The Right Ingredients to Make Your Presentations a Success

By Franziska Hall

Jobs Vacancy, Job vacancies, Employment

A bit of ginger, a tip of cinnamon, half a cup of sugar, 3 cups of flour... not sure what you get, but sounds pretty good (could almost be ginger bread). When you bake something you need to combine different ingredients and flavours to get a great result, the same applies to your presentations.

Can you remember a time when you were sitting in a presentation and instead of paying full attention to the speaker you found yourself checking your watch, sending phone messages to your friends, thinking about what to have for dinner, looking through a brochure... only waiting for the presenter to stop talking. Why is it that some presenters are really boring and disengaging and others aren't. They are not using the right ingredients to keep you engaged and interested throughout.

It is so crucial for business owners, sales teams and managers to be able to present effectively, be it to get their ideas across, attract new clients or inspire others. You are often in the forefront of the business and need to know how to capture your audience and stand out from the 'boring' presenters.

I am really passionate about this topic and there is so much information I would like to share with you, but I know how busy you are, so I will focus on one practical key factor to successful presentations.

People have different 'modalities' (ways of filtering information or preferred ways of learning). The main ones are auditory, visual, kinaesthetic and auditory digital, so let me show you how you can apply this to your presentations immediately.

Visuals:The easiest way to engage visual people is by using pictures, graphs, drawings and models.

Auditory: Auditory people are very sensitive to sounds, they don't actually need to look at you during your presentation. You can engage them by changing the speed of your talk, variation of rhythm and tonality of your voice and by playing some music or audio recordings where appropriate. A little tip here, if you have people in the audience that never look at you, don't assume that they are disengaged, they might be auditory and don't have the need to see you.

Kinaesthetic: For 'Kinaesthetics' it's all about the feeling. They like to touch things and want to feel good and comfortable. You engage them by slowing down your speech at times, using handouts and engaging them through group activities.

Auditory Digital: For auditory-digital people your content needs to make sense. They don't like the fluffy stuff, they want numbers, facts, statements and key points.

There is so much more to this topic, but this will get you started. Add some more spice to your next presentation and make sure your audience is not the one checking the clock and hoping for you to finish soon. By integrating the four techniques, you will get better results immediately and see your audience engaged. Presenting is one of the most masterful skills you can have. The good news is, everybody can learn it, you don't have to be born with it.