED x Cincinnati

“We are privileged to have Michael Davis of Speaking CPR as one of the Speaker Coaches for our TED x Cincinnati event. I had the opportunity to be on several of the calls with Michael as he worked his craft with his speakers. I was impressed with how genuine, exuberant, and in touch he was with each speaker. He truly has a gift in connecting with the heart of each person he works with and helping them to unleash their story into their talk. All of the speakers raved about his work with them. Each of them has had broad experience in speaking, but they all felt that working with Michael raised the bar on their ability to speak. You can listen to all of his speakers, Anthony Munoz, Richard Bernstein and Graeme Joffe, at http://www.tedxcincinnati.com/talks/.”

https://speakingcpr.com/testimonials/allison-wonders-gars/

“Investing in Michael is one of the best investments I have ever made. I speak on the subject of diversity in the workplace, which can at times be a difficult topic to discuss.

Michael taught me a repeatable process that allows me to create a foundational concept, a logical structure, an opening that grabs the audience’s attention, and a conclusion that encourages my audience to take action that will save them time and money.

I found Michael easy to work with, flexible with his schedule, and a wealth of information about the art of speaking. If you need to improve your presentation or speech, I highly recommend you consider hiring Michael. It is one of the best investments you can make in your own growth.”

Natalie Holder
Founder, QUEST Diversity

5.0

2018-03-20T17:33:18-04:00

Natalie Holder
Founder, QUEST Diversity

“Investing in Michael is one of the best investments I have ever made. I speak on the subject of diversity in the workplace, which can at times be a difficult topic to discuss. Michael taught me a repeatable process that allows me to create a foundational concept, a logical structure, an opening that grabs the audience’s attention, and a conclusion that encourages my audience to take action that will save them time and money. I found Michael easy to work with, flexible with his schedule, and a wealth of information about the art of speaking. If you need to improve your presentation or speech, I highly recommend you consider hiring Michael. It is one of the best investments you can make in your own growth.”

https://speakingcpr.com/testimonials/natalie-holder/

“Michael has completely opened my eyes! I’m performing at an entirely new level. I went into my last event with the utmost confidence thanks to him. He even called me the night before with a few last-minute reminders! If you speak for a living — if your revenue depends on your ability to communicate, you NEED Michael Davis!”

Brennan Scanlon
Co-Executive Director, Business Network International

5.0

2018-03-20T17:39:14-04:00

Brennan Scanlon
Co-Executive Director, Business Network International

“Michael has completely opened my eyes! I’m performing at an entirely new level. I went into my last event with the utmost confidence thanks to him. He even called me the night before with a few last-minute reminders! If you speak for a living — if your revenue depends on your ability to communicate, you NEED Michael Davis!”

https://speakingcpr.com/testimonials/brennan-scanlon/