Struggling to best present yourself in front of camera? Here are my 5 best on camera speaking tips to help you come alive, look natural and also connect with your audience more effectively than ever. Touching on tips to equip you with things to consider, questions to ask yourself, lenses to look through so that you can fill in the gaps to be more engaging, effective and entertaining when you're speaking on camera.
Quick note: this episode originally aired two years ago, so a few things mentioned in the episode are out of date like the name of my program and my mini course, but the message is TIMELESS.
Check out my new program >>The Signature Talk Accelerator<< an on-demand program to condense the time it takes to nail your message, hone your story and craft a money making talk.
EPISODE SHOW NOTES👇
➡️ https://heathersager.com/episode121/
🔗 Grab the latest FREE resources: https://heathersager.com/start
🔗 Browse all episode shownotes: https://heathersager.com/blog
👋 CONNECT WITH HEATHER:
Work with Heather: https://www.heathersager.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theheathersager/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/HeatherSager
If you’re loving this episode, please take a moment to rate & review the show. This helps me get this message to more people so they too can ditch the hustle 24/7 life.
Struggling to best present yourself in front of camera? Here are my 5 best on camera speaking tips to help you come alive, look natural and also connect with your audience more effectively than ever. Touching on tips to equip you with things to consider, questions to ask yourself, lenses to look through so that you can fill in the gaps to be more engaging, effective and entertaining when you're speaking on camera.
Quick note: this episode originally aired two years ago, so a few things mentioned in the episode are out of date like the name of my program and my mini course, but the message is TIMELESS.
Check out my new program >>The Signature Talk Accelerator<< an on-demand program to condense the time it takes to nail your message, hone your story and craft a money making talk.
EPISODE SHOW NOTES👇
➡️ https://heathersager.com/episode121/
🔗 Grab the latest FREE resources: https://heathersager.com/start
🔗 Browse all episode shownotes: https://heathersager.com/blog
👋 CONNECT WITH HEATHER:
Work with Heather: https://www.heathersager.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theheathersager/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/HeatherSager
If you’re loving this episode, please take a moment to rate & review the show. This helps me get this message to more people so they too can ditch the hustle 24/7 life.
Ultimately, we have to learn, as entrepreneurs, how to think more strategically, how to ask higher quality questions to get higher quality results, and that's what I really want to talk about today is how we can ask better questions of ourselves to be able to then go. What are the specifics to fill in the gap? I'm going to teach you different ways that you can take your message and learn how to unlock it for your audience. How do you describe things in a way that not only resonates with your audience, but in a way that's authentic to your personality, your topic, your style. So that's the most important thing you got to make sure that you're coming back to your specific style. This is the podcast for the entrepreneur who wants to make a big impact, who doesn't shy away from hard work but also wants to enjoy life along the way. Hi, I'm Heather Sager, former executive turned entrepreneur, and I've spent the last 20 years working with premium brands on sales, marketing and communication, and I've learned that when you become a magnet with your message, you only need a hint of hustle to achieve your goals. Get ready to be inspired and ignited each week with tangible strategies on sales, speaking, marketing and so much more. This is the hint of hustle podcast. Let's go. Hey friend, welcome to another episode.
Speaker 1:We're hitting episode number 121, and I don't know why that feels so special to me, but that's a pretty big number, if I don't say so myself. If I do say so myself, I don't know what the expression is. Anyway, we're here and in this episode today, we are digging into my absolute best tips for how to show up on camera. Specifically, we're talking about speaking on camera and no, we're not going to go down rabbit holes about tech and equipment and lighting. I find a lot of those things are excuses and crutches for procrastinate and not doing video. No, we're going to talk about you how you can show up in the best way on video. These are my power tips. If I only had 30 minutes with you, which is what we have today this is what I would share with you. So we're going to dive into the episode. We're ready to rock and I had had a different topic prepared for today, but I was down on the couch drinking coffee this morning and I don't know why, but this topic just came up front and center and I felt compelled to share it with you.
Speaker 1:So I want you to grab your notes app, grab a pen, grab something, because I'm going to give you some tangible tactical things today for you not to implement all of them, but the goal of sharing with you these my best like video tips on camera speaking tips. What I want to do is provoke your thinking so that you can start asking yourself how can I be more engaging, more effective, more entertaining when I show up to the microphone? That is the question. I want to equip you with things to consider, questions to ask yourself, lenses to look through so that you can start asking better questions of yourself to say how can I be more engaging, effective and entertaining when I'm speaking on camera? That is the mission here, and I want to say this really loud and clear, because what's happening so much is that people are looking to follow such a scripted recipe. They're looking for what do I say?
Speaker 1:How should I arrange my camera? What kind of camera should I buy? What is the secret to adding text on it? Should I do text? Should I not do text? Should I do transition? Should I not do transition? Should it be long video? Should it be short video? Should it be real? Should it be YouTube? Should it be IGTV? Should it be reliable. My gosh, that's exhausting, just to say all that. But all of these technical, specific questions and I don't want to discount their importance but ultimately we have to learn as entrepreneurs, how to think more strategically, how to ask higher quality questions to get higher quality results, and that's what I really want to talk about today is how we can ask better questions of ourselves to be able to then go.
Speaker 1:What are the specifics to fill in the gap? What am I mean by this? Okay, instead of me giving you a script to follow to make a rockin Facebook live teaching video which, by the way, I can give you, that that's all included in my program lights camera, rock star, which, by the way, you can grab that now, I'll put a link in the show notes. It's just a little mini course that we have out to help you get over your fear of going live on camera. But coming back to it and give you the script, but you know the expression from the Bible give a man a fish or teach him to fish. You're the man right now and I'm not going to give you a fish. I'm going to teach you how to fish, which means I'm going to teach you different ways that you can take your message and learn how to unlock it for your audience.
Speaker 1:How do you describe things in a way that not only resonates with your audience, but in a way that's authentic to your personality, your topic, your style? That's the most important thing of all the things I mean, of all things I just said. You got to make sure that you're coming back to your specific style. So let's dive into it. There's five things. I'm going to list them out for you, just to kind of rip off the Band-Aid so you can hear them and let's dive into each one. And holy hot dang, we're only 10 minutes in the episode Fire. Here we go. Number one it's going to be preparation. Number two be yourself. Number three eye contact. Number four movement. And number five make yourself laugh or smile. Let me explain what I mean by these. So we're going to set the stage here.
Speaker 1:So when I say speaking on camera, I'm talking about going live on Facebook or Instagram or, if you have it, linkedin or YouTube right, going live. It could be recorded video. Maybe you're doing a video presentation at a virtual summit or you're guest teaching in a workshop. Maybe it's not on camera necessarily. Maybe it's doing what I'm doing right now, which is recording an audio podcast. It could be you being a guest on podcast. You get the idea here when I'm talking about speaking on camera, specifically, I'm talking about you giving an interview or delivering some kind of training with the goal to educate and teach an audience. So, speaking on camera it could be a lot of different things, but that's what we're talking about here, and the question is how do we show up through those lenses I mentioned before? How do we show up more engaging, more effective and more entertaining?
Speaker 1:So, going into the first specific area, preparation. Preparation means a lot of things to a lot of different people, and I'm going to give a shout out real quick to an amazing podcast episode that I listened to this week. It was on Amy Porterfield's online marketing made easy, and she had Juliana Ransick and Jason Kennedy from E News on the show. Which, first of all, how amazing is it that she had celebrities. If you will, I used to be a huge fan of Juliana and Bill. I love that show. What was that like a decade ago? Anyways, if you're not familiar with that, juliana Ransick is a TV personality and host. She's been on the air for a 20 year career. She had some amazing, amazing tips, and one of the things that she shared was her approach to preparation, and I wanted to share it with you here, and then I'll give you my definition here.
Speaker 1:But Juliana was talking about now. She worked on E News, which was pop culture, working red carpets, just talking with celebrities a lot, which might feel a little different than what you and I do on a daily basis. But what was fascinating with what she shared was she her whole thing, for going live is to be more prepared, like prepare, prepare, prepare. That's how she's able to show up and be more quote unquote off the cuff. But what she talked about when it came to preparation is it wasn't that she was sitting down and creating all of the questions or writing herself the specific outline and all the details. For her, it was actually more about getting the right information to equip her to be in the moment. So she talked about how, if she was working the Oscars on the red carpet, she would make sure that she's watched on the movies and studied the list of the actors and actresses that were gonna be there, so she would know who she might run into. She'd be reading up on their histories and their most recent events, so that she was prepared meaning that she had relevant information to be able to have quality conversations with those celebrities. So what she brought up was this idea of doing your homework, doing your research. That is what quality preparation is. So I'm gonna link to that podcast episode in the show notes.
Speaker 1:But, bringing it back to you, my point number one here is the best way for you to stand out on camera, first and foremost is to prepare, and it's up to you to define what that looks like. Because here's the thing you might not be like Juliana or Jason Kennedy or me it feels very awkward to lump myself into that category but what I mean by that is very comfortable speaking live, very comfortable being quote, unquote, off the cuff, even though we've done the prep work to be able to show up live. But I really thrive in the moment. I love the impromptu nature of being live and reacting to my audience and seeing people live, engaging with them. I actually coach people live and sometimes I have no idea where the conversation is gonna go and that excites me because I know I can bring it back, because I've been doing this Heck for 13 years now. I've been facilitating sessions. Actually no, 15 years facilitating sessions with audiences.
Speaker 1:But what I want you to really consider is that your comfort zone and if you do not thrive off of the live element, your version of preparation is going to look very different. So, first and foremost, if you really want to be greatly present on camera, if you want to show up confident, you have to prepare. So what that might look like for some who love the more live nature, that might be a simple post-it note where you write down your maybe the prompt for your opening hook, and a hook is how you're gonna start the video right, and it might be writing down a few bullet points. That, honestly, that's how I prepare for most things is a post-it note with some bullet points and, to be perfectly honest with you, sometimes I don't even practice my intro or opening. I always find that I hold attention on the video replay when I do practice my opening. So, even though I'm more of an off the cuff person, that's the one area that I'm more intentional on planning.
Speaker 1:You have to figure out what that means for you. Not gonna give you the specific recipe or exactly what preparation means, because you have to define it, but the question is what background knowledge and or notes can you put together so that way, when you press that record button, you might feel timid, you might feel nervous, you might feel a little, might be a little sweaty that's all fine, that's all normal. But the question is, what is going to be the safety net that gives you the courage to continue and go and do it anyways? That's the question. So preparation that might mean you wanna do a little research on the topic you're speaking out, maybe have a couple statistics to pull from so it's not just story-based. Maybe for you, preparation is when you're getting ready to do a video and you're reviewing a virtual summit. You wanna understand who are the other speakers there so that you can connect what you're talking about to the other speakers. Preparation for you could be having a list of the common mistakes your ideal customer makes, so that you make sure that you don't skip one. Preparation for you could be putting a post-it note so that you don't forget about talking about your freebie at the end of your podcast interview. The list can go on and on.
Speaker 1:The question is, what is the specific thing or set of things that's gonna help you feel more prepared? It should not be a script, so sorry if you love scripts, but I'm gonna challenge you is using a script. Is that giving you the best impression and interaction with your audience? Is that the most engaging, effective and entertaining method for your audience to connect with you? I'm gonna say probably not, but you do you, you do you. But that's number one is prepare. Number two be yourself.
Speaker 1:Now, this one here sounds so simple, but I'll go back to the quote I say over and over again from Will Rogers just because it's common sense doesn't mean it's common practice. What happens so much? When we show up online in videos or interviews, we feel that we have to be polished. In fact, that word actually came up a ton in that interview I was mentioning before. It's something that I hear so often when I'm interviewing my clients and students and people that I've been helping with speaking.
Speaker 1:We've all done the quote unquote ideal customer avatar interviews polished it is a word that people use so often around what they aspire to be like on camera, and the challenge that I have for you is when you watch other people on virtual stages or video, do you love the polished person or are you a little turned off by them? Ie, they rub you at the wrong way just a little bit, and you can't put your finger on it. Most likely the latter. I don't mean to be all snarky about it, but the truth is we don't trust perfect. There's something that we can't put our finger on, but we just were turned off by the corporate polished look. And when another entrepreneur shows up so perfect and polished, we put them up on a pedestal and we no longer relate with them. And while we might enjoy their content, there is, I believe, an underlying level of mistrust Because deep down, we wonder are they really that curated, perfectly polished? The answer to that question is we know a resounding no.
Speaker 1:What I want you to really think about here is why is it that we appreciate realness, authenticity? We cheer for the underdog, ie the person who flubs and make mistakes. Hello, opening of this podcast today. If you were thinking, yes, either we love it when you just go on random tangents or we love it when you flub up because it gives me permission to do the same. If you've ever thought that before and I said it, if you want it polished, go find someone else. But if you were thinking that it's because we like the realness, we cheer for the underdog. We want to see that person succeed and win. So why is it that we love that another people but for ourselves, we have this expectation that we have to be perfect, that we must communicate like the six o'clock news anchor on channel 12. I don't know, I don't watch the news. I think channel 12 is still a thing around here, anyway. So what we want to focus on is how do we completely be ourself? What does that even mean? Well, when we're thinking about how to be better on camera when you're speaking, I want you to think about am I talking right now like I would normally talk to another human being, or have I put on my announcer recording voice? There is a difference.
Speaker 1:When I was growing up I think I've mentioned this on the show before we always laughed because in my house, the youngest of six kids, my mom, is a stay at home mom but seems to us and she I can't even imagine having six children. Oh my gosh, can you imagine if anyone's listening? They have six children. I pray for you every day and I am just so in awe of everything you do. You should get all of the gold medals and all of the brownies. That's all. That's what I have to say so my mom, right, with kids that don't listen, we're running around like crazy. My mom could be like yelling or whatever would happen, but then the phone would ring. And the phone would ring and mom would be like back up the socks. Hello, this is Clara. This is so funny to me. Maybe this is not as funny to you, but I'm sure you have this memory of your mom or someone with their telephone voice. We always joked as kids that we're like man when we're in trouble we should just go somewhere and call mom. So she talked to us on that telephone voice. We knew, though, right that that voice so syrupy sweet it wasn't matching the realness of that moment.
Speaker 1:And while I'm not saying that you should be like aggressively yelling for real, in real life, I do not condone that. What I am saying is I want you to shake off the difference between how you talk normally and how you might be trying to play a persona on camera. Shake that off and be real. What does that mean for you? It means use expression in your voice Like you tell stories to your friends. It means tell the stories about the weird, quirky things, right? You hear me go off on random tangents all the time. I've embraced that more and more. Sometimes I probably should do it less, but I've just built that as part of my brand. Sager Side Note is a thing. Sager Side Note became a thing in my program because I went off on so many side tangents.
Speaker 1:Anyways, I want you to think about how can I be more of myself. So if you're a funny person but you find yourself not being funny on camera, there's an incongruity problem. We need to add the funny in. If you are an energetic person, if you are happy and passionate, but your energy is way stoic and serious on camera, you're not being yourself. If you're a serious person and you're trying to be funny on camera because you like other people that are funny, you're probably not being congruent and, honestly, you're probably not being that funny. If you're a sarcastic person and you're not bringing some of that sarcasm to the camera, you're not being totally authentic. You have to ask yourself the question, right, and I don't know what the exact answer is for you but how can I be more of myself?
Speaker 1:I did an episode, man. It was early last year. I'm gonna scroll back and find the number. It was with Bobby Clink. It was episode number 35. It was such a good episode and Bobby and I were talking about how to bring more of your personality in your copy, specifically your email. But this stands for the stage two, so we'll link to that in the show notes here. I really encourage you to listen to that conversation if you're struggling with that. Also, my interview with Saphira Rajan. She was on just a few months ago earlier this summer. We were talking about infusing her personality. Those are two great episodes to listen. After this one so that you can start asking yourself how do I bring more of me to the party?
Speaker 1:This is critical if you're a personal brand, because people are drawn to you, not just because you teach yoga or you teach cooking classes or because you're a coach or because you design websites right, the craft of what you do. That's a piece of it, right? That's probably why they initially looked at you, because they had a need or an interest in a topic. But the reason why they've stuck around. There's something more to that. They like your teaching style, they like your personality. They love the fact that you talk about your cat or your cute new puppy, whatever that is for you. They stick around because there's more.
Speaker 1:I think this is something that's really important, because I think we lose sight sometimes that sometimes people find us at a moment where they're not actually in need of our product or service. It doesn't mean that they're not a potential buyer down the road, but for right now they're not it. But if we have different ways to connect, like I don't know, they like the way that we speak or they like our graphics or they like how we talk about certain things, or they connect on the mom level or whatever it is for you right, if they find those other connection points, they're going to stay connected and engaged even when they don't have an immediate need to buy your product. And there's a thought thinking about that. Well, what's the point of having people in my audience that have no interest in buying my product right now? If that's the question, you're playing a short-term game and business is long-term. My friend and I know if you're listening to this show you're not thinking like but what about the now immediacy? That's not how we do marketing around here. We look more on the long-term. But bringing more of you is going to not only make you feel more comfortable in front of the camera, it's going to make your audience feel more comfortable and connected too.
Speaker 1:Ooh, that was a long one. I really went off on a tangent on that one. But hello, that's on brand. Okay, let's go to number three. We've covered.
Speaker 1:Number one was preparation. Right, preparing a way that makes you feel confident showing up and pushing record. Number two was being more of yourself. I forgot to mention. I wrote this down. Being more of yourself means including your mess ups, being more authentic. Being more of yourself also means including the mess ups. Does it mean we record, like do every single mess up? No, I'll tell you, I hit record. This was the third time I hit record on this episode, because the first two intros I didn't like because they weren't to the point enough. So I cut those because it would be more valuable for you. But the rest of these mess ups here I kept in, with the exception of one little deletion here where a fire truck went through my neighborhood, which is very random because we don't ever hear sirens out here in the burbs. Anyways, I tell you all this because I would imagine if you are in my audience and you listen to me, you probably find my random side, tangents or word flubs or mistakes. You probably find those endearing and actually empowering, because it gives you permission to not be perfect for your audience. So embrace the imperfections. That's part of being you.
Speaker 1:Number three eye contact. All right, now we're taking a left turn and getting really tactical here. I'm going to go quickly through this one, because I've talked about this over and over and over again. What we have to remember, specifically with a virtual audience, is it's up to us to give our audience eye contact. The bummer is we don't get it back because we're looking at this little black dot of a camera. I'm staring right now in my Logitech webcam. If I stare at that which side note here we go again. What's hilarious right now is I'm doing this as an audio only podcast, but because I've trained myself in the habit, I've been staring at my Logitech webcam. I didn't realize I was doing this, but the entire time I'm sitting in my normal recording spot, I'm staring at my Logitech webcam and there is no video on which now my video editor is probably going to be like why the heck do we do video this week? Well, max is because I didn't want to take a shower today. So that's why we're doing audio only. But coming back to it, it's my job as the speaker to stare and make eye contact with that little black dot, but I have to understand that that means that I sacrifice connection, of receiving that connection back from my audience. Let me clarify what I mean.
Speaker 1:Let's pretend that you're on a Zoom meeting where you're presenting to 12 people. The tendency of what we want to do is we want to look at the faces that people are talking to, because we want to see how our message is resonating with them. Are their faces lighting up? Do they look confused? Do they look tired? Are they excited? Are they laughing too? What are they thinking right now? And you don't get that gift of feedback when you're speaking virtually. I wish it was different, my friend, but it's just not.
Speaker 1:You have to give them the eye contact if you want to maintain their engagement. You need to look at that camera, which means when you're speaking, you stare directly in that camera and you don't get to look at their faces. Now, that doesn't mean that 100% of the time you need to be staring at that camera. In fact, that would be really creepy. A good rule of thumb. I learned this from my friend, tonya Reiman, who's a body language expert. She's incredible. I've talked to her on the show before when it comes to eye contact. She says that we should have a target to maintain eye contact about 70% of the time in a typical conversation, and I find the same to be true when it comes to video work.
Speaker 1:If we stare into that camera lens 100% of the time, it would be totally creepy, like the person was trying to reach in and suck out your soul. It's just too much. Right? You want to look away because you feel uncomfortable. People become uncomfortable when you stare into their eyeballs too long. 70% is what we're going for. So that gives you permission to look off to the side, to look up, to look at your notes, to look at the screen of the faces you're talking to. So I'm not saying you don't get to look at them. I'm just saying that you mostly need to look at that camera lens because that is looking to them. It means that you have to sacrifice your own need for feedback in order to give them what they need, which is they need your eye contact. That helps showcase confidence, it boosts trust. It makes your message connect even further. So I want you to put that in weight over your need. Sorry, you got to put your needs in this moment on the back burner, but your need for that immediate feedback and I know that hurts a little bit, but let me share with you something that I shatted about with the members of my students' programs Speak up to Level Up.
Speaker 1:This week we were chatting about how difficult it is sometimes when you're presenting the example was on Zoom and you do look down at the faces and people are distracted. They're looking at other web browsers, they're looking at their phones or talking to their spouse or their kid that just came in the room. They're eating their lunch Hopefully their camera's not on but they're sitting on the toilet Like people are all over the map and their faces look tired and exhausted. So let me just give you this bonus thing for here. Imagine for a moment you're delivering a workshop inside someone's mastermind and you are on fire and you are excited and you're oh, you're going, and you look down and people look so bored that's not going to serve you to get that immediate wah, wah. But here's the thing. You might hear that and be like what am I doing wrong? Okay, let me just pull back the curtain here, friend, the virtual environment, the likelihood of people staring at the camera at you the entire time and hanging on every single word and laughing at all your jokes and dancing with you when you ask them to dance Sorry, I don't.
Speaker 1:When you go to a conference or you attend a live training, do you hang on to every single word and worship the person on the camera, or do you multitask a bit, even when they tell you not to Guilty, I have stuff to do? It's very rare that I give a sorry, a guest speaker my 100% attention in this virtual world. I wish it were different, it's just not. So I say all of this in a little bonus tip here. I'm probably going to get in trouble for saying this because I'm undoing a lot of the hype around virtual speaking. It's needed, we need to present ourselves and being a virtual speaker can be very powerful and it's still effective. And we have to acknowledge that we're not going to hold people's attention for the entire presentation and that's okay. You're not going to get the same level of oh my gosh as you would in a live audience. However, I will say, sometimes the connection can be more powerful because you're speaking one on one, when you look at the camera lens, when they are paying attention, which is a lot. I don't want to make it sound like everyone's off doing all these things right, but there is a level of multitasking happening. That's the point here. But that connection through the camera when you're making eye contact, it feels like they're speaking just to you, even though theoretically you know they're not right or logically they're not. But when they look in the camera, when you have the confidence to look straight in that camera, it's like your message is just for them, which makes it more powerful, more engaging and a heck of a lot more effective. So I want you to remember that eye contact, plus a lot of extra bonuses that I gave you in there, eye contact is one of the most important power tips that you have to have in place, where you have to follow whatever that means for you when you are speaking on camera.
Speaker 1:Number four Movement. Let's talk about movement. This also came up this week on my coaching call inside my program, we were talking about what it means to not be so stoic on camera, creating more magnetic presence on camera and if you go back two episodes ago, we talked about creating magnetic presence on camera. We talked about what it means to have body language, how to leverage body language to be able to create more connection with whoever it is that you're talking with. What I want to mention here is movement on camera, and one thing specifically popped up in our it's our level up lab this week, where we go together and we practice every month, and this week was was a magnetic presence.
Speaker 1:As I said, the specific thing that we were talking about here is when people look uncomfortable on camera. It comes back to one of a few things Either one they are staring awkwardly at the camera lens or the screen or a teleprompter, so it's like they're fixated on one point of focus. That becomes really awkward for the viewer, either if it's just like staring creeper bills in the camera or if it's steering over at the screen. You're like hello, look at me, look at me, I'm over here, look at me. So that's one that's distracting.
Speaker 1:Number two is when someone doesn't move their face at all on camera. Right, they have one expression the entire time. Maybe they hold their eyebrows up the entire time, or they have a very stoic look or a very you know that scrunching we get between our eyebrows when we're really focused. Their look, their face, doesn't move, or it doesn't move very much. That doesn't work so well. But the other thing that I think about when it comes to movement, that a lot of people forget about, is the stiffness across our shoulders and in our neck. For just a moment, I want you to roll your head. Roll your head around, like loosen up your neck A little rolly roll. That's what I'm doing right now, which means my voice is probably going to go a little weird. Roll your neck around Now. I want you to roll your shoulders back a few times backwards. Roll shoulders back and then roll your shoulders forward and then roll your shoulders back one more time. Okay, we'll move that neck around with that neck around. It's kind of an interesting activity to do when we're just audio. What we're doing here is we're loosening up your shoulders and your neck.
Speaker 1:I want you to think about. I want you to imagine in front of you right now there's a camera and a microphone in front of you, which is actually the setup that I have right now. I want you to imagine for a moment you talking to the camera and I want you to pretend like you're talking to the camera, but do not move your shoulders, your neck or your head at all. Just imagine talking to the camera being totally, perfectly stiff like a statue. I want you to think about this. I want you to imagine you're talking to the camera and you're like I'm going to say something. Say hi, I'm talking to this. Pretend camera like a freaking statue. Good job. Thanks for following along with my weird little role play here. It felt weird, right, it felt really really weird to hold ourselves still.
Speaker 1:I want you to think about, though, when you actually go to speak on a camera. You don't do an intentionally, but I would imagine you actually become that statue or a version of that that we just did In order for you to be more effective. When you show up live on camera. I want you to think about movement. Movement with your eyes right Looking at that camera, the eye contact we talked about before, but more so your facial expressions and how you move your head and your shoulders. I know this feels very weird to talk about when I can't actually show you these things, but I think there's a gift in that, because then I'm not actually showing you moves.
Speaker 1:To copy, you have to go by the feel of your own body and start thinking about what is natural movement look like for me when I speak, how do I naturally move my head and my neck and my shoulders? I know this sounds super geeky and super specific and super weird, but that's what we do around here on the show is we get super geeky, specific and weird? These are things that I want you to not only think about, but I want you to practice. So, if you're out somewhere right now, where you're I mean not going to have people look at you like you're a crazy person. Actually, if that's the case, if you're somewhere right now with people around and I'm in your ear, but pretend like you're on a phone call, pretend like you're on a phone call and move your head like you're talking, how does your head normally move? How does your shoulders normally move? I want you to start thinking about movement, because movement is going to create more captivation in your message.
Speaker 1:Right, it's not just about the words you're saying on camera, it's about the experience you create around those words. Right, you learn that two episodes back. It's not just what you say, it's how you say. It matters. But, specifically, one of my most important power tips for speaking on camera is to be aware of your shoulders, your neck and your facial expressions. So I'm going to challenge you. Just start thinking about this, start recording yourself and ask is, do I need more variability in how I move? Do I look stoic? Do I look flighty and frenzy? How can I elevate how I'm showing up with my movement? That's number four. Number five I saved my absolute favorite one for last, because this is my best, best, best secret. Now it's no longer a secret because I want to gift it to you, but this is my favorite strategy to use for myself and my private clients, especially those who are super nervous for some kind of speaking gig coming up here. It is Make yourself smile and or laugh, preferably laugh early on in your presentation. Make yourself we'll just say make yourself laugh early on in your presentation. I'll clarify what I mean by this. I well, actually, let me just it's exactly what I said Make yourself laugh early in your presentation. Why?
Speaker 1:What typically happens when we present as much as we practice being natural, as much as we practice those things I've told you before, what happens is we will show up at a little lower energy level than we typically are when we reach our stride with speaking. Do you know what I mean by that? Right, when you get going into conversation, even in this podcast. Right, you've noticed my energy open up or jiving, but I bet if you go back to the early episode it's a little slower pace, maybe a little softer toned. You typically will hear me warm up in these episodes. You probably do a version of that and I would argue for you. It's probably really tampered down at the beginning of your videos or podcasting reviews or speaking pieces, but then you hit your stride. For most of the clients I work with, when I watch and audit their videos, I see them hit their stride between the seven and 12 minute mark and typically these are 20 to an hour and a half long presentations, 20 minutes to an hour and a half. Having someone hit their stride five to 12 minutes in this is when I start working with them. That's what I notice.
Speaker 1:What happens is you lose that momentum you can gain with your audience right out of the gate. There is power in first impressions and when you do not show up with your best energy right out of the gate, you kind of like get your audience a little bit more skeptically. They're evaluating now. Now they're starting to really nitpick the content more of like is this really applicable to me, versus when you show up as you, that authentic, vibrant, engaging, excited you and I don't mean like raw raw you, but you, whatever version of you, that is, when you show up at the best, at the best level, right out of the gate, you create a connection, right when it's not as so important to have all of the words so technically correct. How do we do that? The best way we do that is for us to fall into our natural like ourselves is when you laugh and I don't mean like hysterical peer pants laugh, although that's really fun there. You don't need to be peeing your pants in your presentations. What I want you doing is get something to make you laugh, like not fake laugh, but authentically laugh, but like you. Actually I've laughed multiple times at myself through this episode. Have you noticed that I laugh? I used to not do that, but now I allow myself to laugh. And what happens is when you laugh, couple things happen. What happens when you laugh? A couple things happen. Oh, my gosh, my words are just all over the map today. It's okay, here we go. Here's what happens.
Speaker 1:Your voice changes to a more dynamic tone and volume. Your voice changes to a more dynamic tone and volume. So let's pretend that you were speaking for a moment and it was a little more polished, maybe a little slow or a little more dry, and you say something to make yourself laugh. You're going to come back with a little bit more of a like a I want to say like a growl. It's not the right way to do it, but there's like a warmth and there's just like a spark in your voice when you come out of that laugh and that'll stick with you. There's like a hangover of the laugh that elevates how you speak. That's number one. Number two when you laugh, your whole body language changes. Your face lights up, your eyes light like they totally come alive, and your shoulders it's like they come out of your ears and sink down into this comfortable confidence. I deserve to be here and I know what I'm talking about, kind of feeling. Yes, all of this comes on the aftermath of a real laugh.
Speaker 1:So what I do with my clients and again it has to come back to if you're the kind of person that's able to laugh at yourself, you like quippy humor, you enjoy a little joke here and there. Right, it doesn't have to be a planned like we're not talking about, like a knock, knock, laughy taffy joke. Here. We're just talking about something that just makes you chuckle. I like to tackle this in within the first two to three minutes of a presentation, sometimes sooner, but you'll notice this now I'm gonna have to be. Let me think about this, because I only just do an autopilot.
Speaker 1:But when you hear me in my interviews with other people, I try to say something to break the ice and make them laugh very quickly. In my presentations Sometimes it's self-deprecating humor, sometimes it's something funny that happened, sometimes it's making fun of the tech issues that we're having or whatever. Right, but something to lighten and lift the spirits, to make it all not so heavy or so serious. And for me, as a gift for my audience, right, because it lightens things for them. But it's a huge gift for me as a speaker because it allows me to go and sink in to the real me. And the reason why I put this last is because when you do this, if you can master the art of a little laugh, right, not just at the beginning but throughout your presentation.
Speaker 1:You don't want to do a we're not comedians here. You don't need to do a joke filled presentation, but a well intentional joke or just a little point of laughter will lift the spirits of your energy and lift your talk. It's really powerful and everything we talked about today, everything then gets elevated. So it'll elevate the eye contact of how you connect with the camera. It makes you more you right, more authentic. More of that, that magnetic nature of you comes out. It makes your movement more natural. All of this comes together and with your natural smile. Oh, my goodness and I know these tips right. They might seem super simple and basic, but, as you and I both know, it's the simplicity that those are the tips that make things really powerful.
Speaker 1:Stop trying to look for the sexy tech filters, tools, apps, that all can be well and fun, but what we really can focus on here is how can we be, how can we honor more of our raw, organic voice? How can we really start to hone our craft as speakers, as storytellers, as teachers, as leaders? How can we get better using our voices as a true instrument, as part of our brands, to connect with people, to compel people into action? You do this by coming alive on camera. So let's recap real quick what we talked about today.
Speaker 1:Number one we talked about preparing, and you have to define what preparation looks like for you. Maybe you're a more. I need to have the structure. I got to think through the scenarios. I really got to have a game plan. Maybe that's you and that's fine. Do what works for you so that you show up more prepared. Maybe you're like me. You're a post-it note kind of gal Right, where you write a couple things down on a post-it note. I'm just going to say this, I didn't say it before my biggest recommendation you've heard me say it over and over again the most important thing when it comes to prep is that you say it out loud.
Speaker 1:You don't just say it in your head. If you haven't said things out loud beforehand, you don't quite know. Spoiler today obviously I didn't say these things out loud before this episode and you got that really raw thing which works in this format for a podcast. But I could not do what I did today with how fast and loose I got with my language and how just a little bit all over the map it was. It wasn't totally all over the map, but you know what I mean. I wouldn't do that on a virtual stage. If I was guest speaking for some of these audiences it would be tightened up, which would have required me to be, instead of me just writing down my outline for today, me actually thinking through what I said out loud. I hope you caught that. You caught that distinction.
Speaker 1:Number three eye contact. Making sure that you're prioritizing the need of your audience, which is connection, therefore looking at the camera instead of staring at the screen to see the faces of the other people. Number four get more comfortable being yourself, so adding your sense of humor, adding your quirky stories, adding your movement, adding your mistakes, allowing space for mistakes and spotinating your recovery, like whoops that was my puppy jumping on my lap or whoop whoop, there goes the fire truck. Whoop whoop, it's optional. Number four get more comfortable with movement.
Speaker 1:Do not be stoic, do not be reserved. I want you to take up space, be powerful on camera, and I don't mean physically in your face powerful, but I mean own your space, open up your chest, be loose with your neck, use your facial expressions to your advantage, connect with your audience and showcase your authenticity and charisma and passion for your topic. And, lastly, to really come alive on camera. Number five make yourself laugh. Make yourself smile, because that is like a, it's a spark that ignites you when you come alive in that way. When you see that bright light of a smile and that realness in someone, your audience melts into you and it's just magic. It is absolute magic. All right, we covered a lot of ground today with these five tips for helping you show up on camera my best speaking tips for that. I hope these were helpful for you. Be sure to send me a message on Instagram or hit reply on one of my emails and tell me what you loved about this episode. I love doing these for you each and every single week. I'll see you back here next Monday.
Speaker 1:Well, thanks for listening to another episode of the Hint of Hustle podcast. That flew right by, didn't it Gosh? I hope I didn't say anything super embarrassing today, but if I did, it's pretty much on brand. If you love today's episode, be sure to scroll on down wherever you're listening from, and if you haven't yet left a review, it would mean the world. Hit those five stars. Tell other people who are prospecting podcasts how awesome this show is. Give us a little love. We would appreciate that. And hey, if you're hungry for more of what we do here on this show, you can peruse all of the past episodes, grab the show notes and find out the latest free resources to help you get seen, heard and paid for sharing your expertise. Head on over to heathersakercom. You can also grab the link wherever you're listening to this episode, and we'll see you in the next one.