Biker in Google Project Glass Demo
The most inspiring and memorable presentations are marked by one moment that leaves people in awe. I call it the “wow moment”—the one part of the presentation that brings it all together. It’s the moment when a person thinks, “I want to business with that company” or “I need that product now.” Sometimes it has nothing to do with a product, but inspires an audience to take action. It can be thought-provoking, persuasive, or inspiring. The wow moment sometimes happens spontaneously. However, more often than not, it is planned, scripted and rehearsed well ahead of time. This week Google co-founder Sergey Brin delivered one such moment. It reminded me of two other wow moments that have left an indelible impression on me. If you want to improve your public-speaking and presentation skills, you should watch each of the these three presentations.
Skydiving with Google glasses. On Wednesday at Google’s I/O developers conference, co-founder Sergey Brin took to the stage to show off the latest project from the Google Glass team. The ‘glasses” are high-tech goggles—a wearable camera—that transmit what the user is seeing. The “wow moment” in Brin’s presentation came in the form of a group of skydivers jumping from an airship 4,000 feet above San Franciso’s Moscone Center where the conference was being held.
Brin interrupted another speaker for a ‘time-sensitive’ event. He then pointed to a screen where the audience saw a live view of skydivers sitting in a blimp high above San Francisco. The video was being live streamed from the divers’ headsets and connected to Google + Hangout. As Brin repeatedly said that things might not go as planned, the audience watched as the skydivers fell through the air at 200 miles an hour. They saw the fall from the divers’ perspective as the video was streamed from the jumpers’ glasses directly to a projection screen in the auditorium. Seconds after landing on the roof, the skydivers handed the device to cyclists who raced down the roof, into the lobby and into the hall. The audience saw everything the cyclists were seeing as they navigated the obstacles to enter the building.
According to Information Week, “Google accomplished something rarely achieved at technology events: the company managed to make a product introduction genuinely exciting.” At least one popular tech blog called it the best keynote ever. The stunt was most certainly one of the exciting product demonstrations I’ve seen in years.
Bill Gates unleashes the mosquitoes. Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist, Bill Gates, has become an extraordinarily effective communicator. In some way he has had to. Gates must explain incredibly complex problems and proposed solutions—improving education, curing diseases, reducing poverty, etc. In 2009 Gates gave a TED talk on reducing childhood deaths caused by malaria. Gates unleashed mosquitoes in the audience to make a point. Yes, real mosquitoes.
Gates used both shock value and humor to grab the audiences’ attention. “There’s more money put into baldness drugs than are put into malaria,” Gates started. “Now, baldness is a terrible thing and rich men are afflicted which is why the priority has been set (audience laughs). Now malaria is transmitted by mosquitoes. I brought some here so you can experience it. Let’s them roam around the auditorium. There’s no reason only poor people should have the experience.” No one in the audience probably remembers the slides Gates showed (although they were very well designed), but they all remember the mosquitoes.
The day Apple reinvented the phone. In January, 2007, Apple “reinvented the phone” with the launch of the first iPhone. Steve Jobs gave a mesmerizing presentation. His wow moment did not include skydivers or insects. Jobs simply packaged a message so creatively it left the audience in awe.
“Today we’re introducing three revolutionary products,” Jobs said. “The first is a wide-screen iPod with touch controls. The second is a revolutionary phone and the third is an Internet communications device. So three things: a wide-screen iPod with touch controls, a revolutionary mobile phone, and a break-through Internet communications devices [Jobs paused]. An iPod, a phone, and an Internet communicator [Jobs paused again]. An iPod, a phone [pause]. Are you getting it? These are not three separate devices. This is one device and we are calling it iPhone. Today Apple reinvents the phone.” The audience went nuts. Clever, memorable, wow.
Get away from your slides every now and then. Yes, slides are important and I’ve discussed effective slide design in previous columns (and will continue to do so). But often the most memorable part of a presentation has nothing to do with slides. Be bold. Take a risk. Be creative. Find ways to get your audience to think: “Wow. That’s cool.”