I was at a conference recently and there was a speaker who was introduced as an "equity release specialist". He may well have been, but certainly wasn't a good speaker. He confused a lot of people with his view of equity release plans and equity release schemes.

I don't want to publish his name (or that of the conference) for fear of embarassment - however, if any other people in the audience are reading this entry and want some good material on equity release, then you'll find some on this site, which I created especially for the purpose.

Also, if you want some professional, specialist help on equity release, then I suggest you speak to leading Wirral law firm, Lees Lloyd Whitley.

HSBC is sponsoring an event for its top clients at its purpose built conference centre in Manchester on Wednesday 26 November.

Chris Davidson is presenting the secrets of getting people to buy, without really selling to them.

You can find more details, including the agenda and how to get tickets here.

Fasthosts, the leading web-hosting company has seen a 30% increase in domain ownership disputes in the past year, according to Web Designer magazine. 

Should this worry you? Only if you don't know who actually owns your domain(s). Many companies out there have domains registered by their web design companies, or other advisiers, such as accountants or lawyers. This provides no benefit at all and can only lead to tears befoire bedtime.

Domain names are value assets and you're crazy to leave them in other people's hands.

Check out who wons yours and if necessary raise the current transfer forms to get them moved over to your ownership ASAP.

Then you can sleep easy at night. 

Earlier today I received an email from Aweber advertising a new capability in their system. You can now syndicate (publish) your broadcasts to Twitter.

Wow, amazing, so what?

Well, there's some really intersting, long range marketing ideas attached to this and I for one have joined the gang. This news alone was enough to pursuade me to open a Twitter account - which I have done:

ChrisDavidsonUK is my user-id, by the way

Here's where I see the benefit:

I publish the Professional Speakers Journal (PSJ), as many of you already know. The PSJ has a Tip of the Week newsletter called "Business Booster" and this is broadcast using Aweber. Now, with no extra work at all (apart from ticking one extra box) I can broadcast my Business Bootsers across the Twitter network. I see this as potentially massive and if you're not already up to speed on this issue, then I really think you ought to do some homework, pretty darn quick - which leads me to my second point:

Where to go for "Twitter Help"?

A really good place to start is the CommonCraft website and their introductory video on twitter - found here:

www.CommonCraft.com/twitter 

In August this year I was lucky enough to go to the NSA Convention in New York. It really was totally great fun and while I was there I had the opportunity to present to the New York Chapter of the NSA, who were having a meeting just prior to the Convention proper. They're a great bunch of people and if you're every in town I'm sure you'll find them very welcoming.

I presented on the six ways of influencing people, based on the amazing work by Robert Cialdini. It constantly amazes me how so many people in the profession of speaking know so little of his work.

From the actual Convention itself I would say my favourite (main stage) speaker was Bill Strickland Jr. There were other good speakers, sure, but Bill was the only one to "blow me away". In fact, there's only been one other speaker I've met in my career who's been as good and that's Alvin Law. If you haven't seen either, then make every opportunity - life enhancing stuff, I promise you.

We are delighted to announce that our new service the Professional  Speakers Journal was launched today.

The Journal is a unique online resource, designed specifically to help professional and corporate speakers build more profitable and successful businesses. The Journal has over 150 pages of content, all about the business of speaking - and this will be increased in coming months, in line with the exciting editorial schedule we have planned.

If you’re a professional speaker and would like an objective measurement of how effective your speaking business is, why not take our Speaker Business Effectiveness Questionnaire, available directly from the public portal. It’s totally free and you don’t even have to be a member to benefit from its use.

Likewise, if you’re a corporate speaker and would like an objective score on your approach to speaking in public, why not take our special Corporate Speaker Performance Questionnaire - again directly accessible from the public portal and presented free of charge.

When it comes to people skills, communication training courses are nearly always at the top of the list. Communications skills are vital in all walks of life - both personal and professional - however, it's communication skills at work training that seems to attract most attention.

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GSA Convention information, 07-09 September in Munich

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New multimedia product launched for public speaking training.

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German sound track to accompany video made for GSA Convention (September 2006).

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