In this episode of The Best Practices Show, Kirk speaks with image expert Janice Hurley about how to maintain your best image while meeting with clients remotely via Zoom and the like. They first discuss the general anxiety and uncertainty that most of us felt going into the first few weeks of the pandemic.

Janice explains that it starts with understanding your audience and showing them that you do care about what you look like, and how they see you. In addition to this, make sure that you are being thoughtful about your audio choices, too. Think about the space you’re in while on a Zoom call, and set up your environment to help make your audio and video as clear as possible. Take calls in a room that dampens the sound, for example, and keep the mic close to your mouth to boost clarity. You should think about lighting, too. Consider a ring light, and avoid lamps. Another tip is to use a separate, higher-quality webcam as opposed to the camera built into your laptop.

Janice then shares several examples of colleagues’ before and after photos once they had made changes to simplify and increase the quality of their Zoom audio and visuals. In most of these examples, the people in the screenshots made small changes to their hardware, their lighting, or the arrangement of the room to make it easier to focus while boosting attention and professionalism. Janice implores the listener to pay attention to ads and the stock photos that show people adapting to the Zoom call world. She suggests even taking a photo of your actual background and using that as a virtual background. The benefit here is you can brighten your background up and draw the attention of your viewers. And here are some background no-no’s: no blinds, no doors, and no busyness.

In closing, Janice talks about her workshops and who attended them. She really thought long and hard about whether she wanted to go back to work, but once she felt passionate about dentistry again, she got into it. She revamped her newsletter to dentists about how to magnify your “stage presence” in the industry. Now she runs these workshops for people around the world.

Main Takeaways:

We live in a new reality, but we still have old habits.

We have undervalued the visuals, so to speak.

You need to be consistent with your persona.

The most important thing for video is audio.

You need adequate lighting on your face.

The depth of your space is an important consideration, too.

Keep your background clean and uncluttered, if possible.

What you have to say will be more important than the visuals, but the visuals strongly communicate value.

Our visuals ultimately communicate respect.

Quotes:

“It seemed like no one else was saying the things I thought were really important.” (4:10)

“The photo that you put up for your Zoom profile should look just like the one that your audience sees when they pull it up for the meeting.” (7:20)

“If you’re on a Zoom call, there’s real value in understanding what you do have control over.” (10:50)

“We can be casual in what we wear, but as soon as we’re slouching...it becomes harder for our audience to focus.” (19:40)

“What determines your ability to use a virtual background is your computer’s memory capacity and updated software.” (24:00)

“A casual approach worked in the beginning, but now that it’s become a part of life, we need to make it feel like it’s work.” (30:15)

“Meetings in person are going to come back in some way, in some form.” (32:00)

Snippets:

Janice’s background. (3:00–4:45)

Why is this important? (7:00–9:45)

Where do we start updating our visuals? (10:15–11:00)

Have a “pre-Zoom” meeting to work out any audio/video problems. (16:00–18:00)

Male and female best practices. (26:45–28:00)

The future of Zoom conferences....