Chapter 12 - Business Presentations (1).pdf

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Guffey and Loewy, Essentials of Business Communication, 12th Edition. © 2023 Cengage. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or
posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part. 1
Chapter 12
Business Presentations
posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

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Icebreaker: Afraid to Speak
1. What scares you the most about making a presentation in front of your class?
Being tongue-tied? Fearing all eyes on you? Messing up? Forgetting your
ideas and looking unprofessional? Something else?
2. What are some ways to overcome these fears?
3. Be prepared to share your ideas with the class.

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Learning Objectives
By the end of this chapter, you should be able to:
12-1 Discuss two important first steps in preparing for business presentations.
12-2 Explain how to organize your business presentations to build audience
rapport.
12-3 List contemporary visual aids and design practices that help presenters
overcome the monotony of bullet points.
12-4 Create a memorable error-free multimedia presentation that shows a firm
grasp of basic visual design principles.
12-5 Name delivery techniques for use before, during, and after a presentation
to keep the audience engaged.

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12-1
Creating Effective Business Presentations

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12-1 Creating Effective Business Presentations
(1 of 6)
• Glossophobia means fear of public speaking.
• At some point all businesspeople have to inform others or sell an idea.
• Such informative and persuasive presentations are often conveyed in person
and involve audiences of various sizes.
• Making a business presentation look seamless requires many hours of intense
preparation and practice.

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(2 of 6)
Speaking Skills and Your Career
• 39 percent of managers found new graduates lacking in public speaking skills;
46 percent would like to see better overall communication skills.
• Speaking skills rank high on recruiters’ wish lists.
• Almost 70 percent of career services professionals named verbal
communication as a key attribute they seek in an applicant’s résumé.

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(3 of 6)
Understanding Presentation Types
• Presentations can be informative or persuasive, face-to-face or virtual,
performed before big audiences or given to smaller groups, elaborate or simple.
• The following are just some of the business presentations you may encounter in
your career:
− Briefing
− Report
− Podcast
− Virtual presentation
− Webinar

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(4 of 6)
Knowing Your Purpose
• The most important part of your preparation is deciding what you want to
accomplish.
• Whether your goal is to persuade or to inform, you must have a clear idea of
where you are going.
• At the end of your presentation, what do you want your listeners to remember or
do?

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(5 of 6)
Knowing Your Audience
• A key element in preparing presentations is analyzing the audience, anticipating
the reactions of audience members, and adjusting to their needs if necessary.
• Audiences may fall into four categories:
− Friendly
− Neutral
− Uninterested
− Hostile

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(6 of 6)
• Other elements, such as the age, gender, education level, experience, and size of the
audience, will affect the style and message.
• Analyze the following questions to determine organizational pattern, delivery style, and
supporting material:
− How will this topic appeal to this audience?
− How can I relate this information to my listeners’ needs?
− How can I earn respect so that they accept my message?
− What would be most effective in making my point? Facts? Statistics? Personal
experiences? Expert opinion? Humor? Cartoons? Graphic illustrations?
Demonstrations? Case histories? Analogies?
− What measures must I take to ensure that this audience remembers my main
points?

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Self-Assessment
1. Divide a piece of paper in half.
2. Label one column “Types of Presentations” and the other “Audience
Categories.”
3. Under the first heading, list some of the business presentations you may have
to give in your career.
4. Under the second heading, list the types of audiences you may encounter.

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12-2
Organizing Presentations to Connect With
Audiences

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12-2 Organizing Presentations to Connect With
Audiences (1 of 10)
• Good organization and intentional repetition are the two most powerful tools in
ensuring audience comprehension and retention.
• Many speech experts recommend the following, admittedly repetitious but
effective, plan:
− Step 1: Tell them what you are going to tell them.
− Step 2: Tell them.
− Step 3: Tell them what you have told them.

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Audiences (2 of 10)
Getting Off to a Good Start in the Introduction
• Strive to accomplish three goals in the introduction to a presentation:
− Capture listeners’ attention and get them involved.
− Identify yourself and establish your credibility.
− Preview your main points.

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Audiences (3 of 10)
• To establish credibility:
− Describe your position, knowledge, or experience.
− Dress professionally.
− Display self-confidence.
− Use direct eye contact.
− Try to connect with your audience.

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Audiences (4 of 10)
Organizing the Body of the Presentation
• The body of the presentation should be 20 minutes or shorter.
• Include two to four main points.
• Develop each main point with adequate, but not excessive, explanation and
details.

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Audiences (5 of 10)
The following provides many possible strategies and examples to help organize a
presentation:
• Chronology
• Geography/space
• Topic/function/conventional grouping
• Comparison/contrast (pro/con)
• Journalistic pattern (the six Ws)
• Value/size
• Importance
• Problem/solution
• Simple/complex
• Best case/worst case

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Audiences (6 of 10)
Summarizing in the Conclusion
• Strive to achieve three goals:
− Summarize the main themes of the presentation.
− Leave the audience with a specific and memorable take-away.
− Include a statement that allows you to exit the podium gracefully.
• The take-away is a specific audience benefit or thought-provoking idea
resulting from a presentation; the main message of a talk.

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Audiences (7 of 10)
Establishing Audience Rapport
• Rapport refers to a feeling of mutual trust and respect; a bond established
between the speaker and audience.
• Helpful techniques for building rapport include:
− Providing effective imagery.
− Supplying verbal signposts.
− Using body language strategically.

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Audiences (8 of 10)
• Use the following techniques to enliven and enhance comprehension:
− Metaphor
− Analogy
− Personalized statistics
− Worst- or best-case scenario
− Personal anecdote
− Simile

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Audiences (9 of 10)
• Knowledgeable speakers help the audience recognize the organization and
main points in an oral message with verbal signposts such as these:
− Previewing
− Summarizing
− Switching directions
• You can further improve any oral presentation by including appropriate
transitional expressions such as first, second, next, then, therefore, moreover,
on the other hand, on the contrary, and in conclusion.

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Audiences (10 of 10)
• The following suggestions focus on nonverbal tips to ensure that your verbal
message resonates with your audience:
− Look terrific!
− Animate your body.
− Punctuate your words.
− Get out from behind the podium.
− Vary your facial expression.

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12-3
Understanding Contemporary Visual Aids

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12-3 Understanding Contemporary Visual Aids
(1 of 3)
• Pictorial superiority refers to a scientific concept suggesting that information
conveyed in images is more memorable than text alone.
• Good visual aids:
− Emphasize and clarify main points, thus improving comprehension and
retention.
− Increase audience interest.
− Make the presenter appear more professional, better prepared, and more
persuasive.
− Jog the memory of a speaker, thus improving self-confidence, poise, and
delivery.

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(2 of 3)
Types of Visual Aids
• The following forms of media can enhance presentations:
− Multimedia slides
− Handouts
− Zoom presentations
• Software as a service (SaaS) is a cloud-based software licensing model
allowing users to access software online on demand.

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(3 of 3)
Moving Beyond PowerPoint Bullets
• Overuse or misuse may be the downside of the PowerPoint slideshow.
• Chartjunk refers to crowded or otherwise poorly prepared multimedia slides
and other unclear graphics.
• PowerPoint Phluff is a term coined by Edward R. Tufte describing poor,
misused PowerPoint presentations.
• The experts recommend creating slideshows that tell a story and send a
powerful message with much less text and more images.

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Knowledge Check 1
True or False:
1. Pictorial superiority refers to a scientific concept suggesting that information
conveyed in images is more memorable than text alone.
2. There are no downsides to using PowerPoint slideshows.
3. Chartjunk refers to charts or graphs that provide unnecessary visual
information.
4. PowerPoint Phluff refers to necessary images or information in a PowerPoint.

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12-4
Preparing Engaging Multimedia Presentations

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12-4 Preparing Engaging Multimedia Presentations
(1 of 12)
• When operated by proficient designers and skillful presenters, PowerPoint,
Keynote, or Prezi can add visual impact to any presentation.
• Gaining expertise with a software program requires an investment of time and
effort.
• You could take a course, or you could teach yourself through an online tutorial.

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(2 of 12)
Analyzing the Situation and Purpose
• Use the following questions to analyze the situation and purpose of a slideshow
and make the best design choices for a presentation:
− Will your slides be used during a live presentation?
− Will they be part of a self-running presentation such as in a store kiosk?
− Will they be saved on a cloud server so that users can watch the
presentation online at their convenience?
− Will they be sent as a PowerPoint show or a PDF slide deck to a client
instead of a hard-copy report?
− Will your presentation mainly run on smartphones or tablets?

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(3 of 12)
Adjusting Slide Design to Your Audience
• Audiences respond to the colors, images, and special effects you use.
• Primary ideas are generally best conveyed with bold colors such as blue, green,
and purple.
• Because the messages that colors convey can vary from culture to culture,
presenters must choose colors and other design elements carefully.

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(4 of 12)
• Adjust the color to provide high contrast so it is readable:
− Use light text on a dark background for presentations in darkened rooms.
− Use dark text on a light background for presentations in lighted rooms.
− Avoid using a dark font on a dark background, such as red text on a dark
blue background.
− Avoid using a light font on a light background, such as white text on a pale
blue background.
− Keep in mind that colors that look vibrant on your monitor may look washed
out when projected onto a screen.

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(5 of 12)
• The 6-x-6 rule specifies six bullets per screen and six words per bullet maximum on a
PowerPoint slide.
• Breaking this rule is sometimes necessary, particularly when your users will be viewing
the presentation on their own with no speaker assistance.
• Strive to break free from bulleted lists whenever possible and minimize the use of text.
• When using presentation software such as PowerPoint, try to avoid long, boring
bulleted lists.
• Alter layouts by repositioning, resizing, or changing the fonts for the placeholders in
which your title, bulleted list, organization chart, video clip, photograph, or other
elements appear.

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(6 of 12)
• Using animation and sound effects—flying objects, swirling text, clashing
cymbals, and the like—distract your audience, drawing attention away from your
main points.
• Add animation features only if doing so helps convey your message or adds
interest to the content.
• The zooming effect of Prezi presentations can add value to your presentation as
long as it helps your audience understand connections and remember content.

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(7 of 12)
Building Your Business Presentation
• Translate the major headings in your outline into titles for slides.
• Build bullet points using short phrases.
• Create a blueprint slide, a slide that provides an overview of major points and
later provides transitions as the speaker moves from point to point.

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(8 of 12)
• Set a limit for how much time you will spend making your slides or canvas
visually appealing.
• Create a slide or canvas only if it accomplishes at least one of the following
purposes:
− Generates interest in what you are saying and helps the audience follow
your ideas
− Highlights points you want your audience to remember
− Introduces or reviews your key points
− Provides a transition from one major point to the next
− Illustrates and simplifies complex ideas

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(9 of 12)
• All presentation programs require you to:
− Select or create a template that will serve as the background for your
presentation.
− Make each slide by selecting a layout that best conveys your message.
• Alter existing templates so they better suit your needs.
• Visual clichés, overused templates and clip art that come preinstalled with
PowerPoint, Canva, and Prezi, can weary viewers who have seen them
repeatedly in presentations.

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(10 of 12)
• Use the PowerPoint slide sorter view to rearrange, insert, and delete slides
during the revision process.
• Make presentations as clear and concise as possible.
• Be sure all listed items use parallel grammatical form.
• Check carefully to find spelling, grammar, punctuation, and other errors.

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(11 of 12)
• Use the following questions to critically evaluate slideshows:
− Is your message presented in a visually appealing way?
− Have you tested your slides on the equipment and in the room you will be
using during your presentation?
− Do the colors you selected work in this new setting?
− Are the font styles and sizes readable from the back of the room?

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(12 of 12)
Seven Steps to a Powerful Multimedia Presentation
• The following presents a step-by-step process for creating a powerful multimedia
presentation:
− Start with text.
− Select background and fonts.
− Choose images that help communicate your message.
− Create graphics.
− Add special effects.
− Create hyperlinks.
− Move your presentation online.

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Knowledge Check 2
Fill in the Blank:
1. Primary ideas are generally best conveyed with bold colors such as
________________.
2. The ________________ specifies six bullets per screen and six words per bullet
maximum on a PowerPoint slide.
3. A ________________ is a slide that captures the main points in a visually appealing
way and can then be used several times throughout your presentation.
4. ________________ are overused templates and clip art that come preinstalled with
PowerPoint, Canva, and Prezi.

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12-5
Refining Delivery, Rehearsing, and Performing
Your Talk

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12-5 Refining Delivery, Rehearsing, and Performing
Your Talk (1 of 7)
Choosing a Delivery Method
• Avoid Memorizing Your Presentation
− Memorizing only significant parts, such as the introduction, the conclusion,
and meaningful quotes, can make presentations dramatic and impressive
and prevent the speaker from sounding robotic and unnatural.
• Don’t Read From Your Notes
− Listeners will quickly lose interest.

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Your Talk (2 of 7)
• Deliver Your Presentation Extemporaneously
− Extemporaneous delivery means speaking freely without reading from
notes or a manuscript after preparing and rehearsing.
− Impromptu speaking describes improvised, unrehearsed, spontaneous
spur-of-the-moment delivery.
• Know When Notes Are Appropriate
− By preparing and then practicing with your notes, you can use them while
also talking to your audience in a conversational manner.

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Your Talk (3 of 7)
Combating Stage Fright
• Stage fright refers to nervousness before or during a presentation/appearance
before an audience.
• Performance anxiety refers to stage fright, the fear of performing before an
audience.
• The fight-flight-freeze-response is an involuntary physical reaction of the
human body to frightening situations.

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Your Talk (4 of 7)
• To conquer stage fright:
− Breathe deeply.
− Convert your fear.
− Know your topic and come prepared.
− Use positive self-talk.
− Take a sip of water.
− Shift the spotlight to your visuals.
− Ignore any stumbles.
− Feel proud when you finish.

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Your Talk (5 of 7)
• Before your presentation:
− Prepare thoroughly.
− Rehearse repeatedly.
− Time yourself.
− Dress professionally.
− Check the room and the equipment.
− Greet members of the audience.
− Practice stress reduction.

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Your Talk (6 of 7)
During your presentation:
• Start with a pause and present your first
sentence from memory.
• Maintain eye contact.
• Control your voice and vocabulary.
• Show enthusiasm.
• Skip the apologies.
• Slow down and know when to pause.
• Move naturally.
• Control visual aids with clickers, pointers,
and blank screens.
• Avoid digressions.
• Summarize your main points and drive
home your message.

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Your Talk (7 of 7)
• After your presentation:
− Distribute handouts.
− Encourage questions but keep control.
− Repeat questions.
− Reinforce your main points.
− Avoid “yes, but” answers.
− End with a summary and appreciation.

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