There is an argument to be made for secrecy. Not in protecting and hording everything that you are and have, but in keeping some of the magic behind the scenes and waiting for an audience’s reaction.
Case in point – the latest Captain America film has 16+ trailers available on TrailerAddict – some with an extra second here, or a glimpse of someone there – but sixteen trailers? Really sixteen?
How many times have you gone to a movie in a recent years where you’ve come out saying – “All the good parts were in the trailers”. Now what if there had been less shown in the trailers a lesser amount of times?
Would the audience’s reaction have been different?
The best moment in any demo, lesson or presentation is having an audience that has no idea what you are presenting but by the end, they see it all come to light and they get it, it dawns on them, the dots become connected and it’s clear to them.
That moment, is a great moment to be a part of, to witness and observe. I could just as easily have thrown it all into an email BEFORE the presentation or sent out the deck in advance, but it might have missed the point. And worse, people might have come in wanting to skip the build-up and go straight to the end or perhaps even have hijacked the message you are trying to deliver and focus it on what they do not understand.
Holding back is hard – you WANT to give it all away, you NEED to give it all away, but you don’t HAVE to give it all away. What you need to do is channel your inner sales guru and think of it as the greatest story you are ever going to tell and how you want everyone in that room to leave with that feeling of being blown away.
If you can do that, then gameover for the other the other side. If you can’t, then you’ve just given the other side all they need to critique you all the way along and change your message into theirs.
