Tips to Create and Deliver an Engaging Presentation

Writing and delivering a presentation in any setting can be a daunting task.

You want to make sure that your presentation is informative, engaging, and memorable. But how do you do that?

Here are a few tips on how to create an engaging presentation:

• Be enthusiastic. Your enthusiasm will be contagious, and it will help to keep your audience engaged.

• Know your audience. Who are you presenting to? What are their interests and needs? Tailor your presentation to your audience's interests, and make sure that you are speaking in a language that they can understand. If you are much more knowledgeable in the topic being discussed, make sure to explain, define, and take a sense check throughout your talk to ensure you aren’t losing anyone.

• Have a clear purpose. What do you want your audience to learn or do after your presentation? Make sure that you have a clear goal in mind, and that your presentation is structured in a way that will help you achieve that goal. This may take some discipline as you may find that some of your favorite elements of your presentation have to be removed if they aren’t serving the clear goal that you’ve defined. For each slide, ask the tough question if this one serves the goal. If not, remove it. You’ll find a much more effective presentation will emerge.

• Tell stories. People love stories. Drive home the elements in your presentation by linking them to a funny or interesting story. Making your topics relatable and repeatable will lead to them being more memorable.

• Use Music. Adding “walk-up” music after you are introduced can help set the tone. Adding a background track to one of your stories can help create a memorable environment. By repeating and linking an ear worm of a track to your talk can force your attendees to think of your presentation every time that song comes on the radio. This will require a small bit of logistics with your AV or production team — but an easy value-add to the impact of your overall message.

• Be interactive. Ask questions, encourage discussion, and get your audience involved in your presentation. This will help to keep them engaged and make them feel like they're part of the conversation. Why hold questions until the official Q&A at the end of your session? Encourage the audience to jump in at any time. Or stop ten minutes in and honestly ask for questions. Most attendees don’t want to be first to ask a question. They are used to presenters stopping and seeing if there are questions and most expect there not to be. It would help if you sincerely ask them to participate.

  • As a side note, don’t be afraid to plant questions in the audience through a trusted colleague that is there as well. Let them know you are trying to build interactivity and use your plant to get the conversation going. You may not need to use them, but it would be nice to know that you already know the question (and the answer of course) to the first one getting things going.

• Use visuals. As mentioned in our “Presentation Tips for Speaking at Your Next Conference” article, visuals can help to break up your presentation and make it more appealing. But visuals to reinforce the talking points are far more effective than words. The attendees are coming to learn from you, not your slide deck. Impactful visuals that you tie directly to each point will make your points more memorable.

• Be enthusiastic. Yes, we repeated this one. It is too important. Your enthusiasm will be noticeable and infectious. Even the most dull topics can benefit from a presenter that is excited about the content.

• Practice, practice, practice! The more you practice, the more confident you'll feel on the day of your presentation. This step also helps with your enthusiasm. Being confident about your presentation will add to your engagement with the audience.

• Take Your Attendees on a Journey. This can be as complex as an interactive road trip filled with metaphors and analogies or as simple as explaining the path that you’re going to follow in the introduction, checking back in with attendees on the way, and wrapping up in a memorable summary.

• Use humor. Humor can help to break up your presentation and make it more enjoyable for your audience. Just be sure to use humor appropriately and avoid anything that could be offensive.

• End with a call to action. Tell your audience what you want them to do after your presentation. How can they apply what they have learned to their lives outside of the meeting room? Do you want them to sign up for a newsletter, donate to a particular charity, research the topic and report back to you in a week, or simply apply any of the ideas you delivered in their work lives.

By following these tips, you can create an engaging presentation that will leave your audience feeling inspired and motivated. And noting how the attendees feel as they are leaving your presentation or your event is crucial to their likelihood to take action on what they have learned, continue to spread the message, and return to your next event or presentation.

I’d love to chat with you about these and other ways that our Equinox Audio Visuals team can help you improve your presentations. reach out to us through our email — info@equinoxaudiovisuals.com — or by hitting the Contact Us button below.