Craft Your Perfect Summit Presentation

Jenn: 00:00:03

Welcome to Virtual Summit Success.

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I'm Jenn, founder of Virtual Summit Search, and you're in the right place

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if you want to make the most of your virtual summit experience, whether

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you're a host or virtual summit speaker.

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Let's get going with your next step to virtual summit success.

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You're listening to a snippet from a Sell With a Summit:

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Speaker Edition presentation.

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If you've struggled with how to craft a great summit presentation, Lucas is going

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to give you the options you need to choose the best presentation structure for you.

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Let's get started.

Lucas Zellers: 00:00:31

Hello!

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I hope you're enjoying Sell With a Summit: Speaker Edition so far.

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My name is Lucas Zellers.

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I'm here as a speaker who helps speakers and I want to take this part of the

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summit to help you with one of the...

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probably one of the first things that you have to think about when

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you are putting together your presentation for a virtual summit.

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Okay, so you have a bunch of ideas.

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You have a solution for people, a service they've never seen before, a

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product that's going to change their life, that's going to make it easier.

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How in the world do you put one idea after another, in a way that's

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compelling and interesting and is going to draw people into your service or

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your product or your family or however it is you organize your business?

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This is one of the first things that you have to think about when you are

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writing a speech and Aristotle would say that it's one of only five things,

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five canons of rhetoric is organization.

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How in the world do you organize a speech?

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You've probably gotten this advice: "you gotta solve a problem.

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You just gotta.

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That's how it is."

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And I don't want to put this down - this is pretty intuitive: you have

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a product or a service that solves a problem that fulfills a need for your

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customers, and so why wouldn't you talk about your business in this way?

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I'm going to give you two reasons, actually.

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One is that it's repetitive.

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I've heard this one before, and you probably have too; that's probably why

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you're thinking, "what else can I do?"

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I also want to challenge you that the reason you might feel dissatisfied with

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this is that it's not the whole story.

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Problem and solution come in the middle of a long series of other

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ways in which people prioritize and organize and evaluate information.

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So I'm going to give you seven other ways to organize your speech, your

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presentation that are going to be just as effective, just as engaging, and I

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would argue more so on both those counts.

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But before we get into that, I have to answer two questions for you, and

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they're the questions that I was asked by one of my directors in college

and I'm still asking myself these:

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why am I here, and why am I talking?

and I'm still asking myself these:

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Why in the world would you listen to me about this?

and I'm still asking myself these:

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Since the beginning of my professional career, I've been a singer, a radio

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host, a stage actor, a speech coach, a podcaster, and now a professor of

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communication adjunct at Cedarville University, and it is a long time

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coming and I'm very happy to start.

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In other words, just about every way that you can use your voice for fun or

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profit I've done on a near-professional level over the last 10 or 12 years.

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So I've seen a lot of speeches, I've judged a lot of speeches, a lot of

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really great ones, a lot of really bad ones - both ones that I've given

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and ones that I've sat through.

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So I'm going to take all of that experience and all of that time and

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save you the effort of sitting through all of those speeches and I want to

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show you other ways to organize a speech besides problem and solution.

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So we're going to start with story.

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You might be familiar with this from Donald Miller's Storybrand, the

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"clarify your message" way of organizing your marketing and your business.

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His work is indebted to Joseph Campbell's "Hero of a Thousand

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Faces," itself based on Carl Jung's idea of psychological archetypes.

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If all of that sounds like mumbo-jumbo, I guarantee you've seen

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this before because it's Star Wars.

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And if you haven't seen Star Wars...

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how?

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I'm genuinely impressed and I hope you never do.

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But it's enough to know that Joseph Campbell's hero's journey, on which

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the StoryBrand idea is built, has as many as 17 different steps,

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depending on how you count it.

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By contrast Dan Harmon story circle has eight, so I'm going to take the same

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idea of story and do it in only eight points that are a way of organizing your

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speech and helping position yourself as a guide to the power of the unknown.

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Okay, so it's a circle.

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It's got eight points on it.

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It looks like this.

The points are as follows: 00:04:27

one, a character is in a zone of comfort - that's

The points are as follows: 00:04:32

where you begin, it's your home, it's the Shire, it's the moisture farm on Tatooine.

The points are as follows: 00:04:37

But they want something - to take the ring back to Mordor, to go on an

The points are as follows: 00:04:41

adventure, to actualize themselves, to solve a problem in their business.

The points are as follows: 00:04:46

Alright, that's point 2.

The points are as follows: 00:04:48

We're here.

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So they enter an unfamiliar situation They adapt to it.

The points are as follows: 00:04:54

They get what they wanted.

The points are as follows: 00:04:56

They pay a heavy price for it.

The points are as follows: 00:04:59

And then return to their familiar situation - and this is the

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important part - having changed.

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The other reason that I like this story circle over Joseph Campbell's

The points are as follows: 00:05:08

work - other than the fact that I hear about it entirely too much - is

The points are as follows: 00:05:11

that as a circle, we can divide it into halves and then quarters.

The points are as follows: 00:05:15

But the half, for your purposes as a business owner, is the important part,

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because this is the divide between the familiar world and the unfamiliar world.

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I've heard it said that there are only two stories that have ever

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the journey of adventure, and a stranger comes to town.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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what you know, and what you

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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don't; what's familiar to you and what's unfamiliar to you.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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And in the unfamiliar world where there be monsters, that's where the power is.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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That's where where you go to learn things and change and come

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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back with power you don't have.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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If you keep doing what you're doing, you'll keep getting what you've got,

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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so you'd go to the unfamiliar world.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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So your challenge when you're putting a speech together is to

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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organize it in such a way that you are a part of the unfamiliar world.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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You're going to give something back to your audience that they can return to

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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their familiar world with having changed.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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The other way that you can use this is to think about where are people

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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in the story, because if they haven't gotten to the point where they've

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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recognized that they want something and you give them a problem immediately,

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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then you haven't been effective.

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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So a problem-solution here doesn't work for people who know

Both of those deal with a threshold:

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they're in a zone of comfort.

So think about it: 00:06:25

where in their journey is your customer and

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where do you want them to get?

So think about it: 00:06:32

How much ground do you have to cover?

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Do you have to hit all eight of these things?

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Probably not, given the context of the presentation, the

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place where you're presenting.

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But you should hit some of them and you should definitely structure this

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so that you are part of the unfamiliar world where power is gained, and then

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you can give that to your listener.

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So that's one way of of organizing your speech - the story circle.

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The second way is A Plot/B Plot.

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And it's telling two stories at once.

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So we're building in the story circle idea and adding another story to your speech.

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The best example of this I think I can give you is this

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guy; this is Chris Hadfield.

So think about it: 00:07:11

He gave a Ted Talk a while back about what's the scariest

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thing you've ever done.

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His example, of course is far and away more intense, maybe, than any of us

will ever see: 00:07:23

he was on a spacewalk in a space suit and couldn't see well

will ever see: 00:07:28

enough to complete his mission in space.

will ever see: 00:07:30

So that's where he began his speech, with this fantastic story of where he

will ever see: 00:07:36

was about to be stuck in space without being able to get back into the shuttle...

will ever see: 00:07:41

and then he got to his point.

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Another great example is this book.

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:07:44

On Fairytales, Disability, and Making

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Space, and it's worth your time, but the subject of it really isn't my point.

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The way it was structured was to take a look at all of folktales over history.

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Just an overview of fairytales and how they're structured and how they

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portray people who have disabilities, people who are differently abled, people

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:08:10

with disfigurements, or handicaps; or however you want to say it.

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:08:14

And the way that those are presented in like Grimm's fairy tales.

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That's a lot, and it can be dry and kind of depressing, depending

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on how you come down on it.

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:08:28

So in order to make this work, she tells a fairy tale alongside her real

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:08:32

life literary analysis, a fairy tale in which the princess is not what

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:08:37

you would expect - blonde, blue-eyed, beautiful, able, rich, whatever.

s is Amanda Duke's Disfigured: 00:08:43

And it's the story of her own life and dealing with her own disability.

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:08:47

tell two stories at once, one on top of the

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:08:51

other, or start in the middle of one to get people's attention and

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:08:54

then tell your story from there.

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:08:56

And remember to go through those eight steps or however many of those

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:09:00

your audience is going to need.

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:09:02

The next couple of them kind of break away from stories, so those two come as a pair.

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:09:06

The next one is called comparative advantages - this or that.

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:09:10

This is a way of structuring your speech so that you can give information to

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:09:14

people, so that you can recognize your competitors and say why your business

So that's A Plot/B Plot: 00:09:19

or product might be different or gives people the thing that they're looking

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for, that power from the unfamiliar world.

Here's my example: 00:09:26

I use two different pieces of software to

Here's my example: 00:09:30

edit my podcast, Making a Monster.

Here's my example: 00:09:32

The one on the left is called Hindenburg Journalist.

Here's my example: 00:09:34

It's used by NPR professionals, it's very lightweight, it doesn't

Here's my example: 00:09:38

have a lot of bells and whistles.

Here's my example: 00:09:40

The one on the right is called Descript and it does video editing,

Here's my example: 00:09:44

audio editing, transcription, project management - the whole nine.

Here's my example: 00:09:49

And I use both of these for my podcast, but I love them both

Here's my example: 00:09:51

for very different reasons.

Here's my example: 00:09:53

So, which of those do you need?

Here's my example: 00:09:57

It depends.

Here's my example: 00:09:58

This is why comparative advantages is really powerful: you can recognize

Here's my example: 00:10:03

the needs that your audience has, provide them a solution that matches

Here's my example: 00:10:08

what they have, and you don't want to give them things that they don't need.

Here's my example: 00:10:14

Don't sell them Descript if they want Hindenburg and vice versa.

Here's my example: 00:10:20

On a very practical level, too, this gives you a way of organizing

your thoughts: 00:10:23

let's talk about this thing and then this thing.

your thoughts: 00:10:26

So what are the features of this thing that this thing doesn't have, what

your thoughts: 00:10:29

are the ones that they don't have?

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So quite aside from the fact that this lets you organize your ideas in

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a way that has flow, that isn't just problem and solution, it has this sneaky

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comparative advantage of positioning you as the guide to this unfamiliar

your thoughts: 00:10:44

world of perhaps audio editing software.

your thoughts: 00:10:47

So that's our third way of organizing a speech: comparative advantage.

your thoughts: 00:10:52

Another way of organizing your speech is with distance, and by this, I

your thoughts: 00:10:55

don't mean necessarily geographical distance or physical distance.

your thoughts: 00:10:59

This is more psychological distance.

your thoughts: 00:11:01

It could be far away from me in space, like on the other side of the

your thoughts: 00:11:04

country; it could be far away from me in time, something that happened

your thoughts: 00:11:07

a while ago or has yet to happen.

your thoughts: 00:11:09

It could be distant from me socially in the people that I tend to

your thoughts: 00:11:14

interact, with my friends and family.

your thoughts: 00:11:16

And it could be conceptually distant or just kind of too abstract to be

your thoughts: 00:11:20

a part of my regular experience.

your thoughts: 00:11:24

You can organize your speech near to far along these dimensions, or far to

your thoughts: 00:11:29

near, depending on how you want to do it.

So here's my example for this: 00:11:31

I've been working on a project that looks

So here's my example for this: 00:11:34

at the stories of extinct species.

So here's my example for this: 00:11:37

It can be really difficult to connect with, especially when

So here's my example for this: 00:11:39

most of the information that you have looks kinda like this.

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This is a depiction of the passenger pigeon, probably one of the most famous

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extinct animals in North America.

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And this is a shooting of passenger pigeons that happened in Northern

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Louisiana - quite far away from where I live - it was drawn by Smith

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Bennett in 1875, quite a while ago.

So here's my example for this: 00:12:00

And it depicts a flight of passenger pigeons.

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And we know these from historical accounts to have been millions strong - numbers

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that we can't even really conceptualize, like, hold onto it or minds.

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Like, imagine a million of anything.

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At some point, that becomes a word and not a number that you have

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any real way of holding on to.

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This, however, is a picture that I took of one of the last passenger

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pigeon specimens in the world.

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This is a male.

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And it looks - by the museum director's own admission - not much

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better than a pile of feathers, and a ratty pile of feathers at that.

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I took this picture a week ago.

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I got this close to it.

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And I can't really describe to you what I felt because this distant idea of massive

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hoards, massive flocks of passenger pigeons that used to exist in the 19th

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century all over the country suddenly became something that was a few inches

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from my camera, just one of them at a place I can get to an hour's drive away.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:16

That's what I mean by closing psychological distance.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:19

So that's how you can organize your speech by distance.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:21

The closer it can be psychologically to your audience, the more

So here's my example for this: 00:13:25

effective it's going to be.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:27

I've talked about temporal distance, but I also want to give you time as a

So here's my example for this: 00:13:30

way of organizing your speech, and it's not cheating, I promise, because I don't

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mean closing a psychological distance or bringing something closer to me in time.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:39

What I mean is for this way of organizing a speech, life doesn't

So here's my example for this: 00:13:42

always follow a three-act structure.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:44

It is okay to just tell the story as it happens or tell a process

So here's my example for this: 00:13:50

as it is supposed to happen.

So here's my example for this: 00:13:51

Like, what do I do first?

So here's my example for this: 00:13:54

What happened first?

So here's my example for this: 00:13:57

When do I preheat the oven?

So here's my example for this: 00:13:59

My example for this is Griffin McElroy.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:01

If you don't know him, he's one third of My Brother, My Brother, and Me, the

So here's my example for this: 00:14:04

juggernaut of the podcasting industry.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:07

He's a games journalist and one of the founding members of Polygon, now

So here's my example for this: 00:14:10

an imprint of Vox, and he's also a Forbes 30 Under 30 media luminary.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:15

The most helpful thing that I ever saw from him was an address he

So here's my example for this: 00:14:18

gave at Florida State University.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:21

And it was just his story.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:22

How in the world did he get a full-time job as a podcaster

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starting in West Virginia.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:29

And he just told this story how it happened.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:32

There's an immense value to that, especially if your story is interesting or

So here's my example for this: 00:14:37

outside of the norm or something I might not ever get to experience on my own.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:43

You are allowed to just tell stories how they happen.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:45

You're allowed to just show me processes how they should happen.

So here's my example for this: 00:14:48

It's going to be way more real and personal and credible than problem

So here's my example for this: 00:14:52

and solution could be off the bat.

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Then finally, here's my curveball: all of the above.

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If you look back over at the presentation, I've just given, I've

So here's my example for this: 00:15:02

used a little bit of all of these in order to work through my material.

So here's my example for this: 00:15:09

It's okay to mix and match.

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And bonus points for those of you who can identify which are

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the ones that I've actually used.

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So that's the information that I've got for you.

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If you want to connect with me, you can find me on Twitter at @sparkotter.

So here's my example for this: 00:15:23

I tend to talk a lot about Dungeons and Dragons and how it interacts with the

So here's my example for this: 00:15:26

stories that we tell ourselves and the way that we share truth with each other.

So here's my example for this: 00:15:31

If that's interesting to you, you can find me on Making a Monster

So here's my example for this: 00:15:33

or wherever you get your podcasts.

So here's my example for this: 00:15:35

And you can also email me at lucas@virtualsummitsearch.com.

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I'd love to connect more with you, I'd love to hear some of the ways that you've

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organized your speeches if I haven't covered them or maybe walk through

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how you can take the content that you have and reorganize it along one of

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these schemes in order to have a more interesting and more effective speech.

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That's really my hope for you, and I hope that by going through these

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seven things, I can give you a piece or an idea of how to make that happen.

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So thanks for your time.

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Again, I hope you enjoy the rest of Sell With a Summit: Speaker Edition,

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and I hope to talk to you soon!

Jenn: 00:16:13

I hope this episode has sparked some ideas for you when it comes to

your Summit: 00:16:16

presentation structure for the full presentation, where Lucas

your Summit: 00:16:19

shares all seven of the options, as well as the other fantastic sessions,

your Summit: 00:16:23

go to sellwithasummit.com/speakeredition to get free access.

your Summit: 00:16:28

Which presentation structure stood out to you most, or do you have a different

your Summit: 00:16:32

presentation structure that you love?

your Summit: 00:16:34

I want to hear all about it, so share with us in the comments.

your Summit: 00:16:39

Thanks for listening to Virtual Summit Success.

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Don't forget to leave a review and let others know your biggest

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takeaways from this episode.

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Every review helps others find us, and the more successful virtual

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summits there are, the more tips we'll have to share with you.

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For show notes, links, and other resources, go to virtualsummitsuccess.live