After the conference one of your friends poses the question, “Which keynote speaker did you like the best?” As soon as one person answers everyone else immediately jumps in and says, “YES! Me too! She was so good. Why do you suppose we all loved her so much more than the others?”

I can tell you one thing she probably did… She engaged your brain!

What exactly does “engage their brains” mean? It simply means this… keep their minds working with things they love to do. Now there are different ways to keep their minds busy. Remember, there’s a reason why reading a dictionary vs. watching the next Mission Impossible movie feels different. One of these would be difficult to do for even 10 minutes while the other can be done for over 2 hours and it seemed like 10 minutes!

So there’s got to be more to it than just keeping their brains busy. We have to look at how you’re keeping their brains busy. What are you asking their brains to do? Pick the right tasks and you can be more engaging too!

How can we engage their brains?

The best way to do this is to make the entire experience engaging! We do this by engaging different regions of their brains. Remember, don’t make these into huge engagements like the grand finale of a fireworks show. Most of these techniques are extremely subtle, but they’re still quite effective.

Here are 5 techniques you can use to engage your audience’s brains throughout your message.

1. Say the words “imagine…” or “picture this…”

I know, I know… this one sounds too simple! It’s crazy how effective this technique is with an audience. But just picture this… a speaker is on the stage. You’re in the audience listening. She pauses for a moment of silence as she looks down and away. Then her gaze comes back up to the audience and she says, “Will you all do me a favor? I want you to imagine something. Think about…”

When someone tells us to imagine, we immediately warm up our imagination to picture whatever she is about to tell us to imagine. That creative, imaginative part of our brain is quickly put to work. Creating scenery in our minds is something we’re good at and it’s something we love to do. By the way… did you see how I started this explanation by asking you to picture the speaker on stage? Engaging right?  😉

2. Offer one line of dialogue

My manager popped his head in my office and asked me, “Hey Dave, would you have any additional headcount to support the Alpha project this quarter?”

This is an example of dialogue. When the speaker is actually quoting someone else, but they deliver it to the audience as if we’re all (audience included) hearing this line delivered for the very first time. It’s as if it’s being performed LIVE for us to relive the actual moment with the speaker. Our imaginations will create a scene in our minds as we watch the scene unfold. We construct that scene so quickly we don’t even know we’re doing it. It’s fun. It’s easy. We love doing it. It’s engaging!

3. Propose a tough question

But what happens if we invest in this upgrade and 18 months later, the software is obsolete? Is it worth the risk to save thousands next year?

Our brains love to solve problems. We love doing it on our own because we gain a sense of accomplishment, but if we can’t solve the problem on our own, we want someone to help solve it with us to remove the internal tension. Think about it. You know this is true. When someone proposes a really tough trivia question and you don’t know the answer, it can drive you crazy if you don’t know the answer. Luckily today we just turn to Google or Siri for the answer. Wa-LAH! Tension is gone! Give your audience a tough question to wrestle with to engage their problem-solving brain. Then lead them with your message to your proposed solution.

4. Generate a feeling

I’m sure you’ve heard it before. This quote is credited to Maya Angelou, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” I can prove this is true. Think about the 5 most memorable experiences in your life. I certainly hope there were more than 5, but we don’t have all day. Just pick five. Now… can you recall a feeling from each one?

Sharing stories or experiences can help generate both positive and negative feelings in your audience. They will remember how they felt when you finish speaking. As you saw in last week’s blog, we use feelings from memorable moments to reconstruct each memory. Engage them with a feeling you want them to have walking away… excitement, anxiety, fear, pride, confidence.

5. Give them candy for their 5 senses

We don’t like to just hear a story… we want to experience it! The way we experience a story in our mind is with our mind’s senses. When we hear someone talk about a loud clang or a bright flash of light, we use our mind’s ear and our mind’s eye, respectively, to internally recreate the sound or the sight. The regions of our brain that handle actual sound and sight are stimulated even when we are just imagining them through a recreation in our mind!

If you want to engage the audience’s brain, then describe parts of your story with words that will stimulate their senses.

• The sandpaper feel of grandpa’s hands.
• The warm sweet aroma of apples and cinnamon.
• The loud tinging clash of the metal frame falling.
• The salty taste of the ocean.
• The yellow-orange haze of dawn over the meadow.

I’m not asking you to turn your next business presentation into story time, but I am challenging and encouraging you to stimulate their brains. The audience wants a logical presentation but they also want to love the journey.

Engage their brains!

Have a great week,
Russ