🚫 “It’s great to be here.”
🚫 “Hello, I am [insert name, job title]. Today I’m going to talk about…”
🚫 “Thank you for having me”

Avoid these predictable presentation intros. These just set up your talk as nothing new.

If you want your talk to be memorable you need to hook your audience from the very beginning and give them a compelling reason to pay attention.

The graphic below from Sequoia Capital illustrates a typical attention span over 60mins and the potential to lose 90% of your audience within the first five mins…but how to remedy?

Here are three ways (and a bonus fourth😁) to help to set up your talk as unmissable:

🎬 Set the scene like a movie.
“Our industry is facing seismic challenges. That’s what I would have said – until six months ago we discovered something that changed everything. Here’s what happened..”

📊 Drop an eyebrow-raising stat.
“If women started and scaled new businesses at the same rate as men, we could create £250 billion in additional value to the UK’s economy, according to a recent review. Here’s what needs to happen…”

🔍 Use a prop or an attention-grabbing slide.
One influential presenter wordlessly put up an image of an elephant to kick off a talk where they went on to talk about tackling ‘the elephant in the room’ of their industry, while another promised a visual to capture the current state of the economy…and put up a completely black slide.

Remember: with audio only, retention of content three days later is around 10%, but with an image that increases to an incredible 65%

⭐ Or you can call us. We can to help you to be memorable in all your business interactions.

Liberi Consulting 💬

About Aimée Norman

Successful business interaction is built on clear purpose, clarity of message and confident delivery. We offer strategic internal and external communications expertise, coaching and consultancy and can help on a project, retainer or fractional basis.