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It’s about the audience

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powerpoint-tips-speaker-in-front-of-blurred-audienceYou’re always presenting for your audience. Your presentation shouldn’t be about you.

What type of presentation will give your audience the most value?

Ask yourself…

What do they need and want?

Your content needs to be relevant to the needs and wants of your audience. Sometimes that’s hard to know but if you can survey them in advance or do some research, you’ll be more on track.

Sometimes, you’ll prepare a presentation and discover during it that you are going in the wrong direction. If possible, change tack and adjust.

powerpoint-tips-about-audienceWhat will help them understand and remember the content?

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The why of presentations–getting results

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powerpoint-tips-why-presentations-1To get the best results from a presentation, you need to think about the “why.” Why are you doing the presentation? If someone else assigned it to you, why? What is the goal of the presentation?

There are lots of possible goals. Often, I see other presentation skills trainers make blanket statements that I know don’t apply in every situation. For example, they might say that you should always stand up or not use PowerPoint.

How you write, design and deliver your presentation should depend on 4 things:

  • Context: What is the reason for the presentation (the why)?
  • Audience: Their knowledge, what they need and what they want
  • Speaker: The speaker’s knowledge, solution, suggestions and evidence
  • Action: How people apply the knowledge and solution

Know the context

It’s so easy to miss the mark when you don’t know the context, the why.

powerpoint-tips-why-presentations-2I remember watching a video of a presentation given to some reporters in the context of a concert that Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr gave in New York City a few years ago. It was a benefit concert to raise money to teach at-risk middle school children the Transcendental Meditation technique to reduce the stress they were experiencing.

The context of the presentation was that the reporters were there because of the Beatles. The organizers wanted them to put some mention of the research in their articles. This was actually a challenge, because the reporters didn’t really care about the research, so there was quite a bit of persuasion required. [Read more…]

Ask the audience questions

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Many presenters take questions from the audience and answer them, but fewer ask the audience questions. Asking the audience questions has many benefits, including:

PowerPoint tip: Ask the audience questions

  • Breaking the ice — when you do it early in the presentation
  • Getting the audience involved
  • Giving the presenter crucial information about the audience, including what they’re interested in, what they already know, and what their needs are
  • Waking up the audience (works well after lunch and in the late afternoon)
  • Getting feedback on how much they understood
  • Uncovering objections or disagreements (important if you’re trying to persuade the audience)
  • Showing respect for the audience’s point of view

Some of these benefits you obtain by taking questions from the audience — if they ask the questions they have. But you’d be surprised how many people never ask questions.

Other benefits are unique to the technique of asking the audience questions. You start a conversation. Try to build flexibility into your presentation so you can respond to the answers you obtain. For example, some audiences want you to get straight to the point and others want lots of backup details. You may not know in advance which type of audience you’ll have, although it’s good to do some early research, if possible. You can have slides with the details available and show them only if your audience says they want to see them. You can do this using the custom show feature or by linking to a separate presentation.

When you ask questions, you need to plan out the questions you’ll ask and plan for possible answers.

Try asking your audience questions at your next presentation and see if you get better results compared to just speaking yourself straight through.

Use copywriting principles for your presentations

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If you create presentations to sell or to persuade, deciding what you want to say, and in what order, is obviously extremely important. And what better place to turn to for guidance than copywriting. Copywriting is usually defined as the art and science of writing to sell. Experience (it’s an old discipline) and modern research have provided many guidelines for getting the desired results.

After all, copywriters test and test and test again. When you click on a link and go to a page that describes a product, little do you know that other people click that link and go to a slightly different page. Marketers then count how many people buy from each page. They choose the winner, modify the better page slightly, and the start over, comparing results.

From this process, copywriters have derived tried and true principles for effective selling and persuading. Remember, even if you’re trying to persuade your boss to approve a new project, you can use these principles.

The most common structure is called AIDA:

  • Attention: Get attention.
  • Interest: Keep interest
  • Desire: Create desire
  • Action: Spur action

How do you translate AIDA to presentations?

Get attention

In traditional copywriting, you use the heading to get attention. In a presentation, the first words out of your mouth should get your audience’s attention. Will, “Hi, I’m so-and-so, and I’d like to start by telling you a little bit about our company” do it?

No!

Instead, say or do something to get attention. Ask the audience a challenging question. “How many of you sometimes feel like a gerbil in an exercise wheel?”

Display a striking, full-slide photo. You might use this one if you’re presenting about organization and time-management skills.

copywriting-get attention

Put a thought-provoking quote on a slide.

effective communication

(Effect by Julie Terberg of TerbergDesign. You can get this and many more for free on Microsoft’s Web site.

Tell a meaningful story

Yes, if no one introduces you, it’s OK to introduce yourself and explain what you’ll be saying, but finish it in under 1 minute. But putting the attention step first is ideal. Then, you can introduce yourself.

Keep interest

You hold people’s interest by:

  • Making sure the content is relevant to your audience
  • Providing information they don’t know
  • Using the Tell ‘n’ Show (SM) method to communicate visually
  • Interacting with the audience, including eye contact, answering questions, and asking questions

This is only a partial list! Try to think up some more ways to keep the attention of your audience.

Elicit desire

Elicit desire by showing the audience how they can benefit and what your points mean to them. Highly sensoral images also help. If you have customer testimonials, use them.

Spur action

At the end of your presentation, summarize what you’ve said and state your conclusion. Invite comments so that you have a chance to respond to any concerns. Finish by asking for the next step, whether it be signing a contract, approving a project, or setting up another meeting. Have the necessary materials (the contract, approval form, your calendar) so you can accomplish your goal.