Whether you hold a commercial, technical, or administrative position, it’s extremely important that you possess the ability to communicate and convey information effectively. This applies both to internal clients when presenting ideas or promoting your work, as well as to external clients when selling a product/project or advancing to the next stage.
In this article, I will share a compilation of techniques that I have adopted and developed over the past 5 years while delivering presentations to clients, whether in person or mostly (given the pandemic) remotely.
The aforementioned techniques stem from observation, analysis, and personal experience when creating and attending presentations. In the case of remote presentations, I reflect on what I would have liked to see from the audience’s perspective. It’s worth noting that several of the following points are subjective and subject to personal preference.
I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.
Maya Angelou
What do I mean by the phrase quoted above? The focus of this type of presentation will not be on sharing content just for the sake of delivering as much information as possible within the allocated time frame. On the contrary – as cheesy as it might sound – the focus is on generating emotions, and consequently, ensuring that the audience takes away a message that lingers in their memory after the encounter.
Multitasking is your worst enemy: Given the ever-increasing possibility that your audience is working remotely while attending a meeting, the “multitasking” factor comes into play: Anything that fails to immediately capture the audience’s interest will divert their attention to WhatsApp, Outlook, or the first Google Chrome tab they have open. Avoiding this entirely isn’t always feasible; however, I’ll now share a list of tips to help you, despite this challenge, effectively convey the central idea through your presentation and increase the likelihood of translating your next steps into action.
The 10 Commandments for Creating a Highly Compelling Presentation (+ 3 Bonus Tips 🤓)
- Create Your Own Slides
Craft a presentation that, beyond its design, suits your presenting style. The first mistake you might be tempted to make is reusing slides from someone else who has presented the same content before. It doesn’t mean that a presentation deck made by someone else is necessarily bad, but what I can assure you is that they crafted it according to their own presenting style and a storyline that’s hard to replicate unless you’ve seen their presentation about five times (which, in most cases, doesn’t happen).
Feel free to reuse some slides if you find them relevant. However, I want to emphasize the importance of integrating them into a story and a style that fits your personality.
- Tell a Story
Hold on… Does this mean I should start my presentations with “Once upon a time…”? 🤨
No! Well, not literally. But you should follow a similar structure: (brief) Introduction, development, and conclusion.
A special note about the introduction: This point is often present in most corporate presentations, where you talk about your journey, the number of clients you have, how prestigious you are, etc. While a client is interested in having a reliable provider, they’re less engaged in hearing about this for 30% of the presentation time, and it’s highly likely that they’ll start multitasking shortly after. While briefly mentioning something about the presenter/company being represented is valid, this introduction should primarily focus on providing context for the main topic to be discussed.
The presentation should follow a thread that engages the viewer, with a specific focus on the topic of interest or the problem/situation you aim to address. It should conclude with the proposed solution or a conclusion and next steps if applicable.
- Analogies are Your Best Friend
Are you introducing a new concept to your audience? Instead of describing it technically right from the start, a great approach is to explain it using an analogy before providing a formal explanation.
Here’s an example of “Cloud Computing”:
Imagine that Cloud Computing is like the electricity consumption in your home: instead of having your own generator and managing its maintenance, you connect to the electrical grid as a service. You can turn lights on and off with a switch based on your needs, and you’ll only be charged for the actual usage.
- Use Dark Slides
When you create a new presentation, the default slide background is white, and you start adding images, text, etc. The idea behind using dark slides, though not as revolutionary, follows a concept similar to what Steve Jobs introduced with the launch of the iPod. Until then, all headphone brands manufactured black earphones. In contrast, Apple introduced its new product line with white earphones. This made the brand easily recognizable, and when people saw someone wearing white earphones, the first thing that came to mind was that they had an iPod. This is clearly seen in their famous commercial, where only the earphones stand out through their color.
- By using dark slides, it helps to begin by breaking a pattern, stepping away from what people are accustomed to seeing most of the time.
- Furthermore, when you consistently present using the same style, you’ll set yourself apart in that aspect, building a part of your personal brand. Your presentations will be easily recognizable by others, even when you’re not presenting.
- Lastly, and no less important, it helps reduce visual fatigue, especially when attending a remote presentation. It’s not pleasant when screen brightness during transitions distracts from the content.
- Turn on the webcam [remote presentations]
If you’re delivering a remote presentation, it’s important to show yourself through a webcam. When you present using only your voice, many facial expressions are lost, and as a result, the audience’s final perception isn’t the same as when you activate the camera.
At the same time, the act of turning on the camera might encourage some members of the audience to turn on their cameras as well (very likely in small groups, but more challenging in larger audiences). This is crucial because it allows you to have instant feedback on how you’re delivering the presentation: whether there’s interest or if they’re multitasking (and therefore you need to find ways to capture their attention), if they seem confused, if there’s laughter after a joke, and so on.
- Incorporate animations and/or movement
If you’re going to be discussing the same slide for a considerable amount of time, it’s important to have some movement to keep the audience’s attention. During in-person presentations, this is manageable because dynamism is conveyed through body language, and the focus doesn’t stay on a single slide all the time. But in remote presentations, the spotlight is on the slide being shared in 80% of the screen space. To add dynamism, some very useful resources you can use are:
- On-screen Writing to Highlight Points or Annotate Keywords: PowerPoint offers this functionality natively. You can use the mouse as well as a graphics tablet for a more professional and precise approach.
- Include Simple Animations: Use animations to make items or images appear progressively as you explain each of them.
- If you have a graphics tablet and can conduct explanations entirely through whiteboarding instead of slides, even better!
- Avoid the “DocuPoint”
Slides serve as visual aids, not instruction manuals. Therefore, it’s essential not to include paragraphs of text or an excessive number of items. When you do this, the audience doesn’t know where to direct their gaze, or they jump ahead to read the content before you explain it. Additionally, very little information is retained after moving to the next slide. So, why would you place so much information on a single slide, knowing all these disadvantages? 🤔
I understand that in some cases, a live presentation is later sent to the audience digitally, which is why you want to include all necessary information so that it serves as reference material. ❌ Mistake! The slides to be presented can be accompanied by a separate document or reference material (another presentation) that will be sent digitally. However, under no circumstances should you try to combine both in a single presentation.
My specific suggestions:
- Create slides with a maximum of 3 to 4 items.
- Use images or icons that visually support each of those points.
- If you need to provide detailed or extensive explanations, do so verbally, using a diagram or item as visual support. But never include this detailed explanation in a slide.
- Prepare a complementary document or presentation that includes annotations or explanations made verbally, to be sent to the audience afterward.
- Avoid excessive slide count during your presentation: that’s what the complementary document is for. 🙂
Remember: A presentation aims to convey information (and make it stick in memory), which is very different from simply delivering content.
- Avoid Giving Content Spoilers
Imagine there’s a series of items you want to present one by one. These items might be interconnected or present alternatives to a certain topic under discussion.
If you were to show them all at once, the audience might rush to stop paying attention to the current explanation and jump ahead to read or think about the next item.
A great way to prevent spoiling the upcoming items is to make them appear on the screen progressively with a simple animation, as you finish explaining or discussing the preceding item. This way, the focus remains on the item being presented, and the audience remains unaware of what’s coming next.
- Identify the Main Message and Include Repetitions
What will be the message or piece of information that you want your audience to remember after your presentation?
It’s important to understand that not everyone will find the same slide as relevant as we the one had in mind. Therefore, people might perceive a different section of the presentation as the main message, or even worse, the main message might get lost among the other slides, leaving nothing in their memory.
Fortunately, there are techniques we can use to increase the likelihood of the audience taking away the message we intend to convey.
One of these techniques is repetition: strategically including the same message across different slides. This way, you’re reinforcing a concept that the audience becomes familiar with, rather than introducing new information on each slide. As shown in the image below, the main message is introduced right at the beginning of the presentation, reinforced during its development, and used as part of the conclusion after exploring the solution.
In addition to repeating this content, another valid technique is to set it apart from the rest of the slides. This can be done by including a color that significantly stands out from the previous slides or by using a distinct typography or image.
- Use Images with No Background: That’s Why the .png Format Exists!
If you find the advice in item #4 valid and you’re using dark slides, it becomes even more important to find images or icons that have no background. This small detail aesthetically makes a significant difference in the design of your presentation.
Some resources to easily find these types of images:
- Google Images: Using the “Images” section on Google, under the “Tools” menu, you have the option to select the “Transparent” color. This way, the images in the search results will be in the .png format.
- Free Icon Website: Flaticon. These are high-quality icons, all following the same design style.
- Illustration Website: Storyset. If you’re looking to depict a scene or situation, this website is a good resource for finding illustrations that maintain a consistent design style.
🌟 Bonus Track 🌟 – The Moment to Present Has Arrived!
- Encourage Audience Engagement
By promoting audience participation, you not only keep them attentive and engaged in your presentation, but you also receive instant feedback on their perception of what’s been presented so far.
Depending on the number of people you’re presenting to, I suggest promoting engagement in various ways:
- Less than 10 people: You can simply ask if anyone has questions or comments as you progress through the presentation (not just at the end). Since the group is small, this level of personalization is possible.
- More than 10 people: With a larger audience, while it’s possible to ask questions directly to the audience, it might be challenging to address all questions comprehensively or attendees might be more hesitant to raise their hands due to being part of a larger group. In this case, there are tools to encourage participation that suit a larger audience. Mentimeter or Kahoot, for example, allows you to create interactive polls, idea clouds, or quick surveys for instant feedback from a larger number of people.
- Manage Time Effectively
When presenting remotely, nobody likes to have to end the meeting without having covered all the content or, even worse, having to rush through the remaining slides in the last 10 or 15 minutes.
If you have an hour for the presentation, plan it to be around 45 minutes. If you have two hours, plan for about an hour and a half of content. Meeting time is not purely dedicated to content; there are introductions, questions that arise in between, and other factors to consider. Also, it’s always good to have a few extra minutes to wrap up the content and define the next steps, instead of ending abruptly and immediately saying goodbye without a formal conclusion.
If, in the best-case scenario, there’s extra time at the end of the meeting, no one will mind – in fact, they’ll appreciate it! That’s valuable time that people can use to prepare for another meeting.
- PREPARATION 💪🏻
Last but not least: Preparation!
A presentation that truly connects with the audience requires a lot of preparation time. When creating a set of slides while considering all the previous points, you’ll notice that it can take at least 4 times the duration of the actual content presentation (not including the time spent studying the content itself). This is a non-negotiable aspect if you genuinely want to make an impact on the audience and convey the right message, ensuring that it sticks in their memories.
Do you know any other point that hasn’t been mentioned and you consider it valuable when it comes to delivering impactful presentations? Let me know in the comments!✍🏻