Making A Presentation? Let Your Visuals Win Them Over

By Mary Love

The ability to make good presentations is as vital to your business career as your phone, Palm Pilot or day planner. And visual aids can make or break your talk — whether you’re pitching to a potential client, sharing market research with your department or recruiting for your company’s community service project. Good visuals will make your talk more exciting and compelling.

Start by assuming that your audience would rather do anything else in the world than listen to you. They want to talk, fidget, read, make to-do lists, prepare for their next meeting or just zone out for a few minutes.

Your goal is to reel them in and get them to pay attention to you. A dynamic, engaging speaking style helps, but if you think you lack that talent, give your audience some well-thought-out visuals and you’ll work wonders. Here are some tips:

1. Start with a theme. This gives unity and direction to your talk and will help your listeners focus. Make it simple and easy to remember: “Triple Your Sales” or “A Breakthrough.”

2. Leave the lights on. Use a format that doesn’t provide an invitation to nap. Try flip charts, overheads or a computer screen instead of projecting slides.

3. Keep slide content to a minimum. Especially data. Some speakers show a slide that looks like an entire page from a phone directory, and then say, “I know you may not be able to read this one, but . . .”. Why show it at all?

4. Use pictures. Graphics give the audience a breather from reading. Think of creative ways to present pie charts and bar graphs.

5. Read your slide text to your audience. Verbatim. Exactly as it appears on your slide. This may sound juvenile, but if you don’t, it’s guaranteed that they will be reading it when you most want them to listen to you. Don’t compete with your own visuals.

6. Guide your listeners with numbers and headings. Number your main points on charts or slides and let people know how many you have. Use headings so your audience can follow you.

7. Keep your audience from jumping ahead of you. If you show five “talking points” everyone will want to figure out if your next point might be more interesting than the current one. If you’re working in PowerPoint, use its animation options and have each bullet item “wipe in” just as you begin talking about it. If you’re using overheads, cover up the talking points and reveal them one by one as you’re ready to discuss them. (You can also use this to involve your audience. Invite them to guess the next bullet or the research results.)

8. Distribute handouts wisely. Supplements give listeners a very good reason not to listen to you. Try to save them until the end, or pass them out as needed.

9. Rehearse. Set up the equipment the day before. Make sure your visuals are readable from the back of the room. Go through it all twice — with props. Aim to stay under your time limit.

10. Finish strong. Don’t let the meeting drift from your control. Summarize and strongly restate your recommendations or key message. Be creative and look for a dramatic close — a cartoon or photograph. Or, if you have the time and money, give them something tangible as well as visual — an inexpensive gift, pencil or small toy that reinforces your theme.

Try to enjoy the experience. If you look like you’re having a good time up there, your audience will want to be part of the fun.

Mary Love is a writer and editor specializing in medical and health communications. She can be reached at 410-381-6523 or at Writing@MaryCLove.com. Her web site is http://www.MaryCLove.com.