Long Winded

Here are some ways that presenters fail when giving a talk. They are long winded, which will lose your audience quickly. If you make your presentation a test of endurance, you will see attention drop rapidly. Condense your information so it’s easily remembered. Be concise.

Build Rapport

They bypass the opportunity to build rapport, trust and a connection with the audience in the first seconds of the presentation. Even if members of the audience know you, when you take the stage you are considered an authority on your topic. Connect with your audience on an emotional or feeling level. You can achieve this by stating a shocking fact or creating curiosity with a question. Reach out and include your audience with your opening sentence. Keep this part of your presentation brief.

Keep It Simple

You know the K.I.S.S. rule. Keep It Simple, Sweetie! Once you’ve engaged your audience, don’t leap into the abyss of boredom by transitioning into a boring monologue. If you’ve successfully got the crowd curious, keep them happy by being energetic. Make sure your talk has a structure so you won’t stray off the points you are making. Address your points powerfully and move smoothly from one concept to another. Conclude well. If you’ve been able to hold your audience’s attention, make sure to wrap up with a powerful quote or some other compelling finish.

Rambling

Another boring feature is the tirade. Or filibuster. Or a rambling blend of ideas. If your presentation appears to be a mess of information that you threw into a Cuisinart expecting to have a brilliant dialogue with your audience, you’re sadly mistaken. No one likes a mess or to feel you’re abusing their attention to get something off your chest.

Practice

Another great way to bore your audience is to deliver an unpracticed talk. If you’ve not put in the effort to get your presentation to a level of proficiency, it will show.

Body Language

Your audience will be less than appreciative if you annoy them with your body language. Think about presentations that you’ve sat through where the speaker paces from one end of the stage to the other and rarely looks at the audience. Or has some annoying habit like clicking a pen or jingling change in his pocket (harder for women to do this!). Or uses “um” or “so” every other word. Not only is this boring, it’s flat out irritating and distracting.

There is a lot to know about giving an engaging and memorable presentation. It takes practice and work to get those skills to a level of proficiency.

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The post How to Make Your Presentation Boring, Dull and Tedious first appeared on Lane Business Consulting.

The Win it ~ Don’t Wing It “Boot Camp” is a “get-‘er-done” program, not a “listen to me talk” session. When we’ve completed the boot camp, you will have done the work, and it will pay off!

You won’t be put on the spot or into the spotlight until it’s time! The weeks leading up to delivering your 10 minute talk will be filled with the work that contributes to developing a great presentation. You will create this free and powerful approach to marketing your business. You’ll walk away feeling confident about your talk, and you will be able to apply what you learn to any presentation in the future.

Each of the sessions are 90 minutes of deep dives into the fundamentals that are basic and important for a powerful performance. And you’ll get personal attention to make sure that you shine in the front of the room.

Sign up here

The post If Not Now…When? Get Your 10 Minute Presentation Ready first appeared on Lane Business Consulting.

Get and keep their attention during your 10 Minute Presentation

Speakers recognize that the first thing they need to do when standing up in front of an audience is to get and keep their attention. Get them to care. If you don’t get them to care in the first few seconds, you’ve lost your audience.

How do great presenters do this? They are clear with their message. They have a compelling invitation to join them on a journey that inspires, sells products and services, and informs.

It isn’t a requirement to memorize your talk so it’s perfect. In fact, it’s better not to. The audience won’t remember your talk word for word anyway. They will remember only how you reached them and how you made them feel.

You capture your listeners by speaking from your heart. Steve Jobs was recognized as a powerful speaker. He knew that data is useful to illustrate a point, but data by itself isn’t enough. By contrast, learning to engage your audience’s emotions is 100% guaranteed to keep their attention and impact them with your message.

Use Powerful Images

One aspect of doing that is to use powerful images. We know that “A picture is worth 1,000 words”. Researchers call this the “Picture Superiority Effect.” It states that we humans learn and recall information presented as pictures far more easily than words. We remember visuals better, and our brains process visual information 60,000 times faster. Amazing isn’t it!

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The post Get and Keep your Audience Attention first appeared on Lane Business Consulting.

How to Use PowerPoint in Your 10 Minute Presentation

Seth Godin, author of countless books on Marketing wrote, in Really Bad PowerPoint, “The minute you put bullet points on the screen, you are announcing “Write this down, but don’t really pay attention to it now. People don’t take notes at the opera.”

Research says that text and bullet points are the least effective way to present important information. ClearSlide, the leading sales engagement platform, says that 32% of people fall asleep during PowerPoint presentations and 20 % would prefer to go to the dentist rather than sit through another one!

It’s said that Steve Jobs never used a single bullet point! Not once. He relied on pictures. And carefully selected words or phrases.

Visual Content

Find an image or picture that demonstrates rather than tells why your audience should care about your message. This takes a commitment of time to fully understand your audience and then carefully craft a message that sings to them.

A 10 minute presentation deserves 5 hours of preparation according to presentation masters. It should take 2 ½ hours, including building your highly visual slides, to create a powerful 10 minute presentation that informs, entertains and inspires. The next 2 ½ hours are devoted to rehearsing the delivery including tone, body language, timing, etc.

Don’t be a “winger”!

Don’t blow your opportunity to market your business. There are no shortcuts to excellence. Mastery takes practice.

If you know you could deliver a better 10 minute presentation with some attention to your content and delivery, ask me how!

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The post No Bullet Points! first appeared on Lane Business Consulting.