Presentations are a great opportunity to win new customers, grow business from existing ones, raise your profile, inspire your colleagues and gain investment but only if yours is a winning presentation.
In this article I’ll show you how to prepare winning presentations.
Winning presentations that will grow your business rather than ones that will lose you business and lower your profile.
So why do presentations go wrong? It’s usually for one or more of the following reasons:
- Not enough time was spent preparing
- No thought was given to what the audience wanted to hear
- The presenter spent too much time on trivial stuff at the start – and tried to be funny
- There were too many slides
- Containing too many words
- Trying to get over too many messages
- The presentation went over on time and people got bored
Some of the excuses I’ve heard for defending what was clearly a poor presentation include:
I was only told about this last night.
In the car on the way here it was under 3 minutes (for a 3 minute presentation that on the day took 8).
How was I to know the screen would be that small.
My spouse /partner said my opening joke was really funny.
No one told me the audience was expecting only 5 minutes.
I should have had ‘clicker’ lessons.
Most presenters usually know quite well in advance that a presentation opportunity is coming up. So there is no excuse for a poor presentation.
Ok you are nervous but so to a degree are even the most experienced presenters.
Which is why the best presenters prepare throughly and practice hard. They check the venue and equipment in advance, they find out who will be in the audience, they understand that they need a powerful attention grabbing opening and that slides should be minimal with few words. They are ruthless editors when it comes to using Powerpoint.
They know that three is the most key messages the audience will absorb so they plan carefully what those three are.
They understand how important having a good, concise summary and finish is.
They carry prompt cards just in case they lose their place – no scrambling through sheets of A4 for top presenters.
And then they rehearse. And time those rehearsals. And rehearse again. Not enough to be word perfect but enough to not mess it up.
Good luck with your next presentation, although if you prepare well and practise the luck factor is not that important.
For more presentation tips and advice check out my website : trevorjlee.com
To find out how more about how I can help your teams deliver confident, impactful, memorable and action inducing presentations please visit my Presentation Training page
If your team need inspiring and re-energising please visit my Sales Training page
Before you book any training or coaching with me it is important for you to be sure that I’m the right person for you or your team so let’s have a 15-20 minute informal no obligation no fee chat on Zoom. Simply click here: Trevor Lee 15 minute meeting
My podcast Better Presentations More Sales features an array of global guests sharing every Monday great presenting and sales advice, tips and ideas.
Check out my book: ‘12 Business Lessons from Running an Ultra Marathon‘ – all proceeds go to Children’s Hospice South West
Here are links to the evergreen webinar versions of the presenting and sales skills sessions I ran in January and February 2023:
