More Impactful Online Engagement

Today’s doom-scrolling culture seems to have impacted everyone’s ability to hold interest. The need to “hook” our audience’s attention is now more demanding in creativity and sometimes even budget. In this post, I highlight enduring communication principles that should bear re-assertion before we add bells and whistles to jazz up our engagement factor:

Control the Meaning: Verbal

1. The KEY point. Let’s face it, we don’t always have our audience’s undivided attention. So, our key points have to be sharp, clear, structured, concise and most importantly, fleshed out early and sufficiently. Most speakers take this lightly and end up taking the audience on a meandering scenic route before the points become clear. Remember that "passivated-audience fatigue" is real. If we don’t flesh out our key points clearly and early enough, we may have lost our audience’s attention in the 1st minute of our speech.

2. The Convincing. The purity of rhetoric alone is insufficient to convince. Yes, rhetorical strategies are important to "sweeten the deal" but in today's empirically driven world, objective, large-scale, and credibly sourced data speaks a thousand words.
   

3. The Story. Storytelling is a fantastic tool to connect the audience with the central message. But not everyone is a good storyteller. If you’re developing a story, think about the "eureka moment" in that story. That's the hook that your audience will mull over after your pitch is done. Also, tell the story repeatedly to different groups of people. When we've heard ourselves tell the same story repetitively, our stories get refined with each iteration. As the first recipients of our own story, we become convinced ourselves. When that happens, we become more skilled at storytelling progressively.

4. The Questions. The idea of asking questions is to connect mentally with our audience. So, plan your questions well. You may wish to ask rhetorical questions as a way to seek consensus, ask open-ended questions to invite dialogue or ask closed-ended questions as a quick way to interact with your audience. But don't forget that you control the meaning. So don't let your questions disadvantage you unwittingly.

Connect with Brand: Visual

1. The Whole of You. We are the physical ambassador of the brand we represent. For example, a brightened, frontal, and shoulder-up view of you is important in an online meeting. If not, there's a lack of brand presence. Also, remember the light source is not behind you and that you occupy a significant central space in the frame. Remember, a strong brand must have a solid presence.

2. The Non-verbal Connection. Ironically, even though we are now less than 1 metre from our audience when we meet online, we feel farther from them than in a physical setting. The online encounter seems to rip out the "warmth" in an encounter. To compensate, our facial expressions and eye contact become limited resources to make deeper connections.

3. The Virtual Background. Indeed, clothes make the man in the past. Would a well-chosen virtual background do the same for us in the digital age? Well, we think that a well-chosen virtual background enhances your brand. Choose one that complements your brand and is agreeable with the company's brand that you represent.

Energize with Impact: Vocal

1. The Energy. Step up on your vocal energy by way of volume, word stress, intonation, and pauses or else you will lose your audience to the zzzz monster.

2. The Tone. Be ready to dial up or down your tone to complement the mood of the message.

Interact with Tools: Digital

The Digital Tools. You know what they are: chat function, poll here and there, thumbs up, annotation. The list goes on. Our advice is to use them selectively as long as they serve a practical function to spruce up your pitch. But like the same advice we gave earlier about over-using rhetorical devices, be purposeful. If not, you could lose control of the meaning and with that, the session as well.

There we have it. In the new era of digital communication, things are constantly in flux. Social dynamics will continue to shift. But as long as our communication principles are kept in tandem with these shifts, we need to adjust communication resources to best support how meaning is accessed.

Writer

Dr. Katy Kan is a communication trainer and practitioner. If you’d like to find out more about communication training or projects, please reach her at katy@katydidconnect.com