Doing Homework Saved My Ass In Front of 1,000 People

Yo, what’s up, everybody? Welcome back to the pod. I’ve been traveling right now. I was at an event last week in Salt Lake City, speaking, and now I’m here in Colorado, just hanging out with some friends, getting some mountain air, and I’m recording in a yoga studio right now. So if you’re watching this on YouTube and you’re like, where the hell is Anthony? This is a very strange environment he’s in. This is what we call controlling the controllables. That is, the work needs to get done, which is making these podcasts. And so we take what we can get and we make it happen. So what I wanted to share today actually is really interesting.

So last week I was speaking at this event in Salt Lake City. It’s called the best ever conference. It’s a real estate conference. And I’m going to share a couple of other experiences, other lessons that came from that event. But there’s one thing in particular I really want to share with you guys, which is the power of research, the power of homework, and how it can really save your bacon. Whether you’re getting on stage and doing public speaking or really just anything in life. Like the more knowledge, the more experiences that you have that you can get from other places that you might be able to use in the moment, might just ultimately be the thing that saves your tush in a tight spot. So here’s the story I want to share with you.

I was watching this video a number about a year ago. This guy named Eric Ed. Is it edmites or something like that. He’s a big public speaker. He’s sharing this story about how he’s on vacation in Sweden, and his friend calls him up, and he’s like, oh, hey, you know what? I have an event going on right now. I would love it if you. You could swing over and maybe just give a speech. And Ed’s like, no, no, I don’t want to do that.
I’m just on vacation. And his friend’s like, no, no, no, really, it means the world to me. Be so helpful. So Ed’s like, okay, fine. I’ll be here at this time. I’ll fly in if you want to have somebody come pick me up at the airport, bring me over there, I’ll fly in just for that speech, and then I’ll leave right away. So he gets to the airport. The driver picks him up, he drives him over to the place, drops him off, and he’s like, okay, now where do I go? And the driver’s like, I don’t really know.
So Ed is left to kind of wander around this big conference center facility to try and find where he’s supposed to be. And that can, if you’ve ever spoken or been to a large convention center, it can be kind of tricky to figure out, where am I going, right? So he finally figures it out. He gets to the place where he needs to be, and he sees the registration line, and he notices there’s, like, ten people in front of him. And each person, it’s taking around five to ten minutes to get them each checked in. And so he’s, like, looking at his clock and realizing he needs to be on the stage in about 15 minutes or something like that, really quick, right? So he cuts in front of the line, he goes to the lady, and he goes, hey, listen, I’m supposed to be speaking here, and I don’t know what I need to do here. And she’s like, well, if you just want to sit and wait in the line, you know, we’ll get you up here, we’ll get you checked in, and we’ll get you on your way. He goes, well, you know, the problem is, you know, it’s taken about five minutes or so to get through each person, and then by the time, you know, you get up here, I’m supposed to be speaking in 15, so it looks like it’s gonna take another 30. So what should we do here? Right? So she’s like, oh, okay, yeah, let’s get you to the stage.
So they take him to the stage, he gets there, and the guy in the backstage, like, in the green room, he points, and he’s like, okay. So when that lady’s done speaking, she’s gonna come over here, and then that guy sitting in the front row, he’s gonna introduce you, and then he’s gonna give you the microphone. So usually what happens is they give you the microphone behind the stage, mic you up, right, so that you can just walk out there and immediately get into the flow. So Ed’s like, oh, okay, well, that’s not ideal, but we’ll make it work. And he looks out there, and he sees a lady presenting. And the problem is she is presenting to this massive auditorium with, like, 20 people in it, and they’re scattered, like, all around. And so it’s pretty much speaking to a dead, empty room. And he’s like, oh, no, that’s not going to be fun.
That’s not going to be good. And so she wraps up, and she walks off stage, and the guy that introduces him gets up there and starts introducing. And then he starts, you know, he’s like, here’s Ed meat user, whatever his last name is. And he’s like, starts walking off the stage really slowly towards Ed. And Ed’s like, oh, my God, this is gonna take forever. So they meet in the middle. He gets the microphone, he goes out there, and he’s staring at this empty room. It’s right after lunch at this big conference.
And a lot of times when you speak at a conference, there’s, you know, a lot of the networking, the value of the conference is had in the conversations out the hallway. And this is something that you’re aware of as a speaker, is that you’re competing against the conversations people could be having with one another, right? And he realizes in that moment that this is going to be a terrible, terrible keynote. If there’s only 15 people in there, it’s going to be a terrible experience for them. The energy is going to be weird. It’s going to be a terrible experience for the people who maybe come in a little bit later because they’re going to miss some context early on. So he’s like. So he gets up there, and he does a really interesting thing. He says, okay, here’s the problem, guys, to the people who are in the room, is that I have been brought in as an expert on how to fill an auditorium, how to give a keynote to a lot of people, how to attract, how to market, how to brand all these things.
And this is not a good look for me to be giving a speech to 20 people, right? So I need to prove to you that I am capable of getting people into seats, right? So here’s what we’re gonna do, is I’m going to count to three, and on three, everybody’s gonna stand up, and you guys are gonna start cheering and hooting and hollering and waving your arms, and you’re gonna get crazy loud, as loud as we possibly can. And my hope is that we can make it seem like there’s something big and interesting going on in here. And then all those people out in the hallway, it’ll pique their interest, and they’ll go, oh, what’s happening in there? And then they’ll start coming in, right? So they do this. He counts down to three, and then on three, they all go crazy. And then, sure enough, people wander into the auditorium because they’re curious what the hell’s happening here. Now, I saw him give this speech a number of years ago where he’s recounting that story, and I thought hey, that’s pretty interesting way to think on your feet. That’s very adaptable. Well, at this event, at best ever, it turned out I was in that very situation.
I step into this room, and it’s the very last presentation of the entire event, and people are out in the hall. People are tired. The people who had just been on before me was a panel, and literally, they sabotaged me by saying, hey, if you guys have more questions, we’ll continue this conversation out in the hallway. So we’ll just move the panel out there. So if you guys want to come and ask us questions, come do that. So they pretty much, like, stole pieces of the audience, right? So I get up there and I’m like, I did not plan on doing this, but this room is, like, half full, and I need to. If I’m going to be giving a talk on the power of branding, on the power of, like, having a personal brand on the Internet and how it can attract business to you, I need to make some drastic changes here. So we did exactly what Ed had laid out in his, and it worked like gangbusters.
And it worked for a couple different. It did a couple different interesting things. One, it brought the people in from the hallway. Cause they’re like, hey, what’s happening in there? That sounds kind of cool, right? People going crazy. The other thing was, it raised the energy of the people who were in the room, and it gave them immediate buy in. They were so invested suddenly in my presentation because they had helped me bring the audience in, and I was like, wow, this is actually a really great way to start a presentation. And it never would have occurred to me, like, if I had not seen that video of Ed, if I hadn’t done homework, if I hadn’t done research, I would have probably just gotten up there and just plowed forward and gone straight into my presentation and been like, it is what it is. But having seen that, I had a data point that I knew maybe I could pull that out of my hat.

And that right there is the value of doing your homework, doing research, studying what other people are doing, trying to put as many tricks into your bag as possible. That’s not just for public speaking. It’s in every aspect of business. I think the person who has access to the most information and can execute on that information in the most timely fashion is generally going to come out on top. So I wanted to share that because it was a pretty unique experience being able to use something that I had learned or had seen before, and it worked, which was really cool. If you’re listening to this and you were at that presentation, I appreciate you so much. And as always, guys and gals, I appreciate you taking the time to tune into the podcast. We’ll catch you in the next episode.

But until then, stay hyper focused, my friend.