How to scuff up your content with Gigi Rosenberg

Do you sound like a robot when you give your elevator pitch?

If so, Episode 508 of the Marketing Mentor Podcast is for you.

I’m talking to Gigi Rosenberg, a public speaking coach, about how to "scuff up your content."

Because in this age of AI, perfectionism is more and more associated with robotic, which means that being human is necessarily imperfect and therefore real.

Accepting our imperfections, like losing your place in a talk or losing your train of thought – maybe even indulging them – is one simple way to avoid being confused with AI.

But you have to relax about it. Want to know how?

Listen here (and below) and learn…

But it’s not like AI is bad, right?

In fact, I’ve been experimenting with using AI to help creative professionals find clients -- and it’s working.

And if you like what you hear, we’d love it if you write a review, subscribe here and sign up for Quick Tips from Marketing Mentor.

 

Read the complete transcript of Marketing Mentor Podcast Episode 508

Ilise Benun
I'm Ilise Benun of Marketing Mentor, and this is the podcast for you, if and only if you are ready to leave the feast or famine syndrome behind. And I mean for good.

If you sound like a robot when you give your elevator pitch, this episode is for you. I'm talking to Gigi Rosenberg, a public speaking coach, about how to scuff up your content, and that includes your elevator pitch and your LinkedIn profile and your website and much more. In this age of AI, I believe perfectionism is more and more associated with being robotic, which means that being human is necessarily imperfect and therefore real. So accepting our imperfections, maybe even indulging them, is one simple way to avoid being confused with AI, but you do have to relax about it. Want to know how? Listen and learn.

All right, welcome Gigi to the podcast.

Gigi Rosenberg
I'm thrilled to be here. Ilise, thank you.

Ilise Benun
Me too. Why don't you introduce yourself?

Gigi Rosenberg
I'm Gigi Rosenberg, and I'm a public speaking coach. I live in Portland, Oregon, but I work with clients all over the world, mostly C suite people and nonprofit leaders and I work with people to help them speak with more authority, more confidence, presence, calm and warmth.

Ilise Benun
What about perfection? What do you think about perfection?

Gigi Rosenberg
Well, it's interesting about perfection, because, you know, when something is too perfect, whether it's a speech or even an elevator speech or an introduction, it can sometimes feel unreal. So there are times when I'm working with somebody, like, just the other day, I was working with somebody on their introduction, and we spent a long time finding the right words. And then I said, "Okay, now what you have to do is, your introduction is now like a pair of brand new white sneakers. You kind of go out to the driveway and take them and scuff them up."

So what I meant by that was we had to take what were these perfect sentences and really turn it into another language, which is the spoken language, because sometimes, if you read, you know, if you if you recite perfect sentences when you're introducing yourself, it just doesn't feel real. It sounds like you're reading from your own website or something. So I guess that's one little take on perfection, yeah.

Ilise Benun
Actually, I'm going to take it in the direction that I was not intending, because I love this phrase, how to scuff up your content. When I heard you say it the first time, I was like, we need to create some content about that. And so it might be very meta, what we create and talk about, because we just might scuff up this content, and we'll figure out what that means.

And it's not going to be perfect, because I've got a dog, and you never know what she's going to do. Or the doorbell is going to ring, or the phone's going to ring, or something's going to happen. And I kind of like that about this podcast, and I don't know, just even the way I work is not wanting it to be perfect. I don't think I've ever actually been a perfectionist...

But all of that said, what your response made me think about is something that I said very recently, kind of for the very first time in my 36 years of working with people on, among other things, their elevator speeches, or elevator pitches, which is how they ask answer the question, what do you do? And I was basically saying the thing you come up with for your elevator pitch is the thing that, yes, you will put on your website or in your email newsletter in the about section or on your LinkedIn profile. But it's definitely not the way you actually answer the question in real life when someone says, what you do?

So I love that you're talking about that too with your coaching clients.

Gigi Rosenberg
Yeah, absolutely, because you don't want to sound like you're reading your marketing materials. You know, you want to just sound like you're having a beer with somebody, and they just said, what do you do? And you're just talking to them in a conversational way, both what you say, but also how you say it. So there might be some pauses in there, you know, I don't teach people to add because they certainly don't. But if it, if it comes out with short sentences or, you know, funny, if you looked at the transcript of how people speak, it's so ungrammatical, and we start and we stop, and we loop around and we come back.

So, you know, that would not work and write in like a book where it's published and there's sort of a level of literary perfection. But it definitely works with spoken language. It's so interesting.

Ilise Benun
I want to maybe talk a little bit, kind of stay on this. I'm just listening to myself talk and not finishing any of my sentences, actually, as an example of this lack of perfectionism. But I want to talk about the difference between what I say, and maybe even what you say, when you give your elevator speech versus what is on my LinkedIn profile or on my website, because they're vastly different.

And one of the questions I want to talk about is like, how different should these be? How should someone think about the difference between the two? So, for example, I will tell you that whenever someone asks me what I do, what I say is, "I teach creative professionals how to market their services." Then I stop talking and I wait to see how someone responds.

But on my website, on my LinkedIn profile, in other places, I will often say, "I teach creative professionals how to get better clients with bigger budgets." Or I say, yeah, no, that's usually what I say. Actually, I focus on the result, the effect. And I'm not exactly even sure why I make that distinction. I just know that when I'm talking to someone, the very first thing I say, I want it to be as clear as possible, and I don't want their eyes glazing over, and I don't want them wondering what I mean. So that's why I keep it plain and simple. "I teach creative professionals how to market their services."

And then that can start a conversation where eventually I'm going to say something about getting better clients with bigger budgets. But I don't know, how do you hear that? Gigi, and maybe even use yourself as an example as well.

Gigi Rosenberg
So if I hear in a conversation "market their services," it sounds like, it's not such beautiful words, but if I hear in a conversation "better clients and bigger budgets," it's, I mean, it's such, you know, there's the alliteration and it sounds, it's great marketing copy, which I'm expecting to read on a website. But if you said it, the first thing, I go, wow. You know, they're so salesy. Or it just, it's too perfect.

The other thing you mentioned that I think is so important is you have that first sentence when you're talking to somebody which includes that, you know, not stunning phrase, but a perfectly fine phrase. "Market their services." But you are then waiting and looking and listening to see what their reaction is, to then decide, do I go further?

So sometimes I say, with a spoken, let's say introduction, it's almost like you're putting out the little cheese cubes and you're waiting. Are they going to eat one? Oh, good, okay. They're coming a little closer now. Now I'm going to put out the next one, and the next one is going to be better clients with bigger budgets, you know. But that's not the cheese cube to put out first. It's too, it's too well written, if that makes any sense.

Ilise Benun
Yeah, no, I agree. That's why I wanted to have this conversation about scuffing up your content, because I do think often what we write is too well written, and especially in this rising age of AI. But I also love the cheese cube metaphor, and I know you've got some content that you created over the years about cheese cubes, so I don't know, maybe tell us a little bit about cheese cubes, if it's appropriate.

Gigi Rosenberg
Well, I don't know if there's more to say about cheese cubes, but really, you know, the thing is, when you're speaking, you know, it's funny how we learn this. I mean, I grew up in a family where, if you weren't interesting, people were going to stop listening. And I think most people are like that. So you learn quickly. Okay, if I want to keep people's attention, and whether this is, you know, I want mom to stop and buy ice cream or whatever, I better craft my content so that people keep listening, you know? So we learn early. I mean, some of us do, because there's some people who really are just the innately boring speakers, but we don't have to talk about them right now. But we learned quickly how to hook our audience, whoever that is.

So I just lost my train of thought -- what I was going to say about that.

Oh, so that's, that's what I mean about the cheese cubes. What's going to keep you engaged? What's going to keep you listening? What's going to keep you coming towards me? And, you know, I'm watching, I'm listening, I'm seeing, I, you know, wondering, is this person losing interest? Are they gaining interest? So that's what I love about speaking, is that it's such an alive, you know, it's something we do. It's time based. It just unfolds with time. And part of what we're doing is watching and listening to our audience to see what's landing and bringing them along with us.

Ilise Benun
And here's one of the meta aspects of this: because you lost your train of thought for a moment. You recovered beautifully. You said, "here's what's happening," and I'm thinking it's fine with me if you lose your train of thought. That's imperfect and real, and it happens to all of us, especially as we get older.

But you know, would you want that to be something we edit out, for example?

Gigi Rosenberg
Well, you know, it's such a great example of what to do when there's a mishap. And a mishap can be, I lost my place, you know? You're giving a talk, and you lose your place, or you lose your train of thought. And it's so funny, what most people try to do is they try to cover their tracks. They don't want anyone to notice. But that's impossible, because in covering your tracks, if you lose your train of thought or lose your place, you can tend to do a lot of umming as your mind is scrambling for what do I say?

So it's like the ball has already dropped, and the best thing to do is to let the audience know what's happening. And then just recover, like let them in and recover with them. So, for example, to say, "Oh, I lost my place. I got to check where I am." Or I said, "Oh, I lost my train of thought," and then that relaxed me enough that I could think, what was I talking about? And then I remember just these kids. Oh yeah, yeah, that's the point I was trying to make.

So we tend to want to, which makes sense, you know, but we want to seem perfect. Oops, we made a little mistake. Then we cover our tracks, but we really can't, because everyone's seen the ball drop already. So it really is a great way to stay connected to your audience, especially when you have the impulse to hide something. Because the hiding is really impossible.

Ilise Benun
I don't know if this is connected to what you're saying right now, but where my mind is going is to this idea of not knowing what's going to happen next, not knowing what I'm going to say next. And connecting that somehow to the idea of mishaps and mistakes which we can't hide, we can't cover up. And most people are not really paying that close attention anyway in the first place, so they may not have noticed.

But I was just thinking as you were talking like, how how much courage do you have to have? How much trust in yourself do you need to have? What is it that we can do or have that allows us to maybe just relax and be who we are, whether we're talking to a big group of 1000s of people or even in a meeting with one or two other people? When you talk about speaking, you're not just talking about people giving keynotes. You're talking about all the different types of situations where you need to speak up.

Gigi Rosenberg
So you said the word relax, and I think that's the key. And I think part of being a better speaker is to learn what you need to relax. And that's different things for different people. So when I teach, I always tell the group, "I want you to leave today with this huge bag of tips and techniques, so that you have a lot to choose from, because you change and need other things, or things that were working one day stop working, etc. Or in different situations, you need different things." So it's like, what do you need to be your most relaxed self? Some people might need to prepare a lot, but in a way where they've got, oh, I don't know, for lack of a better word, just guidelines. They know, whatever that means for you. I knew somebody once who could really just show up and talk off the top of her head, and it, it always came out so great. And I thought if I didn't prepare at all, I would just be so nervous that I feel I wouldn't be able to think, you know. So it's figuring out what you need to be in that state, you know, where your nervous system is in its most relaxed state, so you're the most resourceful.

And I think for everybody, that's a little bit different, because if you over prepare, that can also really screw you up too, because then you're not ready at all for improv. But you know, the other huge thing it takes is just a lot of road time, and that's part of being relaxed. A lot of experience being up there, whatever "up there" means, whether it's leading a meeting or up on a big stage, you need to get used to it, whatever that is. And that, you know, that's really a life's work.

Ilise Benun
That is for sure, because I used to prepare a lot for almost everything, but especially for talks that I would give. And actually, in the last couple of years, as I've been running the Simplest Marketing Plan, which has a monthly Office Hours (office party. I like to call it) where I give a half hour presentation. I'm finding that -- it's not that I don't prepare, it's just that I'm talking about things that I know really well and I talk about all day long. And so I know that whatever I'm going to say is going to be fine, it'll be good enough. And sometimes it'll be really good, and I'll surprise myself.

But I'm not actually aiming for "I hope it's really good." What I'm aiming for is "I hope I'm clear." I really just want to be clear. And so the preparation that I will sometimes do is just talk things through out loud. I guess one might call that rehearsing. But what I notice about this, I'd be curious what you think about this. I noticed that what's helpful about, let's say, just talking through 10 minutes of talking points that I have written out is it will show me what I shouldn't say. And that gives me an opportunity to do it better and better the next time and the next time, and then whatever the real time is.

But that's the part that's kind of new and surprising to me lately, is when I rehearse, it's to get rid of all the things that probably don't make sense or aren't really clear or aren't really relevant, or just are politically incorrect, because I can be politically incorrect.

Gigi Rosenberg
Well, you know, the thing is, Ilise, you're doing a lot of rehearsing in there, and it's also on content that you really know in your bones, right? And I think what happens for people who are starting out, or even, you know, mid career, let's say, or it's a new topic for them, then they need to, it's not in your bones yet. And then I think you need more -- to mix a bunch of metaphors here -- more scaffolding. When you go into whatever that's going to be. You just need more supports, whatever that is.

But the talking it through is one method of getting it in your bones, because you realize then where there's some logic missing, or it's out of order. You know, it's funny, I help people with what's the best way to get feedback. Because if somebody sits and listens to you and you want to say, you know, was that good, or whatever, you know, of course, everyone wants to present their thing and have the person say it was good. But the truth is, if somebody says it's good, that gives you absolutely no information, because you're just learning about their esthetic.

And, you know, you might look back at the video and they thought it was good, and I thought it was awful, you know. But to ask somebody, "What was the thing you remember from what I just said?" Because you want to know, did it land with them, or where was it confusing? Because sometimes it's so clear in your mind, but then someone's like, I don't get it. And it can, it can feel frustrating and awful, but it's good to know.

And I think that's what you're doing in rehearsal, is figuring out what's missing, what's too much, you know. And you also learn, "Oh, I'm so attached to this thing," but then you realize you don't even need that thing. It's not even helping my audience at all. So the rehearsing is such a big important thing to do.

Ilise Benun
Yeah, agreed. All right, now I'm looking at my notes because we haven't talked about anything I intended to talk about, and we don't have that much more time. But I do want to ask you a couple other questions, and I feel like, again, this is where it gets very meta, because I did all this preparation and I'm throwing it away, essentially. 

Actually, just respond to that idea of doing the preparation and then throwing it away, because I think that's a really good idea. But I know some people get very, I don't know, annoyed with themselves, or feel like it was wasted, and I don't feel like it was wasted at all. We can do another one later.

Gigi Rosenberg
That's true. Yeah, you know, it's like having the perfect date planned with somebody where, you know, we're gonna walk by the river, and then we're gonna go to this restaurant, and then, you know, we're going to get this ice cream at the end. Then, you know, it's raining in 40 degrees and the restaurant's closed. It's too cold for ice cream.

It's funny, we do get very attached to our plans. But the truth is, the thinking beforehand is part of what's getting you ready, and then, you know, like everything, or like so many things, it's such, it's an improv, you know, it's funny about that too.

I sometimes in coaching, in the last rehearsal, somebody will be so pleased with how far they've come, and I will be too, like whatever they're doing is really coming together. And I'll have to say to them, "You know what? Now, when you go out there to do it, don't try to recreate what just happened here. That was so good, because each time you do it, it's totally new. And if you get attached to what came before, then you can't be in the moment of  whatever is going to happen with this one you're doing right now."

So being able to throw things away is really, I concur, it is a great thing and and simple, but not easy, right?

Ilise Benun
All right. So there's just one question, though, that I'm not going to throw away, because I think it's related to what we're talking about, which is...

In terms of preparation and for something like this, for example, or for a talk, or for a meeting that you're going to lead, or even for a meeting you're going to participate in, you could have talking points. You could have a manuscript or a script that you memorize. You could have bulleted points based on that script, or you could just totally improvise.

So how do you think about those different things, and maybe which is best when or for whom?

Gigi Rosenberg
So let's start with the most rigid one, which would be having a script that you memorize. For some people and for some situations, that's spot on. Like I'm thinking about a TED talk or a TEDx that needs to be memorized, but you are giving it as if it's not memorized. So that really requires a lot of acting skills to do that, so that you seem like a trained actor, you're acting out the words as if they're just coming to you fresh in that moment.

And then if we take one step back from that, there's having a script that, let's say you're reading. And the trouble with that is that you're very distanced from your audience. But there are cases where the words need to be exactly right, and the reading is just fine for that.

So a step back from that, which is my favorite one, is having bulleted points so that you could look at the audience with them. But every once in a while you glance down to see where you are. You know the script very well. You've memorized the open. And when I say by the open, I mean my first sentence, so you can be looking at the audience. You've memorized the last sentence. You can be looking at the audience, that one I love, because I feel like you've got the security of the notes, but you're, you know, they're just a support.

And then stepping back from that would be, let's just say it would be having maybe a vague idea of what you're going to say and improvising. I think that works for some people who just happen to be good at that. But when I say good at that, I mean relaxed enough and have the gift of gab. And there are people that are very good in in the moment, doing a lot of work, but I think those people are fairly rare. And I think what can happen with complete improvisation with just a couple of little points is you might need to do a lot of talking to figure out what the heck you're saying. And often that isn't that interesting, you know. So it just depends.

You need to know yourself, know the situation, know how relaxed or nervous you're going to be. If I'm nervous, I have nothing to say. I'm just completely silent. So I know that if it's going to be a high stakes thing, I'm going to have to be ready and have my supports with me, whatever those are.

But you know, again, if you really know the topic, and you talk about it every day, and it's sort of like you've already gotten rid of the fat, it's already kind of cooked already, then I think the riffing is fine. So it really, really depends.

Ilise Benun
Let's talk about your podcast briefly, because you have a podcast also, and I'm curious -- tell us a little bit about it. But also, how do you prepare for that? Which of these situations or ways of preparing do you prefer to use for your podcast?

Gigi Rosenberg
So the podcast is Gigi Presents, and the idea behind it is that I'm interviewing great speakers, really, to find out how they do it, because very few people, well, none of us, are born great speakers. We always have to learn that. So I want to know, and so I'll pick somebody who does something really well, whether that's joy they bring to the stage, or storytelling skills, or just how relaxed they seem up there, or whatever it is, I'll interview them.

I also interview people who are specialists in one thing, whether that's voice or stage presence or all the other things that go into speaking. So when I prepare, I really feel like I'm having this person over to dinner, and so I have really dug into their background enough so I won't ask the questions that anybody could read on their website.

I want them to feel that. I want them to feel really well taken care of, so they relax. So they'll give me a better interview.  And I will write my intro, but again, for me, I might write it out, but then translate it to bullet points, and I've got it in front of me. And then I will write my outro, because I want to make sure I get that correct. And I will have a list of questions, because, you know, I don't want to rely completely on everything I'm thinking in the moment.

And even though, you know it can be edited, if I take a long pause, it can be edited later. But I want them to feel like I'm really, really ready, and myself to feel that way. So it might be that I'll do a little less, but I can't imagine that I would, because I do want to dig in and have the questions and, you know, I don't want to forget things in the moment that I really want to ask them about.

So I guess that's that's a lot of preparation, when you think about it. But I, for me, I can't think of any other way, shorter way to do it. And you know, if it's scheduled for the afternoon, it's kind of on my mind all day, and, you know, I'm humming and, you know, stretching and trying to get in the zone. So it's, yeah, it's a lot of preparation. But I just can't, I just can't think of any quicker way to do it. That's just, it's just what I need to feel ready.

Ilise Benun
Oh my god, it's so the opposite of what I do. But before I get to that, I'm curious, do you send your questions to the guest?

Gigi Rosenberg
Actually? No, I just, I don't want them to think about their answers at all, because if they're relaxed, which is my whole idea of all this preparation I'm doing, I want them to feel like they're really talking, really talking -- I want to say, really, off the cuff, and I don't want it to feel prepared. And also, I'm talking to people who talk about this stuff all the time, right? But I'll say to them, "It is going to be an interview about such and such. And there's no need for you to prepare." You know, these are people who've written books on whatever topic we're talking about, so I know they're going to be able to talk about it you know, on the fly.

Ilise Benun
Yeah, yeah. I mean, maybe because I've been doing this podcast for, you know, 12 or 13 years, and I'm talking to people who usually I know or know well, or have a really clear idea of why I wanted to have a conversation with them. I make a list of questions, I send it to them, and then we get on the call, and that's the extent of my preparation.

Gigi Rosenberg
That's amazing.

Ilise Benun
So I am totally riffing, and I am totally just, if I had a question, actually I do. We're going to come back to my last question, which I didn't want to forget to ask you, so sometimes I'll make a note, like, "oh yeah, let me come back to that."

But I really am going only with what's in my head, and that what I love about that, truthfully, is because it means I have to listen perfectly, as perfectly as I possibly can, not just to what you're saying, but also to what I'm thinking as you're talking. And that is one of my favorite experiences in life actually. 

Gigi Rosenberg
That's cool. Very cool.

Ilise Benun
All right, so here's the last question, and then I'll ask you to tell people where they can find you. But I want to bring it back around to the elevator speech and the way we introduce ourselves, because I've seen you introduce yourself many times, and I noticed that you always say something slightly different, and you look up. Are you aware of looking up as you are talking? And is that a strategy?

Gigi Rosenberg
Well, I don't know if it's a strategy, but, you know, long ago, I studied NLP, which stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming. And I learned that when people look up, they're usually like imagining the words, like seeing the words written out. So I think it's what I do and, you know, what other humans do when they are thinking. I don't have a photographic memory, but that's part of how I remember things. It's almost like how I spell, I see the word written out, and then I just say, Oh, it's, you know, ch, and I'm just almost reading off an image in my mind. So that's what I'm doing. I mean, you know, I don't love looking up.

Ilise Benun
I love it.

Gigi Rosenberg
That's hilarious. But I also know that for me, unless it's a super high stakes thing, unless I'm being interviewed by, you know, I don't know "60 Minutes" -- if that show is even still on. But maybe I would memorize. I want it to be different each time. I want, when I introduce myself, to be thinking about, "Oh, who have I just worked with? Or what did we work on?" Because, you know, it's always, it's always evolving. I hopefully it's always getting better. And so I want it to stay fresh, which is why I do it a little differently each time.

Ilise Benun
And what I see in your looking up is that you're thinking,

Gigi Rosenberg
Yeah, I'm thinking, yeah, exactly right.

Ilise Benun
That's what you said, even. And when I see that someone is thinking, taking the time for themselves, giving themselves the time to think, instead of feeling pressure to, "oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, I gotta answer or I don't want to make this person wait." Like, no, there's a lot of self respect, I think, in the pause. I know you've talked a lot about pausing, right? And just taking a pause and not rushing. And I don't know, I feel like it's very in the moment.

Gigi Rosenberg
You know, it's funny, in a way, it's something you can do if you don't want it to seem perfect. And when you're talking to somebody, introducing yourself, you definitely don't want it to come out like you're, you know, an elevator pitch robot. So definitely, I mean, it's the first sign of "She's not a robot. She's looking up. She's thinking."

And yeah, that's probably I guess one thing you could do, although I don't think it's a strategy, to like, "Oh, I'll look up now. So it looks like I'm thinking." You can't plan it. It does make it seem imperfect, which in that situation is absolutely spot on.

Ilise Benun
Well, I am so glad you're not a robot. And I appreciate you coming on the podcast and sharing your expertise and your improvisation and your thinking. Tell the people where they can find more from you and what specifically they can find.

Gigi Rosenberg
So you can go to my website, which is GigiRosenberg.com and I have a lot of videos there. I have some great resources that you can download. A book workbook about elevator speeches and some other great little cheat sheets, And you can also find a link to the podcast there. So it's GigiRosenberg.com and I would love to have you come over and have a visit.

Ilise Benun
Don't you also have a newsletter that people can sign up for?

Gigi Rosenberg
I do have a newsletter. It comes out about once a month, and each month I share one tip, so it's not overwhelming. But the idea is it's one tip that you can start using that day and all around public speaking. Actually the sign up is at the bottom of every page.

Ilise Benun
Awesome. All right, thank you again. Gigi, thank you.

Gigi Rosenberg
You're welcome. This was fun.

Ilise Benun
I love how meta that conversation was, don't you?

But it's not like AI is bad. In fact, I've been experimenting with using AI to help creative professionals find clients, and it's working.

So if you want my help finding actual clients using AI. Check out my new one on one AI client-finding coaching calls.

Or you can just sign up for my Quick Tips. All of that can be found at marketing mentor.com and once you're on the site, you'll see lots more resources, including my simplest marketing plan. So enjoy, and I'll see you next time.

* This article was originally published here