How to Influence – In Just 7 Minutes with Diane DiResta

Resources/Links:

• Achieve the Next-Level of Leadership Success Now.Check-out: https://www.diresta.com/

Summary

You hope that you’ll have the confidence to speak like a leader. You hope that you’ll have the audience sitting on the edge of their seats. Then you remember that hope is not a strategy. Public speaking is a vital component of executive presence.

Diane DiResta coaches executives to be influential public speakers.

In this episode, Diane shares how she works with leaders to increase executive presence and influence through public speaking, become great presenters and transform everyday presentation skills into those that drive more business faster.

Check out these episode highlights:

• 01:29 – Diane’s ideal client: My ideal clients are leaders, primarily in corporations. I have worked with entrepreneurs, but most of my work is in corporations with leaders.
• 01:43 – Problem Diane helps solve: They need to be able to communicate with impact and influence and to do it with confidence and clarity. And when I say leader, you don’t necessarily have to be in the C-suite. You might be someone who’s also a coach or a consultant, but you’re leading your company and you need these speaking skills.
• 02:10 – Typical symptoms that clients do before reaching out to Diane: One of the things that’s very typical, even in leaders, is not getting to the point. I see people really get stuck in the weeds really bad for selling and for leading and for influencing. The other big mistake, well, they’re two, lack of focus, meaning they’re not really clear about their outcome. And the third one is they are speaker centered instead of listener centered, it’s all about me, myself and I. Not a good technique for selling or influence.
• 03:22 – Common mistakes people make when trying to solve that problem: They are all over the place. They’re not clear about who their audience is sometimes, they’re not clear about their message. And you can tell there’s no flow or structure to the message. And what I always say to people is delivery sits on structure. So, if you are well organized, that’s going to impact your delivery in a very positive way. So, the two go together. They’re a marriage, organization and delivery go together.
• 05:12 – Diane’s Valuable Free Action(VFA): Before you do anything else complete this sentence, “At the end of my presentation, the audience will blank.” The answer to that is your outcome. You have to be clear about your why.
• 06:17 – Diane’s Valuable Free Resource(VFR): Achieve the Next-Level of Leadership Success Now.Check-out: https://www.diresta.com/
• 07:37 – Q: “Can anybody be effective as a speaker, as a public speaker?” A: Gifted speakers are born but effective speakers are made. It’s a skill that anybody can learn. It’s simply taking an idea in your head and transferring it to someone else’s head in a way that they can hear it.

Tweetable Takeaways from this Episode:

“Gifted speakers are born but effective speakers are made. It's a skill that anybody can learn. It's simply taking an idea in your head and transferring it to someone else's head in a way that they can hear it.” -@speakingpro Click To Tweet

Info about our correspondent host: Travis has a background in sales, marketing, and strategy, and left the corporate world several years ago to start his own agency. As a copywriter by trade, his biggest skill is putting the right words, in front of the right people, at the right time. Travis has developed go-to-market strategies for grassroots apps to Fortune 500 and helped optimize up to $50k per day in Facebook Ad spend for one of the biggest startups in Asia.

Transcript
(Note, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)

Travis Bennett: 0:09
Hi everyone, and welcome to another edition of Marketing The Invisible. My name is Travis Bennett. I’m rocking it to you out of Yangon, Myanmar, proving you can build a successful business anywhere in the world. I’m joined today by Diane DiResta. Diane, a very, very warm welcome.

Diane DiResta: 0:23
Thank you. It’s great to be here, Travis.

Travis Bennett: 0:26
It’s a pleasure to have you. And where are you coming to us from today?

Diane DiResta: 0:29
From New York City, the financial district, downtown.

Travis Bennett: 0:33
Very nice. Very nice. That’s Suits, right, was all New York City?

Diane DiResta: 0:36
Suits, although I’m not wearing a suit, I’m in my dress today. I’m very comfortable.

Travis Bennett: 0:40
Very nice. Me too. I’m, I’m comfortable with this. For those of you who don’t know Diane, let me introduce her real quick. She’s a Certified Speaking Professional. She’s the founder and president of DiResta Communications. The author of Knockout Presentations, which is now in its third edition, and might just grab a coffee.

Diane DiResta: 0:57
Here it is, third edition everybody.

Travis Bennett: 0:59
Wow, there’s the book. And she, basically, she works with leaders to increase executive presence and influence. Diane, it’s great to have you on the show today. We’re going to be talking about, “How to Influence in Seven Minutes or Less,” and Diane’s going to explain everything, and you guessed it, seven minutes or less. Diane, I’m going to start our timer here because I couldn’t get that one to work.

Diane DiResta: 1:23
Okay, the pressures on.

Travis Bennett: 1:25
Pressure’s on. Question number one, who is your ideal client?

Diane DiResta: 1:29

My ideal clients are leaders, primarily in corporations. I have worked with entrepreneurs, but most of my work is in corporations with leaders.

Travis Bennett: 1:38
Perfect. And what’s the problem that you’re solving for these corporations and these leaders.

Diane DiResta:1:43

They need to be able to communicate with impact and influence and to do it with confidence and clarity. And when I say leader, you don’t necessarily have to be in the C-suite. You might be someone who’s also a coach or a consultant, but you’re leading your company and you need these speaking skills.

Travis Bennett: 2:00
Gotcha. And then six minutes, 18 seconds on the clock. We’re doing good. What are the typical symptoms that people experience when they’re not doing this the right way?

Diane DiResta: 2:10
All right. So, one of the things that’s very typical, even in leaders, is not getting to the point.

I see people really get stuck in the weeds really bad for selling and for leading and for influencing.

The other big mistake, well, they’re two, lack of focus, meaning they’re not really clear about their outcome. And the third one is their speaker centered instead of listener centered, it’s all about me, myself and I. Not a good technique for selling or influence.

Travis Bennett:2:36
Yeah, because people, they want to feel heard, right? They don’t want to be spoken or sold to.

Diane DiResta: 2:40
Absolutely, yeah, they don’t really care about your product or service. They care about their own self-interest. And a lot of times people lead, “Hi, today, I want to talk about my company and why you should use us. I want to talk about the greatest product since sliced bread.” We don’t care, do we? We care about ourselves. So, you need to, I show people a process called Listener Centered Communication that will allow you to organize and deliver a talk in seven minutes or less.

Travis Bennett: 3:08
Very cool, and very relevant to all the people listening in. So, five minutes on the clock, we’ve kind of touched on this a little bit. But what are the mistakes, the common mistakes that people usually make when they’re not doing this the right way in their organization?

Diane DiResta: 3:22
They are all over the place. They’re not clear about who their audience is sometimes, they’re not clear about their message. And you can tell there’s no flow or structure to the message. And what I always say to people is delivery sits on a structure. So, if you are well organized, that’s going to impact your delivery in a very positive way. So, the two go together. They’re a marriage, organization and delivery go together.

Travis Bennett:3:46
Gotcha. So, you get organized and then your delivery kind of sorts itself out.

Diane DiResta: 3:50
You know, and the other thing, yes, and the other thing is lack of confidence. That’s a big one. People are so nervous and so afraid. So, let me give you a quick tip everybody, get over yourself. It’s not about you, it’s about them, the audience. So, when you’re nervous, you’re really being self-centered, because it’s all about me, myself and I. “Oh, what if I trip? What if I lose my train of thought?” Forget it, I show people recovery strategies. So, whatever your worst nightmare is, you can recover from that.

Travis Bennett: 4:19
Wow. Well, that’s kind of reassuring, right? Because one of the things when you’re, you’re going on stage or you’re about to present or even if you’re doing a webinar, a podcast like this, you get butterflies in your stomach. When you’re putting your face in there, you get, you’re putting yourself out there. So being able to know that you’ve kind of got that toolkit of recovery strategies would be, yeah, it’s a powerful thing that you can boost your confidence a little bit when you are on stage.

Diane DiResta: 4:42
And here’s the other thing. That nervousness is just adrenaline, it’s a good thing. So, embrace it, we tend to resist it. It makes us more nervous. Just know, “Okay, just like a runner.” I’m getting my adrenaline going for a high stakes performance and then you’ll have an impact.

Travis Bennett:5:00
Very cool.

Diane DiResta: 5:00

So, allow yourself to feel it.

Travis Bennett: 5:02
Perfect. So, we’ve got three minutes 10 seconds on the clock. Question number five, what’s one valuable piece of free advice that we can give all the people listening in today?

Diane DiResta: 5:12
All right, here’s a tip that will give you laser-like focus. Before you do anything else complete this sentence, “At the end of my presentation, the audience will blank.” The answer to that is your outcome. You have to be clear about your why. Why am I doing this, and what do I expect at the end? Just don’t be like someone in one of my classes who said, “At the end of my presentation, the audience will applaud.” Well, that’s very nice, that is not an outcome. So, fill in the blank, start here and then everything you do from PowerPoint on will lead you to that outcome, that’s focus.

Travis Bennett: 5:49
Perfect. And that’s a very powerful thing, because when people can take something away, then they also recall that, right? They remember the speech that you gave and when you are ultimately selling a product or selling your business, you do want them to remember you in the right way. Cool.

Diane DiResta: 6:04
Absolutely.

Travis Bennett: 6:05
So, two minutes 10 seconds on the clock. What is one valuable free resource that we can direct all the listeners to where they can get some more help for this problem and learn a little bit more about what it is you’re doing?

Diane DiResta:6:17
Sure. Well, what people love is the free audio course I have on my homepage at DiResta.com. It’s D, as in David, I-R-E-S, as in Sam, T, as in Thomas, A.com. It’s called, ‘Seven deadly mistakes speakers make and how to avoid them for maximum success.’ It is an audio course, there are seven audio emails that will come to your desktop or your laptop or your mobile device. All you need to do is go to DiResta.com, put in your email and you’ll get that audio course free of charge. Really great for speakers, coaches’ consultants, for anyone actually.

Travis Bennett:6:53
Perfect. So DiResta.com, D-I-R-E-S-T-A, scroll down, lock in your name and your email and you can get full access to this free audio course and basically upgrade your speaking skills.

Diane DiResta: 7:05
Absolutely. And I also have a YouTube page with over 100 videos, Travis. So, anyone who wants free skills, go to youtube.com/DianeDiResta, and you have even more than that.

Travis Bennett: 7:19
Ah, it’s also very good. So youtube.com/DianeDiResta. And they can check out and see more of what it is you’re doing. Very cool. So, 45 seconds left, we’re on question number seven. So, we’ve done perfectly for time. What’s the one thing that I should have asked that I didn’t get a chance to ask just yet?

Diane DiResta: 7:37
One question that comes up a lot is, can anybody be effective as a speaker, as a public speaker?

Because the myth is that this is a skill, it’s inherent, like selling, you’ve got the gift of gab or you don’t. No. Gifted speakers are born but effective speakers are made.

It’s a skill that anybody can learn. It’s simply taking an idea in your head and transferring it to someone else’s head in a way that they can hear it. So, for more tips, you can find them in my book. The outline for listener centered communication is there. I have a whole chapter on listening and profiling your audience. It is there, anybody can do this.

Travis Bennett: 8:16
Perfect. And that’s seven minutes. Diane, thank you so much for your time. We made it. Everyone who’s listening in, thank you so much. And it’s been a pleasure to have you on the show.

Diane DiResta: 8:25
Thank you, Travis.

Tom Poland: 7:49
Thanks for checking out our Marketing The Invisible podcast. If you like what we’re doing here please head over to iTunes to subscribe, rate us, and leave us a review. It’s very much appreciated. And if you want to generate five fresh leads in just five hours then check out www.fivehourchallenge.com.