Every one of us has the ability to be truly great as a presenter. There is nothing particularly special about the people who stand out as brilliant. However, the average presenter is usually holding themselves back, doing things which prevent them from being good.

At every training course run by The Presentation Business we spend some time debating what makes a great presenter. This inevitably leads to a discussion of what the bad presenters do wrong. Having kept a record of what these sessions considered I have been able to produce a definitive list of what to do to make your presentations great.

The overwhelming conclusion of all these discussions is: content is NOT important. Of the hundreds of people who have debated what makes a great presenter not a single person has mentioned the value of the content. Your audiences are likely to think in just the same way. They are NOT interested in what you are saying, but the way you are saying it. If you say it well, that appears to make the content interesting. But what this means is, if you concentrate your planning and preparation on content, you are likely only to be average.

The most important factor for great presenters according to our discussions is that they make a personal connection to every member of the audience. This means lots of eye contact, liberal use of the words ‘I’ and ‘you, and that everything you deliver is done form the audience’s perspective. This means you need to know a great deal about your audience in

The overwhelming conclusion of all these discussions is: content is NOT important. Of the hundreds of people who have debated what makes a great presenter not a single person has mentioned the value of the content. Your audiences are likely to think in just the same way. They are NOT interested in what you are saying, but the way you are saying it. If you say it well, that appears to make the content interesting. But what this means is, if you concentrate your planning and preparation on content, you are likely only to be average.

The most important factor for great presenters according to our discussions is that they make a personal connection to every member of the audience. This means lots of eye contact, liberal use of the words ‘I’ and ‘you, and that everything you deliver is done form the audience’s perspective. This means you need to know a great deal about your audience in

The most important factor for great presenters according to our discussions is that they make a personal connection to every member of the audience. This means lots of eye contact, liberal use of the words ‘I’ and ‘you, and that everything you deliver is done form the audience’s perspective. This means you need to know a great deal about your audience in

The most important factor for great presenters according to our discussions is that they make a personal connection to every member of the audience. This means lots of eye contact, liberal use of the words ‘I’ and ‘you, and that everything you deliver is done form the audience’s perspective. This means you need to know a great deal about your audience in advance so you can do this.

The connection you make between yourself and your audience seems to be enhanced by the widespread use of examples. Our discussions at training courses show that your audience expects you to ‘show’ rather than ‘tell’. In other words, you don’t need to give them ‘messages’ and ‘content’; instead you need to give them lots of examples and they will work out the message for themselves.

A further element of this aspect of being a great presenter is that these examples should always include you. Your audience wants to know about your thoughts, your feelings and your opinions. They want to share your experiences. If all you deliver is content, this does not help your audience. They could get your content from a book, a web site or some other non human contact. The fact that you are presenting to them means your audience wants to hear from you personally.

Your audience also wants you to be a living person. They don’t want to hear from a statue. In other words you need to be active. The discussions held at our training courses show time and time again that presenters who move are the one who gain the most attention. If you think about this, it is quite understandable. In social situations we are active – we use gestures, we move our bodies and change posture. To avoid doing so when presenting makes you look abnormal and this serves to disconnect you. There is also a big advantage to moving – it helps reduce nerves when presenting.

As well as moving to be natural, our discussions show that great presenters are interactive. They ask questio