What Will Make Your Presentations Dynamite!

According to Mark Twain it takes three weeks to prepare for a good impromptu speech.  When we prepare for presentations, where there is a lot riding on it, we tend to do it the day before.  Time is the enemy of the presentation, because without proper planning and preparation, it becomes a gamble as to whether we are going to be successful or not.  The standard presentation is obsolete.  Targeting the audience to meet their needs and relieve their pain is what presentations are all about.

Slapping together a power point presentation and using it as your road map, is not good enough.  It is time to look at how we prepare for our presentations, ensuring that they are professional, slick, time efficient and persuasive.

The preparation for the presentation has some key elements:

Know your audience – if you don’t know your audience how can you relieve their pain?  How can you match up your message with their needs?  Knowing your audience means that you have to analyse and do some research.  Even if it is an internal presentation, revisit the current status of who you are presenting to.  Use the 5 W’s – who, what, where, when, why.  Align your presentation your answers.  This is your road map and the presentation must be designed around them.

Keep to the essentials – I sat in a presentation, the presenter spoke for an hour.  At the end, he smiled and said:  “that was a successful presentation because they gave us an hour”.  No it wasn’t!  The audience lost interest within the first 10 minutes but were too polite to say anything.  There were no questions and no participation, this meant there was no feedback from the audience and no way to gage whether the audiences needs where being met.

Design your content – Use the KISS principle of keeping it short and simple.  In any presentation there should be a maximum of three key issues that you want to get across.  Know the important points and the message that you want to send.  The content needs to align to the needs that you have identified, otherwise it is irrelevant.

The end in mind – always start at the end.  What is it you want to achieve?  If you want to persuade to take action, be clear on what action you want taken.  Every component of the presentation should link to this objective.  If your content does not support your goal, it is irrelevant.

Company profile – always put your company profile at the end.  Engage your audience.  Get them fully involved, so that they appreciate your company’s experience and quality.

Make it a conversation – look for opportunities to include your audience.  A good conversation will get better results than a stiff, formal speech.  Don’t only through information at your audience.  Participation can be in the form of questions, examples, and relevant anecdotes.  Look for opportunities to touch your audience.

End with a specific next step – your closing should always include a call to action.  Don’t be shy.  If you want them to buy your product, ask them to do so.

If you invest the time in your presentations, you will achieve success!  Don’t get comfortable.  Revisit and refresh when you are doing presentations.

Jerry Seinfeld said that he spends most of his time taking an eight word joke and trying to get it to a five word joke, so that he can hold his audience.  Take the time to hold your audience.