Are you looking for a presentation designer? I’ve been asked so many times if I could recommend a presentation designer that I’ve decided to publish a list of PowerPoint and Keynote slide design companies and freelancers. I asked each presentation designer to talk about their approach to presentation design and to give me an example of a slide that represents their brand.

I’ve used a very traditional method to order these presentation designers – it’s alphabetical based on the principal’s last name.

You’ll see a tremendous variety in approaches – from business focus, to scientific rigor to aesthetics.

Rick Altman, Better Presenting
There are plenty of PowerPoint trainers in the world. There is also no shortage of speaking coaches. And finding a marketing consultant to help with message and branding is not terribly difficult. But finding a consultant with demonstrated expertise in all of these critical areas of presentation is not so common. Rick Altman is one of the few in the presentation community who blends presentation design, best practices, and software technique to serve his clients.

This finished slide, for the largest insurance provider in the United States, began as a typical slide, with far too many words, no white space, and no visual focus (text is greeked to respect company privacy). Pairing down the text to hone the message is just the first part of the solution; integrating an evocative visual is critical to giving the message its emotional weight. Finally, using PowerPoint’s support for semi-transparency allows the text and the image to be blended into a single story.

Claudia Bennett, Cestudio Design
The best presentation has the speaker’s message simple and right to the point and educates the audience in the subject message matter while keeping the story line alive. Like a good movie! I feel privileged to count myself as one of the few  presentations designers worldwide able to work in both English and Spanish. I’m based in Boston, Massachussets, USA.

Chantal Bossé, CHABOS
I have a passion for visual communications. Since I created CHABOS in 2004, my main goal has been to help entrepreneurs, trainers and speakers improve their presentations and performance with a real “visual communication” tool.

To convince audiences we need more than just pretty slides; we need a convincing and inspiring message! My approach to help clients set themselves apart from the crowd: flexible presentations. It gives them the possibility to tailor their message to the audience’s needs on the spot. It does take more time, and of course practice to master content structure and the use of the technology. But presenters willing to go that route have a memorable impact on audiences. Some clients have even increased their sales with this presentation method, and greatly reduced the need to design new slide decks all the time.

When people are not comfortable with this method, I stick with regular linear presentations but with very few bullet lists, using instead meaningful visuals and one idea per slide.

Jeff Brenman, Apollo Ideas
Apollo Ideas is a presentation consulting and design company. We help people with great ideas develop and deliver presentations that convince, inspire, express, captivate, evoke, teach, move, entertain, sell, engage, challenge, motivate audiences. Our mantra, “Clear Simple Expression”, is part of what sets our work apart. Everything we create is tested against three criteria: 1) Is the message clear? 2) Is the story simple to understand? 3) Is it expressive? A “yes” to all three defines Apollo Ideas style.

Louise Cunningham, Halo Media
Halo Media is a design company with a passion for presentations! Our focus is on the content flow and visual appeal – transforming your content into a professional, well-designed (and hot!) presentation. We’ve produced PowerPoint and Keynote presentations for well-known brands across the globe including:

Coca Cola  |  Unilever  | Orange (France Telecom)  |  GTS Lufthansa  |   Nestlé

We are South African based – this mean’s we are in line with GMT time (1 hour ahead of the UK), English is our first language and our exchange rate suits your pocket!
You’ll find our showreels on our site… we look forward to hearing from you!

Mike Davenport, Stick Figure Simple
I believe people are overwhelmed with information. They can’t cut through the mind clutter anymore. I believe people want easy to absorb information. Information they can grasp in a glance so they can learn, lead and find opportunities faster. Better. Easier. I believe people want simple communication – the simpler, the better.

Ever have that relieved feeling when someone says, “Wait, let me draw you a quick picture?”

It works. Simple pictures make communication better. And simple pictures – stick-figure-simple pictures – sweep away complex information, leaving us with what really matters.

Nancy Duarte, Duarte Design
A good story changes how people think, feel, and act–moving them to buy a product, embrace an idea, fund a cause or join a movement. Presentations have the potential to transform audiences by connecting authentically and communicating persuasively through the power of story. Duarte is the global presentation leader, with expertise honed through more than twenty years in practice, two top-100 Amazon business books, and global training curriculum based on the award-winning methodology. We apply visual storytelling techniques from cinema and literature to build engaging communications, high-concept campaigns and transformative experiences that inspire a groundswell response in any audience. Our presentations unfold across multiple channels, whether it’s a live keynote or breakout, video or multimedia content delivered on demand, or an immersive, user-navigated experience. Through a highly collaborative process, we’ll work closely with you to write, design, produce, and deliver a presentation–in any form–that accelerates the reach and impact of your message.

Artur Ferreira and Rogerio Chequer, SOAP
SOAP – State Of the Art Presentations –  was created by business consultants who, after participating in business presentations, realized that most of the presentations were boring and ineffective, and so opportunities were being lost. SOAP brought together elements from Design, Advertising, Consulting and Storytelling to develop a unique methodology that we call Soap System.

SOAP System touches on all the components of a presentation: defining the approach, writing the script, creating the visuals and coaching the presenter.

Our goal is to leverage strategic moments with impactful messages, stories and visuals that lead the audience to your objective.

Our leading-edge design studios are equipped with the latest technology for graphic design, animation, video production and other interactive media.

Ana Foureaux Frazao, AnaFxFz
I create designs that attract, inspire, and motivate people to respond to visual messages. My conceptual designs are original artwork focused on innovation. I am a Mac-based designer but proficient in a broad range of design applications for both Mac and PC. I am multilingual, with solid international experience, and have designed keynote and pitch presentations for high profile speakers, book authors, and technology entrepreneurs from around the world. I am currently based in San Francisco, California, where I launched AnaFxFz Communication Design, a studio focused on Presentations, Branding, and Information Design.

Sandra Johnson, PresentationWiz
Sandra Johnson is on a mission to help people use PowerPoint responsibly. By combining marketing communications and design expertise with known audio-visual learning tenets, her presentations bring her clients’ ideas to life in a way that connects with and compels audiences.

Johnson is a 20-year marketing communications veteran who has developed and successfully implemented marketing communications programs for clients like 3M Health Care, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals and Porsche Cars of North America. Her strategic expertise and creative PowerPoint design and strategic consultation skills have made her a valuable resource for her clients since forming her PowerPoint presentation business in 2001.

Since 2008, Sandra has been recognized by Microsoft Corporation as one of a handful of Microsoft PowerPoint Most Valued Professionals (MVP) in the US.

Philippa Leguen de LaCroix, Cornerstone Presentations
At Cornerstone Presentations in London we do things differently: we’re into the science of how our brains process information, and we use this science to create strategically designed, highly-targeted slides that communicate effectively and engage the audience.

In fact, the multimedia learning science we follow actually proves that traditional onscreen bullet points are not only a tedious PowerPoint habit – they are also detrimental to your audience’s capacity to learn.

We’re a small and expert team and we take time to understand your business and your messages. Our scientific approach has been a big hit, and more importantly, hugely successful:  we’ve helped our clients win millions of pounds worth of business.

With excellent design and scientifically proven techniques – we’re confident that we can improve your presentations significantly. Give us a call or drop us an email for an informal chat about how we can help you.

Jason Leow, PopcornPrez
PopcornPrez is about crafting presentation experiences that delight, so that we deliver “presentations to have popcorn with” – which is our tagline. Ultimately, a delightfully great presentation experience is about getting buy-in to a product, service or an idea. I always tell my clients that I’m really a business consultant with a specialty in presentations. What I am really doing is to help businesses achieve their business objectives through visual communication and design.

We also love sharing our design inspiration and knowledge with more serious presenters/presentation designers, through a laterally-inspired curated blog where we get the kick out of connecting seemingly disparate pieces of information into inspiration for presentation design!

Rowan Manahan, Fortify Services
I come from a corporate background and have been crafting presentations at every level since 1989. From flipcharts, OHPs and 35mm slides to the latest in Slideware technology, I have seen the best and the worst that goes on when people stand up to speak. What makes for a good presentation, speech or talk?

(1) Having something that’s worth saying
(2) Having an audience that wants or needs to hear what you have to say
(3) Having the time to turn the thing that’s worth saying into something that’s worth listening to

My company, Fortify, can transform your presentation delivery, content and technology to whatever level you need and I work closely with every client on every project. We start at the end – what do you want to happen as a result of the presentation? – and work our way back from there, to determine the optimal approach.

Magda Maslowska, Haute Slides
My presentation design philosophy has been developed both through my interest in cognitive science and over 7 years of practice as an information graphic designer. This means carefully selecting design elements such as photography, icons, typography, colors and layouts so they dance harmoniously together emphasizing the idea.

I focus on visual persuasion and information retention through story, design and appeal.

• Story is the heart of the presentation. An effective presentation is an equal partnership of data and emotional connection with the audience.
• Design is about problem solving, organizing and presenting data to transform it into valuable, meaningful information.
• Aesthetic appeal serves an integral part of how we feel about the things we see.

Creative and production processes are based on years of experience developing audience-centric high stakes presentations for global technology leaders. The goal is to make slides both beautiful and meaningful with a purpose to effectively communicate the message.

Miguel Monteiro, Tribe Presentations, Portugal
At TRIBE Presentations, our main contribution, as design and communication professionals, is helping to build contents and add-value through visual illustration, optimizing understanding and achieving the best adhesion of audiences to the messages delivered.

Simon Morton, Eyeful Presentations
Many people know that their presentations are not quite what they could be and we are often approached by people asking for stunning design. The first question we ask is ‘why?’

The problem with stunning design is that a ‘stunned’ audience is in no position to appreciate your message. Time and again we hear audiences chatting about a particular slide, animation or transition that has wowed but ultimately overshadowed the rest of the presentation.

We combat this by a process that we call Presentation Optimisation. This is essentially a simple three step process which focuses on giving the presented material a logical and memorable story flow. From this point the design input is all about enhancing that story to give the audience a strong, memorable message to take away with them. This approach ensures that you audience is both educated and inspired by beautiful visuals, rather than merely stunned.

Nick Oulton, m62
m62 is one of the world’s leading presentation development companies. Having produced over 10,000 presentations for clients worldwide, m62 focuses on helping presenters convey their messages more effectively. This includes creating impressive presentations that effectively convey the presenter’s message, and training presenters to ensure they know what to present, and how to present it, for maximum success.  m62 creates presentations that are:

Impressive – so presenters portray a professional image
Engaging – so audiences actively pay attention
Memorable – so audiences can recall key messages

This combination ensures that m62 presentations are effective, and far more likely to be successful at achieving the presentation’s objectives.

With a solid foundation in cognitive psychology, m62 has developed Intellectual Property that has secured billions of dollars’ worth of contract wins for clients. Using successful techniques such as Passive Mnemonic Processes and Visual Cognitive Dissonance, m62 ensures that its clients’ messages are understood – and remembered.

Dave Paradi, Think Outside the Slide
I help executives and professionals sell ideas that are not easily understood, like technical or financial information, so the audience gets it. I start with the structure of the message and help create slides that enhance what you say.

I am not a designer, I don’t use graphics software, and that’s exactly why I might be right for you. I have an MBA, wear a suit and understand the bottom line orientation of business executives. If you are an executive, sales professional, engineer, or analyst who has to create and deliver presentations regularly to win business, update others, or inform a group, there’s a good chance I can help you.

I won’t craft a gorgeous set of slides or make your slides “pretty”. In my training workshops and consulting assignments, I provide practical advice to help you create and deliver persuasive PowerPoint presentations to colleagues, executives and clients.

Carl Pullein
Simplicity in design, naturalness in language and restraint in content. That is the fundamental approach to my presentation design and delivery philosophy.

We are teaching Korean people to present in English in a much more communicative and natural way that gets results.

Jan Schultink, Idea Transplant
Idea Transplant is a presentation design firm headed by Jan Schultink. Jan is a presentation designer without a formal training in graphics design. Instead, he spent 10 years as a strategy consultant with McKinsey & Company. This experience has taught him how to craft stories for a CEO audience.

Jan is based in Tel Aviv, but the majority of his clients are abroad (thanks to the Internet). These clients range from the smallest startups (fund raising pitches) to the largest multinationals (sales presentations, analyst presentations).

Jan is the driving force behind Idea Transplant, one of the most popular blogs about presentation design.

Scott Schwertly, Ethos3
The question here isn’t whether or not our designers are good or not. Our ironclad egos are 24/7, impenetrable self-esteem shields, and we feed them everyday. The question is whether or not design matters for presentations, and the answer is a resounding yes.
The aesthetics of your presentation are divided into two categories: expedience and resonance. Our designers are expedient because they walk around looking at things and ingesting lifelong lessons from their observations–it’s like Neo learning martial arts in The Matrix. Our designers are resonant because they are fully formed emotional creatures that have been augmented with 4+ year degrees entirely focused on how imagery precipitates change.Not everyone needs presentation design help. Take Ethos3: we don’t hire it out because we already do it. For the rest of you, let our skilled team turn your expertise into expedience and resonance. This is the correct interpretation of today’s horoscope.

Jon Thomas, Presentation Advisors
Presentation Advisors was founded on the cornerstone of my favorite quote, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. (Leonardo DaVinci)” Designing your presentation is less about repeating the presented information in visual form, but creating a visual backdrop that accentuates the information being presented by presenter. It requires visuals that engage the audience’s senses, giving them a visual cue to tie to the information being presented. It means fewer words, more images, unique fonts and large images. It’s about delivering your message in its simplest form (but no simpler).

Presentation design is also about weaving narrative throughout the presenter’s story. Since audiences have little time to hear a sales pitch but lots of time to hear a great story, presentations require a narrative format to truly resonate with an audience.

Simplicity + Beauty + Story = Presentation Advisors

If you’re a presentation designer and you’d like to be added to this list, let me know via my contact form (please don’t use the Comments for this purpose).

And readers looking for a presentation designer, tell me what could make this post more useful for you? Do let me know in the Comments.

When I was in the States last year, I met up with Nancy Duarte… and she interviewed me. She’s now written up the interview on her blog. Find out more about my story and why I’m passionate about helping people be better presenters – and particularly helping people overcome the fear of public speaking. Here’s the link: Nancy Duarte interviews Olivia Mitchell.

And here’s five more links to great writing on presentation skills:

Even TED speakers get nervous
TED is an elite conference where invited speakers give 18 minute talks on the ideas they’re passionate about. In this short post on the TED blog, TED speakers talk about what  it’s like to give a TED talk. Main takeway – if you’re not nervous , you’re not pushing yourself enough – you’re playing safe.

What you can learn from Dan Pink
Another of Andrew Dlugan’s signature speech critiques (scour his blog for many others). This one features a 2009 TED talk by Dan Pink which is worth listening to in it’s own right. Andrew has a wonderful talent for deconstructing a talk and showing us why they work (and occasionally why they don’t).

An elegant way of addressing the elephant in the room
Diane DiResta was about to teach a class of young girls when she was told that their school principal had died unexpectedly the day before. How did she handle it?

Jon Thomas’s best 20 posts on PowerPoint presentation design
Jon’s blog is a fantastic treasure trove of slide design advice and now he’s collated a list of his best posts that will help you create visually engaging and effective PowerPoint presentations.

Speaking Perfection is a Myth
This is a recurring rant of mine – and it’s well-articulated in this post by Rich Hopkins. If you fall prey to the disease of perfectionism, then you need to read this.

If you’ve recently read a great article on presentation skills, do leave a link to it in the comments.

Related posts:

1. The 5 Bad Habits of Experienced Speakers
2. The two types of presenter: which are you?
3. How to turn your story into a movie

Last week I spent three awesome days at the Presentation Summit. In this post, I want to explore what audience members remember from a presentation, using the first three keynotes of the conference as my examples.

I asked as many people as I could what they remembered from each of these keynotes. This was an informal, non-random, non-scientific survey.

Nigel Holmes

Photo Credit: Rikk Flohr – www.rikkflohr.com

Nigel Holmes is a phenomenal graphic artist who used to be Art Director for Time magazine. His presentation didn’t start well – there were a few technical hitches and it took him some time to hit his stride, and even then he wasn’t a hugely energetic speaker. When I asked people about Nigel’s presentation, they often mentioned the slow start, but then they went onto say that they loved what he showed us, and enjoyed his quirky brilliant mind. Every person I talked to had a different take on what was the point of Nigel’s presentation, depending on what had most relevance to them.

Carmen Taran

Photo Credit: Rikk Flohr – www.rikkflohr.com

Words such as sparkling and scintillating were created to describe speakers like Carmen. Everybody I spoke to loved her as a speaker. One person said “I don’t care what she talks about, I’ll listen to her”. They often mentioned what she was wearing – a gorgeous cream and gold jacket over cream trousers. Then they mentioned her slides – how polished and beautiful they were. I had to prompt people as to what they remembered from her presentation. As with Nigel’s speech, everybody gave me a slightly different answer.

Garr Reynolds

Photo Credit: Rikk Flohr – www.rikkflohr.com

Garr presented to us via Skype. Audience members were immediately able to say to me that Garr’s message was “Be like bamboo”. And they knew what the metaphor meant – be flexible and adaptable like bamboo. Garr made 10 points elaborating on this bamboo metaphor. When I prompted people to recall those 10 points, most people could recall only one or two.

Garr’s bamboo metaphor also elicited some strong reactions. I was talking to two women and one said to me “We’re adding a room to our house and the floor is bamboo. I felt so pleased that we’d chosen bamboo – it’s strong but flexible.” Then the other woman erupted: ‘I hate bamboo. Our neighbor has a forest of bamboo and it keeps sprouting up on our lawn. We just can’t get rid of it. I hate bamboo!” Neither of these two women could remember any of Garr’s points.

My take-aways

1. You don’t have a second chance to make a good first impression, but the cleverness of that saying has eclipsed the broader truth – that you have many chances to correct that first impression. Your presentation is not ruined if you make a bad start.

2. Your message, your slides and your delivery need to be balanced. You don’t want your presentation to be like a movie where people only remember the awesome special effects. Your slides and delivery are there to serve the message.

3.If you don’t present a clear overarching message, your audience will choose (sometimes randomly and unconsciously) the message they take out from the presentation or they may not get any message at all. For most types of presentations, I believe it should be you, the speaker, who decides what the overarching message is. I’ve said “most types of presentation” because I can see that it could be a valid approach to give a speech from which each person takes a different message – depending on what is most important to them.

4. When you choose a metaphor as your overarching theme, beware of the baggage your metaphor may carry. It might be necessary to acknowledge possible preconceptions at the beginning of your presentation so that your audience can put their reactions to one side and focus on your message.

5. If you cover many points of equal importance and at the same hierarchical level, your audience will have difficulty remembering them all.

I loved my time at the Presentation Summit. To be able to hang out for 3 days with people as interested (obsessed?) with all things presenting was awesome. The dates for next year’s conference are October 17th- 20th.

Related posts:

1. 10 tips for overcoming the fear of being bold
2. The Fastest Way to Create an Ignite Presentation

This is a post written by Tony Burns, my partner and co-trainer.

There are two types of people in the world – those who divide the world into two types of people, and those who don’t. I’m one of the former.

I find models useful – they show distinctions that can help explain and predict behaviors – and they can help us see other opportunities and ways we can grow.

One distinction that, as a presenter and presentation trainer, I’ve found useful, is to look at whether a person is “careful” or “carefree” when it comes to creating and delivering presentations.

It’s a question you might like to ask yourself. As a presenter, are you predominantly careful, or carefree?

What does a careful presenter look like?

Preparing the presentation

They plan their presentation. They think about their audience and their needs. They work out what their key message will be and create a structure for their talk that will take their audience on a logical journey. They think about stories and statistics – what evidence will support their message and they design effective PowerPoint slides or other visual aids that will help the audience to understand the points that are being made. They not only think through what they’re going to say, they also create notes or a script. And they rehearse their presentation – maybe many times in order to ensure that there is no hesitancy and no mistakes.

Delivering the presentation

When the careful presenter delivers their presentation, they are thinking about “getting it right.” They refer to their notes a lot – sometimes, even when they don’t really need to. As a result, they don’t look at their audience as much as they could. And they appear as if the presentation is a trial – something painful, rather than an opportunity to connect with people.

They tend to say only what is written in their notes – there’s no spontaneity or variety. In fact, the presentation seems mechanistic – there’s no sense of real connection with the audience.

The audience usually gets value from the presentation but would have liked to enjoyed the experience more.

What does a carefree presenter look like?

Preparing the presentation

The carefree presenter knows “in their head “ what they’re going to say. They may jot down a few thoughts but they don’t create a structure – they’d rather let the presentation flow freely on the day and see where things lead. They might think of a few funny stories to tell but they don’t research – and they don’t rehearse. They tend to use a whiteboard or flipchart rather than PowerPoint – that will give them greater flexibility on the day.

Delivering the presentation

When they deliver their presentation they’re really engaging. They connect with their audience resulting in smiles and nods. They have lots of energy and enthusiasm – they move around, gesture a lot and speak with passion.

But they’re hard to follow. It’s difficult to know what their point is. The audience are enjoying the presentation but they don’t really know what they’re meant to do as a result of attending.

In fact some sections of the talk are quite confusing as the presenter goes back over material that they’ve already covered because they’ve thought of something else to add. And then they remember something they forgot to say earlier which is critical in order to understand what they’re saying now.

But then they crack a joke and everyone laughs.

It’s all about timing

OK – I’ve painted two extremes, but you get the point.

I believe it’s useful to be both careful and carefree when you are a presenter – but it’s all about timing.

Before the presentation – be in careful mode. Think, plan, design. Rehearse and get feedback. Create a presentation journey that is easy for you to present and for your audience to follow. This will make your delivery job easier.

But when you stand in front of your audience to deliver – switch to carefree mode. Don’t be overly concerned if the words don’t come out exactly as you planned – the audience won’t know.

Focus on your audience members. One by one, talk to them as if there’s just you and them in the room. The odd mistake or pause to think does not matter – in fact it makes you more real. Carefree is not the same as careless – it’s a mode in which you trust yourself to deliver with ease the material you’ve carefully crafted.

English actor Michael Cain puts it well – “Rehearsal is the work, performance is the relaxation.”

So both attributes are useful to a presenter – it’s useful to be careful before the presentation and it’s useful to be carefree, during the presentation.

If you realize that you’re strong on one attribute, recognize that strength and keep using it. But your opportunity for development will be the other attribute and by developing that side, you will add to the impact and influence you can achieve through your presentations.

Related posts:

1. How to turn your story into a movie
2. The 5 Bad Habits of Experienced Speakers

Could your body language be more expressive? Do you inhibit your natural body language when you’re public speaking because of your self-consciousness?

Or maybe you’ve been told (by a well-meaning but misguided person) that you wave your arms around too much? As a result you’ve shut down your natural gestures and become stiff and boring.

The secret to curing boring body language in public speaking is to replicate the state you’re in when you’re in an animated one-on-one conversation. When you’re in that state your gestures unconsciously complement what you’re saying and give your message energy and persuasive power. You’ll look and feel more confident. And there’s even evidence that natural gesturing makes you more fluent.

Here’s what to do to develop natural, expressive body language when you’re speaking:

1. Empty your hands

Put down anything you’re holding, whether it be a pen, the remote or your notes (once you’re gesturing naturally you can hold your notes or the remote, but for the moment they just make the task of freeing up your gestures more difficult).

2. Keep your hands free

Holding your hands together, putting them in your pockets, or hanging onto the lectern will stop you gesturing.

So where should you put your hands? For the moment just let them hang loosely at your sides (this is a default position – this is not where your hands will stay). I know that this feels awkward. You probably feel a bit like a gorilla! But have a look at the photo to the right… do most of these global leaders look like gorillas? No. The only one who looks awkward is the one who doesn’t have his arms hanging loosely at his sides!

Your hands will probably creep together without you noticing. When that happens, immediately separate them again.

OK. We’ve got rid of the barriers to expressive body language. Now what?

3. Talk to one person at a time

When you’re in a one-on-one animated conversation, your hands naturally gesture. So kick-start your hands into gesturing by replicating that animated state. Do this by looking at one person and feeling in that moment that you’re just talking to them – and to no-one else. At the end of a phrase or short sentence, talk to someone else in the audience. But always be talking to someone (for more tips like this see: 8 presentation tips to make your eye contact more powerful).

4. Move your feet

To enlarge your body language, move your feet. You could for example, move towards the person you’re talking to. The larger body movement will free up your body and will encourage you to make larger gestures. For more ideas on moving while you’re public speaking click here: 9 ways to use space in your presentation.

5. Vary your gestures

Once you’ve opened up your body language, check that you’re not making repetitive gestures. Either ask someone to give you feedback, or video yourself. In my early public speaking days, I watched back a video and saw that my most common gesture was moving my right arm from the elbow outwards – like I was constantly opening and closing a door. Once I was aware of it, I caught myself doing it and was able to change what I was doing.

Remove distracting and repetitive gestures but don’t try and choreograph what you’re saying with specific gestures. It will look forced and unnatural.

Follow these five steps and you’ll develop natural body language that will add energy, engagement and persuasive power to your presentations.

Your audience’s attention will fade over time unless you take specific steps to keep them engaged. Here’s a graph showing the attention of university students during a 50 minute lecture – where the lecturer lost his audience (Reference: Hartley J and Davies I “Note taking: A critical review” Programmed Learning and Educational technology, 1978,15, 207-224).

Notice how at 40 minutes the attention seems to go up again (just a little!). I’m guessing that this is the point where the lecturer started his sentence with “In summary…”

And the students perked up their ears again and refocused to get the gist of the lecture. Here’s what happened – the lecturer stumbled upon the audience’s Attention Reset Button. Although our attention span is limited, we do have the ability to refocus on a task. When you push the Attention Reset Button you’re giving your audience that opportunity to refocus.

So that’s what you need to do when you’re losing your audience. Push your audience’s Attention Reset Button. Instead of fading to near zero, your audience’s attention will spring back.

How often should you push the Attention Reset Button

Plan to push the Attention Reset Button about every 10 minutes. This is a practical rule of thumb which seems to work for most audiences. For example, John Medina says in his book Brain Rules:

“I decided that every lecture I’d ever give would come in discrete modules. Since the 10 minute rule had been known for many years, I decided the modules would last only 10 minutes.”

But be aware that your audience’s attention span will vary according to many factors – warmth of the room, time of day, how much sleep they had the night before, how intrinsically interested they are in the topic. Be prepared to adjust to the needs of your audience. For instance in the morning you might plan for intervals of 15 minutes between each Attention Reset. During the potentially sleepy after-lunch slot you might decrease that to 5 minutes.

How to push the Attention Reset Button

1. Tell a story

We’re hardwired to listen to stories. They instantly engage us and require very little effort to stay focused. Even the sleepiest audience-member will perk up when you say “I’ll tell you about a time when this happened to me.”

2. Make them laugh

Nobody can not pay attention when the rest of the audience is laughing. We want to know what’s funny. The critical caveat is that your humor should be relevant to your presentation.

2. Make a transition

In the first graph I showed, the students’ attention rose near the end, and I’ve suggested that that was because the lecturer said “In summary…”

Now, I’m not suggesting that you should say “In summary…” when you’re not planning to summarize, but you can use transition statements as a signal to the audience that they should refocus. They may have got distracted for a couple of minutes and then found it hard to get back on track with what you’re saying. But if you make a transition statement such as:

“So that’s the problem we’re facing, now I’ll go onto my recommendation to address it.”

it gives them an opportunity to get back on board.

3. Break for Q&A

The traditional method of ending your presentation with Q&A is a waste of a great way of re-engaging your audience. A short Q&A session during your presentation is engaging because:

• It’s a change from just you talking
• Audience members can ask you questions about what they are interested in
• There’s a live element to a Q&A session that keeps people hooked.

Build Q&A into your presentation, rather than leaving it till the end.

4. Change something…anything

We pay attention to change. You’re probably not aware of the air conditioning hum running in the background, but as soon as it stops you’ll notice it. Here’s what you can change in a presentation:

• Change the type of visual aid you’re using eg: from PowerPoint to a flipchart or whiteboard
• Change the spot that you’re presenting from eg: stage to floor, part of stage
• Change presenters
• Change where people are sitting in the room
• Change what audience members are doing eg: from sitting down to standing up.

5. Get them to talk

Allowing people to process your ideas by asking them to talk to the person sitting next to them is an excellent way of re-engaging them. For example, you could ask them to share with their neighbour “What are three things you’ve learnt so far in my presentation”.

6. Get them to write

Asking people to reflect by writing is also useful. For example “Write down three things you’ll do differently as a result of my presentation”.

7. Take a microbreak

In a longer session (anything more than 50 minutes) take a 2-3 minute break for people to stretch their legs, use the restroom and refresh their drinks.

Warning: Be Conceptually Relevant

Don’t be one of those people who tries to spice up a deadly dull presentation with cartoons or funny images which are not conceptually relevant. It looks desperate and research by Richard Mayer (the guru of multimedia learning) shows that it harms the ability of the audience to take in your core message.

Use a variety of buttons

Don’t use the same technique every time – or your audience’s graph will look like this:

Instead use a variety of Attention Reset Buttons. If you’re using my Presentation Planner, here’s an example of how the planner might look with the Attention Reset Buttons highlighted:

What ways do you have of pushing your audience’s Attention Reset Button?

I’ve been through a long journey (25 years) of developing as a speaker. I started off shy, nervous and tentative. Now I’m a high energy, animated speaker and I love connecting, laughing, riffing with an audience. But along the way I’ve picked up some bad habits. Attending Doug Stevenson’s Story Theater Retreat helped me identify some of these habits. So I’m starting off this list with my bad habits and then I’ll go onto list habits I’ve observed amongst other experienced speakers.

1. The Plastered-On Smile

At the Story Theater retreat, I discovered that I smile most of the time when I’m speaking. Start talking – smile, that was my pattern. This was a cringe-making discovery. I’ve observed other speakers with this habit and internally mocked them – without realising that I too, suffered from this problem.

For me the habit probably started from wanting to portray myself as warm and friendly to my audiences, but it had become so ubiquitous that I was smiling even when I was describing unpleasant events. I broke the habit by identifying the segments of my presentation when I shouldn’t smile, and then rehearsing those segments consciously keeping my face relaxed. Just before starting my presentation, I would remind myself again of the segments when I didn’t want to smile. Now that I’ve broken the habit, I just remind myself to ‘live my content’, to be in touch with the feelings behind what I’m saying and live those feelings in my speaking.

Doug has written more about this here: Beware the Phony Speaker’s Smile.

2. Relying on memory

As a beginner speaker, I scripted all my presentations word for word. As I became more comfortable and more experienced, I let go of the need for a script and trusted myself to say what needed to be said. I took on the concept that I was communicating ideas, not sentences. And that’s what I teach to most of my clients who are beginner and intermediate speakers.

Doug Stevenson advocates scripting your stories. Having eschewed a script for so long this took me a while to grasp. But here’s the paradox. At some point in your speaking career, you will reach a point where you can’t improve without going back to scripting again. That’s because you should be fine-tuning and replicating your best lines. You can’t do that consistently unless you write those lines down.

I’m lucky in that I work most of my time with my partner Tony and we listen to each other speaking and write down the great lines. They then go into our notes so that we can use them again. If you don’t have a partner to do this for you, record your speeches (it doesn’t have to be a camera, it could just be a sound recording) and then listen back noting your best lines. Now you can consistently replicate them.

3. Hamming it up

As you get more experienced and start to get in the swing of telling stories and acting them out, it gets tempting to ham it up. For example, in one of my presentations I act out the drama I have in my head about people being able to see that I’m nervous as I’m giving a presentation. The more I ham it up, the more people laugh. But there are other situations where hamming it up has no effect at all on the audience. The distinction between these two situations had eluded me. Doug Stevenson had the answer:

Humor is big, drama is small

When you want people to laugh exaggerate. But when you want to portray emotion, think Colin Firth – be subtle.

For more on Doug’s take on humor see: How to be Funnier.

4. Power corrupts

Speaking can be like a drug. Being at one with the audience, riding a wave of interaction and laughter, is a great feeling. You feel on top of the world, with this audience in the palm of your hand. You are all-powerful… and yes, power corrupts!

You start improvising, riffing, you get hyper! Most people in the audience appear to be having a great time. Problem is these manic offshoots don’t take the presentation anywhere.

Sure, play with your audience – but don’t forget the point of your presentation.

5. Throwing out random questions

And then there’s the opposite situation where you just can’t seem to make it with a particular audience. Your best lines are falling flat, you’re facing a sea of unresponsive faces.

Some speakers in this situation get desperate. They depart from their plan and start throwing out random, clichéd questions hoping for just a breadcrumb of interaction from someone… anyone in the audience.

Don’t let it happen to you. Audiences are different. Some will show their delight in the ride overtly. Others may be quieter in their appreciation.

Asking questions of the audience can  be an excellent interactive technique. But your questions should be carefully planned – in their placement, wording and implementation. For more on asking questions check out this post: The 10 steps to asking questions so you get an answer every time.

This is the second of my posts on what I learned from Doug Stevenson’s Story Theater Retreat. Check out the first post: How to Turn your Story into a Movie.

To dig deeper into Doug Stevenson’s insights into advanced speaking buy his book Story Theater Method, and the audio version – which you can get as CDs or downloadable MP3s (disclosure: these are affiliate links which means that I earn a 15% commission if you buy one of Doug’s books or other products). And to go deeper still attend one of his Story Theater Retreats.

Related posts:

1. How to turn your story into a movie

When Tony and I were in America we attended a Story Theater Retreat with professional speaker Doug Stevenson. This is a two-and-a-half-day workshop focusing on crafting and refining just one story, but at the same time teaching you a process that you can apply to all of your stories. Each retreat has just four participants so it’s an intensely individualized experience.

Doug has developed the Nine Steps of Story Structure. It’s classic storytelling technique with a protagonist, an obstacle to be overcome, and a resolution at its core. However, Doug adds 3 significant steps to classic story structure so as to brand the learning point of the story. Doug has laid it out in a step-by-step way so that you can take any event in your life and craft it into a valuable story for your audience.

Using Doug’s Nine Steps to structure your story coupled with the acting techniques that he teaches turns your story into a movie.

I chose to work on the story that I tell at the beginning of our courses. It describes my first attempt at the Toastmasters public speaking competition 20 years ago. The Retreat was transformational for me – and my story. I’ve described below some of the elements of my story makeover. I’ve added video clips from my coaching session during the Retreat so that you can see what I was trying to do. The quality’s not great but I still think it’s helpful to see as well as to read!

1. Adding a character

I had many of the elements of Doug’s Story Structure. But I was missing one element. There were no other characters in the story. I was the only character – the story had me battling alone through three levels of Toastmaster competition. That made the story rather one-dimensional. Imagine a movie or a play with only one character!

So Doug suggested that I add another character. It was easy to think of who that should be. At Toastmasters there was a woman that I respected and admired. Her name was Margaret Nixon. Margaret was a mentor to me, giving me useful feedback and encouraging me to set new challenges for myself.

Adding Margaret to the story gave the story much more interest and depth and also allowed me to incorporate some of the acting techniques which Doug teaches.

2. Create memorable characters

So it’s not really a movie. Since the audience can’t see the other characters we have to help the audience visualize the characters by describing them. Here’s how I described Margaret:

She was a government lawyer, just like me. She was petite with blonde, curly hair. Her speeches were models of structure and clarity. But she was never intimidating because she had a warm and sparkly personality.

Later on in the story, I have a short sequence involving our dogs – so I described them too:

Tara is a golden retriever – big brown eyes, always wagging her tail at you (or at anybody). Jodie is an elegant collie (strangers call her Lassie) and somewhat more discerning.

Now I could use photos of Tara and Jodie (you can see a lovely photo of them by scrolling down my about page). But sometimes the images that the audience can conjure up on the screen of their minds is just as powerful, if not more powerful, than actual photos.

For more see: Doug’s post Storytelling in Business – Create Memorable Characters

3. IN moments and OUT moments

Turning your story into a movie means you’re not just telling a story, but showing your audience what happened. Doug was an actor for 20 years before he segued into professional speaking and he’s married his acting expertise with his speaking expertise. He’s developed the Story Theater method to show non-actors a step-by-step system to incorporate acting techniques into a story.

Doug calls showing your audience what happened an IN moment, whereas the times when you’re narrating the story are OUT moments. His guideline is that 30% of your story should be IN moments.

In my pre-makeover story here’s what I used to say:

As I walked up to the stage, my legs felt like they were noodles. I stood up on the stage and looked out and just saw a jumble of shapes and colors. My heart was pounding like it was going to explode out of my chest and I could feel sweat trickling down my sides.

In my post-makeover story all the words above have gone, I act it. Here’s a short clip from my coaching session during the Retreat as I try out acting this moment:

For more on IN moments see Doug’s article: Identify the Moments

4. Humor

Humor is something that I’ve struggled with and at times I’ve just said to myself “I’m not a funny speaker – that’s not me and so I won’t try to be funny”. As I’ve developed experience as a speaker I have realised that I can make people laugh but I still haven’t seen myself as a funny speaker. Doug believes that everyone can be funny and can develop their ability to be funny. So I decided to give humor another go. I already had a line in my story where I mentioned that I rehearsed to the dogs but with Doug’s help I developed it into a funny scene:

5. Two-character Two-step

With another character in my story, I could create some dialogue.  Doug showed me how to do the two-character two-step to act out a dialogue between two people. Here are the basic elements:

- each character stands at a slight diagonal to the audience.

- as you change character you shift to the other diagonal.

It takes some practice to get right! In the clip below I’m just getting the hang of it:

6. Inner monologue

Another acting technique that Doug teaches is the inner monologue. Instead of saying:

To my surprise I won the competition. That was great news for my self-esteem, but bad news for my future. Because it meant that I would be representing my club at the next level of competition – the Area level.

Doug had me pace up and down talking to myself. I found this quite difficult. Whenever I try to walk and talk I end up slowing down – walking fast and talking to myself was tricky! Also my instinct was to look down at the floor as I walked, but that doesn’t work for the audience. I had to look up. You can see my struggle with this technique in this extended clip which includes Doug’s coaching:

Or you can just watch my final attempt:

Using these techniques you can turn your story into a movie too.

I’ve only covered a small percentage of what I learned at Doug Stevenson’s Story Theater Retreat. I highly recommend attending a retreat if you’re committed to taking your story-telling to the next level. Doug and his wife Deborah create an incredible welcoming and supportive environment in their Peak View Studio.

If you can’t make it to a retreat buy Doug’s book Story Theater Method, and the audio version – which you can get as CDs or downloadable MP3s (disclosure: these are affiliate links which means that I earn a 15% commission if you buy one of Doug’s books or other products). I recommend getting both the book and the audio version as you’ll get all the details and  hear Doug telling and dissecting his stories. You’ll get an extra level of learning as a result.

Next week I’ll discuss my personal learnings from the Retreat.

I’m working on being bold – whether it’s in a one on one conversation or in a presentation. In the past, I’ve often watered down what I say to avoid upsetting anyone. And I’m not alone. Many of the people that I coach are concerned about being bold. As a result, they dilute their message so much that they have zero impact on their audience.

Cultivate an attitude of boldness

Being bold is not something that you can “pull out of a hat” when you’re giving a presentation or speech. You need to develop an attitude of speaking out in your day to day life. Otherwise you won’t develop the courage to be bold in your presentations. Practice saying what’s on your mind when you’re with just one other person or a small group.

I’ve found blogging to be extremely useful in helping me be bold. Some posts I’ve written have taken me some time to publish because of my fear, but having done so I’m bolder. Here are some thoughts to help you develop an attitude of boldness in everyday life.

1. Stop being nice

What stops me being bold is that I want to be liked, I want to be nice. I don’t want to have to deal with anyone being upset or offended by what I’ve said. It’s worked for me in many ways, but it holds me back too. I keep this quote on a post-it above my desk:

2. Saying what you think enhances your career

Do you hold back saying what you think because you want to make sure that everything you say makes perfect sense and is supported by evidence? Me too. But research shows that people who speak up more are seen as leaders. Now that makes sense, but here’s the topsy-turvy kicker – what they said didn’t have to be particularly brilliant or clever or original. So don’t worry about being perfect, just speak up.

3. Not saying what you think annoys people

I’ve sometimes held back on saying what I think fearing that it will upset people. Then the situation deteriorates and I end of saying what I think, only to be told “Why you didn’t tell me that earlier?”

4. Your ideas can help other people

Do you think your ideas are not worth sharing, that they’re obvious. Then watch this gorgeous, short video (H/T Rich Hopkins):

5. What’s the worst that can happen

Sometimes when I want to say something bold, I stay silent because I just imagine a nameless disaster. But if I think it through  and ask myself “What’s the worst thing that could happen?” then I realise that the worst that will happen is that the person I’m speaking to might be upset for a day. Can I handle that? Yes, I can! And then often they don’t even get upset for five minutes. They just thank me for being straight! Often the consequences that we fear from being bold don’t materialise.

How to be bold in your presentations

Here are some tips for developing boldness in your presentations:

1. Ask your audience to take action

Just giving your audience information is the safe option. But what does it accomplish? Instead, answer this question:

“What do you want your audience to do with the information you’re giving them.”

Then use your presentation to persuade people to take that action.

For example, in my presentation on Kiva (see my Guide”How to make an Effective PowerPoint Presentation”) I could say to the audience:

“Lending money to poor people is an effective way of helping them.”

It would be interesting information, but I haven’t accomplished anything. Instead I say:

“Lend $25 to a poor person so they can start a business.”

2. Be provocative

In my research on learning styles I came across Frank Coffield, an academic challenging the prevailing mythology of learning styles in education. He said he was inspired by Karl Popper, who wrote in his autobiography:

‘My custom, whenever I am invited to speak in some place, of trying to develop some consequences of my views which I expect to be unacceptable to the particular audience. For I believe that there is only one excuse for a lecture: to challenge. It is the only way in which speech can be better than print’. (Unended Quest Open Court Publishing Company, 1976, p 124)

A friend said to me yesterday “If you don’t miss at least one plane a year, you’re arriving at the airport too early!” Now, I’m not going to change my habit of arriving at the airport in plenty of time, but I can see his point. Similarly, “If you’re not provoking at least one person in your audience, you’re being too nice.”

3. Imagine the friendliest audience

Imagine what you would dare to say if you knew that the audience were the friendliest most supportive bunch of people. That they’re already on your side. Now say that.

4. Express the main point of your presentation in one succinct sentence

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you know that I call this your Key Message. The work of crafting your point into a Key Message has you think through what you really want to say. If you allow yourself several sentences to express your point, you’re likely to have woven all sorts of qualifications and caveats. So don’t. Say it in one clear and succinct sentence.

5. Get rid of weasel words

Do you pepper your phrases with weasel words and phrases? Like “I’d just like to” or “sort of” or “kind of”. They reduce the power and boldness of your ideas. You may not know you’re doing this. So either record yourself and listen back, or ask a friend to give you feedback.

Stop holding back – be bold. You’ll get your message across, spread your ideas and enhance your career.

Related posts:

1. The Fastest Way to Create an Ignite Presentation

I set myself the challenge of preparing my first Ignite presentation as fast as possible.

The Ignite presentation format is a 5 minutes long presentation with 20 slides and with the slides advancing automatically every 15 seconds. It’s the presentation equivalent of a haiku or sonnet. It’s a very challenging format which can take forever to prepare.

Here’s the way that I did it:

1. Sketched the outline using my Presentation Planner

I used my normal presentation planner which I teach to all my clients. Here’s a picture of my planner – as you can see neatness was not important. I just wanted to get my key message and sequence of ideas down on paper.

Click on the image to see a larger view.

Time: 10 minutes

2. Converted planner to 20 slides

I typed what I wanted to say into the format of 20 slides:

Time: 1 hour

3. Packaged into 15 second blocks

I then used the “rehearse timings” button and delivered the presentation:

The Slide Sorter view (above) showed me how long I spent talking on each slide.

My aim was for each slide to take 13 to 15 seconds. The reason for this is that I think it’s better to have to wait a beat for a slide, than to be running out of time and constantly playing catch up.

When I first tried this out I was all over the place, some slides taking 7 seconds and some 34 seconds. I spent time rearranging, deleting and massaging. In the screen shot above you can see that I had got most of the slides close to 15 seconds, but I still had some work to do to shorten some.

Time: 2 hours

4. Created visual slides

I only started creating visual slides once I had my storyline packaged into 20 neat slices of 15 seconds each. Here’s what my visual slides looked like:

Time: 2 hours

5. Printed out my notes

Ignite is one type of presentation format when preparing a script is virtually essential during the preparation phase. Working from a script allows you to massage your sentences to  fit the 15 second time blocks. A slight change in sentence structure can make a significant change in the time it takes to say something. So this is one occasion where you should plan to say it the same way every time (not normally something I recommend).

I printed out my verbal slides (shown in point 2. above) as handouts – 2 to a page:

Time: 5 minutes

5. Rehearsed

I set my visual slides to advance automatically at 15 seconds and started rehearsing. Using my two-screen set-up and Presenter View I was able to see how long I had to go before the slide changed. My major frustration at this stage was that I couldn’t find a way in PowerPoint to record my narration at the same time as having my slides automatically advance every 15 seconds. This meant that I couldn’t playback my slides and audio to check my timing. If you know how to do this I would love you to add a comment.

This step took the longest as I fine-tuned my pace to get my timing just right. For example, I wanted my dead parrot slide to appear just as I said “dead parrot”!

Time: 3 hours

6. Delivered

I used notes for the actual presentation as well. I could have spent extra time memorizing it, but I didn’t see a sufficient pay-off for that extra time. I had rehearsed enough that I did spend most of the time connecting with the audience.

Time: 5 minutes!

My presentation was videoed but unfortunately the audio didn’t work, so instead I’ve produced a Slidecast using Slideshare: