Effective Presentation Key Tips
This is designed to be an easy to follow checklist of all the points required to design presentations in the future. Learn How To Give a Successful Presentation Here
ENSURE THAT YOU FOLLOW THE POINTS IN THE ORDER GIVEN.
- Decide which character type the audience is: Emotive, Directive, Reflective, Supportive or a mix.
- Decide on the Aim of the presentation. Either
- Read your Aim out to someone of the same character type as your intended audience and ask them what points they would need to know to reach that aim. You now have your Vital Points.
- Calculate time required for each Vital Point.
- Put each Vital Point on a prompt card in a box on the left-hand side at the top, with allocated time in brackets next to it.
- Sort the Vital Points into order of importance. Remember to think about it from the audience’s viewpoint.
- Decide on the areas that need to be covered relating to each Vital Point. Put these in boxes down the left-hand side of cards, remembering to allow space in between each for the addition of notes to act as prompts.
- Work through each card, to use to explain and add impact to each Bullet Point. Add variety.
- Put in ‘link’ and ‘recap’ boxes, highlighting where necessary.
- Design Introduction using the following structure:
- Self/background
- ‘Hook’
- Aim statement
- Title
- Length of presentation
Put on a prompt card, again brief notes.
- Design Conclusion, which style depends upon your Aim. If Aim was to give you an understanding of…
- Summaries each Vital Point
- Remind audience of your Aim
If Aim was to convince you
- Ask for action
•Restate benefits
- Refer back to Hook
- Leave them with a final thought
Add the ‘OUT’ statement, i.e. “That concludes my presentation. If you have any questions, I’d be pleased to answer them”.
Put above on a prompt card.
- Put pause and emphasis lines, on the cards, in places needed.
- Decide and design the visual aids required and note on the prompt cards as appropriate. Remember, these need to be of benefit to the audiences’ understanding of the aim and not to act as prompts to you.
Now, all that remains is to rehearse. Try to do this at least three times. Remember they do say ‘practice makes perfect!’.
Effective Presentation Key Tips Secrets of Success
- Colorful Language
Use to paint a picture. Especially useful when a figure or size has very little meaning in isolation. An example could be… ‘that is the equivalent to Wembley Stadium with 8 Concords on the pitch.
- Referring to Third Parties
Quotes always make a point believable, e.g. The Financial Times said “ ”. Use ‘I believe…’ or ‘I
think…’ sparingly.
- Linking to a Visual
Using an item or a book. For example, if you were aiming to convince people of the need for customer care training, showing a file of complaint letters would be appropriate. Even just having a pile of reference materials can convey a message. Lawyers do this to great effect in court with the case books they stack in front of them. This conveys a positive message to the jury about their ability, even if not true!
- Selling Figures
This means reducing or increasing to the absurd, the marketing companies favorite tool. For example, BT earnings per second. An addition to this is to reduce to the absurd and parallel eg. a suit that may appear expensive at £200, sounds a lot more reasonable if you mention that the suit costs £2 per wear if worn once a week for two years.
- Examples and Analogies
Use examples or analogies to demonstrate the points you are making. You can compare work related ideas with everyday life, eg comparing the staff of a store with a football team.
- Rhetorical Questions
Asks and answers itself, but must be immediate to work, otherwise some ‘bright spark’ will do it for you!
- Lists of Three
For some reason, the number three creates just the right balance. People tend to remember the list. Politicians use this technique a lot.
- Repeating Words
A famous example of this is Winston Churchill’s speech… “We shall fight them on the beaches. We shall never surrender”.
- Link Sentences
Tell the audience what was covered and what you are going on to cover. It helps to keep their attention. Radio and television newscasters do this. They tell us what will be covered. Then they tell us the news item and later they tell us what they have told us by giving us the news summary.
- Recaps
These help to keep the audience on track.
Types of Visual Aids
You can find various types of visual aids that can successfully be used during a presentation, but you need to strike a balance between what you feel comfortable with and what will best get your message across.
The dos and don’ts of each of the main types of visual aids are as follows:
Effective Presentation Key Tips
Learn How To Give a Successful Presentation Here
