7 Common Presentation Mistakes to Avoid

If you’re going to create a presentation, it’s important to keep the audience engaged and interested in the topic. These 7 mistakes can take away audience engagement and effectively bore them if you’re not careful.

1. Not Checking The Equipment

Failure to check the equipment and practice the presentation beforehand can lead to failure with the audience. To prevent this, rehearse the presentation before it’s time to present, run the projector before using it in front of an audience, carry an extra bulb for the projector in case one burns out, and check the room you’ll be presenting in to make sure the lighting won’t have any effect on the presentation.

2. Under-preparation

You can include great bullet points on a presentation and have them completely memorized, but what happens when an audience member asks a question you don’t know how to answer? This is a sign of under-preparation. In some cases, it’s a good idea to research beyond the amount of written content in the presentation.

3. Reading Directly From the Slides

So you’ve written a large amount of content on every slide, and plan to read it to the audience. This is probably one of the most guaranteed ways to bore the audience, and quickly. Instead, Jason Hartman recommends including a few simple but relevant bullet points and expanding upon them throughout the presentation.

4. Not Making Slides Readable

Presenting a large amount of text in small font may seem reasonably readable while creating the presentation, but when being shown in a large room of people, can you guarantee they’ll be able to read it from the back row? If not, you should reconsider.

5. Overdoing Slides

If you have 50 to 100 slides, the audience is likely to get bored quickly and start wondering when the presentation is going to end. Depending on the complexity of the subject you’re presenting, 10 to 12 slides is usually a good amount.

6. Design Flaws

Color and design of every slide is important. For the best results, avoid loud colors, pictures, and animations which will distract the audience from the point of your presentation.

7. Padded Presentations

Padding is the enemy of good presentations. For the best results, get right to the meat of the subject. Your audience will thank you for it. By padding information to create a longer presentation, perhaps to fill a time slot, will take away from the presentation. Fight longer time slots if you don’t need them, or incorporate audience engagement to take up the extra time.

Interested in the ways presenting and public speaking can benefit you? Read Become an Expert with Public Speaking to learn more. (Top Image: Flickr | Alexstaubo)

The Speaking of Wealth Team