Perfect Presentation Consulting

Pay Attention To Your Shampoo

2009-04-08T10:24:00.001-07:00

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Have you ever wondered why they feel the need to put that on every bottle of shampoo? Everybody knows how to wash their hair, right? The reason is simple marketing - the shampoo companies have convinced all of their consumers that the only way to get clean hair is to wash it twice. How did they manage that? They did it with a very simple and to the point message. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
Your presentations can be just as effective. Just Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Lather - The "soap" of your presentation is your content. Make it pointed, make it precise, make it relevant. This means you need to take some time and learn about your topic. Your presentation will be much more effective if you can make its lather be and do what your audience is expecting.

Rinse - Once you finish your presentation, you need to rinse it. Get a fresh set of eyes to look at it. Rinsing your hair gets all the loose bits out, the same thing happens with your presentation, often times the fresh eyes will see something that you missed. Once they finish you can go through and make any necessary changes.

Repeat - Another word for this is, wait for it..... practice. We all know it, but many times we fail to do it. Practice really does make perfect! The more you practice the better you will be able to make your presentation natural and convincing.

So you see? All it takes is listening to your shampoo. Lather, rinse, repeat. (Oh, and unless you want people to stare, don't hold the shampoo up to your ear in the store!)

Photo: iStock

ROI: What the heck does that have to do with presenting?

2009-03-27T20:39:00.000-07:00

Any MBA worth his (or her) salt could go on at great and eloquent lengths about ROI. Return On Investment. I'm not an MBA so I'd like to give you a real world example of how ROI works and why its important for presentations.

I am constantly drumming in to my students' heads the importance of turning in their work. You'd be amazed at how many 12 year olds don't understand that failing to turn something in will result in a poor grade! You would be even more amazed to find out that many of these students have actually done their work and then just didn't turn it in!

What does this situation, which is incredibly frustrating for a teacher, have to do with preparing and giving a presentation? Well, the answer to that question comes with the question I ask those students. I ask, "Why even do the work if you are not going to turn it in?"

Now that might sound a little harsh, but stop and think about it for a minute. Have you ever had a presentation where you just "phoned it in", or one where you just couldn't bring yourself to commit totally? If you've ever done that then you are doing the same thing to your success as my 7th graders are doing to their grade.

Ok, so back to ROI. If you want to get a positive return on your presentation then you need to invest the time and create one that will make you shine. If you don't, not only will you not succeed, you will earn a zero return on investment. A zero ROI is just like the 7th grader who does the work and then doesn't turn it in. Don't do that to yourself, make sure you get the biggest possible ROI you can.

Photo: iStock

Upcoming Posts

2009-03-24T21:12:00.001-07:00

Stay tuned for:

ROI: Business term. How does it apply to presenting?
Complacency: Dangerous no matter what you do for a living.
Speaker or the slides?: A return to a favorite topic of mine.
slide:ology - A book review
Presenting to younger audiences: How do you get important info to children without losing their interest?

How to keep your audience interested!

2009-03-18T09:33:00.000-07:00

We've all seen it... the boring, seemingly endless presentation.

The challenge is to avoid being the person who is known as the audience killer. How do you accomplish that? There are many ways to keep your audience alive, I'm going to touch on just a few here.

Some of these may seem obvious, some may not.

Have interesting content: While this may seem like a "duh" kind of item, you'd be surprised how many presenters are bored with their topic. As a presenter it is your responsibility to make your presentation as effective as possible. So, even if you are assigned a subject that you personally have little interest in, it is incumbent upon you to make it as interesting as you possibly can. If you are interested and enthusiastic then the likelihood that your audience will be is increased.
Be coherent: It doesn't matter if you have the most earth shattering life changing information to present if you can't get your message across. If your presentation has no logical structure, if it bounces from topic to topic and back and forth then your audience, besides getting whiplash, will not get a thing out of it. They will be spending all of their time just trying to catch up. So prepare beforhand, go through your presentation and make sure it flows.
Know your content: This goes hand in hand with the previous two suggestions. You MUST be the expert, you must know your material forwards and backwards. I've written on this before (The Slides are Great, but...). It is essential to success to be prepared.
Quality visuals: Avoid bullets if at all possible! Use high quality photos or images. Since a large part of any presentation is the visuals it is very important that you take some time and ensure that they match the tone of your topic, and that they enhance your speaking. It is also important to make sure that your slides have a consistent look and feel throughout your entire presentation.
Get your audience involved: An active audience is an interested audience. Get your audience moving (particularly useful with younger ones). Now, if you are presenting to a bunch of business people in suits you obviously can’t have them running and jumping around, but you can have them get up and work with others on answering questions or discussing a topic you have put forward. Physical activity is not the only way to get an audience involved, mental activity is just as effective. Brain activities, such as brainstorming, or simple thought exercises, are a very important tool to learn and use, take some time and examine your presentations to see if there are opportunities within them to add any interactivity.

It all boils down to one simple point. Keeping your audience alive and interested is one of your most important tasks as a presenter. It is vital that you do everything you can to make sure that you don't become known as the audience killer!

How to be Creative

2009-03-09T13:17:00.000-07:00

In a previous post (Find Your Story) I talked about how you can keep your audience interested by finding your story. But what do you do when you are feeling absolutely no creative spark what so ever? -Kind of like I was when I was trying to figure what to write today...

I found the answer (or at least one answer) in a recent article by the really cool guys over at LifeHack. The author talks about four tools to get your creative juices flowing. Some of the tools are a little pricey but if they work then it's money well spent.

I haven't had a chance to try any of the tools yet but they all look amazingly simple to use.

Check them out and get creative!

Use Some Verve!

2009-02-24T20:00:00.000-08:00

I just returned from a week long trip with forty eight 7th graders. We went to Catalina Island and attended Catalina Island Marine Institute, a camp run by Guided Discoveries. (Unsolicited endorsement.... this is an absolutely amazing learning experience for kids and if at all possible you should find a way to get your child's school to take a field trip there.)

What's the point of my telling you this? Simple, during this trip my students did not attend one single formal, lecture type presentation. They did, however, attend somewhere between 15 to 20 highly effective informal presentations. The point is, even though the instructors were not formally trained presenters and did not have high tech presentation materials, they did not even use Powerpoint or Keynote, they were effective for one simple reason. Enthusiasm!

Enthusiasm for your material can make or break a presentation. As I wrote about earlier (The Slides are Great, but...) the presenter is an integral part of an effective presentation. Here's an example from my trip. The students I was with live in the desert and many of them had never even seen the ocean, much less swum in it. The enthusiasm of the instructors enabled every one of the students to not only swim in cold 57 degree water, it even had them reluctant to get out! I would call that an effective presentation!

What can you do to use enthusiasm to make your presentations better? Here's some simple tips:

Get excited about your material: Now, I don't mean get stupid excited, what I mean is that even the most dry topic can be made more interesting with the addition of some enthusiasm. Add a funny anecdote, use some self deprecating humor, anything that will cause your listeners to perk up their ears is a good thing.
Be careful: Your energy and enthusiasm has to be genuine. If its not your audience will notice and that will make your job that much harder.
Watch your language: No, you shouldn't sprinkle in a few swear words. What you do need to be aware of is how your verbal language and your non-verbal (body) language affect your listeners. Saying you're excited with slumped shoulders says more than you probably want your audience to hear. Try to avoid overtly negative statements, if you are trying to sell your product, highlighting its pluses is much more effective than only highlighting your competitor's flaws.

The bottom line is this: Your job as a presenter is to "sell" your topic. Being genuinely enthusiastic and realistically excited about your material are key to your presentation being "Perfect."

A Book Review

2009-02-16T19:57:00.000-08:00

Trent at The Simple Dollar has posted a fairly in depth review of Presentation Zen. Go read it.

If you read the book pick the tips that work for you and add them to your repertoire.

The Slides are Great, but...

2009-02-13T06:13:00.000-08:00

Here's the scene; you have spent days and weeks putting together the greatest presentation in the history of presentations. Its midnight before the big day, you fall exhausted into a fitful sleep, eager and excited to change the world tomorrow. Tomorrow comes, you get up in front of your audience and...... nothing. It seems that in the excitement of your awesome slides you forgot one of the most important parts of presenting, the speaker. Yes, that's right, the speaker. You. What follows is not pretty. Disaster. You lose your job, you even lose your cat. Life is sad.

Ok, ok, I exaggerate. But just a little. All too often speakers concentrate so much of their energy on making their slides so magnificent that they completely forget to prepare the other half of their presentation, themselves. So here are five things to keep in mind that will help you remember that you are exactly half of your presentation.

1. Avoid the mental place keepers. These are the ums, the ahs, the alrights, that people subconsciously employ when their brain needs to catch up with their mouth. These happen to everybody on occasion but if they become a regular part of your speaking they WILL distract from the power of your message. As an example, look what just happened recently to Caroline Kennedy. I have no idea if she had any good ideas or not but her speaking habits, completely destroyed any chance she had of putting out a coherent message.

2. Speak TO your audience, not AT your audience. How many times have you seen a speaker who would have given the same presentation to an empty room? When people come to listen to you speak they are sacrificing some of their valuable time. Respect them enough to speak to and with them, not at them. The easiest way to do this is talk like you are speaking with a friend about the movie you just saw last night. Be excited, if necessary. Be casual, don't allow jargon to get in the way of your message. It is possible to speak casually and still be professional.

3. Speak to your audience not your slides. The biggest mistake I see from novice speakers is this one. They are so unsure of themselves and their grasp of the material that they actually turn their back on their audience and talk to the screen where their slides are projected. Remember, the screen does not have ears, it can't hear you! Your audience on the other hand does have ears and they need to hear you. If you need to overcome nervousness or fear of public speaking their are organizations, such as Toastmasters, that can help. Another way to avoid this follows in tip #4.

4. Practice, practice, practice. Sounds cliched, but it is so very true. The more you practice the more familiar you become with your material. The more familiar you are with what you have to say the better equipped you will be to deal with the inevitable heckler, questioner, or other distraction that will happen to every speaker at some time. Practice allows you to roll with the punches, it allows you to deal with the distractions and stay focused on your message. It's not an accident that actors and other public speakers rehearse many times before they go in front of an audience or the cameras. If you have a million dollar deal riding on your presentation, don't you think its worth a little of your time to get it right?

5. Know your material. Your audience expects you to be the expert. You absolutely MUST be the expert. This is different from just practicing. This happens before you start to practice, it probably even starts before you create your first slide. This requires you to become familiar with your material inside and out. Go to the library and do research, talk to other people who know more about the subject than you, do whatever you must to become an expert on your topic.

Back to our intrepid presenter. He follows the tips, he practices, he researches, he talks like he is the expert, and it works! He gets the deal, marries a movie star and lives happily ever after!

Find Your Story

2009-02-08T19:20:00.000-08:00

When people hear that there is going to be a Powerpoint at their next meeting,I imagine that their first reaction is to say "Oh, no, not again..." There is a way to prevent this from being the reaction to your presentations. Its a simple idea but it does require some development time. What's the idea? Three simple words... find your story.

What's that mean? It means that you need to find a way to connect with your audience by making your presentation more like a story. Let's take a look at a quick example. Here's the same story presented in two completely different ways.

First, as a standard bullet point style presentation:

3 brothers build houses
1. Straw
2. Wood
3. Bricks
Upset neighbor destroys two houses and kills two of the brothers
Situation at the third brother's house
1. House is too strong to destroy
2. Brother has a plan and kills the neighbor in self defense.

To make it even worse, the presenter not only shows the bullets on each slide, they read them to you!

I am sure everyone recognizes the story as "The Three Little Pigs." Imagine if, instead of bullets, the presenter told the story with visuals on the slides of pigs, wolves, huffing and puffing, and cook pots along with a well placed "Not by the hair on my chinny chin chin!" Thunderous applause! Well, maybe not but no chirping of crickets either!

Find your story!! How? There are many methods, one I have found very useful is Cliff Atkinson's "Beyond Bullet Points." His method, which works well for me, is to structure your presentation like a Hollywood screenplay, complete with protagonists, antagonists, acts, scenes, the whole nine yards. If you can't or don't want to shell out some dollars for a book, you can just rely on yourself.

Finding your story may be as simple as asking, "How can I make this interesting!" Let your imagination go and follow your ideas, if you work at it and let yourself be creative you will be able to find, not just a story, but maybe, just maybe you'll find a perfect presentation!

Less Really Is More

2009-02-03T18:51:00.000-08:00

I recently attended a presentation from an attorney on an educational law. It was horrible. You would think that a person who earns a living persuading people that their side is right would recognize the importance of a quality presentation; you'd be wrong. Almost every slide was chock full of bullets, and each bullet was read to us. Pure agony.

When putting together a presentation make sure you focus like a laser on the most important points, leave all the extraneous details out unless, they too are essential for understanding of the topic. If you have to use bullets keep them to a maximum of 3 or 4 per slide. This guideline means you might have a lot of slides, that's OK, if.... If you have included only the essential, if you have cut the fat, if you, well, you get the idea.

This also means you have to spend some time drilling through your information to find the nuggets. Quality presentations don't just happen, they require work. Get in touch if you want help getting your presentation closer to perfection.

The Basics

2009-01-23T12:00:00.000-08:00

Ok, let's start with the basics.

In order for a presentation to go smoothly you must do your homework! Here are 3 key things, in no particular order, to keep in mind when preparing...

Know your subject inside and out. Your audience will be looking to you as the expert, be prepared to act as one. It will be painfully obvious if you don't prepare. Just about all of us have experienced the unique pain of sitting through presentations where the presenter was, in a most obvious way, faking it. Don't be that guy!
Keynote or Powerpoint should be the last things you work on. Start in a word processor and get your thoughts organized before you put the slide show together. There are several methods for doing this. There will be many posts on this topic as we go along.
Make sure your graphics enhance your presentation. I have seen too many where the colors got in the way of the content. (Side note to my 7th grade students... purple and lime green are NEVER a good combo!)

Many more tips to be coming...

Welcome to Perfect Presentation Consulting

2009-01-19T18:22:00.001-08:00

Hello, and welcome to the inaugural post from Perfect Presentation Consulting! This site and this business are all about helping you move your Powerpoint and Keynote presentations closer to perfection. If you want help perfecting your presentations I can be reached by phone at 520-400-1416 or email; perfectpresentation@me.com