Professional athletes watch game film over and over again. Tom Brady, LeBron James, and Sidney Crosby all watch game film, even though they are arguably the best in their respective sports.

And yet, one of the most overlooked but incredibly valuable opportunities we have as speakers, coaches, and consultants is to watch our own ‘game film’. When was the last time you recorded yourself during a podcast interview? How often do you watch a video recording of your talks as a speaker? Have you ever taken a video of yourself giving a sales presentation?

The next opportunity you get, take a video of yourself during a presentation. Whether it’s a sales meeting, a breakout session, a podcast interview, or even a conversation with a client, record yourself and then watch and take notes.

If this is the first time you’ve done this, be prepared to see some cringeworthy moments. Don’t worry though, this is a great opportunity to improve. Give yourself some grace and work to improve from recording to recording.

What’s even better is that there’s a chance your competition isn’t watching their game film. While they’re busy relaxing, you’re busy building momentum to serve your Market better than they ever will. It’s because you took the time to learn from your game film.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

There’s a reason why people are landing on your sales pages, clicking on your Facebook ads, going through your Messenger sequence, and opening your emails.

They’re curious, but why are they curious? More importantly, how do you drive more curiosity in your content?

Every headline or subject line you send or share needs to pique your Market’s curiosity.

Is it different enough that they’ll keep reading? Is it challenging one of their deeply held beliefs that they want to see what you believe? Is it opening a new door in a direction they want to explore? Is it intriguing enough that they think you may be crazy and they’re curious to see if you truly are crazy?

All of these questions are tied to curiosity. Creating well-written content starts with answering the question: what would make this interesting or curious to my audience? Answer that question, and you’ll win their attention.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

I love watching lessons from Master Class on masterclass.com. One of the more popular promotions features the classic comedian Steve Martin talking about what it takes to do comedy well.

Martin says a line that jumped out to me the first time I ever watched his promo video. He talks about aspiring comedians asking him how to get an agent, how to get comedy gigs, etc. What Martin truly wishes they would ask first is “How do I become good at my craft?”

As speakers, coaches, consultants, and communicators, it’s easy to fall into this same trap. We can focus on how to get more clients, charge more, and build our businesses without wondering the fundamental question: “How do I become even better at my craft?”

That’s my challenge for you this week. What’s one step you can take this week to become even better at your craft? Focus on improving your skill set, and I guarantee the rest of those details will fall into place.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

Multiple studies on copywriting and marketing engagement show us that the average reader gives a sales page only five seconds to catch and keep their attention. Five seconds! That’s all the time you have before the average reader clicks away or closes your website. That’s shorter than the attention span of a goldfish, which is closer to eight seconds.

It’s no secret nor a surprise that the headline for your sales page is your best chance at catching and keeping your audience’s attention.

The legendary copywriter David Ogilvy said, “On average, five times as many people read the headline as they read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.” 

As a rule of thumb, whether it’s writing the headline for your new online course, your mastermind program, coaching program, digital product, even the subject line for your next email campaign, write at least 10 different headlines and then, see which ones jumps out to you.

Invest as much effort into writing the headline as you do in writing the rest of your sales page. The payoff is worth it if you can catch and keep your audience’s attention in the first five seconds.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

One of the best practices you can include as a speaker is giving your audience a window to find themselves in the stories you share.

Whenever I share at an event, no matter the size, no matter the setting, no matter the story, I love asking some form of this question after sharing with my audience.

“Have you ever felt that type of (insert a name of an emotion) before?”

It’s a simple, profound question because your audience is already feeling some form of emotion as they experience your story. What this question does is it names the emotion your audience is already starting to identify with that story, whether it’s joy, fear, frustration, agony, whatever it may be.

By naming that emotion, I affirm that my audience is on the right track and gives them permission to feel that emotion even more. Cognitively, that allows my audience to identify they’re connecting with my message, but more importantly, it starts to release the brain chemicals of dopamine and oxytocin that affirm they’re in the right place and found what they were looking for, which is they found the right place to connect their story with mine.

Your audience wants to have that same experience. So, the next time you're presenting, ask your audience, “Have you ever felt that way before?”

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

One of the problems I see over and over again with speakers, coaches, and consultants is focusing on people who aren’t your target Market.

A client of ours recently shared that she was upset at what someone posted in response to her new set of Facebook ads. I get it - people can be brutal with their comments online. What jumped out to me is that as we talked about what this person said, our client mentioned to me, “I don’t know why I’m so worked up about this because they’re not even someone I’m wanting to reach.”

We let her comment hang in there for a second before I repeated it back to her. This person who made an awful comment in response to a new Facebook ad wasn’t even part of our client’s target Market. Then, who cares what they said? We still talked about that comment to see if there was any validity to it, but in the end, we recognized it was wasting energy thinking about someone who wasn’t part of the crowd our client wants to serve.

My encouragement for you today is to stop wasting time focusing on people who aren’t your target Market. Even if they do love what you’re sharing, focusing on the wrong crowd means you won’t feel nearly as fulfilled as when you’re serving the right crowd. This is your permission slip not to make everyone happy, and that’s a very good realization.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

Can I make a confession? I don’t love the way my voice sounds on audio, and that’s okay. My vocal profile, to use an audio term, is not very dynamic, so my voice doesn’t have the movement and emotion that we may expect from radio hosts or emcees. Compared to a lot of singers, podcasters, and interviewers, my voice pales in dynamics.

And yet, I’m asked to interview people, be the host for different events, and largely, be the one introducing new opportunities and guiding the conversation.

It comes down to the fact that it doesn’t matter what your voice sounds like. It’s about what your voice actually says that matters. 

It doesn’t matter that much how you look on screen. It matters more how you show up for your audience with a powerful message. I’ve said this before, and I truly want to drive this home for you today: your message matters. Your message matters. Don’t let how you look, how you sound, or anything about you physically keep you from sharing your Message with the right crowd. 

Your message matters, so get out there and share your Message with the world that needs to hear what you have to say today.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

If you’re giving a presentation, whether that’s on camera or in front of a live audience, it’s helpful to use your linear spacing on the stage or the screen.

Let’s say you have three main points in your message. For the first point, use the right side of the stage or stage right as we used to say when I did theater productions. This is still to your right, the camera’s left, if you’re facing a camera. Use your hands or even your body’s positioning to emphasize the right side of the stage or camera screen.

For your second point, move to the middle of the stage or screen. Again, use your hands or body to emphasize you’re in the middle of your stage or screen, which also telegraphs to your audience that you’re in the middle of your talk.

Then, for your third and final point, move to your left, the audience’s right, to emphasize that third point. Now, if you have more than three points, four, five, however many you have, you can divide up your screen or stage the same way, and use the linear spacing to delineate where you are in your presentation.

This gives a subconscious timeline for your audience to follow and they will stay more engaged with your message from beginning to end.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

I recently took two weeks off to travel with my wife and kids. I owe you an apology for taking off without planning great content for you to enjoy while I was gone. That’s my fault, and I’m sorry.

Part of that time I was completely offline while fishing along the border between the U.S. and Canada. No tech, no alerts, no WiFi, nothing. It was incredibly refreshing as I got away from the noise.

What was most exciting to me was how much clarity I felt about my message. We live in such a noisy world as it is with all of the notifications, interruptions, and devices vying for our attention. Your audience wants to know what they truly need to listen to in the din of all that noise.

That’s where your Message can give them clarity. Focus on identifying what your audience is searching for in the cacophony around them. The more effectively you can identify that core desire, the better your Message can cut through the noise and connect with the people you want to serve.

If you’re not sure how to cut through the noise, send me a message at [email protected] to start a conversation. Again, that’s [email protected]. Talk to you soon.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”

Today is about putting a bow on your Make-It-Matter Statement. Again, this has four parts:

The first part is your “I am…” positioning element, such as “I guide…” or “I am a champion of…” or “I serve…”

The second part is where we mention your specific target Market, such as a female executives or patients with chronic back pain under the age of 50.

Then, we add the third part, Sharing Your Superpower where you say what you do that shows the world that your greatest gift has a purpose and you’re using that purpose to serve your specific target Market.

Now, we end with the fourth part, the part with three simple words that make a profound difference. “So they can _________.”

What’s the primary benefit your audience will experience because of your superpower? Think about what’s keeping them up at night. What can’t they stop thinking about? What do they really want out of life? What does your superpower unlock for their future that they’re excited, maybe even desperate to experience right now?

This fourth part is the catalyst for this entire Make-It-Matter Statement. It doesn’t have to use the exact words “so they can,” but if you’re just getting started writing your statement, it’s helpful to use that term in your first version, “so they can” what?

Follow those four parts and share your new Make-It-Matter Statement on social media. Be sure to tag me at @keynotecontent and I’ll be happy to share my two cents.

The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing is presented by Jon Cook, founder of Keynote Content. Jon and his team help thought leaders, namely speakers, coaches, and consultants, craft and share their messages to better serve their audiences. Connect with Jon and his team at Keynote Content by visiting keynotecontent.com. You can subscribe to The Keynote Clarity for Thought Leaders Flash Briefing by visiting bit.ly/KeynoteClarity and enabling it there. Then, all you have to say is, “Alexa, what’s my flash briefing?”