Give a person a voice, a platform, and an audience, and they can make a presentation. But add computers and other technology into the mix, and that can take the message to an entirely new level, both in real-time and in the recorded, edited, and reproduced format.
But still, even with all of the best technology and computer processing in the world, a presentation won’t create itself, and the principles of how to put the core concept together will always remain the most difficult part, especially with the rapidly declining attention span of the recent generation.
So, to get to the point where computers will indeed help you, you need to understand what makes presentations great in the first place, choose your multimedia tools wisely, create a seamless flow between tech, decide if a feedback loop will help you out, and practice and edit with your tools incessantly.
Understand What Makes Presentations Great
Before you start delving into the computer and tech possibilities of your presentation, first look at what makes presentations great in the first place. And you could spend years on this topic if you want, diving into the deep details. But to get the crash course, it might take maybe a few weeks of hard study to get the basics down.
Choose Your Multimedia Tools
And now that you have your basic focus set, it’s time to add technology into the mix. Gone are the days of the PowerPoint presentation and talking head. With new presentation technology, you have better computer access, plus video, audio, lights and colors, special effects, soundscapes, multiple monitors. And you don’t have to do all of these things at the same time, but just knowing how they work together can be a huge benefit.
Create a Seamless Flow
One thing that breaks even the best presentations is if there’s a hitch in the action. Changing from one computer program to the next, or requiring time to switch between methods of communication, will really dampen the experience for an audience. So be sure that there are no seams between sections of your talk.
Figure Out a Feedback Loop
You can have a great overall presentation, but if people get bored at any point, you lose them. That’s why some of the best speakers will build in a feedback loop of some sort. It can be through asking the audience questions, or even allowing them a live Twitter feed during the course of your talk!
Practice and Edit
And to tighten down the edges of your presentation after it’s finished, you can always edit it down to create a produced video as well. In fact, you can incorporate the idea of practice into the initial recording, the editing, and feedback, and the end output format as well.
