What’s your point?

If you’ve been asked to make a presentation or you’re planning a pitch to a potential client, where do you start?

Start with the end in mind

What do you want your presentation or pitch to achieve?

What is that big takeaway for your audience?

Once that is crystal clear, every part of your presentation needs to keep that in mind.

Who is your audience?

The better you know your audience, the more able you will be to tailor what you say to their needs and expectations.

A professional speaker usually asks the meeting organiser for this information, to ensure their speech is on target.  If you do the same, you’ll not only deliver a better presentation, but you’ll also be remembered for your attention to detail.  That means that you’ll be asked to speak again by that meeting organiser.

What do you want to say?

You will have some key facts, ideas, information that you want to get across to your audience.  Now you need to look at each of these things and think about how each impacts your audience and make notes of that. 

What will they get or how will they benefit from each of your points?

Remember that your presentation is about the audience, not you, so you need to present each fact, idea or piece of information in a way that they can relate to.

Story structure

All good stories have a beginning, a middle and an end – and so do good presentations.

Typically a presentation has no more than 5 parts:

1.      Introduction: Setting the scene
2.    Key point 1: The first issue you want to present
3.      Key point 2: The second issue you want to explore
4.      Key point 3: The third and final issue you want to outline
5.      Summary/Conclusion/Call to action

When you’re planning your presentation, map out each of these and what you want to include.  This might include statistics, graphs, charts, stories, case studies, theory, models, etc.

The visual elements can go on a slide deck, but don’t fall into the trap of putting all your notes on the screen – then people will read rather than listen.  That’s not as effective in getting your point across.

Rehearse

You should know your stuff – or you shouldn’t be making the presentation, but there are bound to be some nerves, especially if you’re not used  to presenting.  If nothing else practise your opening.  And your closing.

There’s nothing worse than someone arriving on the platform and saying “Er, thank you for inviting me, er, I’m [your name] and I’ll be talking about [your subject] today.”  Firstly, that’s the fastest way to disengage your audience and secondly, someone else should already have introduced you.

Instead, start with a challenging question, a big fact that will make them sit up and take notice or an outrageous statement.

The same applies to your close – your job is to get them to take action and DO something, not nod and clap politely.

Finishing with “I think that’s it, then. Thank you,” is a weak close.

Tell them what you want them to remember and inspire them to action.  If you haven’t rehearsed, there’s a high chance that you’ll forget the key thing you want them to takeaway.

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Remember, if you’ve been asked to present or pitch, it’s because you’ve been identified as someone who has a strong message.  Don’t abuse the privilege by ‘winging it’!