Improve your presentation skills with David Doerrier

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
The following is a paid podcast.iHeartRadio's hosting of this podcast constitutes neither an
endorsement of the products offered or theideas expressed. Very often there hasn't been
much thought given to why and whatthey hope to accomplish. The most important
thing, know your audience. Passageto Profit, Road to Entrepreneurship. You

(00:21):
just heard some snippets from our show. It was a really great one,
So stay tuned. Want to protectyour business? The time is near.
You've given it Hart, Now getit in gear. It's Passage to Profit
with Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart. Iam Kenya Gibson filling in for Richard Gearhart.

(00:42):
I'm Elizabeth Gearhart. I do marketingfor Gearhartlan. I have my own
startups. Yeah, so really excitedtoday. Joining us on the show is
David Dorrier, who is a presentationskills expert. He's a voiceover talent and
he's the owner of Classic Long IslandRadio Online and he's a professional. Sanna,
thank you so much. And thenwe have Andrew Shalki, who is

(01:03):
a B to B marketing expert.I really mean that because I work with
him and he's the author of Marketingfor small B to B businesses and we
are going to dig into some stufftoday, but before that, we have
our segment marketing in the news becausethere has been some big marketing news.
Instagram rolled out its version of Twitter, as some would say, which is

(01:23):
called Threads. So you're a bigTwitter fan, but you also love Instagram.
You now have the ability to playaround with the interface in another way
in the form of Twitter. Youcan pull us pictures, write short sentences
just like Twitter. So it's verysimilar in how you would use Twitter,
but it's through the interface of Instagram. So I thought that was interesting.

(01:45):
Ten million people have joined, Ithink in like two days or something crazy
like that. It was nuts.But if you join, there's a big
caveat because let's talking to some peopleabout this last night and a networking thing.
If you join Threads through your Instagramaccount, if you decide to delete
Threads, it delete your Instagram accounttoo. But it does automatically post from
Instagram to Threats. You can connectthem together right kinda, so you can

(02:07):
post from Threads to IG. Idon't think it's the reverse way around,
like you have to post to threadsand then you can share to your stories
and as a post. The onlything I didn't like about it, and
I'm not sure if it was likea kink that they need to work out.
When I went to go post onThreads and then I added it to
my ig profile page, it tookaway some of my pin posts, which

(02:29):
I was annoyed about. In orderto get the pin post back, I
had to delete the Threads post frommy feed, So that was I think
that might have just been a glitch. But so far I like it.
I haven't used it that much.I think I've only posted like three times,
and there I saw you had postedand tagged me in something and then
I had reposted it. But otherthan that, I've only posted like a
couple of times. But I'm alsonot a big Twitter person either, so

(02:52):
right, well, I used Twitteryears ago for the law firm, and
then after twenty fifteen or so,it just started to get two filled up
with weird up so I kind ofquit using it, and I hadn't started
any new Twitter accounts. But yes, I have a website I'm putting together
my own brand, which is ElizabethGearhart PhD. So I started a new
Instagram account for that, and Istarted a thread for that because I have

(03:12):
four different things I'm working on rightnow, and I feel like I'm scattered
all over the place, so Ijust brought them together under one brand and
one one site. So do youthink it's gonna displace Twitter? No,
absolutely not. And I think it'sfor a different type of user. So
if you were never a Twitter personand you're like very codependent on ig,
I think it's great for that typeof verson, which is that's what type

(03:34):
of user I am, Like.I don't lose Twitter at all. I
don't think that it's going to takepeople away from Twitter alltogether. I think
it's cool. I think there's goingto be a place for it in marketing.
I think it's a great way tobuild a brand new audience quickly with
content without a bunch of ads.So I encourage people, if you're not
in the thread space, to leveragethe time now where it's not inundated with
ads and a bunch of junk,to build some really meaningful content and a

(03:57):
new followership. But I don't thinkTwitter's going away or it's going to be
any less significant. It's just beenaround too long and people are too used
to the way it works. Yeah, Andrew is a B to B marketer,
so I could see him nodding assaid, I'm sure he knows all
about threads. And David is amessage sculptor. I guess I want to
call you. So he really helpspeople engage an audience and keep them engaged

(04:19):
in presentations and speaking and also atSanta Claus. So Andrew, let's start
with you. What do you thinkabout threads? I think I disagree maybe
a little, or potentially a little, with Kenya that Twitter could go away.
I mean, this might be awake up call for Elon. Then
again, you know before this justhappened with Threads, you know investment that

(04:40):
was a forty four billion dollars investmentI read recently was now worth fifteen billion,
which I'll take the fifteen billion,but I'm about used to have forty
four. So if this is awake up call for him, Twitter will
survive. It's got a huge installedbase, but it's a mess, and
it's not just with Elon's involvement.Elizabeth, you mentioned twenty fifteen, twenty
sixteen, that's sort when things reallysort of changed I think for Twitter,

(05:02):
and it got very noisy and verydifficult to navigate as a brand, I
would say, so Threads is notfully formed, which is to be expected.
That's kind of the way the techworld works. You know, everything's
in data all the time, andthere are some pretty key features that are
lacking in threads that Twitter has,and I assume that they'll add them as
quickly as they can. I betI have a pretty good engineering team,

(05:25):
but it's already light years ahead ofeverything else that sort of stepped into that.
Avoid trying to be the next Twitterlike Mastodon. I don't know if
any of you are familiar with Mastodon, but it's kind of a DIY thing
that was going to be the nextTwitter, except it had to kind of
be techy to make it happen.So really cool platform, but be interesting
to see what the community turns into, whether it's more Instagram like, more

(05:47):
Facebook like, or more Twitter like, it will be interesting. So David,
what are your thoughts. You know, I've never been a big Twitter
user, and I understand the importanceof social media in the marketing behind social
media. The only one social mediaplatform that I've really been strongly a part
of and that still is linked in. I have several accounts on Twitter,

(06:09):
but I haven't done much with thembecause I was finding that it's just taking
up so much of my time.It's like a full time job on these
different social media sites. I havenow started to post more often on my
Facebook page, my business Facebook page, but LinkedIn is the place for me
that I'm finding that I'm getting mostof my leads and most of my contacts

(06:32):
through there. And I really losta lot of interest with Twitter when Elon
Musk took over and all of thatmayhem was going on any advertising that I
have, I've taken off my Twitterfeed link off of that because number one,
I'm not doing anything with it,because if someone was to go there
and see, well, he hasn'tposted in three or four years. I

(06:56):
look at that as credibility that ifyou're going to have the social media links,
that they have to be current andup to date, and you need
to be doing something within them.Yeah, I again, hundred percent.
What do you think I was goingto say? I think the winning formula
for Twitter is going to be notas censored as it used to be.
I think that was one of thereasons why Elon must took it over.

(07:17):
I see Meta as a very censoredplatform on all of the user face like
so Facebook, Instagram. I can'timagine Threads is going to be any different.
So I think the formula for winningthere is if Twitter positions itself as
a place of free speech where peoplearen't going to be censored, that could
be the thing that differentiates it overThreads, where it can be a very

(07:41):
censored environment. Or they could justdecide it in the cage match. It's
Passage. I'm Kenny Gibson sitting infor Richard Gerhart. I'm here with my
co host Elizabeth today, and weare joined by David Dorrier, who is
a presentation skills expert. I'd mentionedearlier in the inshow that he is a
voiceover talent and he's the owner ofClassic Long Island Radio and he's also a

(08:03):
professional Santa Claus. Very very interesting. So welcome to Passage to Profit.
Thank you so much, Kenya,Elizabeth, you are a public speaking expert.
What is the most important thing.Let's just dive right in. Most
important thing is to know your audience. One of the things that I see
that many speakers struggle with is notfirst understanding who it is that they're speaking

(08:24):
to. And sometimes they'll come intothat room and speak to the audience as
if we are all experts in thatsame field, which is going to cause
the information is going to go rightover our heads. So the most important
thing know your audience. What istalking and telling a training or selling?
Mean? That's my tagline, talkingand telling a training or selling and that

(08:46):
comes from my many years as atrainer. My background is training and development
and also training trainers to train andwhat I have found in the past,
as many subject matter experts will feelthat because they're an expert in their field,
it automatically qualifies them to be agreat presenter or a great trainer.

(09:07):
So they'll come into a room andjust start talking and telling information to an
audience and there's no engagement in that. And by just talking and telling,
that does not equal engaging training orengaging selling. Do you work with people
individually? Do you work with clientsand do you help them get to that

(09:30):
point where they can engage an audience? Yes, yes, and yes.
So it's an individual one on onecoaching as well as team coaching and working
with teams of trainers, teams ofsalespeople, teams of executives, mid level
managers as well and helping them allachieve the same thing, and that is
taking their existing experience with speaking,but helping them to understand how to incorporate

(09:56):
engagement principles into their current presentation.I've had an opportunity to evaluate a lot
of people over the last fifteen ortwenty years. Many of these people were
incorporate many of them were in networkingevents, and I always walked away with
three things that people seem to strugglewith the most, and one was not

(10:20):
knowing the audience. The second wasnot incorporating stories into their presentations. Most
times people were just throwing out datato their audience, and by incorporating stories,
now you're emotionally bringing people in toyour message. If you're talking about
a client or passed to hardship ofsome sort that we can all relate to,

(10:43):
that we're going to learn something fromthat's going to help us. Those
stories are going to help us tosee it, smell it, tasted,
experience it within ourselves, and weare all going to be more emotionally connected.
There were many speakers that would justget to the end of their presentation,
get to the end of the training, whatever it happens to be,

(11:03):
and say good night, we're outof here and there was nothing to conclude,
and simply you can have a review. Certainly, if it's training,
let's review what it is that wecovered today. One of the principles of
engagement is repetition, and the audienceis needing that review, so we can

(11:24):
kind of put it all together again, what did we do today? We
spent all day in the here,let's review it. A speaker can also
do the same thing, could havea review at the end, or and
definitely some sort of a call toaction. So how do you make a
boring person interesting? That's a greatquestion. First of all, that boring
person, first of all has tohave the motivation to want to be a

(11:46):
compelling speaker. The only way toget through to people is for them to
recognize the need of change. Ican certainly bring up and give the evaluation
and say that I saw these thingswithin your presentation, and one of them
was that you need to open upyour mouth more. They need to see
it themselves. I learned this fromtraining. If you're just telling everybody that

(12:11):
they need to change, I'm tellingyou to do this. I'm telling you
to do that. Your audience isnot going to change. They have to
see it, feel it, understandit for themselves, and understand the with
them. What's in it for me? What's the value in stopping mumbling?
What's the value of enunciating my words? They need to find that out themselves.

(12:33):
Yeah. Well, back in thegood old days, when everybody was
in the studio for every show,we had no offer that, so we
would get the mumblers. If wewould get the drots and know it would
come running in, running in,and it was so funny. Would be
like, oh, here comes noway, you're in trouble. And that
helped a lot. I think somepeople don't even realize how they're coming across
to their audience because they they're soused to speaking in that way. No

(12:56):
one has said anything to them,so they think it's okay. I do
that. Sometimes I have a tendencyshop quickly and I think I'm coming off
this coherent this one, and they'llturn around and be like, what what
you say? And I need thatsometimes, right, We all need a
little a little nudge to be alittle bit more articulate. I want to
talk, though, however, aboutthe biggest sale of all time, which

(13:16):
is Santa Claus. First of all, how did you get into that as
a character, and do you feelthat you've used some of your experience with
playing Santa Claus into your trainings andhow you've taught people how to be better
public speakers. First of all,how I got started in it. I
was at the time, I wasliving in northern California. I was working

(13:37):
full time radio at the time,but I, like many people in radio,
I found some of the fame,but none of the fortunes. So
I had to go out and finda part time job. I was doing
some community theater. I did alot of community theater for about fifteen years.
And I was scanning the newspaper andoutside of Oakland, California, and
I saw an ad that said Santa'swanted. I immediately was attracted to that.

(14:01):
I went down to the Western TemporaryAgency in Oakland, California. They
put me through their little Santa School. I left there with a box that
had a Santa suit inside of it. I didn't have the beard at the
time. I had to strap iton, and within a day or so,
I was doing Santa visits. Iwas doing malls in larger engagements,

(14:22):
and two things happened to me immediately. Number one, I felt comfortable.
There was a lot that I hadto learn about being a good Santa Claus.
However, I felt good being inthe shoes of that character. There
was something about Christmas in my homeas a child that was very emotional to
me, and those feelings were comingback and envisioning my father and his presence.

(14:48):
He was not Santa, but hehad that Santa Claus presence on Christmas
Morning, so those feelings were comingback, and I just found that I
loved it, and found immediately thatwearing a Santa suits like wearing a magnet.
You are like the pied piper inthat thing, and you are the
center of attention. But for yearsI had to strap on beard in the

(15:13):
mustache and all that, and Ifelt that it was easy for me to
hide behind that it wasn't David,it was Santa Claus in that room.
So there was quite an adjustment.Well, it turned out it wasn't much
of an adjustment. Now when Ido Santa with the real beard, I
still do the same stick. What'sthe wornest thing any kid has ever asked
you for? It? I getthem every year. The one that pops

(15:33):
to mind first is a young ladyseven eight, ash years old, and
she wanted real estate for Christmas.And in years past, before the Internet
being as big as it was,kids would come in with clippings from Walmart
ads the Sears catalog, and they'dhave things circled and pointing it out,
it's available at this store in thatstore, and it costs this much.

(15:56):
They'd have all the pages. WhatI find most exhilarating of being Santa Claus
and most emotional is that the younglady of the young boy that comes up
and they have written a letter toSanta Claus. They're all dressed up in
their Sunday best, and that,to me is just really emotional to think
that. You know, I haveno idea what went on before they showed

(16:18):
up here, but I'm thinking thatthey picked out their outfit. They were
anticipating going to see Santa. They'vewritten up this letter to Santa Claus,
their list to Santa Claus. AndI've got boxes. I've got boxes.
I saved all of them because Ijust could not throw any of that away.
Screaming children right, kind of likehaving a bad audience reaction, right,

(16:41):
how do you deal with that?And then how do you teach people
who you're teaching to present to dealwith like a poor audience reaction. That's
a good one, definitely somewhat relatable. I think in the Santa situation,
I think if you can remove theadult out of the situation, the kids
would be a lot better. Becausewhat are I have found is that especially

(17:02):
if there's a line waiting to seeSanta. And what I've been able to
observe as much as i can becauseI'm really busy with what's going on around
me. But what I'm able toobserve is that many adults will say,
Okay, when we get up there, don't be scared. Then they may
see other kids getting all excited.Now the kid who's online is getting all

(17:22):
excited, saying, well, mom'stelling me not to be excited. That
kid just started crying. Oh mygod, when I get up there,
what's going to happen. So that'skind of the anxiety that happens. And
sure, I'm a tall guy.I'm six foot two and I get in
that suit. I'm even bigger whenI'm in that suit, and usually I'm
sitting down when I'm with the kids. But a big guy in a red

(17:44):
suit, it's kind of intimidating attimes, So how do I deal with
it? Number One, don't forcethe kid on Santa. I have seen
those kids just go into a panicmode the closer you put them to Santa.
It's amazing what has Don't force them. Let them stand a little bit
away from Santa. Let them kindof get used to the surroundings a little

(18:07):
bit. They're also in a foreignplace. They're in the middle of a
mall, surrounded by all of theseother people in this strange environment. So
they got a lot of things that'sgoing on right at that one time.
I will say, we teach ourkids stranger danger, and then we go
tell them sit on this stranger's lawor force them to sit on Santa's need.
So anyway, you're listening to Passageto Profit, Road to Entrepreneurship with

(18:30):
Kenny Gibson sitting in for Richard yourHeart. I'm Elizabeth your Heart and we
will be right back after these messages. I'm Merchard your Heart, founder of
Your Heart Law. We specialize inpatents, trademarks, and copyrights. You
can find out more and learn moreabout trademarks dot com. We love working
with entrepreneurs and helping their businesses growand here's our client, Ricky, to
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(18:52):
of Prime six. We manufacture highperforming, clean and sustainable fuel spike,
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(19:15):
Thank you, Rickie. To learnmore about trademarks, go to learn more
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go back to Passage to profit onceagain. Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart.

(19:36):
I'm Kenny Gibson sitting in for RichardGearhart and Elizabeth than I have been sitting
here having a great conversation with DavidDryer. Yeah, and you've had asked
a question, Ken, you whatdo you do. If you're up on
stage speaking and you're losing your audienceand they don't like what you're saying,
there's a lot wrapped into that.That's certainly one scenario based on what the
individual is saying. Maybe it's notresonating with the audience. Maybe there is

(20:00):
a good example of a presenter thathas it really gauged who their audience is
and they're delivering the wrong message tothe wrong audience. Let's take another scenario,
and that is that it is theright audience, it is the right
message, but it's not engaging theaudience. They're losing the audience. So

(20:21):
they're a couple of things that Iwould suggest. Number one is having some
sort of a compelling opening that's goingto immediately engage the audience. And one
of the ways to do that isby starting off with a question, certainly
a relevant question. For example,a question I could ask my audience how
many people here get nervous when you'respeaking in front of others? And I

(20:44):
could follow that up with an additionalquestion, and so that there is going
to immediately engage the audience, andthen my job as a speaker is to
continuously engage them. With stories,antidotes, rhetorical questions, and depending on
the situation, maybe they could dosome sort of an exercise, either on
their own or in small groups.For example, we had a note here

(21:07):
about engaging virtual audiences, and Ijust kind of wanted to talk a little
bit about some of the differences andlike some of the tactics state to be
used there. Well, a lotof the same things that you use on
stage can be used virtually. Youjust have to crank everything up to an
eleven. I think that in bothsituations, whether it's on stage or virtual,
the most important part is setting thatstage up front, letting people know

(21:30):
what are we doing, how arewe going to do it? What can
you expect from me the presenter,what can I expect from you the audience,
and again immediately engaging them right inthe beginning. If it's all just
chatter, if it's all just data, whether it's on stage or virtual,
virtual, it's so much easier tolose your audience. I have three screens

(21:51):
here, I could be easily playingTikTok toe on some other screen or doing
some other work over here. Butif you're asking the question, if you're
telling me relevant stories, if you'remaking it interesting to me. I'm going
to be more compelled to stay connected. I saw this woman give a presentation
and I felt like she was wewere rehearsed, and I felt like some

(22:12):
of the stuff she was doing wasnot natural, Like she was doing this
karate chop thing and approaching the audience, and I'm like, that doesn't look
normal for you. I don't thinkyou would do that if you were talking
dear best friend. So can yoube overrehearsed? And then you get kind
of wooden? Right, Definitely definitelyoverrehearsed. Based on the way that you

(22:33):
describe this woman who was doing thepresentation, I'd be curious if she was
reading her notes. You want tobe you when you're presenting. You want
to have your nuances, your stutters. I stutter at times. I get
hung up on words. I callthat my record is skipping at times.
But that's a part of me.That's one of the things that in Toastmasters

(22:55):
I always get evaluated on and peoplepick up on. But you've got to
be yourself how well or you doneed to have those foundational skills. How
do you open a presentation making transitions, engaging questions, asking questions the correct
way responding to people correctly in virtualworld. The number one way of connecting

(23:15):
with your audience is your camera.Looking directly into the camera. How many
times have you seen someone who's makinga presentation and they're talking the whole time
looking over here at this screen becausethat's where all the faces are. Yeah,
I'm looking at all the faces,but I'm not looking at my audience
by looking into that camera. So, Andrew, you're starting to promote your

(23:37):
book and you're starting to go ona lot of podcasts and stuff. Are
you finding any challenges. I'm notsure that I've found any that are specific
to that. Speaking to the audiencesalways, you know, can always be
a challenge. I'll ask David aquestion I have based on an experience I
had where you sort of came tomind. Very early on. You'd mentioned
there's only one person in the rowwho is you know, thinking this might
fail? And I think that's trueat this instant. But I was brought

(24:00):
into to a small group of CEOsabout thought leadership and using that in your
marketing, and I don't know,fifteen or twenty minutes into what was supposed
to be three hours or at thepresentation and interactivity. The person who brought
me in was feigning sleep in hisseat, being kind about it. We
could say, well, he reallywanted this to succeed, and he felt

(24:21):
badly that this was not what hehadn't advertised ideas, or we had miscommunicated
in some way. And I tookthe hint and pretty quickly pivoted to the
interactive portion of what we were doing. What would you have done in that
situation or what would you have suggested? My first observation or question around that
is his going to sleep. Didthat have to do with what you were

(24:42):
saying? Or is it just thisindividual just didn't get any sleep last night
and there's stuff going on in thisguy's world that is causing him to go
to sleep. Is it you doyou think was the problem? Or is
it him that's the problem. Oh, it was me in his that animation,
it was I was not what heexpected. Okay, you keyed in

(25:03):
on that where it didn't become abig distraction to you, where some people
that could. Someone's fallen asleep andnow that has caused me to just fall
apart up on stage. So it'sgood that you transition. If you felt
that it wasn't going in the rightdirection. Maybe there was an opportunity to
get some polling questions to feel outyour audience on what would be most important

(25:26):
to them based on the topic ofwhat you were talking about. Based on
that, what would be most importantfor you all to learn about that topic.
That's a great suggestion. Thank youwell, Andrew, you're very professional.
That's up. Would have probably calledthe guy out. Yeah, I
was so. Did you ask him, Andrew? That was that? He
told you that was the reason why? Yeah, of course, you know,

(25:47):
I said, he, what's upwith that? You know that really,
as David just pointed out, thatreally could have gone south in a
hurry if it had just flustered me. I think, looking back on an
analysis, especially in light of whatDavid said, I to have said,
hang on, everybody, it seemslike maybe I'm not giving what was expected
here. Let's talk a little bitof what your expectations are and we can
move right into some interactive exercises todrive some of these points home. But

(26:08):
let me know if that's where wewant to go. And I really just
pivoted on my own and of coursethis fellow miraculously woke up I think this
is really important Passage to Profit withKenya Gibson feeling in for Richard Gearhart.
I'm Elizabeth Gearhart. We will beright back. Hi. I'm Lisa ask
LEAs the Inventress, founder, CEO, and president of Inventing a to Z.

(26:30):
I've been inventing products for over thirtyeight years, hundreds of products later
and dozens of patents. I helppeople develop products and put them on the
market from concept to fruition. Ibring them to some of the top shopping
networks in the world, QVC,hsn E, vine Line and retail stores.
Have you ever set to yourself someoneshould invent that thing? Well,

(26:52):
I say, why not make ityou. If you want to know how
to develop a product from concept tofruition, the wait, contact me Lisa
Askalis, the Inventress. Go toinventing atoz dot com Inventing a too z
dot Com. Email me Lisa atInventing a tow z dot Com. Treat
yourself to a day shop full ofnetworking, education, music, shopping and

(27:15):
fun. Go to my website Inventingatoz dot Com. Passage to Profit continues
with Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart. Canyou giveson sitting in for Richard Gearhart.
I'm Elizabeth Gearhart. We have justbeen speaking to David Durier and wow,
that's all I've got to say.All of us have to make presentations today,
whether we want to or not.And He's got the secret sauce if

(27:38):
you want to keep people listening.But right now, Kenny's gonna do for
power move Yes, So for Powermeleltoday we are going to be talking about
Rose Marie Kna Galves. She isa stager of the twenty four hour Flip
on A and E TV and I'mhighlighting her today because she was recently on
my Power MOTL podcast and she wasan interior where she is an interior designer

(28:00):
who found her calling for aesthetics indesign through a friend who had saw her
work. So she figured out thatshe had this gift and she had this
calling and she was able to transitionfrom just doing interior home design to doing
it as a stager on TV andgot picked up for the show. So
I thought that it was a majorpower move right because to land a gig

(28:21):
on TV, and not only landa gig on TV, but doing something
that you're really good and passionate about. So she is our power Move for
today and you can check her outand listen to her story on my Power
Move podcast. Congratulations to her.That is really hard to do, so
hard to do, but it canbe done. Yeah. So I have
a couple of things going on.One of them is Blue Streak directory.

(28:42):
It's a video directory of B toB businesses online. And Andrew Schulkin is
helping me set up the platform.We're doing a website and it's really exciting.
We decided to do a couple newthings I want to go start promoting
this. So we're going to doa landing page so people can sign up
when we go live, when welaunch, they'll know and yeah, so
we're making a lot of progress onthat. I found a piece of software

(29:03):
that we're going to integrate with thesite. It was something that really didn't
exist when I started this as Firesidein twenty nineteen or it was just really
early days for it. And Ilove what Andrew said, tech is always
in beta, right and I'm takingsome software that was made for something else
for a different purpose and we're tryingto adapt it to use with the website.

(29:25):
So that's exciting and fun for me. And then I also have a
podcast with Danielle Woolley. It's calledthe Jersey Pod Cats Podcast where we talk
about cats. And it started becauseI have a cat who kept scratching at
his face and just got really horribleand took him to that. I ended
up counting up the number of visitsand medicine changes. It was twenty six

(29:48):
over eight months. So started apodcast to try to get help from the
community, to figure out how canI help this poor little cat. We
started this podcast and we're building acommunity and we have a guest come on
and we have all sorts of peopletalking about all sorts of things. It's
called the Jersey Pod Cats Podcast.So, without further ado, I want
to now introduce Andrew Shelpit, thename of his companies and to Go,

(30:11):
and he is the author of Marketingfor small B to B Businesses. Welcome
and Drew, very nice to behere. And to Go is a company.
We are a digital marketing and strategyagency. We work mostly with B
to B businesses in the two totwenty five million dollar range, helping them
to build marketing muscle, as wesay, with content, marketing programs and
website design and development. We workwith a range of industries within that two

(30:34):
to twenty five million dollars range andfocus a lot on working with mission driven
businesses so B corps and similar organizationswith a double bottom line approach to creating
profits and doing some good in theworld at the same time. Our approach
can be summed up in three wordsmotivation, message, and metrics, which
means that we work with you tomake sure we understand the motivation of your

(30:56):
audience and audience segments which we canget into. They've got a problem to
solve, of course, but whatis happening that has helped them realize that
there's an issue? What are thecosts of that issue? Are their costs
to doing nothing? Is there anoutcome that would help them get over the
perceived risk of taking action, whetherthat action is with you or someone else.
Those are the kinds of things thatwe want to understand in order to

(31:18):
craft a message based on that motivation, and then take that message and adapt
it for various products or service linesyou may have. For the audience segments
I mentioned a minute ago, andkind of critically and often overlooked for where
in the buying journey your audience isthey're going to have different levels of knowledge
and different interests and concerns depending onwhether they are just starting on this buying

(31:41):
journey and education of themselves or whetherthey're very close to making decision along the
way. We'll define some metrics thatwill help us track whether we're achieving the
results we want and will help usbe thoughtful in iterating our work as we
strive to improve marketing results consistently.Overton, it's very impressive. I started
a company before and Ago in nineteenninety three, and started and Togo in

(32:05):
nineteen ninety six, so we've beenat it for a while. And funny
because in the beginning it was sucha young industry, and you know,
I was just a kid. Ihad a partner in nineteen ninety three,
and he would go out and selland he would come back and say,
hey, I told them we coulddo this, and then I would spend
that night and the next day figuringout whether we could do that. Now,
you know, I think back now, I'm like, wow, I

(32:28):
didn't sleep. That's just so stressful. And fortunately we're not involved in that
kind of world anymore. But that'show young it was, and no one
was in any different position. Youknow. We were all trying to figure
out out of the lot, whichwas kind of fun, but not something
I would want to continue for twentyseven years. So I am reading Andrew's
book, Marketing for Small B toB Businesses because I love this book.

(32:49):
Not just because I know Andrew andrespect him and loved the work he's doing
on my website. Not just that, but if I didn't know ANDREWID still
loved this book because one of thethings I liked the most about it,
well two things. It's real youcould actually take the things in there and
use them in your business. Butthe other thing is is he has kind
of short chapters, which we've talkedabout previously, and the short chapters give
you time to kind of digest andreally understand and think about ways to use

(33:13):
what you just learned in your business. And we had talked about people that
just throw a bunch of information atyou, but this really gives you the
chunks that you can digest and thinkabout for your business and then move on
to the next section. I'm gladyou noticed that those because it's very much
a conscious choice and maybe a littlebit unconscious do because so much of what
we do for ourselves and on behalfof our clients is done online, and

(33:36):
of course they are Nobody reads,right, It's all you scan and you
hope that there's a headline it catchesyour eye and then maybe you dig a
little bit deeper. But the ideais it's got to be quick, it's
got to be punchy, and itdoes have to give you a chance to
take that action before you're just jumpingoff onto the next thing. What is
the first thing you tell your clientsthey need to do? So much that

(33:57):
depends on sort of where they are, which is something that David touched on
earlier. You know, depending ontheir skill level and comfort and level of
sothistication. But more than anything,it's understanding who their audience is and understanding
that the key to marketing today isproviding value. Like we all know about
unique selling propositions and key differentiators andall that, but your marketing has to

(34:20):
do that as well. There hasto be information in there that's of use
to me as a prospect, andnot just information about you. All that
comes later. You know, atsome point, I guess I'll care you
know where you went to college andhow many collective decades of experience you have,
and all that stuff that's in theabout section of your website. But
in the beginning, I want toknow not just what you do, but

(34:43):
what you can do for me.Right, That's something that I'm pretty fond
of saying. Your prospects don't careabout you. Your prospects don't even care
about what you do. Your prospectscare about what you can do for then.
So that's where you've got to start. If there's nothing else that you
take away from any conversation you havewith me, it should be that review
every piece of marketing you have,from your website to tiny little social media

(35:04):
posts, and think about whose perspectiveit's being written from. Is it about
you or is it about your audiencethe help that they are trying to get?
And having that conversation, are youshining a light on your own expertise?
As an addition, it's really moregot to be about that. That's
interesting. So I want to takeit even a step back further, right
in like defining what content marketing actuallyis, right, because I feel like

(35:28):
I've been marketed too since MTV wasaround, right, like in subliminal ways.
So could you just like define whatcontent marketing is is so that people
know exactly how to distinguish it fromanything else that they might be engaging with.
Sure, although at this point Ithink the lines have pretty well blurred.
You know, old fashioned marketing wasvery inward facing. It's about me

(35:49):
and us and less about you andwhat you need. Although that concept isn't
new, right. It was alwaysthe differentiation between features and benefits. And
if you're talking about features all thetime, that's fine, except no one
really wants a quarter in strill it. They want a quarter inch hole.
They have this problem. They needto drill this hole. That's what they're
trying to do, and they don'treally care how it's done. I mean,

(36:12):
there's pretty much just one way todo that these days, right,
That's what we all know. Butthat's the difference in marketing. Are you
talking about the drill bit, areyou're talking about the outcome? And I
think that that to me sums upwhat the you know, sort of underlying
goal of content marketing is these days. That's interesting that you say that,
because I feel like there's all thesedifferent opportunities always to be creative to direct
market to someone, whether it bea product placement and music or a video

(36:37):
piece, or again a laundry listof like, here all the things we
do. So if you had toadvise your client, what is the best
lane in terms of highlighting those benefitsversus just writing out a laundry list of
like we do this, we dothis, we do this. We'll see
if this answers your question. Ithink most critically is figuring out where your

(36:58):
audience is, understanding where they areand where you can meet them on their
own turf so that they are comfortableright there. They've got their guard a
little bit further down, rather thanyou know, when we're all opening direct
mail pieces our guards up until provenotherwise this is garbage. I'm not even
sure why I'm opening it, andI might open it or I might not.
Whereas if you get them and saya LinkedIn group, perhaps since I'm

(37:20):
talking mostly about B two bats,where they've already had great experiences having really
interesting and informative conversations with their peers, and you can slide in there with
something of value that would cause themto say, oh, hey, this
is a person who knows what heor she is talking about. That's much
more valuable than spamming and replied thatwith a sly of it. You know,
is offering fifty percent off your Sservice AX or you know, whatever

(37:44):
the case may be, which ofcourse is different than B two seve focused
product placement and things like that.Right, So, David, do you
have a commenter question? You know, what I find fascinating with what it
is that you do is the similaritiesbetween what someone needs to think about when
they grow the speech and the samethings they need to think about when they
are building their business. Who's youraudience. It's not about you, It's

(38:07):
about what it is that you canbring to your audience. What one thing
can you say is the one areathat these business owners seem to struggle with
the most When they come to youand say I need a website, very
often there hasn't been much thought givento why and to what they hope to

(38:29):
accomplish. So we try and rollback to that point, which sometimes starts
getting into questions of branding. Right, you know, is this on brand's
who you are? And is itconsistent with the brand that you've put out
there? Alreadies, but we reallywant to make sure that there's an understanding
of that, because our expertise reallyonly has value if we can put into
place tactics that are going to work. And so maybe you do need a

(38:52):
new website. But let's talk aboutwhy what's not working about this website?
How do you know that you havemetrics that are pointing you in that direction?
Are just getting anecdotal complaints? Inthat case, should we have some
conversations with prospects, with clients,with employees. Right, you know,
we're very much of the opinion thatmarketing does not end when the sale is
closed. Every point of contact thatyou have with a customer thereafter is marketing

(39:16):
and it is branding at that point, and you really have to pay attention
to whether that's a positive experience ora negative experience. And you know,
it's always the ground in the middle, which, of course, you know
the Grand Bill curve of life.Right, most of things are in the
middle. At one extreme, thingsare so terrible if the client just walks
out. The other extreme, thingsare so wonderful if they become champions for

(39:37):
you and great referral sources. Butin the middle, there's a great opportunity
to turn those folks or just havingan okay experience and in nurse's keeping americause
you're doing what you promise, butyou're not delighting them or wowing them in
any way that is making them think, gosh, I have to tell someone
else about this. So I wantto make sure that they understand that there
has to be a reason behind whatwe're doing, and then you have to

(39:59):
execute real really well. Do fewersaying as well, what channels do you
think people should be on in socialmedia? Does that depend on their business
too? Your fram getting the question. It really depends on your business,
right you know, David mentioned earlierhe's most active on LinkedIn. That's true
for my business as well. That'swhere our audience is, so that's where
it makes the most sense for usto be. There was a period,

(40:19):
it seems to be waning a bitwhere I was surprised at the number of
our clients who were telling us aboutthe success they were having on Facebook as
B to B companies and there aregroups out there for PR professionals and marketers
and all sorts of other industries.Said you served that probably forty to fifty
five age group that it was reallypopular and did really really well. So

(40:40):
it really does depend on your audienceand where they are. Yeah, I've
always felt like LinkedIn was the bestthing for B to B. I've heard
some negative things about it from people, and I do find like LinkedIn is
super saturated now. I used toget invites, which was fine, but
people want me to follow them tojoin their company page. I get promotions
all the time, so it's kindof getting messy, it is, and

(41:00):
that's true everywhere. I'd say that'strue with SEO or paperclick advertising. It's
very difficult to break through all ofthat noise, which I'll separate from competition.
There's plenty of competition. There alwayswas, but now there's just so
much in noise that isn't really competitive. You're just competing to get some of
the attention, pushing all that stuffaside. Do you think that narrowing who

(41:21):
you define as your audience helps withthat? Absolutely, And that's where audience
segmentation becomes really critical, and understandingthat you can't be all things to all
people and even what you do.We talk about being a content marketing agency
and a web development agency. That'sa challenge right from a marketing standpoint,
and most of our marketing focuses onone or the other so that we're out

(41:44):
there trying to niche down, youknow, by talking about the mission driven
businesses to work with st I canniche down further. So that's sort of
the key. Any other good businessthat comes in over the transom, that's
fantastic, but you shouldn't be outthere marketing to try and get those companies.
Well, when you take a lookat like behavioral insights when you're developing
plans for your clients, what doesthat look like in terms of like how

(42:07):
people are consuming certain platforms and evenlike from a quality to standpoint, like
what their interests Maybe how do youwork that into the plan for your clients.
That brings to mind a period acouple of years ago where boy,
every new client that came in askingfor a website wanted to build a mobile
first. Website had to be mobile'sfirst. And because we work with B

(42:28):
to B businesses, and you know, this is when responsive coding was kind
of new, and you could buildone website and it would adapt automatically to
the size screen, the type ofdevice and being displayed on, which is
fantastic. It really is a wonderfuladvance. But people wanted this mobile's first
approach, even though we would pointout, let's take a look at your
analytics for your website and we'll findthat twelve percent of your audience is mobile.

(42:52):
Right, you're a B to Bcompany. People are at their desks
typically, yet you might get somefolks who are going to check things out
on their phone or I've had whilethey're commuting. But well, it's twelve
percent of them. Do we reallywant a mobile first approach? Let's look
at the data, that's the firstanswer. Let's look at the data and
how do they tell us where weshould be going with you? Some grains

(43:12):
of salts are in there. Ifyour mobile experience is really bad, maybe
that twelve percent would be twenty percentif we improve it. So certainly let's
not throw away one tips of youraudience. But maybe mobile first isn't really
the approach we need to take.Similarly, I would look at analytics and
get a sense of what path peopleare taking through a website, particularly if
there are differences between the paths theytake depending on where they came from.

(43:36):
Did they come from your email marketingcampaign, do they come from a social
media campaign? Did they just landon the homepage and you're not sure,
how where do they go, whatdo they look at? And when did
they leave? Are there any cluesthat you can tease out of that to
tell you that there are bottlenecks orthat you're not converting then doing sort of
the mini conversions, getting them tooanother piece of content or join your mailing

(43:58):
list or something like that. Sovery much us a data driven approach,
I think is what you've got totake if you're trying to set us out
different parts of an audience and they'reinterested in different kinds of products or services
that you're offering. Yeah. Ithink the mobile thing too is interesting when
you think of the age demographic andyou're right B to B people are at
their desk. So with Blue Streetthat I'm developing, I'm in this peer
advisory board and I got a lotof feedback from my board this we turn

(44:20):
our meeting and they're like, youcan't use the software, not the website,
but this other software on your phone. Where the young people in there
said that, but the other peoplewere like, yeah, but who's your
target And it's like, well,my targeter people that have established businesses,
so they're probably a little older,they're probably not doing everything on their phone.
Like my twenty seven year old daughterdoes everything on her phone. She
doesn't even have the computer anymore.I'm like, how can you live that
way? But I think that thepeople that I'm targeting for B to B

(44:44):
probably are at their desk with thelaptop or a desktop. Right, Yep,
We've already looked at the data thereand that bore that out absolutely,
David. So, what are someof the trends now with website? You
know, being a consumer or beinga viewer of different websites. And I
was looking at a variety of differentwebsites just the other day doing some research,

(45:04):
and I'm just seeing that these websitesare transforming into these multi media,
very engaging platform So what is thecurrent trend in what's important to have on
your website today? I would saythat we are entering a period or coming
out of a period where so manywebsites looked the same. There was really
a similarity across design that just seemedto, you know, go through whether

(45:29):
there was people emulating Apple or youknow, just some trend that sort of
took the world by storm. Andwe seem to be moving past that into
another era of much more diversity interms of what websites look like. I
don't know that there are technologies thatI would say, you know, there
are things like parallax design, whereyou know, things moved at different rates
down the strain, But that sortof page choreography is making a bit of

(45:52):
a comeback. You know that thereis more engagement visually on pages, but
at the same time there's still alot of use of white space, as
there should be, so that you'rekeeping you know, short, compact,
very tightly crafted messages they are onpage, making them very easy to focus
on. The biggest fight we havewith every web project is how much stuff

(46:15):
we are not going to put onthe homepage. You everyone who's involved,
all the stakeholders who are involved earlyon, have something that is their pet
project, that is, you know, near and dear to their professional heart.
They want it on the website.And yeah, of course the more
stuff you put on that homepage,the less emphasis any of them have.
So making sure that it is amessage driven design more than anything else,

(46:37):
I'd say, is pretty critical,and then use the tools that feel comfortable.
There are very different fields for avery financial services company versus skateboarding sneaker
brand. Absolutely. This has beenreally a wealth of information. Thank you
Andrew. Stay tuned. There's morecoming. Passage to Profit with Kenny Gibsons
sitting in for Richard your Heart.I'm Elizabeth your Heart and we'll be right

(46:58):
back. I'm Merchard Heart, founderof your Heart Law. We specialize in
patents, trademarks and copyrights. Youcan find out more and learn more about
patents dot com. We love workingwith entrepreneurs and here's our client, Peter,
who tells it like it is.I'm Peter. We recently will elected
as one of the best invention ofTime magazine for twenty twenty two. Through

(47:19):
this journey, we'll be relying onget at Law to guide us on the
right steps to build a right portfoliopatent trademarks to support our lunch of our
new products. It has been greatexperience working with ghetat lawa as they have
a deep knowledge into the market bothin North America and overseas, so we
make the right choices at the righttime. Thank you, Peter. To

(47:39):
learn more about patents, go tolearn more about patents dot com and download
our free entrepreneurs Guide depends or booka free consultation with me let's learn more
about patents dot com. Each passageto profit. Noah Fleischman as our producer
here at passage to profit, andhe never stops trying to make sense of
the future by looking at the passIt just wouldn't have been my aunt's kitchen

(48:02):
in the nineteen seventies without the brightrainbow presence of Tupperware. And the best
thing about Tupperware was you couldn't buyit in stores. Long before social media.
Back in the nineteen forties, Tupperwarewas the first big trender. A
man named Earl Tupper developed a plasticalternative to glass kitchenware, but it was
just a little too futuristic for theretail stores. So with the help of

(48:23):
a marketing genius, a lady namedBrownie Wise, they figured out a way
to inspire the housewives of America toself tupperware to one another with fun parties
and events. Before long, nokitchen was without Tupperware for many, many
years until now, with all thepatented retail knockoffs over the years, Tupperware
and all its high flying costs andperks is kind of going out. Can't

(48:45):
make it anymore. The founding fatheris seeing its demise But what a lesson
in marketing when someone takes out azip block container and says, here,
I'll put it in the tupperware.That's a trend without a computer. Now
more with Richard and Elizabeth Passage toProfit? Can you give send filling in
for Richard Gerhart? And it isnow time for Elizabeth's question, So I'm

(49:07):
going to ask Dave Dorier what kindof presentations do you like to attend in
person? Well, that's a greatquestion. Number one, they need to
be engaging, no matter what thesubject is. Sometimes when I was a
trainer, I would say trainers makethe worst participants. I think presentation skill
coaches make the worst participants because we'reconstantly evaluating whoever's up on stage. But

(49:31):
number one being entertaining and engaging andbeing a member of National Speakers Association.
Every meeting every month, they wouldbring in a great speaker and talking about
the craft of building a speaking business. That always fascinated me. Understanding their
life journey, so engaging and hearingabout the journey of how people have made

(49:53):
this business a success. Well,that's great, and Andrew Sulkin, what
about you? As David said,is important, But relevance I'll sit through
the person reading the slides if there'sreal value in it to me personally or
business lies or you know why afteron there, So Kenya Gibson, I
love to go to music concerts,and it is a form of a presentation.

(50:14):
I'm really against lip singing, badaudio. If that's going on,
it's just not a good experience.And I just don't think it's a great
presentation of an artist if those thingsare out of order. Yeah. So
I like to go to entrepreneur forums. There's one Aspire Is coming up.
Barbara Cochrane's going to be speaking atit, and I like those big ones
because you know it's Barbara Cochrane.You know she's going to give a good

(50:36):
presentation. You know she's going toengage her audience. You know she's not
going to be boring. I thinkif you go to a presentation that's not
engaging, you feel bored and Iwant to go eat a chocolate chip cookie.
So I think it kind of dependson how it makes you feel.
And I love educational things too.Joining us on the show is David Jorrier,
owner of Classic Long Island Radio online, Classic Long Island and Radio.

(51:00):
It's an Internet based radio station,no commercials twenty four to seven. Over
eight thousand songs in the library,all from sixties, seventies, and eighties,
mostly album oriented rock. What Ilike to say about the station,
there is a lot of deep cuts. There are the hits that you will
recognize, but there are many moredeep cuts from artists that you will recognize,

(51:24):
and deep cuts from artists that you'venever heard of. So it's been
quite a journey for me when Istarted this back in twenty fifteen, and
you're still doing it now. Stilldoing it now. You may not hear
it in the background, but it'son in the background. Listen to it
worldwide. Go to CLI radio dotcom, Classic Long Island RADIOCLI Radio dot

(51:45):
com. There's also a link onthere or a tab on there where you
can find where it's listed on multipledirectories. It's even listed in I art
Radio. Good David Dorrier you canfind him at Present Your Way to Success
dot com, E Learning Voiceover dotcom, which I looked at that website
that's really interesting too, and thenCeli Radio dot com as he just said,

(52:07):
and then Santa Hoho dot com.So if you're in the Atlanta area,
and maybe want a Santa Claus.He's your guy. And then of
course on LinkedIn, and then wehad Andrew Schulkin with and togo A and
d I g O and it's Andigodot com and he also has marketing for
small B to B businesses. He'san expert in the field. I have

(52:28):
to say, when I first metAndrew during COVID networking, I didn't understand
what an expert in the field heis. But he's really your go to
guy, and I think he divesin deeper than a lot of people do
to really look at cause and effectand strategy and new things coming up and
the history too, So I'm reallyglad I'm working with them. We want
to thank the Passage to Profit team, which is Alicia Morrissey, our program

(52:50):
coordinator, Noah Fleischman, our amazingproducer who always makes it sound so much
better, and of course Ken YouGibson, the media Maven and look for
the podcast tomorrow. Find us onFacebook, Instagram at Passage to Profit,
show Twitter at Passage to Profit,and we have a YouTube channel. While
the information provided during this program isbelieved to be correct, never take a
legal step without first checking with yourlegal professional for all your patent, trademark

(53:14):
and copyright needs. Our firm,Gearhart Law, offers free consultations. You
can visit us at gearheartlaw dot com. Join us next week for another show
of Passage to profit Road to Entrepreneurship. Thank you all for listening, and
thanks to all of our participants.We'll see you next week. The proceeding

(53:40):
was a paid podcast. iHeartRadio's hostingof this podcast constitutes neither an endorsement of
the products offered or the ideas expressed