Whether you’re looking to present a product, practice, or something totally off the map, there are important guidelines to follow to ensure your success.
You want whoever’s listening to feel engaged so that they can understand your key points and take action in whatever ways you suggest.
Keep reading to learn 7 tips you should follow in your business presentations to feel confident and prepared.
1. Start With an Outline, Not the Visual Aid
Many people start creating their business presentation by using a template of a Powerpoint or other form of visual aid.
If you do this, you’re risking coming off as disorganized.
Before anything else, create a rough outline about what you want to present. Include topics, subtopics, and key pieces of information.
While doing this, think about your audience.
Who are they and what are their demographics? What can you expect that they’ll know? What will they need background information on?
Keeping the audience in mind will help you tailor a presentation to meet their interests and needs, generating more interest and attention.
2. “KISS”
Keep it simple, Sherlock.
Try to limit your key points to roughly 3. You can always support them through subtopics, but sticking to 3 main points will stick in your listener’s minds better than, say, 15.
Still, you should aim to know as much as you can about the topic. You should share this knowledge by going in-depth with supporting statistics, facts, and personal stories.
All of your key points should fit underneath an umbrella of one main overarching idea that you want the listeners to walk away with.
3. Establish Ethos
Ethos is essentially the listener’s need for authority. They want to trust that you’re a reliable resource before they take your information seriously.
Start off your presentation by sharing why you’re qualified to talk about this topic. This may include your degrees, area of expertise, or the amount of time you’ve put into researching the topic.
Throughout your presentation, you can reinforce ethos explicitly and subtly.
An explicit way to build trust is to cite where your facts are coming from, such as research papers and trusted institutions. Then, you can sprinkle subtle credibility into your presentation by giving personal stories and examples.
You don’t need to use complicated words to prove that you’re an authority figure on the topic. In fact, you should “KISS” and prove authority with quality information and statistics while simplifying the language around it.
Being able to express complex ideas in a simplified way actually shows full comprehension. Plus, you’re not risking losing your listeners in an overly-wordy presentation.
4. Bring Energy to the Presentation
Nobody wants to listen to a monotoned presenter while staring at a visual aid full of words, no matter how engaging the topic may be.
Don’t be afraid to put some life into your content. Let your personality shine through natural speaking and stylish but clean visuals.
A part of this means understanding where your strengths are. If you’re good on the spot, encourage listeners to engage with you to create a more lively environment.
If you’re a person who geeks out over statistics, show off the best ones you can find that are powerful and easily understood. Find your strengths and work them into your presentation rather than simply speaking words.
If you find this difficult, you can always hone in your communication skills. Be aware of your nonverbal communication, such as posture and hand gestures. Make eye contact with your listeners to create immediacy.
5. Create Your Visual Aid After You’ve Written What You Want to Cover
It will be much more efficient and organized this way.
We’re going to use a Powerpoint presentation to explain this since they’re one of the most popular forms of visual aid.
From your speaking outline, take your main points and put each of them on their own title slide. Consider putting the main points in a smaller text and adding a visual that represents that idea.
This will engage different parts of people’s minds and improve the likelihood of them remembering the information. From there, try to limit wordiness on slides. It’s redundant to put everything that you’re saying on your visual aid.
Instead, use slides to highlight key statistics, graphics, and charts.
Regardless of what form of visual aid you choose, make it your own. It’s great to start off with a template and it saves you a lot of time compared to starting something from scratch.
That design shouldn’t be the final product, however. Tweak the colors, layouts, and fonts to create an aesthetically pleasing presentation.
It might not seem like a big deal, but it is. Cultures across the world highly value aesthetics.
That’s why we have arts and entertainment, after all.
6. Have a Mic-Dropping Closing
This isn’t to say that you should come up with a dramatic finale and actually drop your mic.
What we mean here is you should close your presentation with something potent.
Skip the common tendency to finish with a question and answer session. It may provide value to some, but it also tends to lose people’s interest and fails to deliver your main points.
You can (and should) answer anyone’s questions after the presentation. Encourage the listeners to speak with you one-on-one if they need further explanation.
Alternatively, offer a call to action. A call to action tells the listener what they should do with all of the information you give them.
Be concise with what they should do and how they can do it.
If you still feel the need to have a question and answer session with all of the listeners, at least put it after your conclusive call to action.
7. Rehearse All of Your Business Presentations
Whether you give them all the time or you’re preparing for your first one, the saying still applies: practice makes perfect.
You want to come off as polished, knowledgable, and trustworthy.
To do that, rehearse your presentation after you’ve finalized your speaking outline and visual aid. Know how long it will take you and consider potential questions ahead of time.
73% of the population suffers from glossophobia, the fear of public speaking. Even if you feel confident, practicing will allow you to find areas of the presentation that may cause you to stumble or become sidetracked.
If it’s helpful to you, do your research on speaking skills and watch other people giving presentations online. There are always new things to learn regarding business presentation training.
Level Up Your Professionalism
By following these business presentations tips, you can increase your professionalism and success. Keep it simple, use an aesthetic visual aid, and finish your speech with a bang.
For more ways to improve your career and life, keep reading our blog for more information and tips.
