How can presentations help you stand out as a consultant?

1 Know your audience

Before you start designing your presentation, you need to understand who you are speaking to and what they expect from you. Your audience may have different backgrounds, goals, needs, and preferences, and you need to tailor your presentation accordingly. For example, if you are presenting to a technical audience, you may want to use more data, facts, and evidence, while if you are presenting to a creative audience, you may want to use more stories, visuals, and emotions. You also need to consider the context, purpose, and format of your presentation. Is it a formal or informal setting? Is it a pitch, a proposal, or a report? Is it a live, recorded, or online presentation? Knowing your audience will help you craft a presentation that resonates with them and meets their expectations.

2 Plan your structure

Once you have a clear idea of who you are speaking to and why, you need to plan the structure of your presentation. A good structure will help you organize your ideas, guide your audience, and keep them engaged. A simple and effective structure is to follow the three-part formula of introduction, body, and conclusion. In the introduction, you need to grab your audience's attention, introduce yourself and your topic, and state your main message and objectives. In the body, you need to develop your main points, support them with evidence and examples, and link them to your message and objectives. In the conclusion, you need to summarize your main points, restate your message and objectives, and end with a call to action or a recommendation.

3 Design your slides

Your slides are not your presentation, but they are an important tool to support your presentation. Your slides should complement your speech, not duplicate or distract from it. Therefore, you need to design your slides with clarity, simplicity, and consistency. Clarity means that your slides should have a clear purpose, message, and layout. Simplicity means that your slides should have minimal text, graphics, and colors. Consistency means that your slides should have a uniform style, font, and theme. You can use tools like PowerPoint, Keynote, or Google Slides to create your slides, but remember to follow some basic principles of design, such as contrast, alignment, repetition, and proximity.

4 Deliver with confidence

The final step to make your presentation stand out is to deliver it with confidence. Confidence is not something that you have or don't have, but something that you can build and improve with practice and preparation. Confidence also comes from knowing your topic, your audience, and your slides well. To deliver your presentation with confidence, you need to pay attention to your verbal and nonverbal communication. Verbal communication includes your tone, volume, pace, and clarity of speech. Nonverbal communication includes your eye contact, posture, gestures, and facial expressions. You also need to be ready to handle questions, feedback, and technical issues that may arise during your presentation.

Presentations are a powerful way to showcase your skills and value as a consultant. By following these tips, you can create and deliver presentations that impress your audience and help you stand out from the crowd.

5 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?