Whether a business proposal or investor pitch, delivering presentations that engage listeners and clearly dispense information benefits everyone. The best case scenario is slight head nods and attentive eyes, letting you know your words hook listeners. The worst-case scenario? Yawns howl in the room. To avoid this, develop your presentation skills and focus on what you need to improve to master audience engagement.
Introduce The Presentation Topic Effectively
To keep the audience’s attention from the outset, use techniques that captivate the audience from the first sentence or paragraph spoken.
Share stories and anecdotes
Begin with a story or anecdote that weaves into the presentation. The audience will be compelled to follow the storyline, trying to understand how the narrative will connect.
The same can be said for stories about personal experiences. By initially tackling the presentation from a human or relatable angle, you connect to the audience on an emotional level. This will intrigue listeners enough to stay engaged.
Propose a question
Prompting a question will activate the audience’s brains, allowing their gears to shift as they process your inquiry. They will be more engaged, looking to see how your presentation will answer the initial question.
Proposing a question is also a good opportunity for audience interaction. Look to the crowd for answers and pick about three audience members who volunteer to speak. Then, use their replies to pivot to the main topic smoothly. Audience interaction allows listeners to participate in your presentation and helps you confirm that they are actively listening.
Make the presentation more accessible
To maintain engagement, focus on making an accessible presentation. Pro tip: even if someone isn’t your target audience, they should still be able to understand your speech. To avoid confusing the audience, tailor information, define unfamiliar terms, and interpret statistics. Less confusion leads to more engagement.
Tailor information
Take the time to research and taper information to the audience’s interest. With their interests in mind, listeners will feel your presentation is more approachable, making then more inclined to listen.
Define unfamiliar terms
Additionally, if the presentation is out of the audience’s depth, clarify unfamiliar terms. They may not be immediately comprehended when they are spoken, so take a moment to educate. Doing so will help make the presentation more accessible.
Interpret statistics
When using statistics, try translating them into something relatable. For example, one-third of adults still sleep with comfort objects can be broken down to “some adults feel safer sleeping with a specific stuffed animal, blanket, or item from childhood which in the greater scheme means…”. This will help the audience understand not only what the stats mean but also give justification for their inclusion in the presentation.
Refine Your Speech For Clarity
Focus on clarity in your speech by improving your public speaking skills. The tent poles of public speaking are practicing, preparing for negative outcomes, and using transitions. These tools will help you speak confidently and avoid fumbling concepts that need to be conveyed clearly.
Implement clear language and structure
When moving from one idea to another, clearly explain how the ideas intersect. In simpler terms, use transition sentences.
Use words such as “similarly” to shift between comparable ideas, explaining how the points are related. Inversely, use phrases like “On the other hand” or “Now let’s consider” between points that disagree with one another. Language such as this will help give your speech a clear structure that guides listeners, lowering the probability of losing engagement.
Prepare for negative responses
To minimize fear and anxiety around the presentation, imagine the worst possible scenario. Imagine that you tell a joke, and the audience’s response is crickets; it’s a momentum killer. However, by imagining these potential situations, you can prepare quick responses or follow-ups to maintain engagement even in bad conditions.
Build Stage Presence
Don’t simply stand still or hide behind a podium; develop stage presence for a killer presentation that engages your listeners.
Maintain eye contact
By far, the most important physical element of stage presence is eye contact. You don’t want to stare at the audience; that would come off as creepy. On the other hand, you don’t want to ignored the audience entirely.
We recommend finding three to five faces in different parts of the audience to shift your gaze between while you speak. Look at them like friends you haven’t seen in a long time and finally have the chance to catch up. This form of eye contact will feel organic, allowing your words to flow confidently and keep the audience’s attention by showing you value the topic.
Rely on your hands
Furthermore, don’t allow your nerves to sway your body; it communicates weakness. Keep your lower body still, and instead use hand gestures to emphasize points. For example, if a statistic or piece of information references an increase in growth, use your hands to illustrate what that increase was like, whether gradual or exponential.
Support With Engaging Handouts
Distributing materials is an easy way to engage listeners and help them follow along with your presentation. For example, presentation handouts strongly impact audience engagement by offering a valuable resource to help follow your speech.
Arguing for handouts
Some professionals believe presentation handouts distract audiences and make part of your speech meaningless since the audience already has some information. However, we believe handouts help the audience recall information and supply contact details for follow-ups.
Creating valuable handouts
To make great handouts, keep your presentation slides in mind. Don’t copy information from your slides one-to-one. Include content that is not in your presentation that adds further context to the information spoken about. The handout should be understandable apart from the presentation, intriguing the audience with enough bonus information to pay attention to the actual presentation.
Conclude On A Strong Note
At the end of your presentation, conclude on a note that the audience will remember, satisfying their efforts to stay engaged. Summarize the main points to have them stick in the audience’s mind. Focus on the most important beats, research, and initial purpose of the presentation to bring all the topics full circle. Convey a sense of finality to your audience that closes the presentation on a fulfilling note.