RIDE THE ON-LINE VIDEO WAVE

Are you be able to send a tweet and get hundreds of people to meet you almost instantly as a result? No, neither can I. But I know a man who can. Jim Chapman is what's known as a "Youtuber" and he has an online following of one-and-a-half million - mainly teenage girls.    He's very personable and he knows how to connect with people through the camera. Jim is a member of the new "profession" of Youtubing. It consists primarily of people in their twenties who've developed massive and profitable fan bases by putting out regular YouTube clips on life, cooking, pop groups, make-up or "whatever" - as teenagers are inclined to say. Leading lights are able to generate impressive incomes though payments direct from YouTube, advertisements, appearances, product placement in their chats and various forms of merchandising. Youtubers are like 2014's rock and rollers...except most of them don't sing, dance, play the electric guitar or destroy their hotel rooms. They just chat to the camera about what's on their mind wherever they happen to be. But if you ever want to connect with your target audience through the camera, then it's profoundly useful to be aware of what the Youtubers are doing and how they're doing it. Because the communication power of online video - for those who know how to harness it - is phenomenal. Jim Chapman put out a single tweet late last week indicating he'd be available to meet his fans in London's Hyde Park on Saturday afternoon. I'm personally not one of his fans - or "best friends" as he calls them - though I have to admire his artistry. But I have a teenage daughter who is a total fan...especially now that she's met him. When Jim put out a follow-up tweet on Saturday specifying precisely where he would be, he triggered a stampede of female feet across Hyde Park. Here's the queue that formed to patiently line up for chats, a free signed bottle of Coke and "selfies with Jim" - supplemented by pictures taken by his three body guards.    The crowd got so big that the police turned up at one point to check things were under control. They were, apart from a bit of hysterical screaming.

WOWING THEM AS JIM DOES - IN YOUR OWN WAY You don't need to be a fan of the fairly mundane stuff that Jim chats about to appreciate how cleverly he's managed to harness the power of online video. But he does demonstrate that if you can master the art of talking naturally to the camera, all kinds of possibilities open up for you and your business. I'm not particularly recommending you check out Jim's online videos - though if you have a teenage daughter she may find them exhilarating. If you want to sample a really clever Youtuber who says more insightful things, I suggest a peek at so-called "Super Woman" - Canadian, Lilly Singh - who has over three million subscribers to her online channel.    Despite an apparent superficiality, Lilly has a deep understanding of the language of the face among other things. Here's a sample called "What A Girl's Facial Expressions Mean". Talking to the camera is a learnable and improvable skill. You don't have to have millions of subscribers to make it work for you. I team up with my colleague, technical guru York Smith, to help people talk to the camera in a way that allows you to really connect with your audience.     When you've planned, prepared and practised it - you can utilise the art of "planned spontaneity" by delivering your message in a way that looks as though you've just thought of it. This brings you closer to the skill level of Jim Chapman and Lilly Singh. You're then prepared for the next stage...to do an online chat-to-the-camera for real which York can edit, mix with some pictures and captions and put on your website. This allows your potential customers to really get to grips with you and what your company can do for them. There's more details at "Protecting and Enhancing Your Online Reputation" at: http://www.michaeldoddcommunications.com/online_reputation.php We also run a master class version of this for business leaders groups - where members come away with their own memory stick version of their chat to the camera which we can put on their website.

BEDAZZLE THEM LIKE THE YOUTUBING QUEEN If you want a model for someone who is supremely good at talking to the camera, the undisputed Queen of the Youtubers is Zoella Sugg. She has a way of talking to you through the screen as if you're the only person in the universe.      As a result she's had more than 140-million hits on her blog...yes 140-million. Zoella's You Tube appearances are mainly dedicated to fashion and beauty tips. But in truth, it doesn't really matter what Zoella's subject is. She's just fantastic at chatting in a calm but animated, engaging and natural way. Zoella knows that it's all about making the camera your friend. If you'd like to experience how Zoella does it, here's one of her more unusual vlogs where she talks - not about fashion and beauty - but about the panic attacks she used to have. Here she tells the story of how she overcame them. It led to her catch phrase: "Just Say Yes".   If York and I can get you to come across with the charm and apparent effortlessness of Zoella, then the world of cyberspace is your intergalactic lobster. Keep smiling, Michael

Connection Insights For Business Leaders Groups

GET YOUR MESSAGE ACROSS TO DIFFERENT PERSONALITY TYPES   Suppose a member of your business leaders group had a great new proposition that they were planning parade in the BBC's Dragons Den. Let's leave aside whether or not you think this is a good way to get investment - and free publicity. What will be crucial to your member's success is how he or she stands up to cross examination by the different Dragons. Because the Dragons - like everyone else you meet in business - are not all the same. And while all the Dragons are universally portrayed as being pretty tough, there are of course contrasting aspects to their personalities and they have different preferred ways of absorbing information. So the ideal way to communicate with each of them - and get them to invest - differs from Dragon to Dragon. To achieve the right outcome your member needs to take into account that, on the surface at least, the straight-talking Scotsman, Duncan Bannatyne, seems as hard as industrial diamonds.  Mr Bannatyne can be classified as what's known as a "Director Type". He's a driven, task-orientated achiever who wants you to be succinct, straight to the point with no flim-flam. If you're not clear enough when it comes to getting to the "bottom line" he'll chew you up. And then, in the jargon of the Dragon's Den format, Duncan Bannatyne, will declare himself "Out!". But give him what he needs up front and he may eventually warm to you and possibly smile. And maybe even put his hand in his pocket! On the other hand Peter Jones - while not exactly a softie - comes across as being more immediately affable and chatty.  He's predominantly a "Socialiser Type" - a people-orientated extrovert who enjoys engaging with those around him. So Mr Jones will be happier to listen to a bit more of your member's story if he or she makes it engrossing and entertaining as they illustrate their point. When it comes to persuading people on a one-to-one basis to go for your ideas, your products or your services, it makes sense to use a different communication approach for different personality types. This is why I have launched my new communications-boosting session for business leaders groups: "Get Your Message Across To All Personality Types". It's designed to enable your members to connect better with all those they need to interact with, inside and outside their companies. Email enquiries@michaeldoddcommunications.com if you'd like more information about this programme. And if your members do go on Dragon's Den, and they calibrate their answers to suit different personality types they'll have a better chance of securing that investment - or at least getting some civility from the Dragons.

COMMUNICATIONS-BOOSTING OPTIONS FOR YOUR MEMBERS Every time you meet with your members they have - amidst their business problems - new thoughts, plans and ideas. But how well do they communicate these inside and outside their companies? My research amongst the chairs of business leaders groups about the communications skills of your members shows there's considerable scope for them to do it better. Often hugely better. Here are six master classes designed to help your members to communicate more effectively, more powerfully and more confidently. 1. GIVING GREAT ANSWERS TO TOUGH QUESTIONS: Showing your members how to stand up to "blowtorch-on-the-belly" questioning - whether it's from their customers, prospects, staff, shareholders, financiers and the public. 2. POSITION YOUR BUSINESS FOR MAXIMUM FREE PUBLICITY: Giving your members a deeper understanding what makes news, and improving their ability to spot what's of interest to the media within their companies and grab and hold public attention. 3. PERFECTING YOUR 60-SECOND PITCH: Supercharging your members' effectiveness when talking about their company. This session upgrades the content, structure and delivery of their elevator pitches for formal and informal situations. 4. PRESENTING WITH CONFIDENCE, IMPACT AND PIZZAZZ: Overhauls or polishes your members' ability to wow their audiences - and where necessary how to utilise slides to keep their audiences engrossed rather than send them to sleep. 5. CREATE YOUR OWN WEBCASTS: Enhance your people's ability to talk to the camera while looking and sounding natural, authoritative and persuasive. Sessions can include producing clips and mini-corporate documentaries for showcasing on their websites. 6. BOOSTING YOUR MEDIA STRATEGY AND PERFORMANCE: Equipping your members to determine the best approach to dealing with the media in good times and difficult times. This session shows how to respond effectively to tough and tricky interviews from journalists - and to deliver impressive answers every time.   All these sessions involve measuring the "before" and "after" performance of participants so everyone taking part can see how far they've come.  Here are the views of the chairs of business leaders groups who've booked sessions.  "It was truly amazing to observe how people could improve their performance, after just a short session with Michael." Luiz Paulo Ferrao, Owner, Vistage Brazil "As well as being highly constructive, Michael's presentation at our recent executives' workshop enabled members to deal with difficult questions in a session which was lively, entertaining and fun. The fact that we keep inviting him back to work with several of our groups says it all." Graham Speechley and Chris Chater, Joint Chairmen, Business Leaders Group "Michael achieved the rare outcome of delivering a nugget of practical learning for each member of three consecutive executive groups. The secret of his success lay in the combination of his detailed preparation and genuine personal interest in the wellbeing of each and every member. This earned Michael the distinction of being one of the most memorable and highest rated speakers in a decade of executive learning and development". Drew Pryde, Chairman, Scottish Institute for Business Leaders  "Michael is one of the best speakers we have ever had in the Academy. He puts an enormous amount of effort into the preparation and the final delivery is nothing short of brilliant." Simon Lester, Co-owner, Academy for Chief Executives   For more about sessions to boost the communications skills of your business leaders group visit: http://www.michaeldoddcommunications.com/workshops_for_business_leaders_groups.php And send an email if you'd like the programme for any of the sessions mentioned here.

A FINAL WORD ON THOSE DRAGONS  Most of your members are no doubt too established to need to go and face the Dragons to raise cash.   But if any of your members in a rash moment say they want to go on the show, get them to give me a call first! A bit of media and presentation training goes a long way when you're under the studio lights. Duncan Bannatyne may be hanging up his dragon horns at the end of the forthcoming programme series. But there are other fire-breathers who will take his place.  Your members need to be ready for his type and others - on and off TV.

GET YOUR MESSAGE ACROSS FAST.  Earlier I was writing about your 60-second pitch. But you can get a message across in less time than this of course. I have been training a German executive recently - in part about being more succinct. He has just sent me this brief but powerful message following the 7-1 World Cup result between Germany and Brazil.  I think my wunderbar German trainee has now got the idea of the short sharp message - even if the German sense of humour can be slightly less subtle than in the English speaking world. Keep smiling, Michael

SPECIAL BLOG POST FOR TEACHERS

WHAT THEY DIDN'T COVER IN YOUR TEACHER TRAINING The higher you get in the teaching world the more you have to deal with events and perceptions beyond the classroom. Whether it's talking to the media about your latest Ofsted report; enticing parents to choose your school at open days; or inspiring the pupils at prize-giving, a lot is asked of senior teachers, head teachers and "super head teachers" presiding over a collection of schools. The Ofsted Boss - Be Ready To Talk About His Team's Report And a lot is expected of those who aspire to fill these roles. The communication requirements of senior leadership teams in education - through the media and face-to-face - go beyond what you were equipped with in your teacher training. Outside guidance in presentation skills for big occasions, media interview techniques and public relations planning can make the crucial difference. I've been training Ofsted inspectors to talk to you. So it's only reasonable that you get some training to talk to - and about - them! Communications-boosting master classes on these topics can be done on Inset Days - or take place within the normal teaching day. This special education issue of this e-newsletter looks at what can be done to equip you and your fellow teachers to project your message within and outside your school boundaries.

PRESENTING WITH HIGH IMPACT OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM There's are big differences between talking with pupils in the classroom and making a presentation in front of parents, Ofsted inspectors and members of the wider community. Not surprisingly, even for people who have spent much of their careers talking on their feet, it often proves daunting. This is especially the case when it comes to answering tough questions that can be thrown at you during or after your presentation. The good news is that teachers tend to be fast learners - so they can typically put the learning into practice with impressive speed. Together with my colleague in the Professional Speaking Association, Nicci Roscoe - who specialises in making a "fabulous impact" - we've been helping senior teachers, aspiring heads and those already at the top to transfer their skills into presentations that grab, hold and inspire your audience. Our sessions are entitled "Presenting for Teachers - with Confidence and Positivity." We help you plan the right content for each audience you face - and give you a magic structure that works. We work on your delivery style so that you look, sound and feel right on the big occasion. You get to understand and apply the golden formulae for answering tough questions, nasty questions and emotionally charged questions. And we equip you with confidence-enhancing performance techniques that put you in the right frame of mind before you utter your first words. Here's what some participants have been kind enough to say... "Nicci and Michael: I wanted to mail you to say how powerful I found the course you ran. I attend many courses, but rarely do I remember so much of the content, days later. I can now clearly see how to structure any presentation and am so eager to get on and do my next one."  Emily Haywood, Paddock School, Wandsworth "Nicci and Michael's master class was utterly inspiring. I have now taken away so many valuable ideas that I can put into place immediately - and I am now excited about presenting with confidence." Helen Palmer, Deputy Head, St Joseph's Roman Catholic Primary School. "Nicci Roscoe and Michael Dodd led a master class focused on Presenting With Confidence And Positivity. Over a week later I am still talking about it! The impact on the day was evident in the way the participants had developed their confidence in public speaking. Presentations changed from the ordinary to the extraordinary - engaging, interesting and influential." Barbara Chevis, Senior School Improvement Partner, Education Kingston And one other thing... If we run a presentation-enhancing session on a regular school day it can include a talk for your students. Sessions for pupils include "Coping with Exam Stress", "Give Winning Answers at University Entrance and Job Interviews" and "Becoming An Inspirational Communicator".

EQUIPPING YOUR TEAM FOR MEDIA ENCOUNTERS  Dealing with the media can be very scary when it goes wrong - and very rewarding when it goes right. The starting point in planning to get it right is delving inside the minds of journalists. When you know what reporters need from you in order to do their job then it gets a whole lot easier. Here are the one-day master classes which can be conducted in groups for the top team - or can be conducted one-to-one.  At times there's been need to train selected pupils who can be great media ambassadors for your school.

HANDLING THE MEDIA FOR THE BENEFIT OF YOUR SCHOOL   This master class fosters an understanding of what makes news. When you know this, you can work out what to give journalists - and what to leave out. We work through the pro-active tactics for dealing with the media when you have a positive story that you want to get out - as Bury St Edmunds County Upper School managed when they got the Ofsted "Outstanding" they wanted to convey to the wider world.     And the master class deals with reactive tactics if the media start chasing you after something has gone wrong. We show how you can turn a negative situation into a positive by saying the right things at the right time in the right way. It's learning-by-doing which gives you practice in doing media interviews, the opportunity to review what you've said - and doing them again at a higher level. We measure your progress along the way so you can appreciate the difference between your starting point and where you finish. You can focus on interviews for the written word - for the local newspapers and websites which are hungry for the right kind of education news. And if you are seeking to project to a wider audience, we can look at interviews for the national papers and their websites as well. The master class can also include broadcast interviews for radio and television. If you want to be ready for TV, a camera operator can be provided. This may sound daunting, but there are enormous benefits for your communication skills when you see yourself back as others see you - and make the appropriate adjustments.  Each participant gets individual copies of their interview material to look back over afterwards and further embed the learning.

WRITING EFFECTIVE SCHOOL PRESS RELEASES Press releases are a standard way of getting your message in front of the editors. Most of them are written badly and end up in the "circular file". Great press releases shine out - because they are written in the style a journalist would write them. This master class shows how to write the way journalists do - and maximise your chances of media success. It shows you the kind of newsworthy aspects of your school that the media will be prepared to run with. You learn how to write a press release when your school is becoming the subject of adverse attention - and how to put it in the best possible light. Importantly, this session also shows what makes a great media picture- and how to set up attention-grabbing photo opportunities.

DRAWING UP A PUBLIC RELATIONS PLAN FOR YOUR SCHOOL This master class works with key members of your school to foster a strategic approach to establishing or improving relations with your target groups. Typically these targets includes the media, the families of prospective students and the wider local community. We identify the core school values and develop a series of PR aims and objectives in order to project these outside the school. Key members of your education team are identified to deal with aspects of the media - from fielding the first phone call from a journalist to timetabling press releases and planning media photo and interview opportunities. One school which I've worked with on this is the Freeston Academy in Yorkshire. Before it became the thriving academy it is now, Freeston was beset by regular damning local media headlines and a poor image amongst many of the parents and prospective pupils. Its dynamic head teacher, Dr Gill Metcalfe, felt the impression the outside world had of the school was outdated and unfair. And we worked with her governors and senior teachers through the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust to turn things around. Here's what Dr Metcalfe (pictured) says, looking back on the jump she and her team achieved in the way the academy was perceived by parents, pupils and the media.    "We wanted to agree and convey the school's messages in a way that maximises its attractiveness to others.  "We wanted to be clear about what is different and unique about our Academy. "We wanted to be able to get the messages across with confidence and be able to illustrate our headlines with real stories. "Michael Dodd was the catalyst we needed to get the ball rolling, challenge our thinking and cut through the waffle and jargon we often use. "The session was split into sections so that senior leaders, Governors and community ambassadors could take part in different practical tasks where they could explore what their ideal narrative might be. "This meant working through 'uncomfortable' situations and being challenged with tough questions to get our key points across. "The day was thought-provoking, inspiring and exhausting. "We worked together to produce ten simple and 'straight to the point' statements that we all feel are the key messages about the Freeston  Academy.  "Governors formulated conversations around these, and staff came together to write their own stories to illustrate the key points, with specific and accurate information.  "We decided upon strategies for the launch of the Academy, new press releases, targetting the Year 5 market, Open Evening and Awards Evening, all opportunities we intend to seize and utilise so that everyone knows clearly what is so special about our school. "We now realise that as communicators we, ourselves, are an important part of the message and now intend to use our community ambassadors more effectively to promote the positive aspects of the academy. "This training session allowed us to practice communicating our new messages within a safe environment, and also gave us the impetus to take this much further. "Without Michael Dodd to push us on, we would not have planned our next steps. "By implementing the techniques we now know, I am certain we can confidently paint the picture, and communicate what it means to be part of The Freeston Academy." Thank you Gill. Whether it's turning around public perceptions, shining out in media interviews or giving presentations that inspire your audiences, a little outside help can go a long way. For further details on any of the sessions here, email: enquiries@michaeldoddcommunications.com Taking part in an education sector communications-boosting master class is always confidence-enhancing. Even if, as Gill Metcalfe warns, they can be exhausting. Oh, and they are fun! Keep smiling, Michael