Effective Presentations, Meet Social Distancing.

I recently spent 18 hours in 7 virtual conferences. Here’s what I learned about what works and what doesn’t when it comes to creating and presenting content virtually.

By way of background, I’m an events guy: more than half my work (as a speechwriter and creative director) happens as part of large, live events such as sales meetings, product launches and tech conferences.

Thanks to COVID-19, that world has migrated online. For the next couple of months, if not longer, all events and conferences will be virtual, with presenters and audience members joining from their homes. So I decided to spend a chunk of the past two weeks crashing a variety of virtual conferences and taking notes. I've summarized my findings about what works and what doesn’t in six key takeaways to help folks who plan and present at these conferences.

 Here’s the TLDR version:

1. Do it “live:” if the content is all pre-recorded, it’s not an event and there’s no reason to “be there” when it’s happening.

2. Speak, don’t read: that speech you wrote for the conference won’t work online.

3. Make it much shorter: attention spans at home are shorter and infinite distraction is one click away.

4. Interact with the audience: include them in meaningful ways so they’ll be glad they experienced it “live” instead of on demand.

5. More conversation, less presentation: there’s a reason people watch talk shows, not presentation shows.

6. Keep it loose: everyone’s doing this from their living room, so embrace this casual reality.   

Now, the details:

1. Do it “live.”

The larger conferences I attended – including Adobe Summit and octane 20 – both consisted exclusively of content that was pre-recorded. I felt as if I was watching a series of recordings, because that's exactly what was happening!

I found myself questioning why I needed to log on at a specific time for the “event.” Why not watch the same content later, or tomorrow, or next week, or maybe not at all?

I understand why organizations decide to pre-record content:

• it’s safer: presenters can have do-overs if they slip up
• it lightens the burden on presenters, who can record the content at their convenience, and not have to be available at a specific time

But the disadvantages far outweigh those pluses:

• the audience intuitively knows that they’re not part of a live event
• there’s no opportunity for the audience to participate (more on that later)
• there’s no ability for presenters to react to late-breaking events

To be clear, I believe a “live” virtual event can and should include plenty of prerecorded content (just as IRL conference presentations include plenty of videos.) But if the conference or meeting itself isn’t happening “live,” in real time, it’s simply not an event. And the audience will feel it.

2. Speak, don’t read.

Most of the presentations I watched during the larger virtual conferences featured people reading a script from their computer screen. This doesn't work.

I don’t have anything against people delivering scripted speeches. I write many of these and love to hear my clients deliver their ideas with the help of my words (a lot of people are saying that I have the best words). But that’s called a speech. Speeches work in the context of being on stage and having an audience. They don’t work in the more personal, less formal context of a virtual presentation.

I can imagine the discussions that preceded the decision to read these presentations: “Our message is important and we want to get every word right. I would be reading my speech at the conference, so why not read it at our virtual conference?”

That question has a clear answer: “Because it’s unnatural, hard to watch, and not engaging.” You may get all the words right, but the audience won’t get your message. What should matter to you as a presenter is what the audience takes away from your talk.

So let go of those perfectly formed sentences – even if a great writer helped you create them! – and focus on conveying your main ideas with clarity.

3. Make it shorter.

The two suggestions above, as well as the three below, all focus on how to create a better experience for your virtual conference audience. But even if you take every suggestion to heart, make no mistake: you won’t be able to hold your audience’s attention for nearly as long as at a live event. You have fewer tools, shorter attention spans, and much greater competition for attention.

This means taking a hard look at your content and making those difficult cuts. And when you think you just can’t shorten it anymore, reduce it by another 25%. The choice is clear:

Either you decide what’s most important for your audience to hear, or they’ll make the decision for you by bailing out of the session.

For an online audience, distraction is just a click away!

Full disclosure: I encourage most of my clients to shorten their presentations IRL. That’s because almost all of us are guilty of thinking about what we want to say to the audience instead of thinking about what the audience is willing and able to absorb. This leads us to present too much content, a problem that’s exacerbated when it’s in the context of a conference featuring back-to-back-to-back presentations. Remember, you have plenty of other channels for getting additional information to your audience post-event. 

It’s true for live events and quadruply true when we’re presenting online. Make it shorter!

4. Engage the audience.

It’s not enough for your content to be engaging – if that were the case, you might be able to get away with pre-recording it.

Virtual event audiences want to be part of the event. It’s worth going out of your way to make that happen.

Because without their active engagement, it's not an event.

Here are three suggestions for how to engage an online audience:

1. Many of the virtual meeting platforms offer polling capabilities; use them! Find opportunities to ask multiple choice questions, the answers to which will be meaningful to your content. Make sure you’re prepared to respond to the results, which means preparing for multiple scenarios. Feel free to throw in a fun question or two if it fits your style.
2. Provide an opportunity for attendees to ask questions and get answers. Most meeting platforms offer the ability to send questions via text. Someone other than the presenter can screen the questions and send the most helpful ones to the presenter to be answered following the formal presentation. The questions that don't get answered live provide a great opportunity for follow-up communications.
3. Encourage social media usage as part of the experience. Platforms like ON24 allow you to create dedicated windows for social interaction, enabling participants to share and connect with others without leaving the virtual event screen.

5. More conversation, less presentation.

Throughout this article, I’ve been referring to “presentations” as the default mode of sharing content in a virtual conference. That’s because most of us think in terms of presentations.

In the context of remote events, things instantly get more engaging when the people on screen engage in actual conversations.

Don’t confuse real conversation with more commonly found panel discussion, most of which are simply a means of enabling multiple people to do short presentations within a session. I’m talking about two or more people exchanging ideas in a back-and-forth manner, just like we do in real life – a conversation!

The conversation can be broadly outlined in advance, so that the participants agree on the topics to be covered. After that, let it flow. The audience will appreciate the spontaneity and authenticity of a real, unscripted, human conversation.

6. Keep it loose.

When working on events IRL, I’m frequently focused on tightening things up. That means making sure everything looks great, that the transitions between presenters are flawless, that the crew hits all the lighting and music cues, and that presenters are crisp in their delivery. Yet in the virtual conferences I attended, I was more engaged by loose, relaxed pacing and production.

Why the difference?

The events I work on tend to have relatively high production values. My clients invest in creating a branded environment, quality media, and engaging content. The closest analog is the theater, where an audience takes in an experience presented from a stage. The expectation in that setting is professionalism and tight pacing.

“But hold on,” you may be thinking, “that kind of tight, professional experience can be created on screen. It’s called television, much of it looks great (and tight.) You should really check it out sometime, Gary.” First of all, I could do without the snarkiness...! But you do have a point: a virtual conference can in fact be produced in a “tight” way.

The thing is, that’s not going to be happening in the conference space for a while. For now, we’ll all be presenting from our improvised home office setups. That’s the definition of “loose.” No matter how much we rehearse and plan, we’re going to have technical hiccups and human stumbles. While we should provide audiences with the best experience possible, virtual events in the social distancing era aren’t going to be slick or polished.

The more you lean into the ad hoc, “roll-with-it” vibe, the more your audience will join you for the ride, no matter how bumpy.

Like all of you, I’m looking forward to a post COVID-19 world in which we can once again come together and experience the unique magic of great live events. Until then, let’s make our virtual gatherings as meaningful, effective, and human as possible. Let me know if I can help!

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