Wow .. No WOW what a day in my life! I don’t tend to get nervous these days as I have spoken at so many conferences now it’s almost like going to the pub, you know that some place comfortable but you don’t quite know who you’re going to meet or how the nights going to turn out, so to speak , well today I was well out of my comfort zone and this is why.
A few weeks ago I was asked to appear on Sky News, there’s me thinking that I‘m UK SEO and that the show would be search related or something, I was wrong it was the 7 – 7:30pm slot with Martin Stanford. The show covers the hot stories from around the web from that day and I would get the stories in the morning via email, then I would read them and just repeat them as I see it .. easy you think ok so here are my 5 stories ..
Twitters 10 billionth tweet, 50 million tweets a day !
City workers re-training to be teachers
Why Shady Deeds Are More Likely to Happen in the Dark
After a prospective client meeting I headed over to the Hilton for a bite to eat and a little research, then it all started with Ant in the office laughing and saying I was screwed, think about it what did I really know about these stories and would or could I have an opinion on any of these. The Twitter story was easy I could talk about twitter all day long, the city workers I had to remember 2 things really 23% uplift and a recent study that said that we need more Male Role Models in school. Two down and I’m on fire, more latte for me! , then comes the shady deed story which is basically a study by (first problem) Psychological Science, psychologists Chen-Bo Zhong and Vanessa Bohns if you could have seen my face I jumped on IM to Becky to ask, how do you say Zhong .. zed hong or zee hong ?? Help, but the answer that came back didn’t really help me…isn’t the h silent so it would be Zong, OMG I can’t even say “Psychological Science, psychologists”.
I’m screwed, 10 minutes or so passed while I looked at my laptop with fear in my eyes. Ok I will just move on to story 4,OMG again some deputy has only gone and locked himself in a cell and tried to shoot his way out.. I had a proper LOL in the Hilton bar! The final story Depp’s sex scene with Angelina Jolie upset Johnny Depp’s partner and wants him to quit the movie.
With a few minutes I have scribbled a few notes in my Moleskine notepad and pretty happy I have covered stories 1 and 2 I skip past 3 if it wasn’t even there J and get onto story 4 when I get a IM from James in the office. Me and Tim (xbox buddy) have decided you need to get bell end into the Sky News thing tonight. I laughed and joked for a while with James and came up with a line I could use “of all the things the deputy could do like shout for help or use his mobile to give his colleagues a quick bell, ends up trying to shoot his way out”. We laughed some more, ok now I have a new problem every time I start thinking about the deputy I keep saying “to give his colleagues a quick bellend” now what started at best as schoolboy humour is a real problem even though I don’t what to say bellend I can’t help myself !!
Great 4 stories down one I’m ignoring and the other I keep adding bellend into the summary for no reason. Ok the Depp and Jolie story I keep thinking to myself if I say “hey Vanessa, get over yourself, Depp is no Brad Pitt baby” would I come over as unprofessional, Angelina did meet Brad on the set of Mr and Mrs Smith lol or would I just sound like Perez I have no friends Hilton ( see done it again ) Must stay focussed and professional, and sober.
The next hour goes quite quickly, I work out what I’m going to say and even how to handle tricky story 3, pretty much got it sussed now. My driver collects me and makes for an interesting journey across London at one time it looked like I was going to be late! But the friendly banter and his advice soon cleared my mind of what was to come.. no it really cleared my mind all I could remember was “Bellend” and “Depp is no Brad Pitt” cheers driver. I arrive at the Sky News studio exactly at 6:45pm, exactly the time I was supposed to be, winner things are going right whoa, though security and escorted to the green room. My expectation was some official looking person saying, Hi Mr Naylor I just need you to read and sign these disclaimers, here are few pointers avoid this etc etc ..
What happened was
Pretty Girl : Hello, you David?
Me :Yes ( smiles don’t show your fear!)
Pretty Girl : Would you like a drink?
Me : Coffee would be nice ( pretty girl walks off )
1 min later I get escorted to makeup… hmmm 5 mins later I leave makeup with my coffee..
Back in the Green rooming chatting with other guests on the show then without warning I’m in the studio watching Martin strut his stuff, I quickly grab my Moleskine ( bloody driver I think to myself then bellend ) I start to run though my notes then a gentleman attaches microphone and offers me water. I don’t need water I’ve had coffee ( another mistake ) then points to a chair that he will position in camera shot and if I could quietly follow him at the right time we are good to go..
STOP.. What happened to the form signings the guidance, the don’t do this don’t do that talk. WHAT the hell am I doing here, why is my mouth so dry, where the hell is he taking the chair why didn’t I take the bloody water ..
We are live am I really on the telly.. watch this youtube video for how this story ends
22 Comments
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- 2
Hahaha,
I have had the exact same experience! I was on TV a few months ago for a business-building show; the segment was on SEO and PPC. I got the script ahead of time on the topics to be covered. One member dropped out the night before, which gave extra time for me to speak. It was very exciting and not at all what I expected being on set! Good to hear your story- I wish I had written mine down on my blog. BTW, you can catch a segment here: http://tinyurl.com/ygerp82
It’s not the complete segment (1 hour long!) but you can see me in the blue shirt
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spot on Dave and without the autocue
- 4
Holy crap how did you survive that! Hilarious post. You did great. I’ve done live radio interview and have been on TV, but thankfully that was not live. I would have truely crapped myself if it had been.
Well done!
- 5
Nicely done mate. I think you blagged that pretty damn well!
- 6
Classic! I didn’t hear bell end though
- 7
I could imagine that being a load of nervous stress for only 2 mins 34 secs. And why didn’t he explain what Bronco does??
- 8
Well done mate! Must have been pretty frightened in the build up. I know I’d have been! Will you be doing more of this stuff?
- 9
Looks great, it’s all that ‘off script’ experience you’ve had at conferences
You going to show us a graph of your sky news traffic spike? - 10
Hahahahahahahaha. Genius.
- 11
I’d be interested to know if you saw a traffic spike to the Bronco site while you were on
- 12
Whoa! Good form mate and nice to see you outta your regular environment
- 13
Go on Dave!!!
Cool as a cucumber!
If iti was me id still be dribbling my first word out lol.
So go on- traffice spike???
- 14
You could have a least tried to rank for BELLEND on this post, I feel it’s a total disservice to your readers.
- 15
Good work Dave you came across as confident and relaxed
- 16
Very well handled.
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Hey – congrats – you held you own very well. You are right – Odd topics for an SEO guy, but new doors are opening!
- 18
You aced it
- 19
Missed it when it was on. Thanks for posting the video. Good job.
- 20
That was excellent! Very strange topics for an SEO – only thing related is twitter… Wish you’d got ‘bellend’ in though, but I guess you’d never be allowed back on if you had.
Loved the blog post lead up to the clip – had me giggling anyway.
- 21
Haha Dave! With Mr Carpenter, Slater and Whitehouse writing about EU, World and Google and with Davidnaylor.co.uk appearing on Google for things like “EU antitrust investigation” and “Google credit card comparison”, I’m surprised you weren’t invited by BBC or Sky earlier for a live show. I did a live breakfast show on Sunrise at 7am once ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHGWTNghtGY ) Same story – I arrive, am sent into this room, no script and tada – “Sir, you’re going live in 5 mins”. What??
You did very well there and with no brief, the fact that you knew about all that general news is fantastic. Way to go mate!
- 22
Great post, great build-up, great clip. It had me giggling. Well done on your first live TV slot.
I liked it! Good to see your momentum grow, and look forward to the next one. Still the best speaker “on tour” IMHO – I think generally you respond at your finest and best “on your feet” to direct questions rather than a menu…
Stay Classy!