I was cruising one of the forums I frequent this morning, and one of the members asked for some tips on speaking in public.

It seems he had a chance to do a 25 minute presentation to a local business group on his area of expertise.

Here are the tips I gave him…

1. Most people, when they first start speaking, talk way too fast. You should feel like you’re talking just a bit slower than normal. Of course, if you catch the spirit, let it move you.

2. Use the same hand gestures as you would when talking to someone one-on-one, but just a little bigger.

3. Practice in front of a video camera, then watch the recording. You’ll notice the points and words you stumble over, and you can either practice them or rewrite that bit to flow easier.

4. Do NOT try to memorize your talk word for word. If you get distracted (think loud cough or sneeze in the audience, catering people moving around, questions or comments from the audience, etc.) and lose your place, or forget your lines, you’re screwed.

5. Don’t be afraid to use memory aids. An index card with your outline is cool. No one will fault you for a quick glance to make sure you are on track. Even pros use cue cards.

6. Have fun with it. As the Toastmasters people say, you can’t get rid of the butterflies, but you can sure teach them to fly in formation…

Many local business owners could benefit from such an opportunity. It gives you a chance to strut your stuff, positioning yourself as the go-to guy (or gal) in your field. Other than the occasional evil dictator, no one has ever died from from giving a speech.

Keep in mind, though, this is Show and Tell, not Show and Sell. Use your time to provide real value to your audience, then at the end you can mention your business and offer to answer questions.

And I can tell you from experience, when you put it all together and the applause rolls, the rush is fantastic.

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One of the basics of doing business is to make doing business with you as easy as possible. The more obstacles you put in front of a possible buyer, the more likely they are to simply give up and go somewhere else.

Here’s one good example of how to make things difficult…

My wife likes to print coupons she can take to the store, and one of the places she likes to get them is SmartSource.com.

On the surface, it looks easy. You set up an account, choose which coupons you want to print, and go. IF you use the bug-ridden and vulnerable Internet Explorer, it might work that way.

If you use Firefox, you get a page telling you you need a plugin. Okay, I can buy that.

Install the plug-in, click to start printing…

And you get a page telling you that you need a plug-in.

Jump through the hoops again. Same result. Finally notice a small text link with instructions.

What, the big graphics with clear instructions were NOT the real instructions?

Click the link…

I saw the same four steps as before…along with a FIFTH step not mentioned on the prior page.

Click that button, restart Firefox again. Now we’re back to the original table asking us to select which offers we want to take. Page through all seven pages of choices, and make the selections. Click to print the coupons and get…a page telling us we need a plug-in.

Close the browser. Take a few deep breaths. Open a new browser and start over. Make the selections. Click “Print” and…FINALLY, the promised land! “Printing coupon 1 of 8…2 of 8…” Printer noise! YES!

If my wife was less motivated to save us money at the store, or I was less stubborn about making that darn thing work, SmartSource would have lost us – forever. Imagine someone a little less than tech-savvy running into these obstacles. How many opportunities is SmartSource missing by not making things easy?

There are several points at which this whole mess could be avoided…

First, browser detection is pretty easy these days. All they had to do was read which browser my wife was using and redirect her to a page with complete Firefox-specific directions.

Second, they could have put the complete set of instructions on the original page – including the final step that was buried on the alternate instruction page.

Third, they could have made the link to browser-specific instructions more obvious. A small, six-word text link is lost on a page full of colorful graphics.

Fourth, they could have said that the browser needed to be closed and a new session started before the new plug-in could work. An apology for making us do our selections over would have been nice.

Here’s the big takeaway from this. If you sell anything online… If you collect contact information in return for a premium or gift… If you do anything interactive with web visitors who might not be real tech-savvy…

Make it as simple and obvious as you possibly can.

Remove the bottlenecks that keep people from completing their objective. Especially if that objective is giving you money.

Test your process by going through it yourself. Ask someone without a high level of tech skill to go through it. Look for the sticking points and smooth them out.

You want your whole order, sign-up or fulfillment process to be more like a waterslide at a fun park than the obstacle course in boot camp.

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