when you're boring them to death with slide after slide, drowning them with facts and logic, force-feeding them with all the content YOU want to tell them.
Every single business person I have coached--CEOs, key execs, marketing, sales and technical presenters, professionals, entrepreneurs--has been in audiences when they've experienced these horrible speeches and presentations. Yet, they are poised to do the same to their audiences!
The good news is that they don't want to do the same and that's why they've come to me for help. I tell them to keep these three tactics in mind:
1) Talk about what the audience wants to hear. No matter how much you want to include something, if you can't honestly say that the specific audience you'll be speaking to wants to hear that, skip it.
2) All audiences are comprised of human beings with human brains that respond to variety. All facts all the time turn them off. Get into the non-linear, creative side of the brain (the right brain) and have a bit of fun. Show a cartoon or illustration that makes people chuckle (you don't have to be funny, the cartoon will do it for you.) Pick one idea and dramatize it with your voice, pauses, and a bit of body language.
3) Give the audience something to do after they've heard you. This is what gives the audience a return on their investment--some action, some step, something specific that makes them say "I listened to so-and-so and then I did such-and-such."
Shaking up your audience isn't hard to do when you shake up your own beliefs about speaking and presentations. A little fun and unexpectedness goes a long way towards getting a great response from your audiences.
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