Common Mistakes Made During 60 Second Presentations - Part one of a Four Part Series

Image via WikipediaAs a business consultant and BNI Director I get to help lots of business professional make the most of their word of mouth marketing efforts. Most often I am asked to evaluate their elevator speeches. You know their "60 second infomercials'" or "Sales Manager Minutes" as they are called in "BNI". Over the years I have discovered over 2 dozen things that a person can do wrong when presenting their sales manager minutes.

This article is the first installment of a four part series on common mistakes made during 60 second presentations. In this segment I will discuss the first 5 of these 2 dozen or so common mistakes that I seen. These 4 articles will give you the cure for these all so common aliments so that your 60 second presentations will produce result and make you more money. Eliminate a few and you will see real results. Eliminate them all and the referrals will come rolling in. So let's get started.
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Common Mistake #1. "No Hook".
It is important that your last statement be a memorable one (hopefully a positive one too). People are more likely to remember the first thing and last thing you say and your hook can help "brand" you as the go to person for your particular product or service. Make your hook different, but easy to remember. Keep it simple. Using your companies' slogan is ok, as is rhyme for effect. Keep in mind that you want to be remembered in a positive way so don't make it too funny or off the wall.

Common Mistake #2."Selling to your audience"

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In many cases your audience includes your referral partners. Your mission should be to educate your referral partners in stead of selling to them. People join referral network to get referral not be sold to. Make sure you remove or change the words "you and yours" when ever possible to something else. Don't use phrases like "everyone in this room can use this"! Change the sentence from you need to buy this to; "so when you customers does xyz, tell them about me and my service/product". Sell to their customer not to them.

Common Mistake #3. "Not saying your Name".
Image by Getty Images via @daylifeIt is important that you always say your name when presenting. I often hear members of various net working organization say things like, "You All know me" at the beginning of their sales manager minutes. Although this may be true, often times there are people in the room who don't know you. These "visitors" to your net work meeting are clueless to who you are. They could very well need your product or service and with out your name in hand, they may have to leave with out being able to connect with you. Get use to saying your name every time you present and you will never miss an opportunity with a visitor.

Common Mistake #4. "Going to short!"
It is important that you use every second of your time when doing a 60 second presentation. You did pay for that time didn't you? Would you go to a radio station and pay for a 60 second commercial and be happy when you only get 30 second of air time? No way! Create 60 second presentation, (or what ever time frame you are given). Use the whole amount of time allotted. So remember this. If you meet 50 times a year you only get 50 minutes a year for this type of advertising. If you're in a BNI chapter don't waste these precious moments. If you're in any other networking organization the same goes for you!

Common Mistake #5." Going too long!"
Image via WikipediaIf your sales manager minute goes too long, you quickly start to lose credibility with your audience. "Going to long", is being disrespectful of the other time. It also makes you look unprepared and unprofessional. Rehearse and time your 60 second presentations. Take advantage of the spot light you're given.

In my next segment I will discuss 5 more common mistakes made during 60 second presentations. Each segment will cover 5 or 6 topics. All of these common mistakes affect you're ability to get qualified referrals from the people you meet. Eliminating these common mistakes will greatly increase your result and land you that dream referral you've been looking for. Until then, work on these and let me know how it's helping you. If you would like to know more about this subject, visit my free blog to read several other articles covering word of mouth marketing.

That's my opinion, what's yours.

Hector Cisneros is an entrepreneur/businessman with over 25 years experience, is a 17-year veteran of BNI, and was BNI Director for 6 years. Currently he manages 3 businesses, writes and coach's business people in the art of Word of Mouth and internet marketing. He has several intl. published articles covering word of mouth marketing, social media marketing and how to improve your 60-second presentations. His new book "60 Seconds to Success" is aimed at helping business people make great first impressions and make more money through referral and word of mouth marketing. To learn more about Social Media, Internet Marketing and Word of Mouth Marketing visit the Networkers Apprentice workshop at http://networkersapprentice.com/ To contact Hector write him at hecisneros@gmail.com

Three Common Mistakes Business People Make When Using Social Media

Feel lost about using social media as a marketing tool. Are you afraid of violating net etiquette. Are you worried that these mistakes can ruin your reputation or brand? Do you want to avoid the most common mistakes business make when using social media? If so, read on and learn about how to avoid three of the most common mistakes.

Common Mistake #1 Posting commercials on the pages.

The most common mistake I see is business owners posting commercials on their face book pages. This is also a common problem in other social media sites like Twitter and LinkedIn. This ranks high on my mistake list because it violates one of my cardinal rules of social media marketing. The rule I'm referring to is "give people what they want". I don't know anyone who signed up for Face Book, Twitter or LinkedIn to be bombarded by your infomercials.

Social media is about being social not selling. The best way to sell on social site is not to sell. Social media is best used it to build your credibility, understand your customers and to connect with them. Do a good job for your customers. Get them to follow, friend, or connect with you and have them promote your business, product or service for you. This is usually done by asking them to provide you with written recommends or testimonials. When you say something about your business, product or service it a commercial and most people are jaded by all the hype they're exposed to each day. When a friend, customer or follower says something good about your business, product, or service, it's viewed as true. Don't hesitate to ask for endorsements. Make sure your don't ask publicly on your social media pages. Write your customers and follower directly. If they feel you have done a good job they will respond in kind.

The best place to post a commercial about your business is in the detail section of your profile. Many social media site also offer the option of setting up separate business pages. Put your infomercials on these pages instead of posting them to your wall.

Common Mistake #2 Posting too often.

Another big mistake I see is when a business post too often to their site. This is usually easy to spot. You will see two, three even four of their post before seeing one of their followers posts. Make sure your posts are spread out. If you do all your social media posting at a specific time of the day, use an aggregators program to schedule your post to show up at different times.

Two of the top aggregators programs are Hoot Suite and Tweet Deck. These programs will allow you to spread out your posting by scheduling them at different times. I usually keep at least an hour between my scheduled post, just encase traffic is light that day. Remember the last thing you want to see on your wall is all of your post. Leave room for your followers and they will like your site even more.

Common Mistake #3 Posting inappropriate material.

The last item I will mention in this article is posting the wrong kinds of material. I know what your thinking. Who died and made me the content czar. I may not be the content czar but I am a prudent businessman. I am smart enough to always be respectful of my customers feelings and ideas. I am willing to post links to controversial articles in areas that I am passionate about, but I do set very specific limits on what I feel is appropriate. I make sure anything I post is on worse than PG. I avoid sexually oriented material. I also avoid any material that uses vulgar or racially explicated language. If kids can view my pages and post without being offended, I am happy.

Along these lines, I also monitor the followers and friends who are posting to my pages. If their posts violate my sense of what is appropriate I hide their post. In some cases, if they consistently post items that violate my sensibility I un-friend them. If they are on Twitter, posting in a negative way or being vulgar, I un-follow them. If your site is showing content that you or your customers feel is inappropriate, make sure it's gone, otherwise you are giving tacit approval to those posts and you will lose customers.

That's it, we've covered three of the top mistakes that businesses make when using social media as a marketing tool. As a summary, remember this. It's important to avoid posting commercials to your sites. Social media is not about selling. It's about fun, friendships, entertainment, connecting and useful information. Instead, take care of your customers and encourage them to be your raving fans by posting recommendations and testimonials on your pages. Post all commercial information to a dedicated business page or in your profile detail. Next, avoid posting too often. Your post should only show up interspersed between your followers posts. Use scheduling software to spread out your posts so they give your followers space. And lastly, avoid posting inappropriate material. Links to controversial articles can be OK, but stay away for sexually suggestive, negative, racially oriented or post using vulgar language. This goes for your followers as well. If they are stepping out of bounds, you need to either hide their post or un-friend/follow them.

That's my opinion, I welcome yours.

Hector Cisneros is an entrepreneur/businessman with over 25 years experience, is a 17-year veteran of BNI, and was BNI Director for 6 years. Currently he manages 3 businesses, writes and coach's business people in the art of Word of Mouth and internet marketing. He has several intl. published articles covering word of mouth marketing, social media marketing and how to improve your 60-second presentations. His new book "60 Seconds to Success" is aimed at helping business people make great first impressions and make more money through referral and word of mouth marketing. To learn more about Social Media, Internet Marketing d Word of Mouth Marketing visit the Networkers Apprentice workshop at http://networkersapprentice.com/ To contact Hector write him at hecisneros@gmail.com

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How to Make Your 60-Second Presentations Sizzle

Great 60-second presentations all contain elements that capture your audience's attention. There are words that seem to have almost a magical air to them. Others carry lots of emotion and some just motive others to action. In this article, I will cover several of these magical words and other essential elements that you must have if you want your 60-second presentation to sizzle.

First of all, what do I mean by sizzle. My definition of a sizzling 60-second presentation is a presentation that captures the audience attention, hold it like a vice and then move that audience to act on your behalf. Now that we are on the same page as to what I mean by sizzle, here are five items that will bring more sizzle to your 60-second presentations.

Get your Audiences Attention.
The first element you have to add to your 60-second presentations is something that will get your audience's attention. I call this first element "the opening salvo". My favorite technique is to ask relevant question or ask a riddle. I often start out with the words; "Did you know", then ask a question usually tied to some current event or sensational headline. These headline usually grab a persons attention because of the words used in them are dynamic and emotional. An example might be; did you know that last year more than 80,000 people in the US had been hospitalized because they used Tylenol? I would then go on to tell the punch line, which then allows me to transition in to my own emotionally charged story. The key point here is to grab the audiences' attention with "opening salvo". This grabs your audience's attention and gives you the momentum to move into your story. Your story has to be related to your "opening salvo" in some way for this to work. By using, the right words in your story you will be able keep your momentum and their attention.

Use Emotionally Charged Words
The second thing you must make sure you do is use emotionally charged words through out your 60-second presentation. This allows you to keep their attention all the way to the end where you will empower them to act on your behalf. I have done a lot of research to find which words carry the most emotionally charged weight. These words can carry both a positive or negative charge. You want to use words that primarily have positive connotations. Here are a few of the word I use in my stories; Easy, Healthy, Love, Safety, Proven, Results, Guarantee, and Excited. There are many others highly emotionally charged words that are not listed here. I devote a whole chapter in my book to this subject. Check out 60-Second To success if you want to learn more about these magical words. The point to remember is that positive words draw people to you and negative word push people away. Both types of emotionally charged words will hold your audiences attention. Make sure your words are nudging them it the right direction.

Be Focused
Third, you need to make sure that your message is focused and has a specific outcome. If you try to ask for a half dozen different types of referrals, you will lose your audience and most of them will not know what you're really looking for. On the other hand, if you only ask for one very specific referral, your message will be easy to follow and your audience will stay with you longer. Another advantage of being specific is that your audience/referral partners do not have to mentally work as hard to find you referrals. By being specific, you have done most of the hard work for them. Keep your message focused and specific. Being specific will always be terrific.

Empower your Audience
Forth, your task is to empower your audience. You empower them by giving them specific directions on what to do when they recognize your referrals. If you want your audience to have the referral check out your website, tell them to do this. If you want them to set and appointment with you, ask for that. If you are trying to get your referral partners to ask your prospects to meet with you, ask them to get permission from the prospect for you to call. Ask that they give the prospect your card. Giving your audience clear and specific instructions empowers them to act on your behalf. Add this piece to every 60-second presentation and your referral numbers will go way up, especially if you are not doing this now.

Use a Catch Phrase to be Remembered
The fifth and last element that will give your 60-second presentation sizzle is to make sure you end your presentation with a memorable catch phrase or memory hook. Memory hooks should make you stand out in a positive way. They need not rhyme, but should be unique to you if possible and easy to remember. Using memory hooks is a way of branding your special talents, skills or product. This is important because good catch phrases will trigger a conditioned response to remember you. You should pop into the listeners' head anytime your memory hook "plays". Memory hooks, catch phrases, slogans and jingles are all branding elements. Make sure you are using memory hooks to brand yourself in a positive way. This will definitely increase your recognition and get you more referrals.

Using these five techniques will radically transform your 60-second presentations for bland to bam, from dull to dynamic, from so-so to sizzling. Word of mouth marketing is more that just meeting and greeting people at business events. Being systematic, prepared and professional will increase your credibility. If you use attention-getting headlines like my opening salvos, emotionally charged words to maintain momentum, a focused easy to follow story, ask for a specific out come and use a unique memory hook, your 60-second presentations will take you to the next level. Using these techniques in your presentations will all add up to better communication, more visibility more credibility and before long more profitability. Best of all you will have more fun and have less stress and closed more business.

That's my opinion, what's yours?

Hector Cisneros is an entrepreneur/businessman with over 25 years experience, is a 17-year veteran of BNI, and was BNI Director for 6 years. Currently he manages 3 businesses, writes and coach's business people in the art of Word of Mouth marketing. He has several intl. published articles covering word of mouth marketing and how to improve your 60-second presentations. His new book "60-Seconds to Success" is aimed at helping business people make great first impressions and make more money through word of mouth marketing. To get a FREE PREVIEW of his book, 60-SECONDS TO SUCCESS", Sign up for his blog at http://networkersapprentice.blogspot.com/. Email us when you have signed up and he will send you the free preview. Friend us on face book at http://www.facebook.com/pages/60-Seconds-To-Success/182027141821361?v=wall To contact Hector write him at hecisneros@gmail.com

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Success Secret for Social Media Connecting

Would you really like to connect with your friends, family, co-workers even customers? Do you want to avoid your followers un-friending you because you inadvertently broke a secret social media rule? Do you want others to like you and take the time to learn about you or your product? For a business, being "followed" and "liked" is a necessity. With social media the rule is simple; no followers, no business. If you want to stay connect to the world through social media read on and follow these four secrets of successful social media connecting.

Image via Wikipedia

Success Secret #1 Be a giver not a taker.

 If you want people, friends and customers to like you give them a reason to do so. If you find a person with a magnetic personality you will usually find someone who give freely of themselves. They share their knowledge and give away the secrets for their success. People who are givers act like magnets. People follow them because they have something to offer. If you are offering (i.e. posting) useful articles and information, fun and entertaining links, posting personalized photos and connect by replying and engaging your connections, you too will become magnetic.



 Success Secret #2 Be proactive Reach out to others first.

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeIf you want to catch the worm you have to be the early bird. Most importantly, you have to be the proactive bird. Be proactive when connecting with your followers and friends. Don't wait for them to contact you. You be the first to extend a hand. Remember their birthdays if you have it. Send those old photos from school or others events. Send them articles directly without posting it to your site. Proactively make things personal and actively engaging. If you wait for others to connect with you, your results will be poor at best and not very satisfying. This goes doubly for businesses. Thanks your customers for following you, send them discount coupons (or links to some), on their birthday and anniversaries. Be proactive and you have a real chance of making your friends and customers happy they know you.

Success Secret #3 Be positive

Image via WikipediaSocial Media follows' life's rules very well. If you want to attract others, be positive. Nobody likes a social curmudgeon. Don't be telling the world your problems, at least don't air your dirty laundry and gossip on your pages. This will give you the kiss of dead and get you un-liked and un-followed faster than you can say face book. If life has dealt you a bad hand, take this time to figure out a way to turn your problem into a positive experience. Add related causes to your face book page. Start a non-profit fund raiser. Start tweeting about how others solved their problems and connect with like mind individuals in the online community. I'll bet that your search for a positive outlet results in something that turns your attitude around. Being positive never hurt anyone. On the other hand being negative has scared more people away than most natural disasters that have occurred. Be positive and attract followers.

Success Secret #4 Give credit where credit is due.

Image via WikipediaHave you ever done a good job for someone and nobody said anything about it? Not even a thank you! Here is another great place where you can stand out and get noticed. Take time and recognize others. Helping others is easy. If you know someone who did a great job on something, post an Atta boy about that accomplishment. If someone did a great job for you make sure you post a recommendation or better yet a testimonial for them. This is critical if your in business and have strategic partners. Taking care of your partners should be one of your highest priorities. There are dozens of occasions you can congratulate your connections. Wedding, birthdays, graduations, promotions, successful events, vacations, you name it. The list could be endless. Do yourself a big favor and think about all those individuals and businesses that have helped you out when you needed them. Now go to their social media site and let them know how much you appreciate them.

In this article, I have listed 4 of my secrets for successfully connecting with my social media world. I first pointed out the importance of being a giver and not a taker. To be viewed as a giver you must actively provide useful, fun and entertaining material. I also expressed the importance of being proactive. You can't wait for others to come to you. You have to be the person who actively reaches out to connect with them. No one reaches a high level of success by waiting for the right things to happen. Third, I talked about the importance of being positive. It's a fact. Normal folks run from those who act and speak in a negative way. On the other hand, most people are attracted to those who portray a positive outlook. It is said that positive people attack and negative people repel. Be positive and attract followers. The last item I talked about is the importance of giving recognition to others. This is extremely important for businesses that want to be successful with social media marketing. A businesses connection with the outside world is built on taking care of the customer. Making the customer feel good about themselves is a sure fire way to get them to say good things about you. Take every chance you get to reap praises on your followers, especially your strategic partners. Use these secrets wisely. Not following their universal principle will reap massive amounts of bad karma in your direction. Avoid the fall out by following these not so secret rules and grow your following.

That's my opinion I welcome your.

Hector Cisneros is an entrepreneur/businessman with over 25 years experience, is a 17-year veteran of BNI, and was BNI Director for 6 years. Currently he manages 3 businesses, writes and coach's business people in the art of Word of Mouth and internet marketing. He has several intl. published articles covering word of mouth marketing, social media marketing and how to improve your 60-second presentations. His new book "60 Seconds to Success" is aimed at helping business people make great first impressions and make more money through referral and word of mouth marketing. To learn more about Social Media, Internet Marketing and Word of Mouth Marketing visit the Networkers Apprentice workshop at http://networkersapprentice.com/ To contact Hector write him at hecisneros@gmail.com

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Six Cardinal Rules for Success in Social Media Marketing

Image via CrunchBaseYou've heard everyone talking about how powerful social media is for marketing your business. How if you're not using it to market your business you're is stuck in the 80's. So you go out and create a Face Book page, open a LinkedIn account, start tweeting on twitter, build a Blog and start looking at You Tube. Now what do you do?

You're told by a friend to post snippets about your businesses and create a blog post about things you know, (although you're not sure what a blog is). You start to share information on various sites in the evening and before you know it. Bam, you're spending dozens of hours a week and getting nothing to show for your efforts. You say to yourself, what a pain in the neck social media marketing is!

If you want to avoid the pain of spending too much time posting to social media sites and not getting anything in return, then read on. I will show you a half-dozen cardinal rules you need to abide by to keep your credibility. I will show you how to avoid the most common pit falls beginners make, and I'll help you get the most from the time you spend marketing to your social media sites.

Social Media is not Advertising

Image via WikipediaFirst, remember that social media posts are not advertisements in the typical sense. You need to post what I call the cardinal 4 wanted items! People are looking for useful information. They want interesting facts. Participants want to be entertained and they want to connect with others! Posting information about your product/service should be a rarity. To be successful on social media, you have to give participants what they are looking for. If you want to do conventional advertising on social media sites, use their pay-per-click/view services. Their ads run about $1 to $3 per click through, other wise posts only the cardinal 4 items.

Create and stick to a schedule

Image via WikipediaSecond, set aside a scheduled time to post your information and stick to it. It's all too easy to sit down, start posting your information and before you know it, it's three AM! I schedule my post twice a week and spend an hour each time. During the week, I gather useful information and links from my daily life. These include; email communications, my current events, new and old photos I find, online article I read, RSS feeds I use, internet headlines I like and just surfing the net. I suggest you do the same. Use these as part of posting the cardinal 4 items I spoke of earlier.

Be patient and stick to your growth plan

Third, don't create false expectations for your results. Before your network can produce meaningful traffic, you need it to grow to a reasonable size. Having a total following of a couple of hundred Face Book Fans, contacts on LinkedIn and followers on Twitter is cool but it not a big enough network to produce powerful results. Your social media influences (i.e. power to make things happen), is directly related to the number of members in your network. Social media has a viral quality to it. In this sense, it is a type of word of mouth marketing. Word of mouth depends on your credibility and the size of your network.

Save time by using aggregator software

Forth, you must leverage technology to save time. If you are not using aggregator software for your post, start using one today. Aggregator programs allow you to post to several social media site simultaneously. They also let you schedule post at future dates. These programs can save you lots of time and energy. I personally like Tweet Deck and Hoot suite. Search for them on the web and you will find they are free to use.

How big is big enough

Image via Wikipedia

Fifth, if you are going to build a social network, you must have a goal. It's my experience that real power becomes readily apparent at about 1000 unique followers. I'm not saying that anything smaller is useless. However, real movement, powerful results start with your ability to influence 1000 plus people.

If you concentrate your efforts on building your social network by providing your followers with what they are looking for (i.e. the cardinal 4 items), your network will grow at a slow but steady pace. If you want it to grow faster, provide them with what feeds their needs more often. Post to your network every day if you have time. The more often and regular you post, the better. The only other way to make it grow faster is to either spend more time on growing it or pay someone else to spend more time growing it.

What does this cost

Sixth, you have to set financial limits. I know what you're saying. You're already spending too much time (and money), posting to social media sites. If you still find this to be too time consuming, hire a service to do your posts. They can be had for as little as $100 a week. It can also run you $2000 a month if you're wanting to grow big and fast all at the same time.

If you have, an organized method that you developed, you can hire a college student to enter your post for a lot less. As a marketing expert I can generate anywhere from about eight to twenty new followers per day. You can do the same by following my advice.

Image via WikipediaBy following these six rules you will get a lot more out of your social media marketing efforts. Remember to post the cardinal 4 items regularly. Create and stick to a schedule, even if you don't finish, stop posting when your hour is up. Set goals and limits for time and money your spending. Use aggregator tools to be more efficient and above all be patient. You know the saying. Rome was not built in a day, well that also goes for building your word of mouth social network. That will take some time also. Stick to your plan and before you know it, you will be ready to start harvesting rewards from your social media marketing campaign. That's my opinion, I welcome yours!

Hector Cisneros is an entrepreneur/businessman with over 25 years experience, is a 17-year veteran of BNI, and was BNI Director for 6 years. Currently he manages 3 businesses, writes and coach's business people in the art of Word of Mouth and internet marketing. He has several intl. published articles covering word of mouth marketing, social media marketing and how to improve your 60-second presentations. His new book "60 Seconds to Success" is aimed at helping business people make great first impressions and make more money through referral and word of mouth marketing. To learn more about Social Media, Internet Marketing d Word of Mouth Marketing visit the Networkers Apprentice workshop on a regular basis at http://networkersapprentice.com/ To contact Hector write him at hecisneros@gmail.com