- Our tendency to be concerned with our own interest is one of the keys to delivering a great presentation. You see, your audience brings their own concerns and needs when they come to one of your presentations. If you're presenting something new to them, then their concern might be learning how to integrate that new thing into their life or how it might help them in business. If you're presenting something that's familiar to them, then their concern might be being entertained in the presentation of that well-worn material. Everyone likes a novel take on familiar ground. 

Your audience wants you to do well. They want you to address their needs. And they want to enjoy their time sitting in your presentation. Tailoring the presentation to your audience should be the first step in your preparation. You should ask yourself, who is the audience? What do they need? What are their concerns, hopes, and fears? And then you must answer the most important question, which is, how can I as the presenter help them achieve those objectives? 

All too often, presenters focus on their own objectives. They've got a product to sell, or they need to explain to you how to use some software, or they need to tell you what the objectives are for the company over the next quarter. But if you've ever seen an accomplished speaker deliver a presentation-- for example, someone delivering a commencement address at a college graduation or a keynote address at a conference you may have attended-- think back to that time and ask yourself, how much time did that presenter spend talking about themselves or what they had to offer? 

Accomplished speakers don't spend much time talking about their own accomplishments or what they have to offer the audience. Instead, they tell personal stories in a plain and relatable way, stories that resonate with the audience and that inspire the audience. 

Now, everyone expects a keynote presentation to be energetic and dynamic and inspiring, but who says that your next presentation at the office can't also be energetic, dynamic, and inspiring? It can be if you consider the audience's interests first. Let me give you an example. 

Let's say you're presenting a piece of technology to an audience. You could say, our state-of-the-art SSD drive uses a 4.0 PCIE transfer protocol that allows transmission rates up to 400 megabits per second, much faster than our competition. Or you could consider the audience's needs and say, this SSD drive will save your files much faster than what you're currently using, which is very useful when you're packing up and heading out of the office at the end of the day. 

Saying what you need to say in a way that addresses the audience's concerns and needs gives you one of the most powerful tools that any presenter could ask for-- novelty. No one walks into a presentation expecting to be wowed. In fact, many people just expect presentations to be boring. But if you can tell your audience something that makes a difference to them, they'll leave excited, and that's the difference between any regular presentation and a meaningful presentation. You have to tell your audience something meaningful to them. Remember, if you're presenting, it's not about you. It's about the audience. It's all about the audience. 

So the next time you're making a list of objectives for the next presentation you have to give, don't make it an objective to be liked. Don't make it an objective to sell a product. Make your objective to serve your audience, and you'll deliver the best presentation you've ever delivered. 

Thank you very much for watching. I hope this will be helpful to you in your next presentation, and I really hope you'll tune in next week when I talk about another key tip for delivering great presentations-- the value of storytelling. Until then, stay happy, my friends. 

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