How to spotlight your key presentaiton message

 In Message creation

A point I continually need to reinforce with my speech communication and sales presentation clients, is to signpost their key message/call to action, when they’re delivering a presentation, boardroom pitch or when addressing a meeting.

Often the reason for not signposting the key message is that a person doesn’t take time to focus their thinking before the presentation.

They don’t take the time to understand the audience (ie. Who is the audience, what do they know, their level of seniority, their roles, etc.) and then determine what they want audience to remember and/or act upon – and transform that thinking into a one/two sentence or three bullet points, key message/call to action.

Here is sample language that could be used to start a boardroom presentation: “Thank you for your time . . . My key message is this . . . That you sign-off on $27.5 million dollars for the Karl software . . . these are the reasons why . . . (then you’d state the three major reasons  in short simple sentences, and then conclude the opening with the following) . . . “My key message again . . . “That you sign-off on $27.5 million dollars for the Karl software”.

The how to apply for this post: a. Before your next presentation, take time to focus your thinking to understand your audience and determine the key message/call to action. b. Turn that thinking into short, simple language. c. Signpost the key message/call to action early in your presentation.

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