You want to stand out in the marketplace? Create an amazing experience.

Near the end of 2016 I spoke at a conference in Brazil and it was one of the most epic experiences I’ve had in my career. I can’t even begin to describe the spirit and the energy and the passion of these people. If you ever get a chance to go to Brazil, do it!

And yes, there was a language barrier, so my presentation was literally translated in real time. As if presenting to the largest audience of my career wasn’t a wild enough experience already! But that’s a story for another day.

Anyways, near the end of the event there was a presentation that I really wanted to listen to, so my translator and I went out to the one of the top balconies where we wouldn’t interrupt too many people and she translated the presentation in real time for me.

Boy, am I glad we went, because this presentation was AMAZING. I literally took pages and pages of notes.

The presentation was all about gamification. The presenters, Tatiana Gabrael and her husband Renato Gabrael, sell an online course which helps participants to improve their eyesight, and they include a game as part of the course to keep students engaged and progressing.

 

 

So Tatiana and Renato are experienced with gamification, and what I want to share with you today is the ingenious way they gamified their presentation.

During their presentation, about halfway through, they encouraged audience members to open up a secret envelope that everybody was given when they registered. FYI this was a three day event; people were given this envelope on day one when they registered and on the envelope it stated that they couldn’t open it until they were instructed to.

When it was time for Tatiana and Renato’s presentation, it was the end of day three. People had been holding on to this secret envelope that entire time, so it created all this anticipation until they finally revealed that that envelope was designed for their presentation and people could now open it.

Of course, it turned out that the envelope contained a game to help the audience participate in the presentation and experience the theory of gamification in action. It helped them implement what they were learning right on the spot, as they were learning it.

The experiment was a hit and everybody was smiling and having a good time. It was a great great example of how to design an experience so that people not only get the value from the information itself but from the way the information is presented.

It’s the little things that count and I think, more than anything, the audience appreciated the fact that Tatiana and Renato poured in so much thought in terms of how to involve the audience and how to create an amazing presentation that was three dimensional.

In addition to the game components, one of the things that Tatiana and Renato talked about was incorporating characters in the games you create. To demonstrate this, they actually had characters in their presentation, real people dressed up as the characters they were talking about!

These “characters” went out into the crowd and engaged with the audience.

It was really really cool. It was just an awesome example of how to take information and turn it into an experience.

 

 

The bottom line:

The bottom line is I will not forget that presentation. Yes, the information Tatiana and Renato presented was very valuable, but that’s not why I’m telling you about their presentation today.

I’m telling you about their presentation today because they presented the information in a way that was MEMORABLE.

And this is where you and I have the same opportunity.

We can look beyond the information we’re sharing and focus on HOW we’re sharing the information. By getting intentional about this, we can create an unforgettable experience that people will want to tell their friends about.

This might apply to the content you share on social, to how you structure your webinars, to your email autoresponder when somebody signs up to your list, and it definitely applies to the experience you provide for your paying customers.

Whether you offer a digital or physical product or service, there are always opportunities for you to tweak the experience you are providing customers and turn it into something special, the same way Tatiana and Renato turned their presentation about gamification into an experience that I wanted to share with you today.

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