If you follow the presentation tips here, you’ll have an audience that pays attention.

We’ve all been to conferences and workshops where the speaker had good information to share but something was lost in the presentation. If you’re asked to present, here are some tips to help make your presentation memorable.

1. Provide us with a quick update about your background. We want to know what makes you an expert and why we should listen to you. Then move on and give the presentation because that’s why we are here.
2. Respect the time schedule. We want to hear what you have to say, but when you go over your time limit, you make us antsy. We’re thinking about getting to the next session, or even the restroom.
3. Speak to the audience, not the screen, which ties directly to the next tip.
4. Don’t use so many slides that we don’t get to focus on you. Do use enough slides to give us visuals and another means to understand the topic. If you’re simply reading from the slides, you could have sent us the presentation to read on our own time.
5. Use the microphone. Room acoustics can be challenging. For many of us our hearing isn’t what it used to be.
6. Leave time for questions. No matter how much information you share with us, we’ll still have questions.

If you follow these tips, you can be sure your audience will not only learn but will enjoy learning.