Secret Ingredients of a Powerful Presentation

Has this ever happened to you that even after giving the best presentation, your client was still not impressed? You had spent day and night and chose the best PowerPoint Presentation Template Design. You had toiled to gather all those facts and presented the information in the easiest way that you could. You researched your competitors and offered the most competitive services and then also, you missed cracking that deal.

Graphitales, a Presentation Design Agency surveyed its clients and corporate professionals to find out what it takes to make your presentation more impactful and leave your audience spellbound. After receiving a tremendous response from various industry professionals, we have curated the best ones for you.

Here you go:

“Use infographics and videos to tell a compelling story,” said Adhish Mehrotra, Director-Marketing & Communications, Conduent Business Services. No doubt, storytelling is a new interesting trend in marketing and brands are using this powerful tool to tell their story of success. It builds an emotional connection between the presenter and the audience which leads to easy sales.

“The connection between your offerings and problems is very essential. A few lines to educate your audience before addressing the problem always helps,” said Alok Ranjan, Manager – Strategic Alliances & Business at NDTV Gadgets 360. It is very important to identify the needs or problems of the client prior to presenting them something. Once you know the Achilles heel then, it would be easier for you to convince them and provide them with the right solution.

“Brevity, clarity, innovation, seamless flow of thoughts and ideas, interactive and interesting and should have examples from real life in storytelling style,” said Ashish Kumar, Deputy Producer, WION, Zee Media Ltd. We second that. Real-life examples or case studies make your audience believe that you have the right experience and depth of knowledge about the subject. It gives them confidence that you can relate to their situation and understand their needs better.

“Absolute command of your subject. A great talking voice, good sense of humour and the ability to create engaging PowerPoint presentations which is an art in itself,” said Ivan Bayross, Author and Digital Marketing Evangelist. He had also recommended a book titled “How to create TED Worthy Presentation Slides”. This book is available on Kindle and talks about the presentation secrets of the best TED presenters today.

“Clarity of thoughts, Quality of content and articulation, right body language and confidence of the speaker,” said Nitin Sharma, Senior Manager – Corporate Marketing & Engagement, American Express. From interviews to the Presentations in board rooms, these are the basics required everywhere. Believing in yourself is the key.

“Succinct, minimalist design, subject-oriented, not preachy, data specific,” said Paulami Roy, Senior Manager – Marketing Communication, Reliance Energy. She also suggested content visualisation and focus on making it self-explanatory. Gone are the days of boring statistics. Now, due to time constraints, audiences prefer infographics to understand the facts at a glance.

“Keeping the profile and comfort of the targeted audience in mind, my journey with words, graphics and technology begin. Sometimes one minute video would suffice and at others 30 seconds animation triggered by touch which requires a robust setup,” said Praful Baweja, Marketing Technologist, Diversity & Inclusion Evangelist, Serial Innovator & Event Curator. He also emphasised on making the presentation impactful by weighing in the basics of Who, What, When, Where and Why to unfold the multiple possibilities beautifully.

“Know your audience and use recent examples or industry happenings to elucidate your point. A good starting and impactful ending are what people remember,” said Reby Abraham, Lead-Corporate Communication at a leading blockchain firm. He also added that recording and hearing your own presentation often gives the presenter an idea about the possible questions which can be asked during the presentation. Undoubtedly, it’s a very useful tip and will also help in gaining more confidence and clarity on the subject.

“It’s very important that your speech or presentation is not one-sided. Involving the audience and making it a little interactive will make you and your speech more interesting to them,” said Sumanto Ray, National Creative Head (VP) at Hindustan Media Ltd.

“Similar but different,” said Vanky Kenny Kataria, an award-winning speaker for India who has been featured in many magazines such as Huffington Post, MSN, Entrepreneur etc.  He suggested using the same background in all the slides with different infographics on different slides to prove your point. A screenshot of your display screen of an object made in 2D or 3D software can also be used for this purpose. Going one step further a little video of 15-30 seconds can be eye-catchy as well. Furthermore, using the logo of the company and the social media handles at the bottom of the slides is highly recommendable. “It makes the user feel they are going through a journey with you through your presentation. It makes it look and feel coherent, consistent and compelling.”

Media Professional, Orator or Marketing Guru, everyone has one thing to say. Know your audience, research their problematic areas, illustrate the examples from real life, provide the right resolution with confidence and check their responses from time to time. This will allow you to make instant changes as per the situation and meet the needs of a client, if required and save you from rejection. Moreover, subtle use of infographics, short videos, eye-soothing colours, creative designs, interesting GIFs and animations are important to keep your audience engaged and wide awake.

So, next time when you will get a round of applause for your presentation by following these useful tips then don’t forget to thank us later.

If you have some other suggestions or feedback then you may leave a comment below. We would love to hear your views.