How are you showing up to expand your business?

That conversation has become so much more important right now in our new virtual business environment. There are all sorts of stats about how using video marketing can bump up how much clientele you can get, the level of business that you do, and help you to expand the reach of your brand.

82% of industries are still not using video marketing. Putting out one video for your business means you are in the top 18 percent of marketing statistics for business. However, most people are afraid still of getting in front of a camera to make videos. However, I would say that is one big blessing that has happened in the pandemic experience because we were finally forced to get in front of cameras.

The question to you that I want ringing in your head is what are you going to do with that?

The biggest hurdle before the pandemic was trying to get someone on a virtual meeting because they had to get on a camera. You have had experience in front of...

Posture, breath, and your energy level is an unspoken nonverbal cue of your social status, your personality, and the confidence you have in what you do. Your body placement rules how your posture and your breath work together.

We are built to breathe!  We started from birth breathing correctly. It is stress from our busy lifestyles that creates tension and gets in the way of good breathing. This video shows how babies naturally breathe correctly and without stress.  Learning to breathe correctly will not only improve your presentation skills, but it will also improve every aspect of your life!

One of the key aspects of feeling good when you speak in front of others is breathing well. Good breathing comes from learning to take a diaphragmatic breath. Good posture is key to achieving a correct diaphragmatic breath.  If the body is squished by bad posture, the breath will feel tight and shallow. 

Good breathing allows the body to stay naturally relaxed letting...

 By Kerstin O'Shields, CEO and Founder of The Body Language Strategy Academy

We learned a lot of good lessons back in a day in kindergarten.

When it comes to virtual etiquette, it's time to bring a few of those lessons forward to the current day virtual meetings to start taming the verbal madness that can happen in this environment.

First, we are going to start with the tried and true action of raising our hand up if you would like to say something.  

I know this seems very basic and rudimentary, but it has been a very effective tool in the classroom management world for a very long time.  At times, the conversations in virtual meetings can have an easy flow. But more often than not, these meetings can get terribly busy and even turn to the point of verbally chaotic.  Raising your hand is an easy visual way to let others know you would like to add to the conversation without it becoming a vocal yelling match to see who is the loudest of everyone...

By Kerstin O'Shields, CEO and Founder of The Body Language Strategy Academy

Did you know your body language is associated with your competence?

When you express and exude your competence in the fluidity of your movements you ensure trust in those who want you around them either personally or in business.  When we are looking for a leader or someone to work with, we want to make sure we feel confident with their competence to do the job.

So, how do you exude competence in body language?  

As humans, we emotionally respond to what we physically see. So we need to see you looking and feeling competent through fluidity.  Showing Fluidity in your motions automatically makes you appear as if you are high end, more elite, and a leader in your industry. We show how we are physically put together along with understanding the movements of our body, and because we emotionally respond, you demonstrating your competence through fluidity transpires into you being...

By Kerstin O'Shields, CEO and Founder of The Body Language Strategy Academy

Most human beings are empathetic naturally.  We emotionally respond to what we physically see.

In our neurological systems in the brain, we have what are called mirror neurons. When we relate to something, it is our mirror neurons firing which causes us to “mirror” a reaction or emotion that we are seeing on another person’s face or in their body language.  This causes us to feel like we are emotionally connected to that person or situation.

Hollywood has done a fabulous job of bringing in the money on this particular aspect of how our brains function. When you go to the movies, you get yourself ready for the show by sitting in a comfy chair with your soda and your popcorn. The movie starts and part way through the movie, the plot take a sad turn…The dog died, or the car went off the cliff, or the couple broke up… and all of a sudden your crying, because...

By Kerstin O'Shields, CEO and Founder of The Body Language Strategy Academy

As you know a first impression is very important.

We’ve all had a bad one, yes, even me some time ago. A first impression takes less than a tenth of a second to assess two things – are you someone that is approachable and are you someone that is attractive…..So basically, we decide if you are hot and/or safe in a nanosecond.

In the rest of the first second, we decided what social parameter you fit into:

• Are you a people person or a homebody?
• Do you have kids?
• Are you a cat person or a dog person?

All these aspects are taken into consideration and possibly decided before anyone has uttered a word to each other.

The trick with a first impression is it takes a full 10 hours of one-on-one interaction with someone to erase a bad impression. I don’t know about you but I know I don’t have that kind of time to make up for a bad impression.

Here are my top 4 tips on...

By Kerstin O'Shields, CEO and Founder of The Body Language Strategy Academy

We live in the “information age” where information on ANYTHING is available 24/7. You can even earn a college degree sitting on your couch with your favorite bag of chips all by yourself with no one there. I can learn how to change the oil in my car off a DIY (Do It Yourself) website… but I don’t really want to. I would rather pay someone else who has mastered that skill to do it while I happily sit in the lobby playing on my smartphone.

How people see you as a person is how they view your business as a whole.

Our bodies are our communication tools. How you engage your audience physically is essential because 80% of communication is nonverbal. If you are not using nonverbal communication to express your information correctly, you are missing out on the biggest part of communicating to your audience with what you have to offer them. You’ve just knocked out 80% of...