“A sense of humor is an attitude in how you approach your work and life. It is a skill that can be developed.”
–Jeanne Robertson
Ryan is a socially awkward guy. He is long and narrow, walks lazily with the grace of a drunken penguin, and speaks with a hint of insanity. He doesn’t maintain eye contact, looks disheveled, and comes across as a bag of nerves. He has a combover about twenty years premature and rides a skateboard that makes him look about twenty years immature. He is shy and struggles to converse with anyone. It was hard to believe he was about to take the stage as a comedian.
I met Ryan in the little-known intellectual capital of California, a small city called Stockton. I was there for another comedy show. In most places, when I start to speak with my Irish accent, I’m met with the same question: Where in Ireland are you from? In most dumb places, I hear, “Where is Ireland?” Not in Stockton. In Stockton, I was asked, What is Ireland? A rich source of material at least.
Ryan was to this point the least funny person I had met. But when his time came to go on stage, he suddenly looked quietly confident. He abandoned the skateboard and suddenly gained a spring in his step. His eyes, previously easily distracted, were now laser-focused on the microphone and the eagerly awaiting crowd baying for entertainment. The stage rose five feet above the audience, but he moved with such intention that he made the steep steps to reach it seem like they weren’t even there.
He took the microphone in one hand and used his other to move the supporting stand to one side, removing the only obstacle that stood between him and the audience. He stood with a newfound poise and confidence before a packed house and took a moment to survey those about to judge him. The guy whom I would have bet my house on not being funny was about to prove me wrong. Very wrong.
Ryan wasted no time whipping the audience into a frenzy of loud, often uncontrollable laughter, and he kept this going for a full ten minutes. He put the microphone back in the stand after delivering his last, best joke to huge applause and appreciation as the room pulsated with a new energy. He exited the stage like a king and quickly went back to being really unfunny. The laser-focused eyes returned to easy distractions, but he now had a spring in his step and a wry smile on his face. What he just did felt really good. Like a baseball player hitting a home run with the bases loaded or a soccer player scoring a winning goal in a final, Ryan had just done what he had trained to do and had done it to perfection.
Then he did his best to ruin the moment by vomiting into a garbage can, snorting up a piece of pizza, and exiting the building Tony Hawk–style without another word. What just happened?
Very few comedians I met over the last year were what I would describe as naturally funny. Many were in fact the complete opposite, like Ryan. The natural gifts weren’t there but the skill certainly was—and it was clear that they developed their skill through practice, particularly in writing. Over time, these unfunny people learned how to write better and better.
“Good writing helps good marketers become great marketers. If you have a website, you are a publisher. If you are on social media, you are in marketing. And that means we are all writers. Our writing can make us look smart or it can make us look stupid. It can make us seem fun, or warm, or competent, or trustworthy—or it can make us seem humdrum or discombobulated or flat-out boring.”
–Ann Handley
Don’t get me wrong. Some comedians are naturally hilarious people. They seem to have an innate talent for being funny. From what I have seen over the last year, these comedians tend to rise to the top of their industry quicker than those who just rely on writing alone. We are not trying to be comedians, however. We are trying to become funnier speakers, and what we learn from those who are not naturally funny will do just fine.
Everyone knows that comedy is essentially a combination of what you say and how you say it—your material and your delivery. The often-unmentioned third element is how you write it. The same can be said for public speaking. Every great presentation, like every great joke, is first crafted with a pen, pencil, or keyboard. Mastering the skill of writing, therefore, will improve your public speaking ability no matter how naturally ungifted you are.
Good comedians are good writers, too. As their writing gets better, they get funnier. Few admit it, but they all demonstrate that a sense of humor can be developed and further refined with practice. Practicing your delivery is important, of course, but by learning the skills that go with good comedy writing, you can be funnier more quickly and ultimately a better and more entertaining public speaker.
In this chapter, we’re going to go through a number of ways that you can quickly and effectively bring additional humor elements to your presentation using comedy-writing techniques. These techniques are often widely used by copywriters and learned the hard way by aspiring comedians. All are utilized by great public speakers.
Work in references to the local area where possible.
On a very hot summer’s day in 1962, President John F. Kennedy visited Rice University in Houston, Texas, and gave a speech in the football stadium. One of his more famous quotes from that day is a joke mocking the university’s football team: “But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, thirty-five years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?”23
The University of Texas was undefeated and Rice University was winless at that point in the year. The line got a huge laugh.
By adding a local reference, like JFK did, you’re showing the attendees at your conference or presentation that you have an understanding of that area. The majority of people in attendance at any presentation or seminar will likely be from that local catchment area. (Disclaimer: There are exceptions to this rule. Please don’t contact me saying you gave a presentation in Albuquerque to the Japanese Albuquerque United Consumer Association and your sushi line fell on deaf ears. Know your audience. This is a rule of thumb—and sometimes rules of thumb are as effective as a blind, drunk, one-winged homing pigeon.) By working in local references—whether it’s simply referencing certain affluent areas, calling on local sporting rivalries, or recognizing challenges or issues pertaining to specific parts of town—you demonstrate that you have a special understanding and interest in their location. When I talk to an audience in San Francisco about the collective intellect of Stockton, it’s a joke specifically for them and they know it. This is a chance to add really quick and easy jokes and win over the crowd.
Make sure you set the scene.
Every good comedian makes sure he or she sets set up a joke by painting a picture so the audience can relate to the experience. A great piece of advice given to me by one of the San Francisco Bay Area’s top comedians, Reggie Steele, is to write as if you are describing something to a blind person. It’s a piece of advice he learned literally when a number of blind people came to one of his shows. He wanted to make sure they could relate to his story and follow every aspect of it from the words alone and not just his usual animated style.
Add attitude to your writing and presentations.
You want to use words like weird, amazing, scary, hard, stupid, crazy, or nuts. Try to incorporate these words into your opening setup or statement. I tested the following example of this with a joke at Cobb’s Comedy Club, San Francisco: It’s crazy how soft modern-day workers have become. Imagine them one hundred years ago on an expedition to the Antarctic with Ernest Shackleton and the great explorers of old. Captain’s log: “Only ten days into the journey and we have had to abandon the voyage, due to the tragic loss of the lives of sixty-two of the men, to what has be described as . . . a gluten allergy.” Behind these lines are my own struggles as an expatriate business manager getting used to differing work practices and culture in San Francisco. The use of an attitude word (crazy) in the setup helps people focus and pay attention quickly. If you want people to be passionate about your topic, show them some passion.
Make sure you give clear takeaways.
When you’re crafting a story or a joke, you want to leave people with something to remember. In our presentations, we’ll do exactly the same thing. When you see “1,000 songs in your pocket,” you’ll immediately think about Steve Jobs and the launch of the iPod. This was the key takeaway, 1,000 songs in your pocket. He repeated it over and over throughout the presentation. Also, Martin Luther King, Jr. repeated, “I have a dream,” the key line from his famous speech, to emphasize it as the clear takeaway.
The third most popular TED talk at the time of writing is Simon Sinek’s “How Great Leaders Inspire Action.” He repeatedly states the main point of the talk: “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” Chris Rock is also known for doing this. He will emphasize exactly what he wants you to take away from the joke continually throughout the performance, making sure it’s firmly planted in your mind.
Use callbacks.
Callbacks bring everything together in the end. This is where you go back (call back) and reference items that have had a good reaction or response from the crowd. This can be one of your jokes that worked or a joke from a previous presenter that got a big laugh. Callbacks are a great technique for linking your topic together and really build the audience into an in-joke between you and them. The callback works best if you have moved on to another topic before using it, to create an element of surprise. In JFK’s example, a callback would involve referencing his initial Rice/Texas joke again later in his presentation.
Chris Guillebeau is a best-selling nonfiction author who visited every country in the world over a ten-year period. Chris has been known to tour more than fifty cities to promote the release of a new book. He’s a really great presenter and always includes humor in his speaking engagements.
While answering a question from an audience member who looked very youthful, Chris asked, “How old are you, fourteen?”
“Twenty-two,” the kid responded.
“Oops.”
Everyone laughed.
At the close of his talk Chris directed the gathered audience to seek advice not just from him, but also fellow travelers in the room, including “the fourteen-year-old.” Another laugh. This was a classic callback and reference to a joke between Chris and the audience that already worked.
Callbacks are rarely funny to read but always effective in the moment, as they are all about a shared experience between the audience and the speaker. As a rule of thumb, don’t call back to a joke more than three times, and definitely don’t call back to something that wasn’t funny in the first place.
Use current media references where possible.
Creating material that relates to topics that are current in the mind of those in our audience is another easy way to get a laugh. Nighttime television hosts like John Oliver, Stephen Colbert, and Jimmy Fallon are masters of this, and their popularity heightens the chance that your crowd already will be familiar with poking fun at fresh topics. Celebrities, politicians, and sporting teams are normally easy and acceptable targets. This also gives the illusion of spontaneity due to the short-preparation time scale if something just happened. Don’t go overboard, though. Keep media references to less than 10 percent of your total content. Also, be sensible here. If a plane just crashed, taking 100 souls with it, this is not the time to reference it.
Incorporate act-outs or use of different voices where possible.
Conversational interaction between two characters gives us the chance to bring the scene to life on stage and puts the audience directly into the action. If you can do different voices or different accents or speak another language, it’s a great way to incorporate your skills and show them off while writing them into your stories. Even taking an accent your ears are very accustomed to, like your partner’s or parents’, will work better than just playing both characters in your own voice. But be mindful of how you sound. It’s always safer to change your voice slightly rather than take on a whole new nationality. Be careful to stay away from impersonations that may be seen as politically incorrect. I have been subject to way too many dodgy Irish impersonations in my life, and the same can be said for many other groups. Unless you are really, really good at it, keep it simple. As a guiding principle, think family members before foreigners!
Don’t create these act-outs on paper. Make sure you say them aloud and record how you sound. Then review your recording, take notes, and refine your writing.
Always write in the present tense.
You never want to write, “I was walking and I saw.” It should be, “I’m walking and I see.” Even if the event happened many, many years ago, you want the audience to be living that moment with you as if it’s happening right now. Write the scene for the audience as if it’s unfolding in front of their very eyes. Again, your writing will be much more engaging if the audience feels like they’re a part of the action.
Use inherently funny words.
Believe it or not, some words are funnier than others and can be amusing without any given context. In an interview with the New York Times, Jerry Seinfeld talked about how he wrote his bit about Pop-Tarts. He took foods from the sixties in all their strange, frozen, unhealthy forms and narrowed his focus on Pop-Tarts. Why Pop-Tarts? Because Pop-Tarts sounds funny: “The Pop-Tart suddenly appeared in the supermarket . . . and we were like chimps in the dirt playing with sticks.” According to Seinfeld, what makes the joke, “is you have got chimps, dirt, playing, and sticks. In seven words, four of them are funny. Chimps, chimps are funny.” In one Seinfeld episode, “The Apology,” Jerry has a naked lady wanting to snack on pickles. Why pickles? Because pickles are funny.
In The Sunshine Boys, Neil Simon quips, “Words with a ‘K’ in it are funny. Alka-Seltzer is funny. Chicken is funny. All with a ‘K.’ L’s are not funny. M’s are not funny.” Simpsons creator Matt Groening proclaimed the word underpants to be at least 15 percent funnier than the word underwear.24 Pants are funny. The name of one of Groening’s characters, Krusty the Clown, was, like many others, not created by chance. Words with “K” sounds are just funnier. Comedians and comedy writers know this and use these funny-sounding words consciously. So should you.
Remember, “brevity is levity.”
We want to get to the funny or punch line as quickly as possible. Copywriter Henneke Duistermaat lists some great words to watch out for that can usually be cut out: ought, in my opinion, that, just, actually, truly, and very. These are all words that can be stripped out to get to the punch line quicker. Watch out for them in your writing. Scott Adams, the creator of the comic strip Dilbert, notes, “Keep your writing simple, as if you were sending a witty email to a friend. Be smart, but not academic. Prune words that don’t make a difference.”25
Use the Rule of 3.
According to Greek philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras, three, which he called “triad,” is the noblest of all digits. The number three has held sway over math, science, astronomy, arts, and literature for millennia until, finally, it reached its apex in 1973 with the pilot episode of Schoolhouse Rock! As the episode’s theme song notes, we have “the past and the present and the future” and “the heart and the brain and the body” among many trios.
Not quite Greek philosophy, but the number three’s magic is widely known and used by writers, marketers, and comedians alike. If you want to write in a more entertaining and memorable manner, write with the Rule of 3. This rule is a basic structure for jokes and ideas that capitalizes on the way we process information. By necessity, we have become proficient at pattern recognition. Three is the smallest number of elements required to create a pattern. This combination of pattern and brevity results in memorable content. And that’s why the Rule of 3 will make you a more engaging writer.
This rule has existed for a long time, but I had to figure it out through trial and error. When I told jokes in certain sequences, I noticed they were always most effective when I reworked them into groups of three. It seemed that audiences were trained to laugh on the third item. So, if I made one quick joke and a second quick joke, the laugh would always be biggest on the third one. If I remove any of these elements (leaving only two) or added extra ones (creating four or five), the bit is never as effective. It’s strange, but true.
At its most basic, the Rule of 3 establishes a pattern then ends with something unexpected. This derailment, a break away from the pattern created by the first two items, builds tension, and creates surprise usually resulting in loud laughter.
Information presented in groups of three also sticks in our head better than other clusters of items. For example: “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” “blood, sweat, and tears,” “sex, lies, and videotape.” When the iPhone was launched, it was launched as three products (iPod, phone, Internet communicator device) all in one new cool product. It was no coincidence that it was pitched in this way. It automatically became more memorable. Examples are seemingly endless: NFL, NBA, NHL, CNN, NBC, BBC, UPS, SAS, SAP, “Just do it,” “Yes we can”—get the idea?
Jokes Using the Rule of 3
Let’s have a look at the Rule of 3 in action with a couple of jokes. Written out and analyzed like this they don’t sound that exciting, but when delivered to a live audience, they generate big laughs.
The first one comes from Jon Stewart:
“I celebrated Thanksgiving in an old-fashioned way. I invited everybody in my neighborhood to my house, we had an enormous feast, and then I killed them and took their land.”
The twist here is obviously the last part. The triplet in the set, “I killed them and took their land,” comes as a shock because he used the first two parts of the joke to create an event in your mind that is very familiar; this way, you think you know where you’re going to end up. He starts with a broad picture and something everyone will understand: “Thanksgiving in an old-fashioned way.” Then he begins to narrow the vision in a way that his audience will relate to and personalize: “I invited everyone in the neighborhood, we had an enormous feast.” These lines allow you to recreate your own Thanksgiving memories in your mind, thus making you feel like you know where he’s heading. Then, the twist, the derailment, the laugh line, always third in the set: “and then I killed them and took their land.”
This next joke is one I wrote when I was starting out in comedy. I wrote it when I learned of this pattern. To be honest, I hate telling it, but it follows the structure and sequence, uses the Rule of 3, and always produces a big laugh every time:
“My girlfriend is always driving me crazy about going to Napa. I gave in and brought her. It turns out she doesn’t even like auto parts.”
With the first two parts of this joke I am creating the image of California’s wine country, conjuring up images of couples spending time drinking wine in this famous region. NAPA, of course, with uppercase letters, is also a chain of automotive service centers—the last place in the world my girlfriend would want to go.
That is the third item in the sequence. That is where the pattern breaks. Due to this twist, the punch line, this joke gets a big laugh every time I’m on stage. By following the Rule of 3, whether it is in your joke writing or even just in the way you deliver important information, your words are far more likely to be memorable. Your audience’s minds are ready to receive information in groups of three. You should use that to your advantage.
Use funny images and video.
While you should prioritize the time to write some humor into your presentations, sometimes that’s easier said than done. If you feel too busy to step back for a moment and look at simple ways to add some creativity that, in our case, is aimed at generating laughs and lightening the mood, then you can rely on funny images and video to do that for you. The following image was used to great laughter in a TED talk to make the point: “Entrepreneurs: We are the rule breakers.”
“Presentations have an extra advantage over most traditional stand-up comedy sets—a giant friggin’ screen that the audience is staring at the whole time you’re onstage,” says Sammy Wegent, long-time comedian and creator of the improv PowerPoint comedy show Speechless Live. “In a world where funny Photoshopped images, memes, and GIFs dominate our devices, visual humor has never been bigger. So don’t just say funny things in your presentation. Show funny things, too,” he advises.
It’s great if these images or videos are your own, but they do not have to be. Go on Google Images and type “funny” and then your topic area. More often than not you will come up with a usable image that most of your audience will not have seen before. The key is tying this image to your topic and using it to reinforce a point. Image archive sites like Reddit, Imgur, and Pinterest are another great source of content that is already socially proven. Often you just need to change one word or the setup, or overlay some text, to integrate it into your speech.
My friend Jill had to give a high-level talk recently at a conference organized by LinkedIn, and she wanted to add some humor points to increase engagement. Rather than using words alone to describe how she was feeling in her job when they were experiencing a period of hypergrowth, she showed an image of what she felt like. “Right here . . . I look very calm and collected and happy,” she said, showing a picture of her at her desk with her colleagues. “When in reality how I remember that time is more like this,” she added before revealing another image of a small girl being blasted in the face by an out-of-control water hose. The audience broke out in laughter.
Seth Godin, the writer and marketer I mentioned in chapter one, is also known for his engaging and entertaining presentations. His talk titled “This Is Broken” is always referred to, even by TED itself, as hilarious. And it is. To put it into perspective, he makes people laugh approximately 3.4 times per minute through his twenty-minute talk. If you apply the same loose metric (more on this in chapter seven) to Hollywood’s top comedy movies, he actually makes people laugh more times than such comedy classics as Airplane!, The Hangover, and The Naked Gun. As presenters go, Seth is excellent and always funny. However, when we analyze his talks, we realize they are considerably funnier the more funny images he includes. In this talk, over half of the laughs stem from jokes linked to images he included.
Use the same joke structure with images and videos as you would with written material. Set up your image with an introduction that builds anticipation. The image becomes the punch line and should be enough to solicit a laugh, as it was for Jill. Then you have a chance to keep people laughing through taglines (your additional comments on the image or video). Seth and Jill are by no means alone in using images. Keep an eye out for just how many laughs occur in presentations with the use of funny images.
Remember: There is always a more creative way to introduce your idea. If you are worried about clever writing or your delivery, using videos and images can be a great way of taking the pressure off while bringing the laugh levels up. A little effort here can go a long way.
These quick comedy tips, when taken together and added to your presentation, can make a big impact in generating humor every time. They will not make you a funnier person in life, but, like Ryan, they will make you funnier on stage. And if you want to make it especially easy, my advice is to head out to Stockton. It doesn’t take much to impress the rocket surgeons out there.
Exercise: Linking Stories to Your Presentation
List what problem your product, service, or research solves on a general (macro) and specific (micro) level. This should be based on the next presentation topic you intend to speak on or your most recently given one. Now aim to link your presentation topic to your life stories, observations, and experiences, as listed previously.
How can you write your story into your presentation? Are there any correlations between your topics and your stories? If you are struggling for links, don’t worry. There is always a way to work funny items in. Remember, crafting a funny story involves knowing the ending and working backward. You want to find that funny bit and design your talk to build it in. Ken Robinson’s talk did this masterfully, and he is far from alone in doing so.
For example, say your company has a more user-friendly touch screen with bigger characters or buttons. This makes it easier for elderly people and those with vision problems to use. Cue stories about your parents or grandparents trying to use technology.
Macro/wider topic: It makes it easier for elderly people to use technology.
Micro/specific problem my product solves: It makes it easier for elderly people to type and use smart phones/tablets.
Key funny to my story: My dad’s struggles with technology and specifically what he does by writing emails in the subject line.
The setup intro here becomes the challenges elderly people have adapting to and using technology, specifically email in my case. This should be delivered in as few words as possible.
This example is far from a classic, but it is a quick and easy joke that gets laughs:
It’s sometimes hard for elderly people to get to grips with technology. (Relatable setup)
My Dad (specific to me) finally tried sending email last year. He wrote me a fine long one . . .
All in the subject box. (Punch line)
He continues to do this. (Tagline)
Show staged image of my Dad looking confused or socially proven funny image found online.
Following the joke structure and the above example, try and create one joke with the fewest words possible from your favorite story that can be linked to your company/product/service/research. Use the Rule of 3 and as many as these tips as you can.
Search sites like Reddit, Imgur, and Pinterest for socially proven funny images that you can link to your topic. These images can also be your own, but they certainly do not have to be.
Remember: You are not trying to be the next Jerry Seinfeld. A little laughter is better than 90 percent of the business speakers out there.