Everyone has faced a situation where they have had to give a presentation. You can be sure that it’s never fun to stand up in front of your colleagues and talk about something you might not know much about, but there are some easy strategies to make your presentation more compelling. This article will go over five ways that you can make any presentation better with little effort.
1) Get Comfortable
One of the easy ways to make your presentation more compelling is simply by getting comfortable. You may be aware that you are supposed to stand up to speak, but if your feet are pinched inside shoes or you have a microphone attached around your neck, it can be tough for this advice to take effect. When speaking in front of an audience, you want to feel as comfortable as possible. You can also consider getting third-party help from business presentation design services that can fine-tune your message and presentation aesthetics.
Wear comfortable clothes and shoes so that you can move around freely. If your neck feels uncomfortable with the microphone, take it off for a little bit – make sure to put it back on when you are done. Comfortable clothing makes anyone feel better about getting up in front of people.
2) Keep it Short
Another easy tactic to make your presentation more compelling is by keeping it short. Some people out there love the sound of their voice and want everyone else to hear every word they have ever said, but this isn’t a time for a filibuster. If you keep things moving along at a good pace, then attendees will be more engaged. People love listening to stories about how you made the product or why it was created, but they won’t necessarily need every single detail.
If possible, try not to go over your allotted time – if people aren’t paying attention when you are done speaking, then there wasn’t much point in giving this talk at all. It can be easy for an audience to get distracted when someone is talking for too long and causing them to lose interest in what’s being said.
3) Using simple language and avoiding jargon
The next step is to keep your content compelling by using simple language and avoiding jargon or industry-specific terms that might confuse the people watching you. That means that if it’s important for them to know what kind of software you are talking about, then tell them, but don’t start rambling on about programming languages they probably won’t understand anyway, even though they do work in IT.
The goal is to keep your presentation so easy that everyone can understand exactly what’s going on even if some of the material isn’t familiar to them. If someone asks a question, try not to avoid using jargon or talking about something else entirely – give them an answer that they can understand without too much thought.
4) Keep visuals consistent
Ensure that any visual elements you have going on are kept consistent. This means keeping your slides in line with the color scheme of your outfit and making everything look clean and professional, so it looks like a cohesive whole instead of some random PowerPoint deck someone made for fun one time.
A clear flow from one slide to the next and a good balance between text and images is essential. This means no huge blocks of words that might overwhelm viewers or too many images where it’s difficult to determine what they are supposed to mean in the end. The goal is for everything you have going on up there to read clearly, so people don’t start falling asleep when looking at your slides during the presentation itself instead of focusing on what you’re saying about them.
5) Practice makes Perfect
The final step is probably the most important, and that’s to practice your presentation. You might think you are ready or have it down perfectly, but no matter how much experience you have with public speaking, there will be a little voice in your head telling you that everyone hates what you are saying even though they don’t really at all. Practice helps quiet this self-doubt, so when the time comes for your presentation, then everything should go well.
Conclusion:
Creating a Compelling Presentation can be tough, but it should become much easier if you keep these five strategies in mind. Remember to get comfortable and keep things short while using simple language that avoids jargon or industry-specific terms. Try your best to make sure any visuals are consistent with the rest of what’s going on, like colors schemes or typefaces used for your slides. Last but not least, practice makes perfect so go over everything as many times as possible before giving a presentation yourself.
