10 presentation habits to avoid

Presentation Habits

BusinessWeek carried an article about what business people consider the 10 worst or most annoying or distracting habits presenters do while presenting. And they compiled a list. If you’re compose your investor presentation, you need to consider these. There are presentation gaffs that you will see time and again. It takes a little discipline, but it is worth it for you and your audience.

1. Reading from Notes – Use notes as a support, but know what you’re going to say without them
2. Avoiding eye Contact with the audience – Need to look at people 90% of the time
3. Reciting Bullet: Similar to reading notes- kills the energy of a presentation – rule of thumb no bullet more than 4 words across and not more than 6 bullets to a page
4. Speaking for too long: average audience has a 18 minutes attention span
5. Failing to excite: give the audience a reason to care
6. Poor endings: summarise the presentation, but leave the audience with a single message.
7. Fidgeting, jiggling, swaying – very distracting from the message
8. Fail to rehearse: be sure of the content and know how and when to deliver it
9. Dressing down – Look sharp
10. Standing to attention: Be animated while speaking; use your body, hands, etc to reinforce the message

10 Simple Secrets of the World’s Greatest Business Communicators-Carmine Gallo presentation coach and former Emmy-award winning television journalist

Download this and keep to hand, when you’re preparing your next presentations. Particular when meeting an investor. It takes so long to get that meet, you want to make sure that you get the most from it. Avoiding annoying the audience with silly mistakes is a good start.

Download a print version, here↓

10 presentation habits to avoid