Author: Rich

Helping you communicate with the written word, the spoken word and body language.
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Sit or Stand – which is best for online videos and presentations?

I’ve been busy conducting an informal (very unscientific) survey to determine the ratio between sitting and standing in LinkedIn, YouTube (and other) videos and live streams. Perhaps no surprise that sitting wins hands – or rather bums – down. But is sitting really a winner? Or might standing be better – for you and your audience?

Let’s face it, seeing an endless procession of head and shoulder shots on Zoom and Teams is boring. If you enjoyed that sort of thing you’d stamp passports for Border Force for a living (with apologies to those of you who stamp passports for Border Force for a living).

So here, in the very latest episode of the not-yet-quite-awarding-winning-but-it-can-only-be-a-matter-of-time Z to A of Presenting, I explore the pros and cons of each and ask is there a third way?

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C is for Captions

Richard Uridge: the perfect face for radio.

Captions are really good at making your videos more accessible. And handy for people who want to follow what you’re saying without having the volume turned up (even if it’s just in case the boss is listening). But it’s really annoying when those captions aren’t in the right place. The audience want to see your mouth. And your eyes. So here’s a bit of fun advice about positioning those captions so they help rather than hinder the whole business of communication. Yes! It’s the latest episode in the Z to A of Presenting.

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Free broadcast media training for Ukraine

Watching the heart-breaking images coming out of Ukraine it’s impossible to stand by and do nothing. When I was younger I might have driven across Europe and lent a hand to the relief effort or helped raise money and awareness as I did alongside Oxfam with the BBC in Rwanda in the early 1990s. My effort today seems rather weak by comparison. But I hope it’s not ineffectual. Because I believe in the power of words. I believe words can be used to make the world a better place.

So if you’re planning on using, or are already using, the media to positively influence change around the Ukraine conflict we’re offering free broadcast media training. No catches. Free for all. For as long as the conflict lasts. We’re running sessions on a Thursday or a Friday afternoon every week with additional dates being released every seven days. Please note that registration is required via our eventbrite page.

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The Z to A of Presenting: T is for Tone

In this five minute video ACM Training’s communication coach, Richard Uridge, talks about striking the right tone in presentations – in particular in the current climate with all that is happening in Ukraine.

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G is for Gimmick

Using cheap tricks or stunts to grab an audience’s attention is the presentational equivalent of click bait. So here ACM Training’s communication coach, Richard Uridge, explains (with just a hint of festive irony) the difference between gimmicks and legitimate devices to hook people into your presentation. And, yes, you really won’t believe what he looks like today!

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It’s over darling (I mean dialling)

My divorce should be coming through this week…

When we first got married more than a quarter of a century ago I genuinely couldn’t have lived without you. In fact, I’d loved you from afar for a whole lot longer. After all, we’d grown up together…

Through draughty red telephone boxes – less-than-cosy chats chewing through pockets full of tuppences. Through reverse charges when the money ran out (which it often did), three digit phone numbers and party lines. The operator sat in the exchange at the end of the road “putting you through now.”

We’ve been through more codes than Bond – 01, 071, 0171, 020, 0207 and counting…

We’ve been together through faxes. Through that weird whistling-while-you-wait dial up – all 56Kbps of it. And I’d like to say we’d been through twisted pairs together to the promised land of superfast fibre. But that’s where our relationship has been stuck. In the 3Mbps doldrums for many, many years and through many, many tears.

Let’s face it, we’ve grown apart. My need for speed is greater than your ability to deliver it. I’m sick of your excuses: too far from the exchange; not economically viable; not enough call for it in your area…

I know I’ve threatened to leave you many times before. And every time you came running back to me with promises you’d change. Like when you said you were over your love affair with the local copper. You telegraphed your intentions but in the end left me hanging from pole to pole.

So I’ve hooked up with somebody new. Somebody who can deliver. So long BT. It was fun while it lasted. But I should’ve left you years ago.

I hear you may be hooking up with a foreign lover. Good luck with that. They’ll promise you gifts. But they won’t deliver. Then you’ll know how I feel.

PS If you want to get a hold of us here at ACM Training you’ll find plenty of other ways than an old school landline on our website (which will, of course, one day be old school in itself but by then we’ll all have chips in our heads and just have to think of somebody and they’ll be in touch).

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How a treasury tag might have saved the Prime Minister’s bacon

Every failure is an opportunity to learn and grow – even when you’re the British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson. And it’s to him that we dedicate this episode of the Z to A of Presenting: T is for Treasury Tag. Watch to find out how the PM could have saved himself a whole heap of grief in that lemon-chewingly embarrassing speech to the CBI with one of those little bits of string with a tiny metal bar at either end that are buried at the back of stationary cupboards everywhere. It could just save your next presentation from a #peppapig moment too!

PS Buy shares in treasury tags!

“I knew those treasury tags would come in handy one day.”

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The end of the F word?

No not that F word! But the F pattern that describes the way the human eye takes in content from a screen. A quick scan from left to right along the top of the screen (the top bar of the F). A smaller scan just beneath it (the second horizontal bar). And a glance up and down the left hand side (the upright of the F).

Eye tracking and heat mapping studies of the human eye established this browsing pattern and, based on that research, web writers and designers were encouraged to string the hooks – the words and images – that grab a potential reader’s attention – somewhere along the F. Not bury those hook so far down that they wouldn’t be seen let alone read. Except maybe the F pattern no longer applies.

I say this because I’ve just updated my iPhone to iOS 15.1 and I’ve noticed the address bar has moved to the bottom of the screen (see screenshot). This may seem like a modest layout tweak. But this is HUGE change. It’s akin to the change from top-loading to front loading washing machines. Seriously, I don’t think anyone has yet fully thought through the implications. It could, for example, mean that the screen space just above that box with the URL in becomes as important as the top of the screen. So perhaps the F will morph into an E.

An annotated iPhone screengrab showing the address bar has moved from top to bottom.

That said, what hasn’t changed it is that words still matter. Always have. Always will. Top loading and front loading washing machines have clothes in common. F pattern or E pattern websites have words in common. The right word in the right place is always going to do better than the wrong word in the wrong place. So it’s worth asking: is this the right place? Right down the bottom here with the address bar (at least on my iPhone)? I’m keen to know your thoughts…

Still not sure what the F pattern is? Then here’s a quick video we put together for one of our clients who used our Ask the Owls service on our YouTube channel.

This post first appeared on LinkedIn and will be leading me to update (yet again) my modest little book Writing for the Web which is available to buy here and on the Apple and Amazon bookstores for just £4.99 which is probably less than you spend on coffee everyday and will give you a buzz for weeks.

UPDATE: Since posting this I’ve discovered that it’s possible to change the location of the search bar back to the top of the screen. So maybe news of F’s death is a little premature. If, like me, you want to change back to the old location go to settings>Safari>Tabs and select the Single Tab radio button as per the screenshot.

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Writing for the Web – now available on Apple Books

The first volume in ACM Training’s Wise Owl how-to series is now available in the Apple Bookstore. As an e-book only (for the time being at least) the publication of Writing for the Web – why reading differently means writing differently is not quite up there with the excitement I felt as my first front page lead thundered off an old News of the World hot metal printing press back in my days as a cub newspaper reporter. But hey, that’s the post-Gutenbeg era for you eh?! At only £4.99 in the UK and a similar price in 50 other countries I reckon it’s brilliant value for money. But then I would say that… I’m the author. Judge for yourselves and please let me know if you agree. Or not.

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Albert Mehrabian and the “it’s not what you say it’s the way that you say it” rule.

“Heard of Albert Mehrabian? Probably not. But you’ll almost certainly have heard his work quoted or, more likely, misquoted: that 55% of face-to-face human communication is non-verbal; 38% is para-verbal (that is, to do with the tone and volume); and that only 7% of meaning is derived from the actual words spoken.

There was nothing wrong with the UCLA professor’s original research back in the 1970s. His sample was small and the circumstances narrowly defined. But that didn’t stop the media misinterpreting the results and Mehrabian’s work has been misrepresented ever since.

The fact is that as a presenter words are your principle tool for communicating. And whilst I have no empirical evidence to quote, I’d hazard a guess that in most presentations your words account for nearer 93% of meaning than the remaining seven. If so, then the words you speak are important. The words you choose are important. The way you put those words together is important. In short words are important.”

This is an excerpt from Speak Easier, Richard Uridge’s excellent little treatise on presentation and public speaking skills which is available to download now for the special price of just £4.99.