CHInoy TV Hosting and Personality Workshop: On Standing Out, Learning Chinese and Living Life (May 2012)

     Last May 5, 2012, my friends at CHInoy TV together with John Robert Powers held the TV and Personality Development Workshop at Ramada Central Manila.

     Chinoy TV Personality Development and TV Hosting Workshop
It was a packed whole-day event for CHInoy TV host hopefuls to learn valuable insights from the media world’s insiders on what it takes to succeed in the industry.
It was a healthy mix of:

Amazement          Pocholo Gonzales (CreatiVoices)
Wit                         Vince Golangco (Mellow 94.7/When in Manila) and Valerie Tan (GMA 7)
Engagement         John Robert Powers
Realization           Cris Garcia (Confucius Institute)
Inspiration           Chinkee Tan (Motivational Speaker)

     I didn’t realize how much one could learn from a compilation of speakers. I was under the impression that you’ll just get really tiny bits and pieces of advice from a cast like this, but I was dead wrong.

     It was a meaty day of event from start to finish. Just read along if you want to have a piece of the action and learn what made me turn to Alvin Tan, CHInoy TV head, and say…
“These guys got in here for a bargain”



On Standing Out

     There is a massive amount of people who wants to be on T.V. With so much competition, you can’t simply just blend in with the crowd. You should definitely stand out!

CHInoy TV Workshop was packed!

Here are the tips and tricks of the trade from the industry insiders!
Pocholo Gonzales (CreatiVoices) : Personal Branding

Pocholo Gonzales on Personal Branding

     Heard of Coke? Colgate? Apple? Of course you have. These are the top brands in their respective industries. People associate certain qualities for each one and have specific expectations on what they can deliver.

     This is how you should see yourself. You must create a personal brand for yourself in order for people to quickly recognize you and pick you out from a crowd.
Pocholo, for example, branded himself as the Voicemaster. This was eventually picked-up by different media outlets who then perpetuated this image through various features and interviews.
    
 Think Bruce Willis (Action), Megan Fox (Sexy Bombshell) and Adam Sandler (Comedy). Personal branding gives the people a clear idea of your identity and what your skills are, thus carving out that specific niche in their mind that belongs only to you.
Vince Golongco (Mellow 94.7 / When in Manila) – Fake it ‘til You make it

Vince Golangco and Valerie Tan sharing their industry experience

Question: Do you still get nervous when you’re on air?

Vince: I do, but I just fake it ‘til I make it (paraphrased :) )
I found this answer to be funny and insightful at the same time.
Vince shared that when he gets asked if he was nervous or not, he’d just brush it off and say he’s fine (despite being a nervous wreck). He just kept pretending to be confident and cool until little by little he actually is.

This is a testament to the power of mental fortitude and how our actions externally could actually affect us internally. He kept positive reinforcements close by through saying “I’m fine” that it eventually led him to actually believe it.
Of course pretending could only get you so far, would you go on an exam pretending you know the answer? Of course not.

What is important here is the mental game. You need to believe that you can go through any obstacle you may face. Granted, you can still be defeated regardless of your mental preparation, but without it you are certainly doomed for failure.

Valerie Tan (GMA 7) – Success is when preparation meets opportunity

Valerie shared the famous quote above during her talk, which the participants readily ate up.
They learned that opportunity is objective. It comes and goes as it pleases regardless whether you are ready for it or not. In short, you don’t have any control over it.
What you can control though, is your preparation. Constantly improve and develop your skills, talents and packaging. And don’t wait for the opportunities to just come. Seek it out.
When that time comes, you’ll be more than ready to take advantage of it.
Having said that, I personally think that it is important to point out that you will never be 100% prepared for anything.

Showing up is half the Battle

Take the participants of this CHInoy TV workshop for example, not all of them have been preparing to audition. Some even just joined at the last minute. But by attending and participating, they placed themselves in the best position to succeed.
Oftentimes, half the battle is won just by simply… showing up.
John Robert Powers – Putting your Best Foot Forward
We learn best by doing. And John Robert Powers sure delivered.
The participants learned about:
on-camera appearance,
calming relaxation techniques and
tons of acting exercises (with critiques) to help them in their audition later in the day.
It was the most engaging part of the workshop where the talents were given on-camera exercises to show what they got and receive constructive critiques in return.

Relaxation exercises c/o John Robert Powers

Talents were taught the basics of on-camera appearance

On-camera exercises and critique

Talents actively engaging in the Q&A
The highlight definitely was the “Tiger Balm” exercise where each talent was given a limited time to create a commercial to sell this medical ointment. Doesn’t sound like the sexiest of products, right? Think again.

You’ll be surprised what a few minutes of preparation and a deep desire to be on TV could do.

I was blown away by their creativity, the number of “RARR” reference (complete with the scratching motion) and instant transformation from quietly sitting in a chair into a whole new person in front of a camera.
It was a blast!

Ivica Say, Cheryl and Vince Golangco of When in Manila share a light moment :)
Of course, CHInoy TV hosts Jayson Kiong, Stephanie Obiles, Lesley Tomas, Alice Lee, Jason Tomas, Benedict Yujeco, Kendrick Chua and (workshop host) Norman Ong didn’t back down and gamely joined the exercises and put on funny and witty displays for all the participants to enjoy and learn from.

CHInoy TV Hosts

They are pretty much ready for the audition.
Just one more thing…
Learning Chinese

After the whole day workshop, everyone was revved up and ready to go.
The director then gave them the lines they will use for the VTR and as an aside they will be in both English and Chinese!
Nothing to be surprised about, this IS CHInoy TV right? But I noticed a collection of nervous laughter and cold sweat all-around.
The Mandarin Chinese part was absolutely dreaded.
But it shouldn’t be that way.
Cris Garcia (Confucius Institute): Opportunities and Second Chances

Cris Garcia on opportunities and 2nd chances with Mandarin Chinese
Cris Garcia could attest to that. Amazingly enough, Cris, who himself is without any Chinese ancestry, is a Mandarin Chinese teacher at the Confucius Institute at Ateneo de Manila University.
He shared the strength of China’s economy and the sheer number of people speaking Mandarin Chinese. Being a fluent Mandarin speaker opens a lot of doors to you in terms of employment and business. Including being a host at CHInoy TV ;)
He shared that a lot of his students are Filipino-Chinese who just memorized their way through out their formal Chinese schooling. And are now studying Mandarin Chinese once again to make up for the lost time.
Taking language classes at language institutions such as the Confucius Institute is a great way to (re) learn the language and take advantage of the worldwide trend towards Mandarin Chinese.

It is a dynamic language that could be learned by ANYONE regardless of age or background.

There is a catch…

Learning from school could only take you so far. If you never use it outside of the classroom, it will gradually disappear.

Use it or lose it.

You must actually find time in your day to actually use or be exposed to the language. It shouldn’t be something you HAVE to do but something you actually WANT to do.
This is where Money in Mandarin can help. I know you all are busy and simply don’t have a lot of time to dedicate solely to learning a language. I hear you, because so do I. Just make it as part of your life.



Courtesy of Money in Mandarin

The VoiceMaster Pocholo Gonzales featured in Wow Batangas (September 2012)

What You Should REALLY Do to Make Your Business Successful

You opened a new restaurant in town. Your site is where your target market roams around everyday for work or school. You have the best marketing plans to magnetize people to go try your stuff. But in less than six months, your stats start whispering that soon, you are going to close down your business.

Ouch. Ever wonder why a seemingly good and perfectly-planned business fall down too easily just like that? And why in the world that small eatery nearby is still standing proud and growing?

Last week, I attended a seminar organized by Philippine Marketing Association – Batangas Chapter dubbed as “Trojan Marketing: How Brilliant Marketing Ideas Turn Ugly and How Simple Ideas Emerge Successfully”.

The seminar was chopped into two. Part one was all about personal branding as discussed by the talented and uniquely entertaining Pocholo “The VoiceMaster” Gonzales (who did countless of dubbing for animations, movies, TVCs, etc) and part two was the main chunk about Trojan Marketing as dissected by Lloyd Luna, a business consultant, motivational speaker, author of a couple of business books, pianist, etcetera.

Personal branding is basically how you market yourself to the world (www.stevepavlina.com). Why is it important and what does it have to do with your business?

Say for example, you own a fashion store. You’re selling the most stylish to-die-for pieces but you’re a shabby chic. How do you think your customers will believe that you actually sell clothes and stuffs that will make heads turn and gain overflowing compliments about beauty and style?

Personal branding, according to Pocholo Gonzales, can be achieved and maintained by being consistent, by writing about you and your business on blogs or any medium you think of, by creating an output of interest for your customers, and by extending a helping hand to others (knock knock, that’s what CSRs are for). And oh, if you practice online marketing, Gonzales advised that you pay attention to Google. Yes, sir.

Moving on to Trojan Marketing. For marketing practitioners, have you heard of this new type of marketing? Yes, the basis has something to do with the Trojan Horse from Greek mythology. Lloyd Luna pointed out ‘carelessness’ as a major culprit why good people fail.

Trojan Marketing, according to Luna, is “the art of ingraining the message by breaking the buyer’s wall to hit the emotion”. He talked about perceived value (of one’s good), branding (the importance of the name, the logo, the packaging), knowing your market and how you will be able to ‘break that wall’ a.k.a your customer’s perception of what you’re selling.

I won’t be discussing here all that they’ve shared in the seminar but allow me to share two lines from Luna that might inspire you to think further as well.

One: “Comfort zone is kill zone”. Challenge yourself and do what else you think you can do. Get out of the box and perhaps be bolder, braver in taking risks. But…

Two: “Avoid being everything to everybody”. Unless you own a shopping mall that says they’ve got it all for you. Winks.

Starting a business involves risks. If you won’t dare to materialize your ideas, they will remain as they are — ideas floating, wanting to burst out of your mind. And hey, if you want to know more about Pocholo and Lloyd, Google them. They’re so available online.

Courtesy of Wow Batangas