Let the Presentation Flow

Every time we offer an open-enrollment presentation training workshop, a theme seems to dominate the class. This time, it was flow: keeping the verbal presentation flowing with the visuals. This is important for executives who want to project a leader presence, and is critical for sales people who want to deliver killer presentations and salvage this year with a superior 4th quarter.

A presentation is a focused communication with a clear goal.

• The receiver wants/needs to make a decision
• The presenter provides factual and emotionally-laden to guide the decision-process
• A powerful presentation leaves out distractive clutter – facts that aren't necessary; less is more
• It also presents in an engaging manner – in terms of how its organized (to parallel the way people make decisions) and uses power words and graphics
• Authentically committed to the story, the presenter, competent in the subject matter, delivers a compelling argument and presents it clearly and powerfully

A non-flowing presentation is one in which the information deemed necessary to present are put on slides, without fully considering all of the above characteristics; the communication is about what's on the slide, rather than the other way around.

The good news is that anyone can achieve presentation-flow, First, do your homework on how first to deliver a succinct, compelling story that will engage the specific audience. Then, decide what visual information complements the spoken part of the story; Finally make sure the PowerPoint is visually engaging and organized so it doesn't repeat information but rather guides the reach the goal of making the desired decision.

Wishing you Wonderful Webinars

As webinar experts, we're often asked by marketing, sales and investor presenters for assistance in building and delivering powerful ones. Here are a few tips.

1. Everything you ever learned about how to deliver effective face-to-face presentations applies – with the focus on speaking clearly, and slowly being even more important, because the audience can use body language to help process language.
2. Use those tools of your service provider which will help you build a relationship with your audience.
1. Using polling questions to clarify who is in the audience and share the information with the audience, so they feel they are part of a community. Then tailor your presentation, especially the examples, to those most relevant to your audience.
2. Encourage participants to ask questions at any time, even if you decide to only answer them after the main part of the presentation.
3. If the actual presentation will take more than half an hour, consider breaking it into parts, separated by polling or questions. Remember, a 30 minute sitcom has commercial breaks every 7 minutes.
3. Measure success.
1. If the goal is to get people stay for the whole presentation, monitor how many do so. If 85% or more of the people stayed for your presentation, you succeeded.
2. If the goal is to get them to take action, encourage people o do something within 24 hours of the call.
4. Follow-up. Offer information including an archived copy of the presentation, which people can take you up on.