787 – Keep your audience focused: Tom talks Attention Gaining Devices

Episode 787 – Attention Gaining Devices
[00:00:08] Welcome to Screw the Commute. The entrepreneurial podcast dedicated to getting you out of the car and into the money, with your host, lifelong entrepreneur and multimillionaire, Tom Antion.

[00:00:24] Hey everybody, it's Tom here with episode 787 of Screw the Commute podcast. Today, we're going to talk about attention gaining devices. What the heck does that mean, Tom? Well, I did the intro to bomb proofing for your presentations and speeches when you have to do them to make sure that everything goes good. So I got such good feedback on that. I said, okay, well, maybe I'll do this week on presentation skills and and things. I'm not trying to make you professional speakers unless you want to be, but any time you have to do this or you need to do this, you want to make the best of it as you possibly can. So today we're going to talk about attention gaining devices. This is the whole basis of my Wake 'em Up speaking system. I think we got 11 attention gaining devices. And if you intersperse them and use some funny and some serious men, it'll be over. Before you know it, the crowd will be like, Oh my God, it's over already. This time went so fast. See? So they'll just love you for it. That's today's topic. All right. I hope you didn't miss Episode 786. That was what I just mentioned. Introduction to bomb proofing so that you you never bomb in front of a group. And and it was excerpted from my wake him up. All of this stuff is excerpted from my Wake him Up book that goes into great depth on all of these topics.

[00:01:52] So anytime you want to get to a back episode, you go to screwthecommute.com, slash, then the episode number. Bomb proofing was 786 and attention gaining devices 787. You're going to want to keep track of these episodes, especially if you have to do a presentation. All right. Grab a copy of my automation book at screwthecommute.com/automatefree and then follow me at tiktok.com/@digitalmultimillionaire on TikTok.

[00:02:19] All right. Let's get into the attention gaining devices now before. Well, wait a minute. One thing before I do that is yesterday or day before, I mean, on bomb proofing, I left out one important topic, and that's the theory of relevance. See, if you try to use some humor and it's you always want in a business presentation, you're not stand up comics. You want to use it to make a point. And here's the thing. As long as it makes the point, it doesn't have to be knee slappingly funny. And if it isn't that funny, it still makes the point. So you get like a pass from your mother to to not be bombing say so. Theory of relevance. Make sure all the humor you use is relevant and makes a point that you're trying to make. All right, let's get into the attention gain devices first. One, of course, is humor.

[00:03:12] Now, in my book, I've got 31 ways to use humor. So today I'll give you one called Signs so you can repeat signs that you have seen or you can make a sign up if you want. But it's just as easy to go on Google and Google funny signs and then figure out how it makes a point. So I was doing a speech one time on some productivity thing I can't remember, but I saw a sign hanging up in a company one time. It said, We give 110%. 5% on Mondays, 10% on Tuesdays. So that was hysterical. So that's just one way to use humor. All right. The next attention claiming device is props. These are things that you can physically hold up or show a picture of. I mean, you could show a picture of a prop, but usually they're something you can hold or it's on stage with you, something like that. Now, if if you're on video and it's a prop that's relatively small, you got to hold it close to your face when you're holding it up, almost like like a QVC person holding it. Well, they hold it towards their pretty nails and they're done. But but because the the video has to to zoom in on it to see what it is and you want your facial expressions in that in that small box where the video shows.

[00:04:44] So hold it up near your face. Then you have surprise props. That's where they don't see them until you bring them out. Then you have what the heck is that prop where it's something just sitting there that's weird looking, maybe weird looking or something sitting on a table or something near you or on a chair. And people were wondering what it is. Now, you know, I don't do that too much because I don't want to distract them from, you know, what I'm talking about. But that's just another way. And then you eventually tell them what it is. Now, here's one that helps helped keep me track. When I was doing a certain speech for a while, I called it the three hat prop, so there was three hats on stage with me. One was a ball cap with fake long hair, like I'm a hippy. And the and then one in the middle was like a safari hat and one in the end was a top hat. And so I would pick up the, the one with the long hair. And I said, well, in the beginning of business, we're, we're really wild and crazy and going after everything this, that and the other. And inside the hat when I picked it up was my notes of what I should say. And then I'd put it on my head and then I'd put that hat down and then pick up the safari hat and it says, Oh, but in the mature part of our business, we're searching for more customers and something like that.

[00:06:08] And then I put that hat down and I said, But if you're in the mature part of your business, this, that and the other, you have to do, and I put the top hat on like Abe Lincoln or something, right? So it's just a way. Now if you're really have a fun crowd, you can put the hat on one of them. All right. A real fun person in the crowd. You usually clear with them ahead of time. So so anyway, that's just a little bit on props. I have big massive section on props in the book. All right, next. Attention getting devices, stories and they can be funny or serious. People love stories. One thing about stories, you should have multiple lengths of your stories because you may get your time cut and you can't go on for a four minute story if you only got 30s to do it. So I usually teach my speakers to do three lengths of a story, something like 30s or less two minute and maybe a four minute, something like that. And it's also helps you with your publicity because if you're if you get on a radio interview or a podcast, well, podcasts are usually longer. But if you're on radio and you've got three minute interview or TV, you can't go on with a four minute story.

[00:07:22] You might want to get the point across with a 15 second version of it. And yes, you can do this. I can take any story on Earth and make 15 seconds out of it. All right. Voice inflection, that's another attention gaining device. So here's how this works. Let's say you're normally a relatively quiet presenter and you're talking like this and making points and, you know, telling people good stuff, but then you get really excited about something. Well, that's an attention gaining device, right? Because my voice inflection hit really hard when I was going on at a calm pace and vice versa. If I'm really, really loud. Presenter I'm going this, that and I say, Now let me tell you this. Now that's an attention gaining device because it's opposite of what I'm normally going along at sea. So I might say I want to, I want to whisper a secret to you all. Something like that massively gains their attention. So that's voice inflection, stage movement. So stage movement depends on the size of the crowd, of course. And of course, I never want you to get locked behind a lectern. I want you to be moving left, right, center back all over the place so forces their attention. But you might do it strategically.

[00:08:37] Some people tell stories from a certain side of the stage and they tell jokes from another side of the stage. And if it's something really important, they move forward. If it's something where they want to remove themselves and let the audience interact, they'll go backstage. Not all the way behind the curtain, right? But they'll move away from the crowd and even turn their back, which by the Toastmasters, that you should be murdered if you ever did something like that. No, I do it all the time. I say, here's the things I want you to discuss in in the next 30s do it now. And then I turn my back and I walk towards the back of the stage. All right, So, yes, you can do that. So that's stage movement, asking questions of the audience and they can be funny questions. How many of you guys out there wearing Hanes pantyhose today? So we're serious questions and they can be rhetorical where you're not expecting an answer or you can set it up where you're giving them an exact amount of time to discuss it. And you really I usually had a noise maker with me so I could clearly say, okay, one person talks and then I'm going to go and then the other person talks. And then when we're done, I'm going to go and everybody shut up. All right. Stuff like that.

[00:09:55] So asking questions of the audience. Absolutely. Showing visuals now. I'm not talking about PowerPoint. I only use PowerPoint once in my whole speaking career. And that was because I was a spokesperson for CBS and they demanded it and I got 100,000 bucks, so I wasn't going to question them. All right. But most of the time I use my own pictures, my own videos and things like that, which help sales if I'm using my own stuff and people say, I want more of that, well, then they would buy my stuff at the back of the room. So showing visuals. Let's see what's next playing music. But you've got to be careful with copyright infringement. You can get a federal lawsuit, you can get the whole organization that you're speaking for in trouble. Now, if it's your organization, you don't you certainly don't want a federal lawsuit. See? So either buy some music or make some music yourself if you have the ability, that kind of stuff. Okay. Gesturing. Now, I don't get whacked out about this. Like Toastmasters, where they got to hit the gesture exactly at the right time, you know? No, no, I'm saying it. Make sure it's natural. Don't. Don't be fig leaf. Hold your hands over your crotch. That's the old fig leaf position. So just try more to be natural with it. One of the things I teach my speakers is, is hold bricks or heavy books in your hands and get in front of a mirror, which I don't normally tell people.

[00:11:25] Get in front of mirror. That's kind of stupid that that whole idea of, you know, speaking to a mirror stupid. But anyway, in this case, it's not. Or you don't even have to be in a mirror to do this one because you have heavy dumbbells or big books. And then if your arms move whenever you're talking. Okay, that was a real gesture. All right. So I don't want you faking gestures and doing them on purpose. However, let's say I tell people, okay, I want everybody to look at the ceiling. I'll take my hand and point to the ceiling. All right. That's a natural, natural thing to do. So don't get whacked out over gestures. All right. Next one is using quotations. Now they can be your quotations or other famous people's quotations. Or it could be non-famous people's quotations, but normally give credit for these. And so I might say, hey, this guy, Jack Handey, he's he's famous. He said, before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you're a mile away from them and you have their shoes. All right. So that's a funny one. But there's serious and funny quotations, motivational quotations. So very it's a tension gaining device.

[00:12:41] The last one is reading or reciting poetry. That's not really the last one because one of the ones I didn't write down here is getting people on stage with you. That's a massive intention game. One of my techniques is called Dueling Flipcharts where let's say something's going on and in an organization and you got A, A and B or plus and minus pros and cons and you put one person volunteer to the other flip chart and one on the other side of the stage, the flip chart. And so they're people are on stage with you, you're leading the whole thing, the audience and is yelling stuff to put on the different flip charts. I mean it's it's massive attention gaining. So that's on there. All right. But the last one I got on the list here is reading or reciting poetry. And I used to do one. I can't remember the exact words of it, but it was something where it was one of my humor seminars. I'd go to what one of the real fun women in the crowd, and I'd kneel down before I said, It's okay if I touch your hair, know. And I knew the person would say yes because of how I chose them, you know, being real fun the whole time. And so they'd say yes. And I'm kneeling in front of them with the handheld microphone in one hand and I'd recite a poetry poet like a love poem to him.

[00:14:04] But it had a twist. So I'd say I ran my hand through her hair, my fingers. They did linger. And then a coyote bit my finger. It was something like that. And people would be cracking up everywhere. All right. But you could do any kind of just don't go on for minutes and minutes and minutes with poetry that kind of you know, it might take the the wind out of the room. All right. So those are attention gaining devices, humor. There's 31 ways to use humor in my book. Wake Them Up. Props. There's tons of ways to do that. Stories, voice inflection, stage movement, asking questions, showing visuals, playing music, gesturing and using quotations, reading or reciting poetry and getting people on stage with you. Yeah, if you use the serious and funny versions of all these elements and mix and match them all over the place, no one will ever know in a million years you're doing this, but you will knock your presentations out and speeches out of the park, I'm telling you. And instead of people saying, you know, in their mind, Oh man, when is this over? They'll be saying, Oh, it's over already. What? It went. The time flew by. That's why I get the longest sessions whenever I speak at Multi-speaker events, because they know I'm going to just knock the heck out of the people for hours and hours and hours in a row.

[00:15:35] Nobody will get up and go to the bathroom that nobody will check their emails. I mean, I'm just rolling and it's because of these devices. And yeah, I wrote my book in the 90s and I still use the same exact techniques today because they work and and people are people now you have to do more actually do more of them now because of people's shorter attention spans. But anyway, if you'd like to help with this, I have not only an Internet marketing mentor program, the longest running, most successful, most unique ever. I also have a specialized one for professional speaking. If you only want that. However, you know you've got to market yourself to even if you're a great speaker, if you're in the mentor, the main mentor program, you get the speaking included. If you just want the speaking, that's a separate mentor program. But anyway, check it out with me. Email me at Tom@screwthecommute.com and we know email is crazy, so copy TomAntion@gmail.com and we can discuss it. There's no high pressure with me. If I can help you, great. If not, then these things should get you started. So use those attention gating devices. I'll have another kind of speaking related thing coming up Friday. All right. Catch you on the next episode. See you later.