Home Archives for Seth Godin
July 10, 2008 Leave a Comment

The proper use of charts and graphs

Seth Godin wrote a very useful article, “The three laws of great graphs” on his blog today. Read it. And put a copy of this in the folder of materials for your next presentation. Keep it handy. Heeding Seth’s advice will payoff.

And that’s exactly what you want when you insert a chart or a graphic in your PowerPoint slide – a big payoff! Nothing less.

And… certainly nothing else. As Seth correctly points out – a PowerPoint slide, shown in a dark ballroom to 1,000 people, is not the time to point out nuances.

You want your audience to say (to themselves) “Aha! Now I see it. Now I get it. This really is a big problem!”

A picture is worth a thousand words – if used effectively. Let your graphic speak for itself. Let your audience see the big picture – for themselves!

A poor choice of graphs is like a bad joke. If you have to explain it … Better not to use it.

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007” is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

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Filed Under: PowerPoint, Powerpoint Techniques, Speaking Tagged: ,
March 30, 2008 Leave a Comment

The Magic of Hyper-Links

For some reason I missed this story when it was originally published in The Wall Street Journal:

“Borders Tries About-Face on Shelves” – by Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg

I am always on the look-out for stories on In-store merchandising, book publishing and bookstores. But I missed this one.

However, I stumbled across it via a series of hyper-links:

  1. A post on Seth Godin’s Blog – “Do you have” vs. “Do you want” which referenced…
  2. A post on the Brand Autopsy Blog – “Borders Reducing Its Borders” which was commentary on the original WSJ story about Borders Bookstores’ decision to:
    1. Place more of their books “face-out” on their shelves vs. the traditional “spine-out” style (common in libraries)
    2. This means cutting back on the number of individual titles stocked in each store by @ 10% (9,350 titles)
    3. Because when this new merchandising strategy was tested in a prototype Borders Bookstores, sales of the individual titles placed “face-out” increased by 9%

For anyone who has a life outside of book publishing, book selling and libraries this may seem like a “no-brain-er.”

“Some think the move is overdue. Unlike modern supermarkets, booksellers haven’t done enough to make books look attractive on the shelves, says John Deighton, editor of the Journal of Consumer Research.

“Breakfast cereals are not stocked end-of-box out,” he says. “You want to your product to be as enticing as possible. It’s a little bizarre that it’s taken booksellers this long to realize that the point of self-service is to make the product as tempting as possible.”

“To be as enticing as possible…” As in to pick up the book, look inside and decide to purchase it! Continue reading “The Magic of Hyper-Links” »

Filed Under: Business Communications, Business Practices, Customer Service, Merchandising, Sales Tagged: , , , , , , ,
March 29, 2008 Leave a Comment

It’s So Simple – That’s Why It Takes Hard Work

“My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way.”

– Ernest Hemingway

Great advice! Difficult to achieve. But I am working on it.

I am making a concerted effort to write in a more compact style. One that is better suited for blogs and for reading on-line. It requires a lot of work – just as anything worth achieving does.

As part of my study, I have been researching a variety of blogs.  One of the best is “Seth Godin’s Blog.” Simple, direct, compelling.

Click here to read his post on the difference between “urgency” and “importance.”

I mean no disrespect to Stephen Covey – he devoted 50 pages to explaining and illustrating this concept – but Seth captured the essence in just these few words:

“Add up enough urgencies and you don’t get a fire, you get a career. A career putting out fires never leads to the goal you had in mind all along.

I guess the trick is to make the long term items even more urgent than today’s emergencies. Break them into steps and give them deadlines. Measure your people on what they did today in support of where you need to be next month.

If you work in an urgent-only culture, the only solution is to make the right things urgent.”

Brilliant!

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Filed Under: Business Communications, Communications, Main Page Tagged: , , , , ,
March 28, 2008 1 Comment

The Benefits of Brevity

“I didn’t have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one.”

– Mark Twain

Actually, this is going to be a short post. I am going to share six of my favorite quotations on the topic of “brevity” with you. I will make the briefest of comments after each.

Tell me what you think – in a few words, please!

1) The opening quote by Mark Twain.

  • When writing an article or a speech, spend more time deciding what to take out than what to put in.
  • Edit – mercilessly!
  • Make you point, stick to it, support it and drive it home to your audience.
  • Easier said than done!

2) “The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.” – Thomas Jefferson

  • Edit – mercilessly!
  • Use a two syllable word rather than one with three.
  • History’s most memorable speeches use very few words:

3) “A speech should be as long as a piece of string – long enough to wrap up the package.” – Anonymous

  • Enough said!

4) “Anybody can have ideas – the difficulty is to express them without squandering a quire of paper on an idea that ought to be reduced to one glittering paragraph.” – Mark Twain

  • That is why I love and collect quotations.
  • Edit – mercilessly!

5) “If you can’t state your position in eight words or less, you don’t have a position.”– Seth Godin

  • And your audience won’t remember what you said.
  • And your audience won’t know what to do as a result.

6) “Be sincere. Be brief. Be seated.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

  • re: “Be seated.” Don’t talk yourself out of the sale!

OK – some tasty morsels to chew on.

Please share your favorite quotations with our readers. Just keep it short and to the point!

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Filed Under: Business Communications, Communications, Main Page, Public Speaking, Quotations, Speeches Tagged: , , , , , , ,
March 7, 2007 Leave a Comment

Communicate Effectively and Quickly

“If you can’t state your position in eight words or less, you don’t have a position.”

– Seth Godin

It is difficult to be brief. Try it! State your opinion in a few words as possible. How do you explain your business or service to a total stranger in just a few words – words that the stranger can easily understand? It is a tough task, isn’t it? And yet, increasingly that is what we have to do to retain current customers and to attract new ones. To be noticed – to stand out from the crowd – to move people to take action we must master the art of brevity.

One of the best business summaries I know came from Charles Revson, the founder of Revlon Cosmetics. He said:

“In the factory we make cosmetics, in the store we sell hope.”

Brilliant! All in twelve words. And they are the “right words” because they work. The listener can clearly understand the process and visualize the outcome. The outcome for each customer will be unique because each will define “hope” in their own way.

Will that “hope” renew, revitalize, rejuvenate, restore, rekindle or reinvent? Each customer will choose one or more of these answers – and probably one or more of Revlon’s cosmetics. Being brief, concise and “on-target” has a real payoff.

A few days ago, I wrote an article titled, “The Long and the Short of It.” I commented on the enjoyment and benefit I got from a new book by Dr. Frank Luntz – “Words that Work: It’s Not What You Say, It’s What People Hear.” Buy this book! Put it’s principles into practice. Reap the rewards! “Renew, revitalize, rejuvenate, rekindle, reinvent” is one of Luntz’s “Twenty-one words and phrases for the Twenty-first Century.” They work.

How am I planning to put this principle into practice? Follow this scenario: Continue reading “Communicate Effectively and Quickly” »

Filed Under: Associations, Business Communications, Consulting, Main Page, Marketing, Public Speaking, Small Business Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,