By Carmine Gallo,
Author of The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs: How to Be Insanely
Great in Front of Any Audience
Apple’s Steve Jobs returned to a standing ovation at a
special music event in
Create a “holy smokes” moment. Every Steve Jobs presentation
has one moment that leaves everyone in awe—the water cooler moment. These
“moments” are scripted ahead of time to compliment his slides, the Apple Web
site, press releases and advertisements. In 2008, Jobs pulled the MacBook Air
out of a manila, inter-office envelope to show everyone just how thin it was.
Bloggers went nuts and it was the most popular photograph of the event. On
September 9, 2009, the “water cooler” moment wasn’t a product at all. Instead,
it was Steve Jobs himself walking onstage after a long, health related absence.
He told the audience he now had the liver of a mid twenties person who died in
a car crash and was generous enough to donate their organs. “I wouldn’t be here
if it wasn’t for such generosity,” he said.
Stick to the rule of three. The Rule of Three is one of most
powerful concepts in writing. The human mind can only retain three or four
“chunks” of information and Jobs is well aware of this principle. A Steve Jobs
presentation is typically divided into three parts. During the September 9th event,
Jobs outlined the presentation into three areas: iPhone, iTunes and iPod. Jobs
has even been known to have fun with the principle. At Macworld 2007, he
introduced “three revolutionary products;” an mp3 player, a phone, and an
internet communicator. After repeating the three products several times, he
disclosed the big announcement—all three would be wrapped up in one, the
iPhone. The rule of three turned into a water cooler moment. Ask yourself, what
are the three things I want my audience to know? Not twenty things, just three.
You can get away with more points in written form (like an article) but stick
to three in public presentations and verbal conversations.
Share the stage. Jobs rarely gives an entire presentation
himself. Instead he surrounds himself with a supporting cast. He had a large
supporting cast at the September music event including Apple’s VP of product
marketing, Phil Schiller and iTunes software designer, Jeff Robbin. At least
four game developers took to the stage as well. Songwriter Norah Jones capped
it off. Of course, you’re not going to have Norah Jones wrap up your next
presentation, but if you can share the presentation with another team member
(or customer) by all means, do so.
Introduce heroes and villains. Every great drama has a hero and a
villain. Steve Jobs is a master at creating drama. We see this technique as far
back at 1984 when Apple first introduced the Macintosh. Jobs set up the product
launching by painting a picture of IBM “big blue” bent on “world domination.”
Apple, he said, would be the only company to stand in its way. The crowd went
nuts. One can argue that the “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” ads are hero vs. villain
vignettes played out in thirty second ads. Great presentations have an
antagonist—a common enemy—so the audience can rally around the hero. Your brand
and your product play the role of the hero.
Think visually. Apple presentations are strikingly
simple and visual. For example, there is very little text on a Steve Jobs
slide. While the average PowerPoint slide has 40 words, there were far fewer
than forty words in the first dozen slides of the September music event. When
Jobs talked about the popularity of iPhone around the world, his slide showed
23 flags of different countries instead of country names. When said the iPhone
app store was celebrating its first anniversary, a slide appeared with a
birthday cake holding one candle. When he talked about lower iPod prices, the
new price was accompanied by photos of the iPods. This is what psychologists
call “picture superiority.” It simply means that ideas are more easily recalled
when presented in text and images than in text alone.
Create Twitter-friendly headlines. Apple makes it simple for the
media to talk about their products—the company writes the headlines for them.
Now, reporters will tell you that they like to come up with their own
headlines, but why then did hundreds of them use “World’s thinnest notebook” to
describe the MacBook Air? Because that’s the way Steve Jobs described it, and
frankly, it’s hard to come up with a better way of saying it. Jobs always
describes a new product with a concise phrase that fits well within a 140
character Twitter post. What’s an iPod? “One thousand songs in your pocket.”
What’s Genuis Mix for iTunes? “It’s like having a DJ mix the songs in your
library.” If you can’t describe what you do in one sentence, go back to the
drawing board.
Sell dreams, not products. Steve Jobs is passionately
committed to changing the world and his passion shows in every presentation.
Anyone can learn the specific techniques he uses to create visually creative
slides, but those slides will fall flat if delivered without passion and
enthusiasm. When Jobs introduce the iPod in 2001, he said that music was a
transformative experience and that in its own small way, Apple was changing the
world. Where most observers saw a music player, Jobs saw an opportunity to
create a better world for his customers. That’s the difference between Jobs and
the vast majority of mediocre leaders—Jobs is genuinely committed to changing
the world and he’s not afraid to say it.
Steve Jobs is the most extraordinary communicator on the
world stage today. Learn all of his techniques in Carmine Gallo’s new
book, The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs: How to be Insanely
Great in Front of Any Audience, available everywhere books are sold. To
learn more visit www.carminegallo.com/stevejobsbook
©2009 Carmine Gallo,
author of The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs: How to be Insanely
Great in Front of Any Audience.
Author Bio
Carmine Gallo, author
of The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs: How to Be Insanely Great in
Front of Any Audience, is a presentation, media-training, and
communication-skills coach for the world's most admired brands. He is an author
and columnist for Businessweek.com
and and a keynote speaker and seminar leader who has appeared on CNBC, NBC,
CBS, MSNBC.com, BNET, RedBook, Forbes.com, and in the New York
Times, the Wall Street Journal and Investor's
Business Daily, as well as many other media outlets. Gallo lives in the
Thanks Carmine. Today being “top of mind” is a real challenge with the
bombardment of information. This is not different at the office where shrinking
budgets only allow for a few ideas to be funded. Believe in your concept and
promote it diligently making sure your audience knows where your passion and
focus lie.
