MCEI Seattle holds a dinner meeting each month with a distinguished marketing or communications presenter. Presenters bring a behind the scenes perspective and high-level industry marketing insights. Speakers share provocative stories, ideas, positions, and concepts, including controversial topics.

See below for our current upcoming program.

July 2025

wednesday, july 9, 5:30 p.m. at ivar’s salmon house

How to Create Mind Movies to Boost your Storytelling and Presentation Skills

As communicators and marketers, we need to have powerful presentation skills for our own work and to mentor our clients and colleagues to be better speakers themselves. These days, everyone seems to have limited attention spans and a need for inspiration and engagement. To get your message across quickly, effectively, and to have people remember it, you need to be able to create a compelling visual image in the minds of your audience. Melissa Reaves, a professional storytelling instructor and advisor, calls this approach a Mind Movie.

In Melissa’s presentation, she will share how to create these Mind Movies to captivate your audiences and have them remember key details of your message. Melissa will share some stories about how she shaped and inspired leaders to tell their own stories in a more powerful way. She will also give everyone a chance to create their own brief Mind Movies and provide guidance on how to improve. As a professional storyteller and improv artist, she will be sure to capture your attention and leave you inspired and ready to up your own presentation game!

Melissa Reaves is a professional and award-winning storyteller and storytelling coach. Her sales and marketing background includes more than 20 years in technology enterprise sales, as well as countless stage credits as a professional actor/improviser. This combination of sales, marketing, acting, writing, directing and producing storytelling shows, ultimately led her to found Story Fruition to help others find and tell their stories--with impact.

Melissa works with CEOs, Senior Executives, Entertainment Professionals, and Entrepreneurs to build their storytelling skills and get closer to fulfilling their goals and dreams. Melissa is the Pitch Coach for Founders Live and instructs storytelling for business narratives at conferences across the United States. Start-up organizations and individuals coached by Melissa have already brought in over $170 million in venture funding.

She loves the transformation she sees from people who are hesitant about public speaking and then become confident speakers because they learn to celebrate their own skills and expertise. Their stories light them up to share more of their superpowers with the world. You can learn more about Melissa’s work at https://www.storyfruition.com/.