Using Visuals As A Corporate Speaker

As a corporate speaker, there is tremendous opportunity to add to the audience experience through visual aids. These visual aids can facilitate the message to resonate with the audience beyond her presentation. These cues help listeners do a better job of remembering information that they’ve heard.

Quality and placement of the visual aid are key. For example, adding a short film clip that illustrates a key point offers a memorable form of reinforcement for audience members who regularly binge-watch Netflix shows.  However, poorly planned visuals can easily turn off listeners. Just ask any audience member who has sat in the back row and strained to read a slide with tiny type.

How can a corporate speaker select visuals that add the “wow” factor to a presentation? It comes down to knowing your speech and your audience.

Choosing the Right Visual Aids

A corporate speaker can choose from a variety of visual aids, including PowerPoint, a flip chart, a video, maps, diagrams, lists, handouts, photographs, concept maps, sketches or props. Considering that wealth of possibilities, a corporate speaker faces a challenging task in selecting which aids to use.

The best place to start is through analyzing the content of the speech. Visual aids should serve as an exclamation point for key sections of the presentation. These cues can be used to provide definitions, highlight new points, illustrate important data and offer evidence to support an argument.

Simplicity is key. Visual aids should reinforce the message of the presentation while not taking away from the corporate speaker.  Visuals that are going to be projected onto a screen should be colorful, unique and readable by audience members who are sitting at the far edges of the room.

A corporate speaker also needs to avoid relying on visual aids as a crutch during the presentation. For instance, reading directly from a visual aid will turn off the audience. Using the visual aids in the rehearsal process increases the chances of a smooth presentation. This rehearsal also is especially important when the visual aids are based on new technology.

Know Your Audience

Understanding the makeup of your audience is critical when planning which visual aids to use. For example, an industry-specific presentation can incorporate visual aids that use more data and jargon.

When considering your visual aids, be sure to take the room size and layout into consideration. For example, audience members in the back row need to be able to clearly see visuals that are being projected on screens.

Visual aids can make a presentation more memorable. Therefore, corporate speakers should take as much care developing these aids as they do the content of their speech. Poorly planned visual aids can leave a bad impression – and make a great presentation forgettable.