You'd be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn't sat through at least one snooze-inducing presentation, demo, or lecture. Slide after slide of facts, percentages, and data. You're probably nodding off just thinking about it.

"The only thing worse than filling up your speeches, slides, emails, or reports with fact after fact is not shaping them to tell your story," says communication expert Dianna Booher. She asks, "What story do your facts tell? What trail do the facts leave?"

Booher continues, "Tell me how your division exploded with the introduction of the new widget, and your headcount climbed from 3 to 68 engineers in the first two years you were in business. Then tell me how you grew lax in your quality control. Tell about your reject rates. Show how the customer satisfaction numbers plummeted. Show how orders started dropping as fast as they were logged onto the computer. Then circle back to the layoff of 58 engineers three years later. Then out of the ashes came..."

Well, you get the picture....Drama. Dialogue. Climax. Denouement.

"Set the scene at the trade show. How many competitors were there? How many attendees? Of those, how many did your booth attract? Why? What was the attraction - or non-attraction? What did the competitor do to drive you nuts? What kind of lead follow-up and closing ratio do you have to have after the trade show to make your competitors eat dust?"

"Music, lights, camera, action. Facts alone will never feed the mind - at least not for long," says Booher. "Anecdotes anchor your message in the hearts and minds of your listeners. Success is not about how many statistics you compile, but rather how many your buyer or boss retains."

Dianna Booher is the founder of Booher Consultants, a global performance improvement firm that works with organizations to increase profitability and market share through more effective communication - oral, written, and interpersonal. Learn more at http://www.booherconsultants.com.

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