Designing Powerful Business Presentations from the Inside-Out and the Outside-In!
There is so much information out there about how to make great presentations that I have been reluctant to offer my insights into this avalanche of advice, but I keep getting asked about it and thought I better respond.
As a background, I have conducted approximately five hundred workshops or presentations in my career, and have designed about ninety of them. I have clear thoughts about what makes for great presentations and what ingredients are required to design and deliver them.
Let’s first be clear about what kind of presentation I am referring to. The goals of a sales presentation to a potential corporate client are very different from objectives of a best man giving a speech at a wedding, or even a CEO celebrating a successful year with his team. In most business presentations we try to explain how what we offer solves the customers’ (hereafter referred to as the ‘audience’) problem or meets their needs better than others and at a competitive price point. For the purpose of this post, I will assume if you are reading this you are interested in sales or business-related presentations. These presentations are designed to, for example, impress a potential client, or persuade a board of directors that your proposed path forward is the best one for the organization, or provide insight about effective healing strategies at a wellness conference, or convince skeptical employees that the new IT change program will eventually benefit everyone.
So, with that in mind, let’s identify the key challenges that a presenter faces in this context. I think it is best if we break this down into three main areas:
Challenges associated with the audience
Challenges connected to what I will refer to as the inner presenter or self, and,
Challenges associated with design
Here are some common challenges associated with the ‘Audience’ to your presentation:
Resistant audience with many choices who are not waiting for a decent presentation but a very convincing one before they will consider you
Distracted audience members, who may be even more distracted by the deficiencies in your delivery or argument
The difference between a poor presentation and a great one is primarily about the ‘Inner Presenter’ or Self:
Fear of public speaking
Lack of passion/conviction
Lack of presence (definition will follow below)
It is important to think of the ‘Design’ of your presentation as the way we translate ideas, purpose and passion into the words we will speak, the images we will share, and the emotions we will raise in our audience. The challenges of good ‘Design’ include:
The organization and clarity of your main arguments
Text dependency
These challenges have been covered by countless books, articles and blog posts so I am not going to cover them. Instead, I will focus on the following:
Misalignment with the audience’s needs
Linear logic over story telling
Poor design clarity
Let’s tackle each of these challenges in turn starting with the audience:
Challenge # 1. Audience
When you are in the role of convincing someone that your product, service or course of action is the right one, you are almost by default facing a resistant audience. In other words, their job is to make the right decision, and their necks are often on the line. That means they are going to need some convincing. How we overcome this resistance is the focus of the rest of this post. But it is important to be honest about this as a presenter.
Members of the audience may be distracted for any number of reasons including the following:
They are tired
They are anxious
They were told to be there
It’s not a decision that impacts their department or work directly
They have another candidate or solution in mind already
They don’t yet see the value of what you have to offer
And therein lies the great opportunity. One of the things that I have found very satisfying about presenting or facilitating is seeing people with blocked and disinterested body language shift into engagement during the course of my work. So, when you experience this early resistance or disengagement remember that it is normal, and a wonderful opportunity to change their minds.
Challenge # 2. Self
There is an old saying that goes like this: ‘wherever you go, there you are’. In other words, whatever you feel internally about yourself will show up in everything you do. This is why I have dedicated my life to helping people shift their mindset from one that holds them back to one that feeds their spirit and helps them dream big and achieve those dreams! This truism also applies to what kind of presenter you are. Let’s talk about the three factors I alluded to earlier:
Fear of public speaking
Lack of passion/conviction
Lack of presence
i. Fear of public speaking
There are hundreds of polls about the fears people have about public speaking. I recently came across a survey that claimed that 40% of people worldwide suffer from glossophobia, or a severe fear of speaking in public. In addition, 60% of respondents stated that their fear of public speaking had negatively impacted their careers. Another recent poll stated that the top things that people fear about public speaking are:
Being negatively judged
Forgetting what to say
Being asked a question for which they have no answer
A common solution posited by many experts is preparation and practice. Of course, I agree that practice and familiarity with your presentation are very important. However, I contend that practice doesn’t help very much if you are experiencing high levels of fear.
Let’s address each of these ‘fear factors’ (not the old tv show!) in order:
Being Negatively judged
My first piece of advice is about self-limiting beliefs that can manifest in different areas of our lives. We all have crafted stories about ourselves for good and for bad. Some of these stories are fear-based and do not serve us. We develop most of these self-limiting beliefs at a very early age and carry them with us throughout our lives. To understand self-limiting beliefs and how to stop them read my article entitled ‘Walking Around Mindfulness: How to Silence Intrusive Thoughts’. This practice can dramatically change your life if you are experiencing chronic self-doubts, including those associated with public speaking.
I will add that whenever you are trying to make a transformational change (glossophobia to loving public speaking), it is important to include somatic awareness and somatic practices. In other words, it involves holistic body-brain practices that generate significant change in how you think and feel about yourself in relation to the subject. This is beyond the scope of this blog but if you are interested in learning more about somatic practices reach out to me for a free coaching consultation.
My second piece of advice to combat the fear of public-speaking is to shift your orientation from you and your fears to serving your client, team or company. We are much braver and more effective when we are outward focused (instead of inward) during our presentation and during the design of our presentation. If you are fearful of public speaking, lean into the value you will bring to those in front of you. They are listening to you because they suspect that they need what you have to offer. So lean into that sense of service and purpose: it will make you braver.
This was a critical mindset shift for a client of mine who wanted to build social media videos into her business, but was terrified of doing so. We worked on overcoming her fears over a two-month period, and when she finally published her first video she shed tears of joy because it was something that had held her back for so long. She told me the biggest difference for her was intentionally shifting her focus to providing value to her clients. If she can do it – so can you!
This concept of service orientation leads into my third piece of advice in dealing with glossophobia, or lower-level anxiety around public speaking: passion. I will address passion below as a critical element of great presentations, but I will mention that the more you are connected with the passion and purpose of what you are doing, the braver and more effective you will be as a presenter. It goes hand in hand with point two’s emphasis on service orientation.
My fourth point, is that you must never assume what other people are thinking. I remember giving a presentation outlining the successful achievement of a quality improvement program that I had led for a company. All of the executives, and the entire three-hundred-person company, were in attendance. At one point I made a joke that was greeted with almost complete silence! In addition, I kept watching the owner and the executive team for any kind of reaction, worrying that I was not impressing them. At the end of my presentation the owner and the entire executive team, followed shortly by the rest of the company, gave me a standing ovation. I went from thinking I was dying out there, to pure exhilaration! You never know what someone else is thinking so don’t waste your time and energy trying to do so. If you catch yourself repeating my mistake, simply notice that you are projecting with fear based on no real data. Just breathe and let it go.
My final piece of advice around the fear of public speaking is to make friends with fear. I mean it. I have presented or facilitated hundreds of times, and you know what? I’ve been nervous every single time. Over the last year, I have rarely presented or facilitated because I’ve focused much more on my coaching - and I find myself missing it – especially that rush of fear! I learned early on in life through amateur wrestling that you can take fear and help it to sharpen you. I used my anxiety about presenting to be sharper, to bring more energy, and even to be a little funnier! You can use it too.
Forgetting What to Say
I’m being a little bit facetious here, but my response to this concern is usually ‘who cares’? In my years of facilitation I have made hundreds of mistakes or even lost my train of thought on occasion. But nobody ever knew about my mistakes – like forgetting an entire section of my workshop one day – because I wasn’t worried about it or drew attention to it. If you feel awkward and embarrassed when you forget something or make a mistake or stutter over your words, the audience will feel awkward. If on the other hand, you trust that the audience will leave with more than they came in with, they will not remember or care.
I will also add a perspective my coaching mentor once gave me. In coaching, our job is to be fully present with our clients, to listen at higher levels than most common social interactions. In fact, we practice and hone this ability. I remember during one conversation with my mentor, I told him that I had a bad memory and I liked to take notes during client sessions. He assured me that I “will remember what I most need to”. I didn’t trust this advice, but I did trust him and so I listened - and he was absolutely right. I think a similar concept applies to presentations. If you focus on the purpose and value of what you are presenting, you will find your way most of the time, even if you forget something. Remember, the presence and energy you provide your audience is often of equal or greater importance to whatever information or arguments you are trying to share.
Of course, leaving yourself enough time to practice your presentation and memorize what you can always helps. Additionally, you can create written or visual cues to keep you on track. I’m not a fan of most of the power point presentations I’ve seen over the years, but there is a right way to do it and a wrong way. If you limit your slides to include only key images or key words, you will provide your audience, and yourself, a cue to what you are talking about in that stage of the presentation.
Finally, I can’t tell you how many times and in how many different contexts I have talked about the power of deep breathing (finding a rhythm of breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth) for helping with everything from your emotional state, to interrupting intrusive thoughts, to creating a physiological state for optimal decision-making. It applies here too.
I recommend deep breathing before your presentation to calm your nerves and enhance your focus. I would also recommend deep breathing during your presentation, particularly if you find yourself in an awkward spot like forgetting what to say. This does not mean you sit on the floor with your legs crossed and hum! It just means you take a moment to focus on breathing in through the nose out through the mouth in a quiet way. This can be done in real time – I promise you! I do it all the time in my coaching and I have done it in the past in my training. You may find that if you take a couple of breaths, it will get you back on track and reenergized.
A Question You Don’t Have an Answer To
I love when this happens! Why? Because it turns into an opportunity to double-down on service, follow-up with someone, and demonstrate your problem-solving skills. People and potential clients appreciate that. It also makes you look human. I’ll repeat in this context something I stated earlier: if you act embarrassed, they will feel awkward; on the other hand, if you act with confidence and come from a service orientation they will like you even more.
Do not approach this situation as a problem or a failure. Confidently respond that it’s a wonderful question and you are going to follow up with them with a more detailed answer tomorrow at their convenience. Then you figure it out and respond to them. It is another contact moment; it is another chance to prove your problem-solving abilities, and a chance to demonstrate how much you value them.
ii. Passion
Without passion and conviction in what you are selling/persuading, you are just speaking words. Let me be blunt: you will not be an effective presenter if you do not project passion and conviction.
Some of you may be uncertain if you do or do not feel conviction about what you are doing. If this is the case, ask yourself these questions:
Do you believe in what you are selling/persuading?
If not, is there something you are missing? Have you truly tapped into the needs of the person or board or team in front of you? If not, maybe you should consider a new service/product/project. It is vitally important that you are clear on what you are meant to achieve in the presentation, and that what you offer will have a positive impact on the consumer, company or board. If you have doubts, so will they.
2. Are you inward or outward focused?
In other words, as you step up to make your presentation are you focused on how much you want this sale or project, or are you focused on the needs of the people in front of you? If the former, you will over time be less effective and less respected than if you are outward/service focused. Do you care about the person(s) you are persuading and their needs? Are you curious about who they are, what challenges they face, and what they most want? If not, your presentation message will be less effective than it could be, and you will be less impactful as a presenter.
A powerful way to generate passion for your presentation is to ‘activate’ your curiosity about your audience. You can choose to lean into curiosity and establish connections with the people in front of you. I would strongly recommend you do this before you even begin to design your presentation, and I would also choose to do it when you stand up there in front of your audience. Good questions to ask yourself include:
What are they thinking?
What do they need?
What is bothering them in their life or work?
What do they dream of?
iii. Presence
I love this word, and it has more than one meaning. On the one hand it refers to being fully in the now, or ‘present’, in the moment. If someone is speaking to you and you are thinking about your response rather than what they are saying, you are not present. To be present, means to be fully engaged in what you are doing or who you are with in the moment. You are listening to their words, you are conscious of their non-verbal communication, you are feeling their emotional state.
On the other hand, presence also can refer to the impact that you have on others. In simple terms, do the people you are trying to persuade genuinely like and trust you? This is the kind of presence – impactful presence – that I’m talking about in this case. What’s interesting is that I have found that presence in the moment greatly enhances our ability to have impactful presence with those we are communicating with. If you genuinely listen to those around you, you will ask smarter questions – and your audience will feel heard and understood. The more you are aware of their body language, and the greater your level of interest in who they are and what they want, the more effective you will be as a presenter.
There is a second factor that can affect your presence, or positive impact, on those you are trying to communicate with. I will refer to this as how ‘comfortable you are in your own skin’. This is a topic full of complexity and beyond the scope of this post. It is partially the focus of coaching work, which is always about what you want more of, but is sometimes specifically about becoming the best version of yourself. This in turn, alludes to personal transformation which takes time, effort, and a willingness to be vulnerable. What I will mention here is that the more you can lean into your strengths the better off you will be. Instead of focusing on what you think you are not, or what shortcomings you believe you have, bring your attention to what you believe you do well.
For example, you might be uncomfortable with story-telling but adept at data analysis. How can you find a story within the data that others might not be seeing? Conversely, you might be bored with data complexities but can always see the big picture. In this case, you might take a small piece of the data and weave a compelling story about why these statistics make it essential for the company to pivot in a new direction, or what this data really says about what consumers want.
There are two additional factors that affect your presence, or positive impact on those you are trying to communicate with, and you will notice I have already talked about them earlier in this post in a different context:
Do you believe in/feel passionate about what you are selling/persuading
Are you outward/service-focused or inward focused?
How do these factors affect presence or the positive impression you make on others? Simply put, passion and energy are contagious. You will never convince anyone of anything if you are only half-heartedly invested in what you are selling/persuading. The vast majority of human communication is non-verbal. We ‘feel’ what someone is saying as much as we ‘understand’ it. People in positions to make decisions are typically not fools either. They will have an uncanny sense of whether you are there for your own profit, or whether you genuinely care about their needs.
By the way, the two impulses are not mutually exclusive. If you are offering something of value, you deserve to be paid for it. But if that is your only motivation, your audience will know. It is important to emphasize that it is not enough to intellectualize this. It is not enough to simply say you care about your audience/consumer/board of directors – you have to genuinely feel it. If you are having trouble doing this, I once again encourage you to activate your curiosity about who they are as people, what challenges they face, and what dreams they have. When you activate this curiosity, you will translate that care, that interest, that empathy in non-verbal ways, and you will key in on what really matters to those you are trying to sell/persuade.
Challenge # 3. Design
We have seen how our passion and presence lend power and impact to our presentation. Now we will explore how the quality of our design feeds our presence, reduces our fear, and enhances our impact. I will also add that the level of our curiosity, as well as our attention (focus on service or self) similarly feeds the quality of our design and its potential impact. In other words, it is a reciprocal process as illustrated below:
We will build a better presentation when we focus on our strengths (both as a person/presenter and in terms of the product/service/guidance you are providing the audience), have a service orientation, and lean into our passion for what we are selling/persuading. Conversely, the clarity of our design and its alignment with the audience’s needs, will reduce our anxiety, feed our presence, and enhance our impact on the audience. Let’s explore these relationships below:
i. How a strengths orientation, service orientation, and passion for your message informs your design in powerful ways:
A strengths-based orientation can powerfully inform the content and style of our presentation. I already provided an example of this when I described the presenter who is great with data but weaker in story-telling focusing on sharing with his audience the significance of a piece of data that no one else sees.
A service orientation will also significantly impact what you choose to focus on in your design. If you are service-oriented you may have already dug deeper into your potential clients’ pain points, or the things that are really on the mind of attendees at a wellness conference. Armed with this knowledge you will focus your content on these areas that feel most compelling to your audience. Using the example of the Wellness Conference, you might have learned that many attendees are interested in grief coping strategies and you will lend your expertise to that topic. Or perhaps you are presenting to a large company that been successful for decades but is beginning to lose traction in their traditional market. As a result, your focus shifts to speaking about untapped markets and ways to reach them that the executives may not have fully considered.
A true service orientation may lead you to ask impromptu questions during the presentation as well. On many occasions I have noticed nodding heads in vigorous agreement to something I have said, or shaking heads expressing the opposite. Whether it’s positive or negative I’m always curious where those reactions are coming from, and I will bring it up in the moment by saying something like this: “I noticed you were shaking your head there. Please tell me more about what your thoughts and feelings on this point.”
I don’t care if they agree or disagree with what I just said; I just want to understand their point of view and I want to engage in a dialogue with them about it. Why? Because I genuinely believe that what I have to offer can help them. In my case, I believe people in our society limit themselves in ways that are not necessary, and I feel a passionate calling to help them be the best version of themselves.
When I do ask them about their thoughts and feelings, they feel heard, and I come to understand them better. Usually, when we talk it out, we realize that we share a general agreement on something, but there is a point of emphasis that is particularly important to them. Or, more commonly, they agree with the solution but feel they have unique challenges that prevent them from doing what I advise. This is wonderful! Because it gives me an opportunity to dive into the topic in more detail, and more times than not if we problem-solve I turn someone who wasn’t on board with me, into someone who is passionately on board with me! If they had not expressed disagreement – or I had chosen not to address it - I would never have known, and the opportunity to engage them would have passed unnoticed.
ii. How Audience-Alignment and Design Clarity Feed your Impact as a Presenter
Audience Alignment
Put simply: the presentation is about your audience, not you. People always say that what you are really selling in a sales scenario is you – and there is a lot of truth to this. However, your presentation design must reflect a deep understanding of what your client actually needs: such as, what the board is afraid of, or what is really on the minds of agents attending a real estate conference (hint: interest rates!).
Here's an example. You are presenting to a board of directors about the future of the company. They are seeing threats on every side and are mostly thinking about preserving their current market share and not going out of business. You could choose to focus on why you are the right person to lead the next five years, and all of your plans for regaining lost market share. But this may fall on deaf ears. What they really want is to be less afraid and perhaps even see a beam of sunlight through the freezing rain (yes, I’m from Canada!).
So, you start the presentation by first outlining the conservative way forward, indicating the risks, the meagre rewards, and ending with a picture of a group of sailors in high seas frantically bailing out water. You then present the opportunities that they have been afraid to consider and you emphasize the need to be daring and shift resources to underpromoted products in new markets. You offer a different path of smart risk, agile decision-making, and larger returns on investment. You end with the visual of a ship at sea sailing into the rising sun. Instead of giving them what they expect, you show why one path is limited and the other is full of hope and possibility. There is no guarantee in this scenario that the board agrees of course, but you will have made a unique impression they will not soon forget and you have increased your chance of success.
A Note About Story-Telling
I would add that one of the problems with business presentations is that they tend to be very linear and facts oriented. I think people do that because they think that is what the boss or the company want – and in some cases they may be right. However, in my experience storytelling, painting an image, generating hope and excitement, are the tools of smart business presenters. You may have noticed that I have used the term ‘audience’ throughout this post in reference to your clients, or boards, or teams. That is not a mistake. It is meant to emphasize the mindset you should take both in the design and delivery of your presentation. You are there to inform, but also to convince – and you can’t convince if you don’t generate feelings in them. We convince through sharing compelling stories, generating emotions, showing contrasts, and confidently suggesting the best path forward.
Design Clarity
Design clarity refers to two areas of design:
1. Your alignment with your audience’s needs and how that is communicated in your choice of content and delivery (as illustrated in the example above).
I have already spoken at length about audience alignment, so I won’t elaborate here. I will just emphasize that understanding the needs of your audience critically shapes the content you choose to share, and the methods by which you deliver it (for example: the contrasting images of the ship at sea as described above).
2. The certainty of your message, which springs from the level of conviction you have about the value of that message
When you believe in what you are selling/delivering/guiding, it makes your design choices simple. You do not have to waffle about what you include or exclude from your presentation, because you are focused on what you can offer that serves the client’s needs in meaningful ways.
Operationalizing Design Clarity
So, how do we achieve design clarity? A simple rule is to ask yourself these three questions with each piece of potential content:
Do I believe that what I’m including for content has inherent value?
Do I believe that what I’m including aligns with the audience’s needs?
How do I best communicate #1 and #2
Let’s distinguish what I mean here through an example:
Do I believe in what I’m including for content:
Henry is presenting a new water purification system to an industry conference and is hoping to convince retail outlets and technicians that although the system costs a little bit more, the quality of the system, its advanced self-cleaning technology, and the durability of its components will lead to happy customers and brand loyalty. What is more, although the average consumer will buy less of these systems than inferior products over the course of their lifetime, once it is in their home they will be committed to its use. The retailer will enjoy ongoing revenue streams from expansion of the system within the home or office, and purchase of the organic filter pellets which will need to be removed and replaced every three months. What is more, by using this system, consumers and outlets will participate in saving the planet from millions of tons of plastic – something Henry personally believes is very important. Henry believes that people are hungry for a return to well-made domestic products rather than cheaply made imports, and he is passionate about the employment opportunities this provides in his community.
Do I believe my content aligns with my audience’s needs:
Henry has done some preliminary research and even sent a pre-conference poll out to attendees asking them questions about their business challenges, environmental beliefs, and what they are hoping to find answers to at the conference. He’s learned that most of the retail outlets are discouraged by cheaply made products and are tired of endless complaints from customers. The service call represents a revenue stream but not enough to offset the growing disinterest of private and corporate consumers in water purification products. They are worried about the sustainability of their business, and they would be delighted to find a product that actually delivers on its promises of quality and ease of use. Henry’s poll has demonstrated that most business owners are not overly concerned about plastic use, but they do see an opportunity to market the ‘environmental angle’ to consumers. They also expressed disappointment that the ‘self-cleaning technology’ did not alleviate the need for filter pellets – one respondent even asked ‘what’s the point of the self-cleaning technology then?’.
This information is gold! It clearly illuminates the target audience’s fears, pains, hopes, and confusion about Henry’s product solution. He’s also learned that he will not lead with the environmental benefit of the product, and although he will still cover it, he will emphasize how this helps the retail outlet sell the product to private and corporate consumers. Also, Henry knows enough about people to recognize that any discussion of water filtration systems might lack a little punch, even for those that make it their business. This means he has to bring energy and certainty about the product to the heart of his presentation. He will focus on the benefits for retailers who choose to return to well-made products after years of poorly made foreign products and the reputational harm that has caused them.
How do I best communicate #1 and #2:
a) Henry will begin his presentation with a story about when he first started in the industry and how excited he was about working in an industry that protected peoples’ health and provided a great opportunity for success. He will then share how he became disillusioned with poorly made products and what led him on this incredible journey to develop a better home-grown system. He will show pictures from his design phase in the back of his garage and then a brand-new factory space, and finally a photo of his first customer. From that moment, Henry will say, he had a mission, and he wants to share that mission with the rest of the audience to make it their mission too.
This beginning incorporates storytelling, contrast between good and poor quality, imagery and emotion, and a call to action.
b) He’ll then talk about consumer disengagement, predatory business practices that are harming their reputations, and back it all up with hard data.
Henry is describing the current state of the industry, offering statistics (always include statistics when you can, but this should not be the majority of your presentation!), and appealing to some of the feelings, frustrations, and fears that are already in the room.
c) Henry will now paint a picture of a different path forward, one that includes pride in the product, ease of use and installation, and a far higher quality of water filtration. He’ll mention data about foreign interests buying up plots of land for cattle and gaining ownership over local water supplies, and he’ll talk about the degradation of public water quality, and the damage water bottling companies are doing to the planet. Henry will suggest that access to clean water is no longer a given, even in this country. Then Henry confidently yells out that he is hoping that together they can change the future for the better!
While outlining some of the current risks in the industry, he paints a confident path forward – an alternative vision – and tries to connect with his audience on an emotional level.
d) Henry will then move into the benefits, costs, ROI, and all the other data it is important to share, but it will be a taste only. It is enough to show that his solution is tangible and full of opportunity, but he wants a chance to talk to people in small groups or one-on-one to go over these details. The presentation is about inviting the audience to have conversations with him, not explaining every detail of his model.
Henry is sharing the basics of how his business model works to show his legitimacy, but also to encourage conversations where he has a chance to really connect with people and sell his product.
e) Henry will explain the positive environmental impact of his system with data, and share a story about how he made a deal with a large corporate client by emphasizing the security, reliability and environmental sustainability of his solution.
Henry has already determined that most of his audience does not place environmentalism as high in their priorities as he does, but he wants to outline the marketing value inherent in his environmentally sustainable filtration system. He also employs storytelling again.
f) Henry will end the presentation by thanking the audience for their open hearts and open ears, and that he is incredibly excited for the conversations they will have between now and the end of the conference. He will tell them he has already reached out to each attendee with an email introducing himself, and he can’t wait to forge new connections and change the industry for the better together!
Henry ends with an emotional connection, a call to action, and surprises everyone in the room by sharing he has been proactive enough to already reach out to them to answer any questions they might have. This demonstrates Henry’s initiative, diligence, and service orientation.
Hopefully, you understand from this example how your insights about your audience needs and your belief in your product/service/guidance can shape the content you choose to include in your presentation. Our fictional Henry, would have rocked it!
I know, I know, it is a lot of work isn’t it? I encourage you to do it nonetheless! When you take the time up front to do it right, you will save time, energy, confusion, and make a bigger impact on your audience.
Of course, the example I gave above is a complex one and many of you will not have the time, or access to a poll, or other audience information, that Henry did. That is normal, that is fine. However, I am sure you can have a conversation with someone in your industry and pick their brain, make a best guess about what is important to conference attendees based on previous experience, or have a sense of what a consumer considering your product really wants. The key is to be intentional about communicating with the audience in ways that solve their problems, engage their interest, challenge their assumptions, and energize them into action.
The great thing about presenting is that the more you present, the easier it is to find your own style, and the more your confidence will grow. Good luck out there – you can do it!
