What The Electrical Conference Taught Me About Presentation

Last month I was 3 days at the electrical engineers conference in Zadar town (Croatia). There were more than 600 participants and it was important for me to see and hear what’s new, exchange experience and to meet some new people.

Although I have no intention to bother you with technical details, which nobody cares around here, what inspired me to write this post is my vision of the speaker who attracts attention and encourages the discussion.

The first two days we had lectures and the third was joint boat trip along the coast of the Adriatic Sea (pictures at the end). 😉

Just to get the feeling, lectures were all day from 8 am to 6 pm, and there were around 20 speakers with different topics. Each speaker had about 30 minutes for his presentation.

The quality of a good speaker

Although the topics can seem interesting (on the paper), if it’s not transferred convincing enough to the audience, ends in failure and disappointment.

As they say ‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder‘, speakers that have attracted the most attention in my eyes, but as well as the most of the audience, had:

1. Dynamic tone of speech

Amazing how monotonous tone of voice can be boring. And the worst combination is quiet monotonous tone of voice. Man, that puts me in a sleep.

I little observed the people during such speeches and their gestures say it all. Some of them scratch, another yawn, and most look to mobile phones. I guess the last ones are somehow the most polite.

What do you think, how one stand-up comedian would end his performance with a quiet monotonous tone of voice? I’ll leave it to your imagination! 🙂

Both in speech and in writing, it’s necessary to emphasize what’s important.

How we do that? We can use bold or underlined text, quotes or alert boxes. I like to use bold text, quotes and sometimes alert boxes.

Very effective can also be using using different font colors. Take a look at Robin Hallett’s blog and you’ll see what I mean.

Do you emphasize what’s important (or you think is important) when writing your content and how you do it? Let us know in the comments…

2. Case studies with real examples

One lecture was bounced from others and earned big applause. I listened to in one breath and had a feeling it lasted only 5 minutes.

What was so interesting that attracted such attention?!

In short, it’s about one project that was finished 2 years ago with a multitude of innovative solutions. Now, 2 years is enough time to see how much is really cost effective ie when the investment will pay off. It’s something we’re all faced, you agree?

The point is, something more expensive at the beginning can pay off much faster than cheaper one. So to be convinced we use case studies.

It’s a very effective way of product/service presentation with images, graphs, comparisons that lead us to final results and conclusions. Logically, you’ll buy something sooner when you see all pros and cons, unlike when you see only bragging.

Remember those sleazy long sale pages that were all over the Internet a few years ago. I can’t say that wasn’t effective, on the contrary, but the customer mindset has changed, and continues to change. Keep that in mind!

To gain a deep understanding of what makes buyers buy, organize a case-study competition. Ask your customers how they use your products, what should be improved… This way you talk the customers’ language and gain information from.

On the other hand, you’ll get some nice testimonials in the process.

So, do you use case studies with real examples to promote whatever you sale? Or, do you more believe products analyzed with case studies? Anyway let us know below…