A superior presentation must be better than the competition.
What does that mean to you? Who or what is your competition? If you are delivering a sales presentation, your competition might be other suppliers of your product or service. If you are applying for a job, your competition might be other job candidates. If you are presenting your ideas or solutions to your team, the competition might be ideas from other team members.
The most challenging competition you face is the collection of thoughts in the minds of your audience. What are they thinking or feeling while you’re speaking? That is your toughest competition because that is where the decisions about your message reside. What are they thinking and feeling at that moment about your and your message?
The thoughts and questions in their minds might be:
These thoughts and doubts are the most significant competition that you face for your message because you need to burst through those objections in their mind before you can land your message.
The opposite of superior presentation is inferior presentation. And guess what? Inferior never wins.
The facts don’t always win. The better message wins. Superior doesn’t mean perfect. It means better than the rest. The runner who wins the races wasn’t perfect or the best. They were simply better than the competition today. That’s something else to keep in mind. Your competition changes every day because conditions change and people change. And some presenters get better because they invested in their presentation skills.
A superior presentation is about the audience, not about you. It provides relevant information in a way that is easy to understand. A superior presentation grabs attention and is easy to listen to. It feels real and builds trust. A superior presentation conveys confidence, clarity and credibility.
Don’t be offended by the word superior
Superior is not about ego. It’s simply about developing your skills and getting better every time you present or speak. What will you do to make your next presentation better than the last one? What will you change? How will you get more productive feedback? Is it time to attend a presentation skills training program? Is it time to work one-on-one with a presentation skills coach?
You can boost your presentation skills and become better than you were yesterday and better than your competition when you develop your skills and intend to be better every time you speak. Then you are assured of delivering a superior presentation.
What will you do today to be better than you were yesterday? What will you do tomorrow to be better than you were today?
What can you do to make your next presentation better than the last one? What can you do to make your presentation better than the competition? What are you doing to ensure that your next presentation is superior to your competition?
George Torok is the founder of Superior Presentations. He helps business speakers deliver the intended message more effectively. You can arrange group training for your team or one-on-one coaching for yourself and senior executives.
Your presentations and communications can be superior – or inferior. Your choice.
Presentation training can be delivered across Canada and USA online to meet your convenience for your distributed team. You can arrange onsite training locally in southwestern Ontario including Burlington, Hamilton, Mississauga, Toronto, Oakville, Niagara, Kitchener-Waterloo, Guelph, Brantford, London and surrounding areas.