By Dave Lieber

Fort Worth Star-Telegram Columnist

|| New works by Jana Stanfield and David Avrin ||

Two National Speakers Association favorites have released gifts that speakers should treat themselves to before crafting your 2010 New Year’s speaker resolutions. Both will make you smarter and more agile as you confront whatever changes and opportunities come your way in 2010.

Supreme musical motivator Jana Stanfield, returning from time away in Asia working with orphanages, has released a two-CD set called “What Would You Do This Year If You Had No Fear?” Her work ought to be considered her own personal Sgt. Pepper’s album because of the variety of musical styles she displays and for her vision of what’s next in life.

David Avrin's new book

Jana Stanfield's new album

Hers is a fully-formed album that lives up to its title’s promise. It’s also lots of fun.

Visibility Coach David Avrin of Colorado, known throughout NSA as someone who happily shares his ideas with others, has released a book, It’s Not Who You Know/It’s Who Knows You! (Publisher, John Wiley & Sons.) His is a “small business guide to raising your profits and raising your profile.” Using stories rather than bullet points, Avrin breaks down image-building barriers with simple ideas and solutions. Avrin’s passion becomes your motivator, something he and Stanfield both have mastered.

# # #

Give Stanfield credit for making a leap in her two-CD set:

Disc No. 1 — called “Stay Brave, Do Good, Feel Better” — reflects her agility in all facets of pop — folk, rock, country — that enables her to inspire so many with her upbeat life outlook. Here, she takes her classic “If I Were Brave” song and ramps up the theme across the entire CD about who you are and what you want to do. The music, like her tremendous keynotes, opens up possibilities for you in the most personal of ways.

Disc No. 2 — “The Wilder Side Dance Mix” — is quite something else, even by Stanfield’s innovative standards. Most of the songs are modern techno-pop tunes with pulsating beats designed for either dancing or aerobics class. It’s Stanfield on steroids, and the music and the vocals (although they often don’t sound like her) definitely work to the listeners’ advantage because of the album’s high quality.

So while one CD is more traditional, the other, as Stanfield writes in the liner notes, consists of songs that were “created as ‘affirmatunes’ for a self-empowerment system called I AM Power. With Matt Wilder as producer, these ‘trance-formational’ songs are designed for repeated listenings, to help you stay brave, do good, and feel better.”

The combined package could serve as the soundtrack to the Elizabeth Gilbert book Eat, Pray, Love that Stanfield admires so much. Stanfield asks listeners to “take action.” Women will adore her latest, but men shouldn’t back off. Stanfield touches hearts, both male and female, with titles such as Learning to Fly Mid-Air, If I Had No Fear, and her newest stunner, George Bailey.

The character from It’s A Wonderful Life, she sings so perfectly, is a “guy standing on a bridge, seeing all he ever wanted, all the things he never did, missing every minute of the life he never lived.”

Sample chorus:

“I don’t want to be George Bailey waiting, waiting, waiting for the right time, for a clear sign.”

“Even if I make mistakes, it’s time I do whatever it takes.”

Good thing Stanfield didn’t wait to give us What Would You Do This Year If You Had No Fear? She returned home from overseas and offers her most fearless work yet.

# # #

As Stanfield is like no other “singing speaker,” David Avrin is like few other branding experts. What sets him apart from most image evangelists is that your excitement becomes his excitement and vice versa. He brings a little heart and soul to the creative process because he cares. He can instantly target the strengths he needs to promote, the weaknesses he needs to overcome and the values he wants to share. He understands, to use his branding term, visibility.

Branding powers, the ability to help others see what you are doing in such a quick and clear way that no further explanation is needed, are a gift. You either got ‘em or you don’t. Not everybody is a Don Draper or David Avrin.

For those of us who need help to come up with our phrases and descriptors, it’s a wonder to watch people like Arvin who get it so effortlessly and see things in you that you never noticed before.

The Avrins of the world can fix our problems, showcase our talents, and enable our dreams. Personally, other than customers, I don’t need much more.

His book (forward by Joe Calloway) is aimed at small businesses — speakers, lawyers, doctors, plumbers — but it’s not a business how-to book. Instead, the book is Avrin’s version of a Stanfield album.

“My goal,” he writes, “is to kick you in the pants to dig deeper for better marketing messages and strategies to grow your business.”

And following his own advice, here’s how he brands his own book:

He calls it an “open-to-any-page, stick-it-in-your-bathroom, pearls of wisdom, nuggets of marketing brilliance, best-practice, story-laden book filled with short essays and observations to help you recognize clever personal and professional marketing strategies and creative promotional tactics to help you be seen, be remembered and become the go-to resource for people looking for what you’re selling.”

Phew.

So I played his little game. I took the book into the bathroom and opened the book to any page seeking my pearl, my nugget, his brilliance.

On that page, he wrote about something I had done and wondered, in my case, if it was worth it. Why? Nobody ever noticed that I did it.

His subject was appearances on a city’s cable TV program. I’ve done a dozen and not once has anyone ever said, “I saw you on that.”

Well, Avrin explains that he is hooked on the guy who paints trees on his community access channel. He can’t skip past the tree painter when he’s going to a real channel. The guy is mesmerizing.

Avrin writes that these appearances on little-watched TV channels are good for you because: 1) you get practice time, 2) you gain new video footage, and 3) “you never know who’s watching.”

My suggestion, though, is that, his branding aside, this is more than a bathroom book. Like Avrin, it’s an idea generator. And as both Avrin and Stanfield show in their latest works, there’s little better than that.

# # #

Avrin’s book and Stanfield’s album.

Read one and listen to the other; you’re set for 2010

Full disclosure: Author Dave Lieber uses portions of Jana Stanfield’s music, with her permission, on his Web site at http://www.WatchdogNation.com.

By DAVE LIEBER

Fort Worth Star-Telegram Columnist/NSA North Texas

www.YankeeCowboy.com

Speakers always want their name in the newspaper.  And as a longtime newspaper columnist, I am here to pass on a surefire way to get attention.  Nobody has ever thought of this before, but it works.

Get scammed.

It worked quite well for two co-chapter members, Eloise Owens and Karen Cortell Reisman, of NSA/North Texas.

Both appeared recently in my Star-Telegram column.  They got their names in the paper.  Big time.

Actually, it was quite awful.

Eloise Owens’ column was headlined: “Beware the grandparents scam.”

The column was about how her 85-year-old mother in California got a call from Eloise’s son.  Or so she thought.

Actually, it was a scammer pretending to be him.  When the scammer was done, Eloise’s mom had wired $6,000 to Canada.  She never saw the money again.

Eloise believes the scammer may have learned about her family on the Internet, from her wedding program or from her wedding Web site.  Now, she’s a lot more careful about what she puts out on the ‘net.

A few weeks later, chapter member Gary Rifkin alerted me to another problem.  He had received an alarming Facebook email from chapter member Karen Cortell Reisman stating that she was in London and had been mugged at gunpoint.  She needed him to send money so she could get home.  Gary didn’t fall for it.  He copied the transcript and sent it to me.

For the next two days, Karen had to deal with the hijacking of her Facebook account, her friends’ concerned calls and emails and unknown fears caused by this web identity theft.

The column about Karen was headlined: “Take steps to protect yourself on Facebook.”

(Thanks to Gary for alerting me to this story.  Here is the story about Eloise Owens, and here’s the one about Karen Cortell Reisman.)

All of this comes on the heels of other speakers scams.  Linda Swindling alerted me to a former NSA member who takes URL names and adds an ’S’ to them and tries to scam speakers out of money.  When you call him, he tries to extort money from you.

A speaker friend from California was offered a chance to appear in a New York City comedy club, but he had to help the promoter set up the event by putting some of his own money up.  Turns out the promoter took the money, there was no event, and the speaker never heard from him again.

And then we heard from NSA Executive Vice President Stacy Tetschner, who warned us to watch out for a London “company” that contacts you to fill in for a speaker who has cancelled and asks for money to help for processing the paperwork to get you there.

Recently, I was a victim, too.  One meeting planner gave me a check that bounced.  Turns out he was scamming everyone.  I organized the others and we went to the district attorney to file charges.

So this can happen to anyone.

Even you, the speaker.

So remember the words of Police Sergeant Phil Esterhaus on the TV show, Hill Street Blues:

Hey, let’s be careful out there.

Dave Lieber is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.  Last month, his book, Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong, won its second national book award — The 2009 National Best Books Award for Social Change

By Dave Lieber
YankeeCowboy.com

This is the start of my 5th year as a NSA/North Texas member. My only regret is I didn’t join 20 years sooner.
I can’t say we’re the best chapter because I’ve never been to another chapter’s meetings. But I can say I’ve never had more fun with a group of folks than you.
You never know who you are going to meet.

A couple of years ago — as a member of the Joe Charbonneau Academy (I liked it so much I did it twice!) — I met Melissa, who was also enrolled. We lived near each other and had a bit in common.

Melissa D'Arabian

She and her husband had moved to Keller, Texas because of her his job. Their small kids were adjusting. She was wading into the speaking profession at NSA.
She was active in her new community, too. She had decided to use her business background to volunteer for Keller’s economic development board.

When I gave her background on Keller’s failures in this regard (the biggest retail name in town is some guy named “For Lease”), she smiled and said, “Well, it’s a new day. Let’s see how I can help them.”
She was genuine and direct. Her bright eyes and smile were welcoming. She was a natural.
Maybe you know who I’m talking about. Her full name is Melissa d’Arabian. She became a national celebrity in August when she won the reality TV show, The Next Food Network Star, in which contestants show off their culinary skills.
Just as important, they have to show off their abilities to talk on camera. She must have been good. Of the 10 contestants, she was the only one without professional cooking experience.
Now she gets her own 6-week show on the network — Ten Dollar Dinners With Melissa d’Arabian — shown Sunday mornings.
And NSA/North Texas gets another brag. She’s one of ours! This adorable, good-natured former North Texas mom (the family recently moved to the West Coast for hubby’s job again) won because she was so authentic the judges fell in love.
You had to see her on camera. She looks through the lens right into your heart. Her words about her background and her family caused goose bumps in viewers across America.
Ed Peters, her former dean at our Charboneau Academy, said her people skills were obvious from the start.
“We’ve always known as speakers that the key to success with an audience is ‘connecting’ with them,” Peters says. “I’ve always referred to that connection as ‘It’s not about you; It’s about them.’
“No one personifies that idea as much as my former student in the academy. Melissa d’Arabian. Melissa figured out very quickly that making her ‘performance’ about her audience, and not about her, would be her competitive advantage. It worked. It always does.”

Dave Lieber, one of America’s last remaining crusading newspaper columnists, runs WatchdogNation.com which helps Americans protect themselves against evildoers of all stripes.

By Dave Lieber

NSA/North Texas

Fort Worth Star-Telegram Columnist

www.YankeeCowboy.com

The most edited parts of my newspaper column, aside from obvious mistakes, are my transition paragraphs linking major sections or scenes.  Mine are rough, but my editor is a transition expert.

Speech transitions are even more important.  A reader may skip through a badly written paragraph to get to the meat.  An audience member listening to a bad transition in an uncomfortable hotel chair will, in a second, lose interest and check his watch.

Transitions are like “establishing shots” in a movie.  They also act like a propeller, launching you from one scene to the next.

I spent a long time tinkering with the key transition in my new keynote - Agonized over each word for the perfect tone.  It’s only 15 words.

First comes my opening story, sort of like the overture in an opera.  The orchestra is playing, but the curtain is down.  This playful warm-up lets the audience know I have a pulse … and a sense of humor. ‘Tis transition time.

I pause, think about the meaning behind the words, and then say with conviction the following:

Just like you, I was brought up to believe the world was a good place.

Sometimes, my voice cracks.  I feel the sentence come from within.

Let’s look at how each word was chosen:

Just – My least favorite word.  Usually, it can be struck from any sentence without harm.  But here, it works.  Better than saying “Like you …”  This word serves as an opening drumbeat to set the rhythm of the rest of the sentence.  Lets you know something is about to happen;

Like – One of the most underrated words … one beat short of love, the very best word;

You – The money word in our biz;

I – This combination of you and I, separated by a comma/pause, establishes an immediate connection between the audience and speaker.  We are now together;

Was – By not using ‘is’ and not putting the audience in the moment, which is also a very good word/technique to use, ‘was’ means you are about to tell a story from the past.  The brain likes to hear that;

Brought up – Raised or brought up?  Brought up wins because it evokes the idea that your parents nurtured you in a safer bygone world;

To Believe – The word ‘believe’ strikes a universal cord with everyone because we all believe in things both true and untrue;

The World – This isn’t about neighborhood or even state, but global, even universal; and

Was A Good Place – An expression of purity, evoking in the simplest phrasing everyone’s personal image of his or her own highest ideal.

This transition does its job, helping the audience cross the bridge from overture to Act 1, by using connection-building words to evoke personal ideals and creating curiosity for what comes next.

It doesn’t take a lot of words, JUST the right ones.

Check out the bizarro world Dave created at

http://www.watchdognation.com

Back in March, I posted a brief essay on this NSA member blog claiming that Obama is really NSA Man. Well, last week I listened to a speech of his and he told THE DARN STARFISH STORY! So, uh, I take it all back.

By Dave Lieber
NSA/North Texas Member

Barack Obama is the first NSA-styled President of the United States. I look at him and see a piece of each of you, the speaker.
Look at his stage presence. His words. His motivational pep. Check out his back-of-the-room sales. His Web presence. His search for the best new thing. Like you.
Sure, his take-aways and outcomes are to be determined. But his oratory is so sweeping and unknown to the modern era that you have to go back to the Great Awakening of the 1730s to find something similar on this continent.
His back-of-the-room sales make any CPAE wince with jealously. And the speed! Three weeks after his Inauguration, a newly-minted hardcover book containing his Inaugural Address was perched beside nearly every bookstore cash register in America.
His messages come at you like Scott Halford’s call to action, able to shake audiences from slumber to renewal.
He’s got Patricia Fripp’s stern manner of “let’s stop fooling around and get serious.” But like her, he says it with a smile.
Can’t you see in him Nido Qubein’s appeal to everyone’s higher dreams and noble aspirations?
Do you detect the steady-ahead business style of Mark LeBlanc? The everyone-must-feel-like-a-winner negotiating tactics of Linda Swindling. And for certain, the media skills of Lorri Allen.
He’s not as funny as a Sally Baskey and can’t sing like Jana Stanfield. But nobody, except maybe David Avrin, can craft a message and a means to get it out better than he can.
This new president communicates in plain-speak, a la Ed Peters. He crosses cultural boundaries in a way that would make the late Rosita Perez proud. And he tells a story as good as Doug Stevenson, or almost as good.
His marriage to Michelle seems like a true faith-based partnership — Jim and Naomi Rhode. His smooth elegant manner lets him glide like Willie Jollie. And don’t forget the concise, problem-solving focus he shows, similar to Patrick Donadio.
His come-from-nowhere story is all Francine Ward. His vision is similar to — who else? — Cavett Robert, whose wrote a book called “We are in the People Business.”
Don’t forget to throw in his unending supply of Brad Montgomery-like magic. And oh yeah, he’s tall like Jeanne Robertson.
About the only thing he doesn’t have in him, at least not yet, is a little Dale Irwin. Maybe after a few more years dealing with the Republicans, we can revisit that.

Dave Lieber’s Web site is http://www.YankeeCowboy.com.

By Dave Lieber

Member/NSA-North Texas

I’m finding that audiences today (and I write this in late February 2009), at least in my area of Dallas-Fort Worth, are still upbeat, generally hopeful, but also fearful of the future. They want help and guidance. Who better than you?
In recent weeks, I’ve found that they will listen to a speaker, but usually only buy what we sell if they can see a direct impact and improvement on either their business or personal financial situation in the next few months, when they need it most. That’s a tall order.
I’m lucky. My new book is geared to helping people in tough times. But what if your message is a lot more upbeat and uplifting than is generally appropriate for today’s shell-shocked audiences? What if your prime message doesn’t ring as true with audiences today as it did six months ago because of external forces you cannot control?
What kind of new strategies can you quickly turn to?
Let me throw one out to get the thread started.
I had breakfast last week with my sales rep from Friesens of Canada, the printing company I use for my books. She told me that the company has bought a new press which allows its minimum order for books to drop from 1,000 books to 250. And that 250, she said, is still very, very affordable. Just a few dollars per book for a high quality product that turns around in about a month.
So what if?
What if you took the one part of your message that rings most true in today’s unprecedented times and created a book highlighting that portion of your message with a new title that sounds very 2009ish?
What if you tested that book with your audiences with a 250-press run, then tinkered with it a little more after you learn more about how it sells, and then go back and do a larger run?
Those manuals, tapes and disks that previously offered up your entire program? They might not work so well now, but of course, they will come back to life down the road when things get better.
But for now, a new quick-run book of yours, printed quickly and affordably, can start selling right away.
That’s just one idea. I’m anxious to hear from you what else is working now, right now?

The human touch

By Dave Lieber
Fort Worth Star-Telegram Columnist
WatchdogNation.com

Tough times. Selling anything? Good luck.
So I conducted a little experiment. What does it take to sell in today’s business climate?
Here’s what I did: Asked four area businesses to take part in a December sales contest. Whoever sold the most copies of my new book wins a $100 first prize and a $50 second prize. Vendors also get to keep half the earnings from their books sales.
The competitors? Not bookstores.
— A self-storage business that also contains a walk-in post office. (Great foot traffic in December.)
— A dental office with four friendly women at the front counter. (Offering books to patients still feeling the effects of Novocain.)
— A legendary gourmet restaurant inside a gas station (Shrimp Scampi, gas and my book.)
— And a hairstylist. (She has a captive audience.)
I helped each put up signs, and they placed the book in prominent locations, usually beside the cash register.
You couldn’t miss my little book. The competition ran for a month. But in the end, there was one clear winner.
Wendy the hairstylist.
Here’s how she explains it:
“The book is right in front of my client while I work, and that starts a conversation. I say, `Have you read Dave’s new book? Sit and have a look at it.’”
While she cut hair, “People would actually sit here and read pages. Others would ask questions. I’d say, ‘Would you like it autographed?’”
Three-fourths of all customers who held the book ended up buying it, she says. Maybe that was the key. The other businesses couldn’t get people to stop for a moment, pick it up and ponder it.
Wendy used her passion about the product. She believes in the book. She also believes in that $100 first prize.
She says, “You have to talk about it. Start off simple. Keep it light. They either love it and want it for themselves or others — or they didn’t care for it.
“You put it in their hands. And then you play off how they handle that. You pretty much go by their vibes. But you’ve got to chat it up.”
What did I learn? It’s not a thousand eyes glancing past a book that sells it. The other places had tremendous foot traffic, much more than Wendy.
It’s the human touch. Somebody saying, “This is good for you.”
That works today when little else does.

“I just want someone to talk to and a little of that human touch.” ~ Bruce Springsteen

Dave Lieber is a member of the North Texas chapter of NSA. Check out his new book — Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong.

By Dave Lieber

Fort Worth Star-Telegram columnist

http://www.yankeecowboy.com

  The crinkling little bag got to me, stopped me mid-speech like a freight train at a railroad crossing. I couldn’t go on.

   Talking to a group of women in Garland the other night, I stopped and said, “I can’t talk with that bag.” Then my mind went black.

   Everyone in the audience looked at the offender sitting in the back with a Wal-Mart plastic sack. She was trying to undo a knot. The more she messed with the knot, the louder that crinkling noise became.

   Then she put the knot in her mouth and tried to undo it with her teeth. It was like six cell phones going off at the same time. No one was listening to me anymore.

   “I can’t talk with that bag.”

   Everyone looked at me, then at her. She smiled and put the bag down.

   “Where was I?”

   *

   At the end of the talk, I made a joke referring back to the bag. Let everyone know I was OK. We were OK. There was a nod of relief from audience members.

   And when Bag Lady came up afterward to apologize, I laughed and said I wasn’t angry at all. I gave her a gift and we hugged. All’s well that ends well.

   *

   In the parking lot, she came back over and said, “You’re a very good speaker.”

   “Yeah,” I replied, “but if I were a pro, I would have been able to talk right through that plastic bag in your mouth.”

   She answered: “That’s right!”

   *

   Fifteen minutes later in the car, I finally figured out what I should have said:

    “Ma’am, excuse me but do you need any help with that bag?”

   Yeah, it’s about them, not us — even in the dumbest circumstances.

   *

   How do you handle a ringing cell phone or other distractions in the middle of your talk? Do you ignore it? Do you make a joke? If so, what kind?

   Send me an e-mail to dave@yankeecowboy.com. Maybe we can share your answers in this space.

   *

   Once when Patricia Fripp was interrupted, she said, “Gentlemen, you may not realize it, but I’m usually paid very well to speak. I also have a business in San Francisco waiting for my time. When people pay you to speak, they treat you very well. You’ve taught me that when you speak for nothing, you have to put up with people talking through your presentation. I’ll be happy to leave right now and go take care of my business. I’ll also be happy to stay and finish my speech, but if I do, you will have to shut up and listen!”

Spirit of NSA Strongest in North Texas Chapter

By Dave Lieber

Fort Worth Star-Telegram

www.yankeecowboy.com

   Ever rewrite your speech while stuck in traffic?

   That’s what happened after I rushed out of the last chapter meeting to give a speech in Fort Worth. As traffic stopped on I-30W, I called the meeting planner, who knew I might be running late. Then I pulled out note cards and, and while cruising at 5 miles per hour, worked the advice from chapter members into the newest version of my very new speech.

   As honored as I was to share the basics of my “Secrets of Storytelling” talk at that meeting, I was even more honored to listen to chapter members’ ideas after I presented them with my dilemma — how to artfully mix storytelling with facts and instruction for maximum effect.

   Share any problem with chapter members, and they immediately work to solve it. Of course, even experts can learn more about their subject if they stop and listen to their audience. When you stop listening, you stop learning.

   And when I finally arrived at that meeting and shared the new version with all those suggestions still fresh in my head, it was by far the best one yet!

   I write this little love note to my chapter members on NSA Founder Cavett Robert’s birthday – Spirit of NSA Day. It’s a day in which we’re urged to “provide genuine spirit to speaking colleagues.”

   So thank you for my dose. Our chapter nurtures a loving, caring atmosphere that leads to trust and a willingness to listen and learn.

   Cavett should know that his formula for chapter success still works in North Texas.

   Thanks, NSA/NT! Once again, as always, you came through.

   *

   Cavett Robert said: “A superficial knowledge is not enough. It must be a knowledge capable of analyzing a situation quickly and making an immediate decision.”