Speaking 101: 5 Tips to Getting Email Responses

Goodbye, snail mail! Emails have become a standard part of everyday life, serving as the main tool most people use to handle their business and personal communication. According to research firm Radicati Group, the total number of emails sent and received per day will reach 269 billion in 2017. Here are five tips we try and consider here at cred in order to get emails opened and readers responding.

1. Work that subject line. Subject line can make or break the quick decision to open your email. Make it brief and compelling, limiting to 6-10 words. Refrain from including exclamation marks or buzzwords such as “free” to avoid being marked as spam.

2. Optimize preheader text. Keep in mind the text snippet showing a preview of what the body of your email contains. Make your first sentence clear so your reader gets an immediate feel for the message.

3. Offer something to your reader. Let readers know what they’ll be getting by responding to your email. Provide what you can offer and why it would interest them.

4. State a call to action. Give your email a point and describe what the reader should do next. This can be in the form of text, links, bullet points, or a mix of the three.

5. Keep mobile in mind. Most emails are being read on a mobile device. Put your best words forward and dodge the risk of having your reader scroll past your email

Looking for more tips on how to getting email responses? Read the full article here.

Knowledge Sharing with 100 early Stage SaaS CFOs

Yesterday we were onsite with Bowery Capital, an early stage Venture Capital firm, to help put together the 5th Annual CFO Summit. Bowery hosts these Executive Summits quarterly to provide a forum where early-stage growth companies can come learn from experienced executives. 16 CFOs from leading organizations were selected to discuss extremely tactical, hands-on topics, such as 'Planning for Hyper Growth', 'Understanding the ROI of Investing in People', and 'When to Change Systems Based on Growth/Funding'. Formats included facilitated panel discussions, 'tactical' work-shop like presentations, and roundtable conversations, with the main goal focused entirely on knowledge sharing in your role as a CFO.

The Summit, limited to 100 people to keep it intimate, was a great environment where C-level peers could share actionable business strategies and lessons learned.

Check out some of the highlights below!

Speaking 101: 6 Public Speaking Hacks for Introverts

Introverts can make for great public speakers, too! Self-proclaimed shy-guy Simon Sinek, one of the most watched TedTalks presenters ever, shares his tips on how to handle nerves when speaking to large audiences:

1. Don’t start talking as soon as you get on the stage - draw the audience in by taking a deep breath, making eye contact, and then standing or sitting in a comfortable position. Speaking immediately conveys fear and nerves to the audience.

2. Be a giver, not a taker - the idea is to teach and inspire the audience, who’s very intuitive at distinguishing if the speaker is trying to sell a product or idea to them vs. offering helpful insights.

3. Personalize your eye contact - instead of scanning the room throughout your presentation, focus on making eye contact with audience members one by one.

4. Speak slowly - as we get nervous, both our heartbeat and speech accelerates. The audience would rather wait on you than miss out on important information.

5. Focus on your supporters - of course, there are bound to be naysayers in the audience, pay them no attention. Focus on the smiling faces and nods of approval, they’ll make you feel confident while you are speaking.

6. Show appreciation - always say “thank you” at the end of your presentation, especially when met with applause.

Interested in learning more tips? Check out the full article here.

Event 101: Do Room Layouts Affect Audience Engagement?

Remember, the shoe has to fit! Too often venue size, furniture arrangements, and overall aesthetic is not chosen with the audience or agenda in mind. Instead of providing the crowd with an unforgettable experience, they are left to fend for themselves as they maneuver a venue full of disruptions, inconvenient fixtures, and limited seating.

Three things to keep in mind when you’re choosing a venue for your Event:

• Know how many attendees you’re anticipating, larger crowds don't provide flexibility with seating arrangements.

• Venues tend to exaggerate the number of people they can actually accommodate, so always check out the venue in person.

• Don’t forget to take note of any permanent fixtures  that might restrict your layout options.

Now, let’s transition into layouts appropriate for a professional conferences’ content:

• Theater Style: for big conferences, presentations, annual meetings, or lectures.

• Classroom Style: for note-taking at longer events or trainings where attendees might be using laptops.

• Cabaret Style: for meals with presentations and performances, more for luncheons.

• Boardroom Style: for medium-sized meetings or brainstorming and breakout sessions.

• U-shape Style: for interactive sessions or debates.

• Pods Style: for networking sessions or team-building.

• Semi-circle Style: for small meetings and one-person presentations.

Ultimately, your goal for room layouts should always be to optimize crowd participation and experience.

To learn more, check out the full article here.

ProxSummit Recap: The Future Is In Close Proximity!

Update: 9/17 - check out the action! Unacast's Video Recap is live:

Yesterday, the top 80 Industry Leaders shaping the future of Proximity Marketing came together to create the First Annual ProxSummit, presented by Unacast. We’ve been working with Unacast, the largest proximity marketing platform and global network of proximity sensor companies, to host ProxSummit 2017 - an event highlighting the shift in location data usage to help people understand their connection with the world around them. If that mere concept doesn’t get you excited, the list of top industry speakers certainly will.

This was the inaugural summit bringing in innovators from the advertising and marketing field that were seeking to understand the surge in investments and interest in location-based marketing technologies. The conference advocated for transparency in this specific field, and attendees had a chance to understand the psyche behind accurately approaching innovation through a location-based lens.

Fun fact: The predicted estimate for location-targeted ad spending in 2021 will be approximately $32.4 billion. Our outlook on our day-to-day interactions with places and spaces is about to drastically change as we see growth in technology utilizing location-based data. Yet, what is the value of location-data? What are marketers prioritizing? What does the future hold for this sort of access to knowledge in terms of privacy? All these questions were open for discussion at this year's ProxSummit.

With four separate sessions dedicated to understanding the relevance of location and proximity, one of our favorites had to be “Do You Know Where Data Comes From?" moderated by Street Fight’s David Card. Jeff White (Founder & CEO of Gravy Analytics), Harry Dewhirst (President of Blis), and Brian Handly (Founder of CEO of Reveal Mobile) discussed the role of transparency around the source for data collection in accurately targeting and catering the market.

ProxSummit was held at the beautiful Midtown Loft & Terrace in downtown Manhattan, a rooftop venue overlooking the skyline. Check out some of our favorite highlights:

Event Spotlight: Sales 3.0 Conference

On September 18th and 19th, one of today’s leading sales leadership events, the Sales 3.0 Conference, will be held at the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino in Las Vegas.

Featuring Gerhard Gschwandtner, Founder & CEO, Selling Power Join us at the Sales 3.0 Conference in Las Vegas! Register Today http://www.sales30conf.com/Vegas2017/register.html

Sales 3.0 addresses all aspects of the sales organization. Speakers will address leadership insights, daily sales management challenges, alignment with marketing, sales enablement, sales strategy and execution, customer management, coaching sales reps, the latest industry research on sales effectiveness, and much more.

Between the keynotes and breakout sessions, there's abundant opportunity for networking and demos of the latest sales tech. The event concludes with a complimentary cocktail reception allowing speakers, sponsors, and attendees to get together and mingle.

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Register for the event here, using SPEAKERV to receive 50% off your registration price.

Speaking 101: How to Make Your Presentation Slides Less Boring

When giving a presentation, do your slides actually matter?

Absolutely! We live in a design-centric world, and visuals go a long way.

According to developmental molecular biologist and best-selling author John Medina, vision trumps all senses. It’s no wonder then that people following directions with illustrations do 323% better than those who follow directions with only text. For presenters, this means that visuals can be especially important in helping people retain information and remember your speech.

Here, we’ve rounded up a handful of tips to make your presentation go from boring to engaging and memorable:

• Avoid overloading your slides with too much text. Try to keep it to one idea per slide. Really, you should think of every slide as an individual advertisement.

• Use high quality photos instead of clip art. No pixelated images - there are better ones out there, we promise!

• Choose your fonts and font colors wisely. Keep your typography clean, simple, and professional, and spare your audience from those hot pink or highlighter yellow tones.

• Avoid standard templates. If you want to impress your audience, don’t use a generic preset. It's boring!

• Use infographics to present information. Again, this goes back to people processing information more effectively through images.

• Go easy on the effects and transitions. The transitions you use shouldn’t distract from your presentation, or make you appear less professional.

Need more tips on designing the best presentation? Check out this guide.

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Not there yet, and looking to lock down your first speaking engagement? Give us a shout!

Speaking 101: How to Handle a Heckler

Dealing with hecklers is never fun. Fortunately for us, they rarely show themselves during presentations (most people are afraid of looking bad in front of large groups).

That said, it’s good to be prepared. As a presenter, hecklers can really throw you off and distract your audience. So what’s the best way to handle one?

We’ve rounded up five tips to help you get started:

1. Never reward interrupting. When someone starts talking over you or chatting with their neighbor, keep going. Make them look rude.

2. Respond if you need to. Sometimes you just have to respond to the comments. When this happens, make sure you’re addressing the whole audience and not just the heckler. If you only address the heckler, it may invite them to continue.

   • That said, at a certain point, it is okay to make a firm, direct request to the heckler to stop. Revert to Tip #3 and #4 for this.

3. Don’t try to be funny. Unless you have experience doing stand-up, avoid trying to come up with a witty response - it may fall flat. You can still be pleasant, but deal with the heckler head-on.

4. Stay calm and gracious. Shake off whatever the heckler has to say, and don’t let them ruin the rest of your presentation. Remember that you want to be the most mature and positive person in the room. Lose your cool and you might lose your momentum - as well as the rest of your audience.

5. Don’t let it get personal. Focus on the subject matter, instead of attacking the individual. Avoid trying to get even.

Finally, remember that you’re serving the group’s needs - not the individual’s. Don’t let one naysayer drive a wedge between you and your audience!

Need more advice?

Check out these posts on dealing with hecklers and restoring order.