How to conceive a successful presentation

From the moment I started to think about planning it, I keep in mind the main two actors who brought me here:

Audience: who are they? what expectations do they have? is that our first meeting? By the time I answer these, I will know if I have to keep it formal, or am I allowed to sneak a joke. However, you can be sure that anyone, even the most grumpy of us, has laughed at least a few times in his life, so they know what that good mood is. As a general rule, guide yourself by instinct, as you feel things begin to work once you start the presentation, and adapt your content. Don't force the note with a joke where things are terribly serious or where you have to keep a serious tone of speech.

Product: do I know the basic features of my product? how does it works? By the time I answer these, I will know if I am ready to face a soft challenge or I have to get ready to let myself be eaten by lions. If you are in the second situation, please think seriously if you can not postpone the presentation. After all, neither they nor you have anything to gain except that you ticked an activity on the to-do list for that month.

High-level introduction of what the product is; the team

Tell them briefly what you intend to talk about. Offer them a taste to whet their appetite, just suggestive titles, no details.

Introduce the team that worked on the product. If you don't do it now, there may not be any more time left for that in the end.

Explain your solution. And what it solves

At this stage you need to tell them briefly what are the features of the product and especially to explain what existential problems of the user these will solve.

This is the safest way to get their attention and it will probably stop them from falling asleep during your presentation.

Show them how it works

No, there is no need to go into details, this is a high-level overview.

After all, users will have plenty of time to do their own tests once you finish the presentation. And guess what? There are always practical things that you could not imagine, not in thousands of attempts, from the simple fact that you are not the expert user in that field, but someone who tries to impersonate him.

Naturally, as we develop a product and present it to the public, we ask ourselves questions such as: does it meet the needs and expectations of customers? Are there still constraints or does the product work in all conditions? Did the team properly decompose the work while building the product and was attentive to every detail, or do we have to refactor?

Making the presentation is meant to respond to some of their questions, even during or after the presentation. If one might wonder... yes, several questions arise during a presentation: about how we can improve efficiency, quality, or share lessons learned / case studies with other groups.

Call to action

Tell them the importance of testing what you have shown them and remind them that this is the only way to correct any errors.

This will help you and the team to avoid some reworking or even refactoring the entire or essential parts of the product.

Last word before I leave

No, I am not referring in this section to the actual presentation that you may have to plan, but to this article. I am used to presenting IT products - yes, software -, but I guarantee these rules can be applied in general.

Didn't you feel that we were talking about the presentation of a software, but of any other product, from any other field?