The White Rabbit

Matt lays out a piece of advice he gives to clients about "seeding," or "planting," questions during the presentation, and Alper gives some feedback on whether Matt's is a good piece of advice or not.

Matt and Alper expound on choosing images for your presentations, including the idea that maybe, just maybe, a less-attractive photo might help you more than a more attractive photo. 

They also go into the need to distribute questions throughout the presentation, rather than saving them up for the famous "Questions?" slide at the end, and better alternatives to the traditional "Thank you" slide.

The conversation starts out with the impossibly handsome or beautiful "people" shown on website testimonials these days, and then turns into a general conversation about stock photography. When to use it and when to stay away? Is stock photography about stock photography, or is it about something else?

Matt and Alper, having given trainings on the 6 principles of persuasion, revisit a couple of those principles and ask themselves how their understandings of those principles have morphed over time.

Alper goes into three tools he uses a lot (remember, no PowerPoint, we have to take that one out), and his rabbit hole. His rabbit hole is a mean one. Even Matt heard about it and thought, "Oh, man, that's like Kryptonite!"

Matt goes into his love for Grammarly and his unfortunate relationship with Wordpress plugins. BTW, his words about Netflix just might help you defend yourself the next time your spouse says you watch too much TV.

Matt and Alper go into actionable items that normal people can use to make their presentations better, without hiring a fancy presentation coach or a dedicated visual designer just for them.

Matt and Alper venture further into the existential question that came up last week: Does anyone benefit from training, or should we all just go home? Fortunately for the training industry, the answer comes back that training is good for some, but a complete waste of time for others. Along the way, the debate winds through pro basketball players, catered lunches, and internal conviction.

Matt and Alper, joined by guest Andreas, dig into whether they should or should not be offering service guarantees. No definitive conclusion is reached. In fact, the debate explodes into a larger subject that will need to be addressed in future episodes. But for today's episode, they stick to the narrower subject of guarantees.

Alper continues the "Business of a Presentation Business" theme by outlining the milestones of his own business, including the evolution from his first slide design job for a Toastmaster, to life in the high-stakes world of entrepreneurial pitches.