3 tips to help give entertaining presentations

Speaking to a group can be testing at the best of times. Being a tad nervous is only natural but if that begins to channel itself into your presentation or speech, it will hinder how engaged any audience is.

However, putting anxiety to one side and injecting a bit of lightheartedness into your speaking can boost how well your presentation goes down. Here are three tips which will help do just that:

Be energetic 

While jumping around the presentation area may not exactly be endearing, making sure you come across as energetic can be key in winning the audience over.

It is all too easy to bury your head into notes and ignore the crowd in front of you. Using body language effectively, projecting your voice or even throwing in an extravagant piece of vocabulary can all help in any ongoing efforts to come across as energetic and ultimately improve your presentation skills.

Tell jokes

It’s important to remember that you’re not trying to be a stand-up comedian, but interspersing humour into any presentation can be beneficial.

Firstly, when the audience are laughing it’ll help put them in a good mood if and when you have to address the serious stuff. Secondly, showing that you have a sense of comic timing will have a huge humanising effect on how peers perceive you.

Don’t be afraid of mistakes

A big part of any anxiousness which forms when preparing to speak to a group is likely to stem from the fear of making a mistake or saying something embarrassing.

As is the case with adding in humour, your audience is likely to embrace you more if you are slightly less than perfect.

Whether it’s a slip of the tongue or a tech issue that trips you up on the day, laughing off minor mistakes will not only help you quickly get over them, but it will warm the audience to you too.