15 Useful Tips For Killer Presentation

An article by Mina

The first thing to note is that great presenters are not born, they are made. Anyone can develop good presentation skills to deliver with confidence if he/she is willing to invest enough time. You can make an interesting and appealing presentation with less amount of text yet communicate more effectively and create a greater impact. I have outlined a few important things that I have learned along the way all you have to do is keep these easy points in mind whenever you prepare a presentation and I assure you will impress your client.

Mental And Physical Preparation Before Your Presentation

Physical and mental preparation is very important before your presentation. Drink lots of water and get a good sleep. If you will work for whole night you will not feel fresh next day when giving presentation. A good quantity and quality of sleep is important for good brain health. Researchers have uncovered new evidence that sleep improves the brains ability to remember information. So take things lightly eat, breathe and visualize a positive outcome. It will be very useful for you if you can manage to hang out with the other speakers and ask them questions and for advice. Taking advice from experienced people has always helped me.

Be Neat And Tidy

Creating a positive initial impression with a neat and clean appearance is a very important part of any presentation. Maybe it’s unfair to judge a book by its cover, but we all do this. It’s human nature.  Attire is the first thing your client will see during your presentation. Your clothes communicate identity, personality, and image. You’ll feel more confident about yourself if you are dressed up nicely and in appropriate yet comfortable clothing. Research shows that 93% of the impact of a first impression is formed on non verbal communication i.e. how you look and behave. So as you stand in front of your audience you need to ensure you are giving the right signals.

Eye Contact With The Audience

If you ever wondered where you should look when giving presentation the answer is right in front of your client. Try to make eye contact with everyone sitting in room. If you don’t do this then you are not engaging the audience. And it gives a feeling as if you are talking to yourself. This can result in lack of attention from your audience. So you need to interact with your audience and create a conversation.

Keep It Simple

You need to give your client general information about your business. Just put a good photograph and only the key points in bullets. Do not ever print entire paragraphs! No one reads them and they create a negative impression. You should put as little text in your presentation as possible. Hence it’s important that you should give your slide a strong title to get the message across. Keep your slides simple and to the point.  Don’t let your message and your ability to tell a story disrupted by slides that are unnecessary and complicated. The less cluttered, the more powerful your visual message becomes.

Highlighting What’s Important

However small or big your concept or task is, it is wise to save your breath and clients time and present the most important parts. If it’s half an hour or longer, remember your client may not able to absorb all the information. Briefly explain the purpose of your work and how you can help your client in his work. After explaining everything politely asks for the feedback.

Presenting In An Order

Order of presentation really matters. If your information and slides are not in sequence it will give a bad impression. Presenting in a planned sequence is more effective than just showing a sample. You should always have a starting and ending point in presentation. If your presentation is in an organized form, this will help your client to understand you work more easily. You can also give your client a full print report copy in an organized form.

Use understandable And Easy Language

If you want your audience to understand your message, your language must be simple. Don’t use technical or specialist words that may not be familiar to your client because they will have problem in understanding what you are talking about. The easiest solution is to stay away from explaining how your work looks good. Instead, explain how your work communicates for the benefit of the client. Don’t speak for you speak for your clients.

Be Clear And Use Pauses

The power of pausing in a presentation can be very helpful. It gives your listeners more time to absorb what you are saying. Don’t be afraid of taking pauses they can help to keep you calm and in control by giving you time to check your notes. Last but not least, they allow you to catch your breath.  You usually don’t notice when you say “uhm”, “ah”, or any other useless word repeatedly, but the audience does. So instead of using these words it is better to take pause and speak slowly and clearly.

Encourage Questions

It’s always good to figure out any questions as early as you can to avoid dissatisfaction at the end. Give your client a feeling that you’re always willing to answer questions and that no question is silly or insane. Frequently say things like: “I would be more than happy to answer any questions you may have”. Make sure you understand and hear the full question before answering. Ask for clarification if you don’t understand anything. You can make a great presentation and deliver it brilliantly. But if you get confuse in responding to questions you can damage your reliability and mess up your presentation. So always give your best and satisfy your client by answering their queries.

Be Honest

A lot of people present what their audience wants to hear, instead of what they need to hear. This is the most important part of the entire presentation. Here is where you sell your product or your service. Make sure you tell the truth about things like the cost etc. as this will convince the client that you are not here to cheat them. Your client will respect you if you are being honest to them.  At the same time, be firm. Make it clear that you are here for business.

Show Some Movement

You possibly know that you need to show some movement when speaking, but naturally you may forget to do so. Make sure you show some gestures on the stage when speaking. Presentations can be scary, but the audience won’t eat you alive. Keep in mind that no one likes watching a stiff person. Always support your hand gestures with head and body movement. A little movement will help you keeping your client awake.

Show Your Personality

It doesn’t matter if you are presenting to senior citizens or to a corporate crowd you need to show some character when presenting. Don’t pretend that you are working for so many years and you have one of the best clients if you really haven’t. If you look unsure of yourself and still you are trying to impress your clients it gives a bad impression. So try to show who you are. It gives a positive impact when you don’t complicate the fact that you are new in the business. You’re best at being yourself, so let your true self show. It’s easier to talk to a person who’s open and sincere.

Make Them Laugh

Although you want to educate your client, you need to make them laugh as well. Yes, you can joke. Don’t tell jokes unless they’re perfect for the situation and support the point you’re making. Even if you have a serious presentation full of statistics, numbers, graphs and charts, look for places to add humor. This keeps the audience alert and they’ll learn more from you than someone who just busy in giving lectures.

Differentiate Yourself

If you don’t do something exceptional and unique compared to all the other presenters the client has heard, they won’t remember you. Your objective is that people remember you and the best way to do this is to inject some of your own personality into your work.

Final Thoughts

A good presentation has only one climax. Try to summarize your content into one sentence. That one sentence should not have any “comma” or “and”. Your one sentence should be so powerful that your client should memorize it.

In short all the ingredients i.e. knowledge, preparation, and appearance are necessary to make a good impression. Above mention tips can help you in making your early presentations successful and build up your confidence for the future. We will come up with a new post soon in which we will specifically guide graphic designers that how should they present design to their clients.

Good luck!