Speaker - September 2009

the answer. She teaches how to find your speech deep within your heart. Salsbury says, “You are one of a kind and your life experience is unique from all others.”

Salsbury’s approach also can help you find your next blog article or the next chapter of your book. So, even as you write, you need to find the courage to reach into that deepest part of yourself. That’s where your creativity comes from and where your imagination takes flight. You might call it Glenna’s Internet Formula:

Raw material + your unique
viewpoint = fresh and surprising
content

Old Dead-Guy Quotes
Do your brain and your content one
more favor. A couple of years ago
at the NSA Annual Convention in
San Diego, the brilliant and inspi-
rational thought leader, Simon T.
Bailey, CSP, suggested that you
delete the “Quotes folder” on your
computer. Bailey argued that a
device that once gave weight and
authority to speeches and articles
was now making audiences and
readers yawn. Instead of relying
on quotes from the likes of Peter
Drucker, Gandhi and Mark Twain,
he suggested speakers talk to more
people, listen more closely and read
more extensively.

You might not be surprised that we’d add “search more on the Internet.”

When it comes to quotes, many people know that by putting quotation marks around phrases you can find out who wrote any of these: “Clean favored and imperially •

slim”
“Walk a little slower when you •
walk by me”
“Shoot if you must this old grey •
head”

Yes, any search engine worth its salt can take even a tiny snippet of a song, poem or joke and retrieve not only who wrote it, but the complete text, as well. Cool, huh?

But, you can also use quotation marks to find brand new quotes that will surprise even the most jaded audience.

Consider NSA member Barbara McNichol, who is an author and editor. She was revising a promotional piece for a client and needed a great quote about being extraordinary.

So, McNichol thought about the words her perfect quote would include, and then searched a few fragments of phrases like: “find the extraordinary,” “extraordinary people always” and “extraordinary is simply.” With all of the blogs, articles and books now on the Internet, someone somewhere has probably said something quite quotable. While she did find the perfect

quote, you won’t read it here because her client paid for it.

When we tried the same search, we found a quote by Australian artist Heidi Knoepli:

“I am alluding to the possibility that the extraordinary is simply ordinary. This is not a philosophical proposition to ponder over; for me it’s a truth, which must explode in one’s heart.”

The thing is, in context, it doesn’t even look like a quote. It’s just a sentence from Knoepfli’s Web site. She probably doesn’t even realize how quotable she is. But, it’s certainly fresh and surprising, no one else will be using it—and you don’t have to be a creative genius to find quotes like this.

Search the Internet—your imagination station—to find the perfect voice for your next speech, article or blog. Ideas are right at your fingertips.

Michael Benidt and Sheryl Kay are the only speakers who treat technology with the disrespect it deserves. Their goal is to spend less time online and more time goofing off. Indeed, the only cure for modern plagues like information overload, online swindles and social networking is to develop your Net Intelligence with the new survival skills of the information age. Visit GoldenCompass.com.