Whatever language you are presenting in, it’s extremely important that your presentation has impact.
If your presentation has impact, the audience will pay full attention to you and your message will reach them loud and clear.
Here are 10 things you can do to engage the audience and make them remember you!
- When you stand up to present, be quiet for a couple of seconds and look at the audience. This really commands their attention and creates a great impression of confidence.
- Start your presentation with a personal anecdote. This shows openness and vulnerability to the audience and endears you to them as a real human being.
- If you use PowerPoint slides, show only images and photos, forget about bullet points. Lots of bullets literally kill people! Find images which might not be the predictable choice to your subject with the intention of surprising your audience. Look for images that provoke an emotional reaction.
- When speaking use metaphors to connect people’s minds to the concept.
- Make sure your ending is very powerful. Create a conclusion that addresses both the needs and emotions of your audience.
- Use the word ‘you’ as much as possible to refer to the audience and their concerns. This creates great rapport and shows you have really considered the audience when preparing your presentations content.
- Share the stage especially if you are speaking for more than 40 minutes. Bring on other speakers live or by video if they can offer extra expertise or a particular angle.
- Use what Nancy Duarte calls ‘STAR’ moments – Something They’ll Always Remember’. For examples:
- Find shocking/surprising statistics that put your subject into an unusual perspective.
- Use evocative visuals especially to make contrasting points.
- Tell an emotive personal anecdote in which you suffered and later triumphed.
- Do memorable physical demonstrations; an example of this is the TED talk where Bill Gates released a jar of mosquitos into the air making the audience think (for a few seconds) that they carried disease.
9. Have only ONE idea, ONE slide. The audience should be able to look at the slide very quickly, absorb the message, then turn back to you to hear what you have to say.
10. Project your voice well and vary the tone and rythm. Know at what points in your presentation you want to speed up and be passionate and which points you want to speak slowly with pauses to create suspense.10 ways to make your presentation more impactful.
