Practical tips. Prompts to get you thinking. The odd rant.

  Good question! Seriously, if you’re giving some thought to your audience’s likely questions, you’re way ahead of many other presenters. Whilst it’s essential to prepare your material and yourself, there’s much more to a successful presentation than the ‘ME show’. Failing to prepare for your audience – and their questions – is preparing to… Read more

  In his best-selling book, ‘Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion’, Professor Robert Cialdini sets out six ways to influence others: Liking Reciprocity Social proof Commitment and consistency Scarcity Authority Based on participants’ questions in my workshops on topics such as presentations, communication or – surprise – influencing and persuading*, the last of the six can… Read more

Q: Is it…that funny video? Your pointer that lights up? Maybe it’s slide #1? Or your last slide? The ‘killer infographic’? Could it be the amazing way you’ve got the room all set up? Or the whizzy interactive app? A: None of the above. It’s YOU, [your name goes here]. Yes, great visuals can help…. Read more

  Just because you wrote your presentation – (OK, most of it. Or your bit if it’s a team effort) – don’t think you needn’t rehearse. Creating your content and delivering your presentation are two very different things. Ask anyone who’s ever overlooked that point – like the social media bigwig who flew in to… Read more

Something that I cover in ‘How to influence and persuade’ is taking the time and effort to understand how people take in information and then decide. Most of us have a preference for either the big picture or the detail. So, there are some of us who just ‘want the headline’ or the top 3… Read more

“What, presentation tips from my Gran?!” No. Not quite. Presentation tips from the ancient Greeks: specifically for this post, from Aristotle (384 – 322 B.C.). The philosopher has some handy presentation tips for us that have survived remarkably well down the years. To influence and persuade an audience, he said, we need to achieve the… Read more

Make sure all the words in your visuals can be read easily. Thanks to my friend Andie Hemming for this one. Now it might sound like common sense…but it isn’t common practice. Andie and I heard – and struggled to see – some very clever people give presentations recently, and that was how I tested… Read more

“When you’re creating a presentation, what’s the first thing you do? Do you fire up your last presentation?” Whenever I put this question to the participants in Zoomly’s ‘How to write presentations’ workshop, there are a few expressions of ‘yup, that’s me’. And right there is a tip to take away and apply. There’s a… Read more

So you’ve been asked to do a presentation – good for you, particularly if you’re relatively new to this and see the request as a great opportunity to step up. (More experienced? Hang on in there, even you may find some helpful tips here.) Q: What’s the first thing you’re going to do? A: Fire… Read more

Image by clearviewstock (Philip Morley) We’ve all heard of the ‘elevator pitch’, right? And we’re all way too cool for school to be bothered doing anything quite so, well, ‘salesy’ (ew!) Oh grow up. Pssst: if you’re doing a presentation, on some level, at some point, with some people, you’re going to be selling –… Read more