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3D Printing on Your Desk

How cool!

I just checked out this video from FormLabs about their 3D printers.

To me it is more than 3D printing. 
It is manufacturing on a small scale. 
It is unleashing creativity.
It is lifting ideas off the page
It is enabling the next level.

Think of the leap for musicians when they could create their own high quality CDs using their computers and back room. All of a sudden designers and artists can effortlessly create their pieces.

Image: www.Formlabs.com

Think of the personalised items you could create at Trade Shows and Expos to engage with your visitors.
Think of the modelling you could do to solve engineer issues.
Think of the cool bass guitar picks your could create!

What would you do with your very own 3D printer?

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Tips for a Successful Event

I shot a quick video recently on the key tips for a successful event. If you are an Event Planner, Event Professional, PCO (Professional Conference Organiser) or even if you run events in your company, you will find these tips valuable.


Enjoy!

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How are Your Questioning Techniques?

Questions
Whether you are talking to a prospect, a friend, a client, a stranger or a loved one, the power of a conversation is in your ability to ask the right questions. Too often I observe people asking questions to confirm what they think they know rather than explore for information that they may not have.
Most people are familiar with the basics of Open or Closed questions. You may

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also be aware of techniques to ask about problems or issues the other is facing.

THE most powerful question I have found for exploring the depth of a subject is a very simple one.

“Tell me more about that.”

It shows a deeper level of interest from you and enables the person you are talking with the freedom to say whatever they want in relation to the topic. Frequently it will uncover a deeper issue or concern with a situation and expose some valuable information for you to use in assisting the person to solve, resolve or contribute to their issue or situation.

If you want some practice, try it on some kids, you will be amazed what they say!

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Warwick Merry – The Get More Guy, is your high energy, results focused, action oriented, no holds barred tour de force MC, keynote speaker and Exhibiting Specialist. He ensures your attendees Get More from your event. His MC work is like insurance for your event. It guarantees things will run smoothly and on time. As a speaker, he is like a dose of Berocca – a bubbling, burst of healthy, sustainable energy for your attendees. If you need a burst of inspiration, cogitation and celebration at your next event you MUST book The Get More Guy, Warwick Merry.

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Why Are You Paying For It?

Let me pay
Why Are You Paying For It?

Many business run different events. They could be internal team building, internal state of the nation, external marketing events or simply a client get together with some valuable information presented. My question for you is “Why are you paying for it?”

It is increasingly accepted by participants that there will be an event sponsor. The big sporting events are even named after them, KFC cricket, KIA tennis, NAB football, this list goes on.

So why not you?

I recently ran an event for 30 prospects with my business partner. We had a sponsor cover the costs of the event (minimising risk for us). The sponsor had his suppliers give him promotional materials for all participants and he got to address and network with his target market (and has since signed up new clients from the event).

My challenge for you is to get a sponsor for you next event that minimises your risk, enhances your event and even pays for the event. Why are you paying for it?

PS If you want to find out more about how to get or how to be a sponsor, join us tomorrow on our f r e e  EASI Money – Sponsorship webinar. Register here.

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Are You Ready for 2013?

2013
I have had the last couple of weeks off. I spent the time relaxing, celebrating, planning, resting and enjoying. I feel refreshed and ready to embrace whatever 2013 holds for me. 

What about you? Are you ready for 2013?
I have seen a lot of blurb about New Year’s resolutions. Can I humbly suggest that you don’t waste your time on them? Most people get excited, make commitments and then simply get on with their life. I have found it more valuable to learn from the past, plan for the future and act in the day.

To help you put some substance into that process I created the Regular Results Review, an easy to use 2 page template to build your action plan for the year. Let me know how it goes.

So are you ready for 2013? If not, be ready because it is already here and will continue along regardless. I hope 2013 is magic for you, your family and your business. If I can help at all, get in touch.

Enjoy! 

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12 Days of Christmas 2012

12 days
Welcome to the Twelve Days for Christmas for 2012.

Maybe you don’t celebrate Christmas, maybe you are more a Haj, Chanuka or Bodi day kind of person. It doesn’t matter, this applies to everyone.
Last year I put out the 12 Days Challenge and it got a great response so here it is again.

Here is your challenge for the

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next twelve days. Don’t forget, that they are cumulative, just like the song. That is, on the first day, you give the first thing. One the second day, you give the second thing and then the first thing. On the third day you give the third thing, the second thing and then the first and so on.

Your Twelve Days and their challenges:
On the first day of Christmas I gave to my partner or best friend, an extra long and extra firm hug.
On the second day of Christmas I gave to a person on the road, 2 moments to cut in ahead of me.
On the third day of Christmas I gave to the person on the street $3 for a coffee treat.
On the fourth day of Christmas I gave to a member of my team, 4 minutes to tell me what they thought of me.
On the fifth day of Christmas I gave to myself 5 minutes of mediation.
On the sixth day of Christmas I gave to my family, six minutes of singing silly songs.
On the seventh day of Christmas I gave to my kids, seven minutes of undivided attention.
On the eighth day of Christmas I searched my memory for eight things I learned from this year.
On the ninth day of Christmas I wrote in my diary, nine goals for the coming year.
On the tenth day of Christmas I gave to my friends, ten minutes of non-stop praise.
On the eleventh day of Christmas for my sanity, I gave myself an eleven minute bath (Frankincense and Myrrh is optional).
On the twelfth day of Christmas I committed to the community twelve hours of my time as a volunteer.

It is ALMOST singable to the original tune!! Don’t be discouraged if you don’t get it perfect but do act on as many as you can. Carry the spirit of Christmas and giving with you as you do.

PS I know that the 12 Days of Christmas don’t officially start until the 29th of December but I thought I would get in early! Have a fabulous festive season and here is to a magnificent 2013

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How Good Is Your Call To Action?

Signage
I spoke to a school group this morning. On the way there I saw a delivery van covered with signage on their products. There was lots of colour and pictures but the sign that stood out was words saying 

“Book with me Now!”

My initial response was ‘Book what?’

You see their signage got attention but you could not tell at a glance what it was for. With signage on a vehicle that moves at somewhere between 40 and 100 km/h you have to be able to understand it in a single glance.

This is a principle that I share with clients in my Exhibiting work. Can you tell at a glance what your stand is about?
It is equally applicable to the action line on an email. If the recipient cannot understand what you want from them at a glance, then you need to rework your call to action.

Are you getting the response you want with your “Call to Action?”

PS Be careful with abbreviations too. This sign was taken by a friend of mine in the USA and I don’t think it says what they want it to!

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Are You Trained?

BriefingAre You Trained?

I spent three days last week locked in a room with other similar minded entrepreneurs. Well maybe not locked but you get what I mean. We were looking at how to transform our businesses and take them to the next level (or even the one beyond that). The final day was planning and commitments for 2013 with an action plan to help get us there
.
As a business owner it can be hard to dedicate this kind of time for additional training and development.

As an employee as well, there is always too much to do to spend time off getting training and development.

I have heard it said by many business gurus, “Too many managers say What if I train my employees and they leave, but what if you don’t train them and they stay!”

By the way, don’t wait for others to pay for or approve your training either. If you really want it or need it, be prepared to finance it yourself, after all, you get to keep it!

So what training do you need? What skills do you need to develop? What will you do TODAY to make that happen?

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PS Tomorrow night (Tuesday 4th December) we will be hosting the 5 Keys to Successful Exhibiting training from 6pm in Doncaster. Be my guest and use the promo code EASCOMP for your ticket at my expense. To register or find out more details, visit EASInstitute.Eventbrite.com

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Are You Protecting Your Assets?

Mute WGM
Are You Protecting Your Assets?
In business and life it is important to protect your assets. Sometimes our most important assets are not “things” but “skills.” 

For example, as a Master of Ceremonies and Event Strategist, my most important asset is my ability to talk. Unfortunately I did not protect that asset and I have lost my voice! (The good news is that for the first time in a long time, my wife can finish her own sentences without me interrupting!)

I was speaking at a gig on Thursday last week – it was pretty warm and I was drinking ice water before I spoke. At the end my voice was a little strained but I thought it would recover. I was then MC at a wedding on Saturday night. I had spent the day chatting with a friend who had come down from Queensland and then the wedding venue was noisy so you had to shout to talk. The PA was poor quality so I strained the strain. As you may expect, the best thing to do is to not talk and let it recover. But Wifey and I had lunch and dinner planned with two sets of friends on Sunday. I tried not to talk but I can’t help myself. 
This morning I have a very sore throat and minimal voice.

This all started with the Ice Water. If you are a performer, you must only drink room temperature water as it keeps your vocal chords flexible and ready to work. I know this but still I did not protect my assets.

What about you? What assets do you need to protect? How will you do that?


If one of your assets is to Sell or Generate leads, then let me help you look after your asset. On Tuesday 4th December in Melbourne we are running a 2 1/2 hr workshop on 5 Keys to Successful Exhibiting and Event Sponsorship. I would love you to be my guest. Simply use the Code EASCOMP when you register here and there will be no charge for you to attend. See you there!

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Want More Sales?

Rego Desk
Want More Sales?
There seems to be so many people out there spruiking the short cuts to more customers and more sales. Let me be honest with you, there is no short cut!

The best way to increase your sales and customer based is with focussed attention on the key methods that work and measuring your efforts and results in the process. The Centre for Exhibiting Industry Research found that Exhibiting and Event Sponsorship has one of the lowest costs per lead when compared to traditional marketing methods.

Now as you will know from previous posts, I am also a huge fan of Exhibiting and the results it brings but it is easy to get it very wrong!


THE BIGGEST MISTAKE


The biggest mistake people make is that they have no idea why they are exhibiting. They may know in loose terms but they have no idea how to measure it. As the adage says, “What gets measured gets improved.” So when you next exhibiting, you MUST know your why and how you will measure it otherwise you are wasting your money.


My joint ventu
re business The Exhibiting and Sponsorship Institute is just about to launch our new product, the Exhibit Like A Pro 12 Disc pack. We are launching it by running a 2 1/2 hr workshop on how to Exhibit Like A Pro on Tuesday 4th December. We are starting in Melbourne and next February we have a tour of Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. To find out more or to register, click here. I would love to see you there.

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Warwick Merry – The Get More Guy, is your high energy, results focused, action oriented, no holds barred tour de force MC, keynote speaker and Exhibiting Specialist. He ensures your attendees Get More from your event. His MC work is like insurance for your event. It guarantees things will run smoothly and on time. As a speaker, he is like a dose of Berocca – a bubbling, burst of healthy, sustainable energy for your attendees.  If you need a burst of inspiration, cogitation and celebration at your next event you MUST book The Get More Guy, Warwick Merry.

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Are You Flexible?

OMG! Can you believe it? I stuffed up. 

I live in Melbourne and didn’t realise that I had scheduled my How to Create and Deliver a Great Introduction webinar smack bang in the middle of Melbourne Cup Day. Naturally I only found out about this just after I had sent the newsletter to over 1,500 people!

So a few quick tinkerings of the system and voila, it is now on this Wednesday at 1pm Melbourne time. If you want to be part of it, the webinar detail and registration is here 

What about you? When you find out about a problem can you let go of control enough to be flexible? Can you release the idea of what you wanted to happen and come up with a solution that will suit? From a cancelled meeting to a cancelled contract, anything can happen. As has been said so many times, it is not what happens to you but how you deal with it that counts. So are you flexible enough to deal with what happens to you?

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Warwick Merry – The Get More Guy, is your high energy, results focused, action oriented, no holds barred tour de force MC, keynote speaker and Exhibiting Specialist. He ensures your attendees Get More from your event. His MC work is like insurance for your event. It guarantees things will run smoothly and on time. As a speaker, he is like a dose of Berocca – a bubbling, burst of healthy, sustainable energy for your attendees.  If you need a burst of inspiration, cogitation and celebration at your next event you MUST book The Get More Guy, Warwick Merry.

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What About Me?

Warwick MC

One of my personal bug bears is when an MC says, “And now for a person who needs no introduction…” and then spends five minutes introducing them! Most of us have been to meetings or networking functions where people are introduced by their resume (at least it feels like they are reading their resume.)

Here is the secret of a brilliant introduction: the introduction is NOT about the person you are introducing. What people forget is that the introduction means more to the AUDIENCE that the presenter.

That is not just for presentations either. Think about when you are introduced to someone at a networking event. What has more value to you?
“This is Jill Jones she is the CEO of Jones International”
OR
“This is Jill Jones. Her business specialises in graphic design and branding. I recall you saying you were looking at yours recently.”
In the second introduction you will love the context you get about Jill and Jill loves the referral the introducer is giving her.

So how are your introductions?

If you want better introductions, join me on Wednesday 7th November for a complimentary webinar on How to Create and Deliver a Great Introduction. If you can’t make that time, no worries, simply register and you will get access to the recording.

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To register click here

By the way, this is not a normal webinar where I talk and you listen. This is a hands on workshop where you will create an introduction and we walk through what will make your introduction better.

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What Are You Up To?

One of the most common questions around the work place is “So what are you up to?”It’s usually the boss, a colleague or a friend just asking what is happening.
When it comes to work, there would be 4 key answers I would be looking for:

  1. I am servicing the client and providing what they have paid for or assisting someone else in the firm to do that
  2. I am getting more prospects to consider us
  3. I am converting a prospect to a sale
  4. I am looking for ways to increase the sale to a customer – maybe a repeat sale or maybe an increase in the sale amount or maybe building a product to sell.

Anything else is just busy work.
If what you are doing does not related to one of these four things I would have to ask why are you doing it.
So what are you up to?

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Warwick Merry – The Get More Guy, is your high energy, results focused, action oriented, no holds barred tour de force MC, keynote speaker and Exhibiting Specialist. He ensures your attendees Get More from your event. His MC work is like insurance for your event. It guarantees things will run smoothly and on time. As a speaker, he is like a dose of Berocca – a bubbling, burst of healthy, sustainable energy for your attendees.  If you need a burst of inspiration, cogitation and celebration at your next event you MUST book The Get More Guy, Warwick Merry.

Read more →

 

Can You Negotiate Successfully?

Negotiation is such a core part of what we do, but I am not a guru on Negotiation. Luckily I have a very good friend that is. I asked her to give me the secrets to mastering negotiation and she was happy to oblige.
Tanya Edlington has negotiated everything from wages deals worth millions of dollars to car parking arrangements where she lives because she knows EVERYTHING is negotiable. She has learnt everything she knows by doing it and learning from her mistakes. Tanya believes the art of conversation is important to all kinds of relationships. She’s a mediator accredited through LEADR, and is a sought after facilitator. Tanya uses her skills as an actress to help everyone from doctors to corporate managers develop their face to face communication skills.
TanyaHere are Tanya’s Top Tips to Negotiate Anything!
If you follow these every time, regardless of what you’re negotiating or who you are representing, you are bound to have a successful outcome.  

  1. Know what you want.  It seems obvious, but it’s also often the thing that people neglect.  If you don’t know exactly what you want, you’re not ready to negotiate.
  2. Know how what you want can be packaged.  Sometimes it’s easy to miss a great opportunity to settle because it looks a bit different from what you were thinking.  Be creative and open minded as you consider offers made by the other side.  Think about how offers can help you get what you want, rather than focussing on the shortcomings.
  3. Make sure the people with authority to settle or reach agreement are in the room.  There’s nothing worse than putting in the hard work and reaching a great outcome, only to find that the people you’ve been talking to aren’t the decision-makers.  I only negotiate with decision-makers.  If the other side can’t do this, then they’re not committed to negotiation.
  4. Spend some time agreeing on the rules of engagement before you start negotiating on substantive matters.  Apart from being useful to set up rules of engagement, this helps everyone practise talking to each other.  If I’m negotiating with several people, I look for clues about communication styles, power relationships, thinking preferences and the dynamics within the group.  I include issues of confidentiality (where relevant) and also communication with stakeholders (who, what, when and how).
  5. Don’t leave the room without a written agreement.  Whatever I am negotiating, the last thing I do before anyone leaves the room is to write down what we’ve already agreed.  I write this summary together. I’m not talking about a fully drafted document!  I’m talking about an agreed written record that reduces the risk of people walking away with different interpretations or an intention to wriggle out of something.   Electronic whiteboards are really handy for this.  If there isn’t one I take a photo and email to everyone.  Once everyone agrees on what is written down, I then distribute copies.  I include the date, time and names of everyone in the room and who they represent.  This process is also clarifiying and can often flush out anything that isn’t really agreed between the parties.  

Putting it all together, approach your negotiations with your creative problem solving muscles flexed and view the other team as useful collaborators with expertise to contribute to the solving of the problem.  I find that this approach means the relationships with the people remain intact – sometimes even grow – and people are more willing to keep going when it’s tough.  
Lastly, I make sure that my thoughts, words and deeds are in alignment so that I am operating with integrity, regardless of who I’m working with and what we’re trying to achieve.  

If you need help with your negotiations, please contact Tanya. She is sure to help you achieve the outcome you want.

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Warwick Merry – The Get More Guy, is your high energy, results focused, action oriented, no holds barred tour de force MC, keynote speaker and Exhibiting Specialist. He ensures your attendees Get More from your event. His MC work is like insurance for your event. It guarantees things will run smoothly and on time. As a speaker, he is like a dose of Berocca – a bubbling, burst of healthy, sustainable energy for your attendees.  If you need a burst of inspiration, cogitation and celebration at your next event you MUST book The Get More Guy, Warwick Merry.

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Are You Ready?

Ready
I had a big weekend. 2 1/2 day as MC of the Super Conference in Melbourne (from Thursday to Saturday), a 1 year old party, MC another function on the Saturday night and then 6 hours reviewing the upcoming video product I am creating.

Phew!

The recurring theme seemed to be “Are You Ready”. At the Super Conference, one of the speakers arrived late, was foofing and fluffing around with AV, running back to his room, forgetting something else and had no introduction. We delayed the start but it got to the point that I had to fill in for about 10 minutes while he got ready. For some a 10 minute fill

is not easy (lucky I like the sound of my own voice!) Other speakers arrived the day before to check the room, had their AV all tested and loaded on our machines two presentations prior. True professionals that were a delight to deal with.

On the Saturday night, there was a little more stuffing around trying to get the hotels projector working. Luckily the client was patient because it took the hotel awhile to find the person who knew what was going on (apparently the projector always goes to sleep automatically – that would have been nice to know up front!)

What about you? Are you ready?

Are you ready to start your meetings on time? Do your minutes get done promptly after the meeting? Do people have all of your requirements, introductions and contact details when you are on site? Have you practiced the difficult meeting with your staff member? Do you have the correct documentation when you get on the phone to talk to a service provider? When you are running an event, are you ready to stall for five minutes if you need to (because you know it will happen!)

When you know you have something significant happening, make sure you are ready. It makes a massive difference!

—————

Warwick Merry – The Get More Guy, is your high energy, results focused, action oriented, no holds barred tour de force MC, keynote speaker and Exhibiting Specialist. He ensures your attendees Get More from your event. His MC work is like insurance for your event. It guarantees things will run smoothly and on time. As a speaker, he is like a dose of Berocca – a bubbling, burst of healthy, sustainable energy for your attendees. If you need a burst of inspiration, cogitation and celebration at your next event you MUST book The Get More Guy, Warwick Merry.

Read more →