I’ve been speaking to groups of people for over 20 years now. Whether it was a classroom, a sports team, a project meeting, a webinar, or a conference I’ve done them all. Over the years I’ve learned a handful of tips and tricks. With the PASS Summit upon us this week I decided that I’d share with you some of the things I’ve learned along the way.
These tips will apply to you any time you need to speak to a group, no matter how big the size, or the setting, and are in no particular order:
Speak to everyone
Some people try to do this by speaking to the people in the back of the room. Don’t just focus on any one area. Make eye contact with people and move around the room so everyone feels engaged at some point.
First and last
People tend to remember the things they hear first and last. It is a good idea to build your content in a manner that takes advantage of this.
Be similar and unique
You get better interaction if the audience sees you as someone similar to who they are. But your talk needs to show them something special, something unique that they have not seen or heard before. Finding uniqueness is easier than most people realize. The uniqueness is your story. Discuss the good, the bad, and the ugly that you’ve experienced. Be willing to share and the audience will feel the talk was valuable.
It’s not about you
It’s about them. The more time you spending lifting yourself up, the more time you spend letting your audience down.
Focus on the process
Your content should be focused and follow an outline that helps to define a process. The best presentations are about a process, not about a person.
Your story should also be their story
You want the audience to understand that your story is similar to their story. This helps you build a connection that allows for the audience to leave feeling inspired.
Learn how to tease
Great speakers know how to weave their story in such a way that as the story unfolds it has natural teases built in. You *want* the audience to anticipate what your next slide or sentence is going to be. Even if they’ve heard someone speak on the topic before, a person in the audience feels connected with the speaker if they believe they know what is coming next. Think about how you enjoy television shows when you think you know what is coming next. Even if you guess right, you often still enjoy the show.
Visuals often work best before the verbal
Whenever possible you should show a visual before you start explaining what it means. Images are very powerful. You want them to be seen as much as possible, so get them out early and often and explain what they are as they are being seen. Also, make certain they are relevant and not just pictures of your cats. Showing abstract images that are unrelated to the topic at hand are not likely going to impress your audience.
Don’t just tell, ask
Asking questions of the audience is a great way to make them feel engaged in the presentation. Don’t spend your whole time lecturing to them. Nobody likes someone telling them what to do for an hour. Develop a sense of empathy and understand that other people have experiences that are not yours, but they still have value. Only an egomaniac would think that their experience is all that matters.
Put the firehose away
If you try to get across too much information in a short amount of time your presentation is likely to feel rushed and your audience will be disengaged. It’s an easy mistake to think that you need to have more content than you really do. You often need less than you realize.
You aren’t funny
Unless you get paid to write comedy, don’t bother trying to put humor into your presentation. A better approach is to let the audience discover the humor within your material, if it exists.
Focus on what you know
What you know is based upon your experiences. Focus on that. Don’t try to speak about every possible topic, or pretend to be an expert on everything. Think about what your niche is and let that be your guide. Otherwise you end up trying to build a presentation that speaks a little something for everyone. When that happens you often find that your presentation ended up speaking to no one.
Lastly, buy a book to help you. I like The Jelly Effect: How to Make Your Communication Stick
Great post. Speak to everyone, wrap up with your takeaway points (last thing they hear), be one of them, engage them with questions – this stuff really works. I made it a point to do many of these things in my last presentation, and it was hugely successful. And I WAS funny…
Tracy,
Yes, I heard you were funny, but looks aren’t everything.
I compliment a guy on the quality of his post, and this is the thanks I get…
THANK YOU!
[Feel better now?]
Good points. The humor thing can work really well for some folks, speaking as a consumer, rather than a producer of this product (presentation). But I think your phrasing is apt; “trying to put humor into your presentation” is often a recipe for failure. If humor is a natural, more spontaneous part of your presentation, that can work, but please, oh, please don’t TRY too hard to wedge it into a presentation. Then it’s just sad and the audience feels awkward (avoids speaker’s eye contact, pity chuckles, stares deeply into phones). But done right, as an extension of the presenter’s personality, a good laugh here and there can make a technical session a bit more engaging and enjoyable. But it should only be seasoning, not the meat…better to underdo it than overdo it. Done right, it adds lightness and a sense of feeling natural and at-ease.
Thanks Nic!