Maximizing Your Presentations

Maximizing Your Presentations

Have you ever sat at a conference and found yourself taking your glasses off and putting them back on - and you still couldn’t see the screen? In the financial services industry, we have a bad habit of putting everything that we are going to say onto a presentation slide. At conferences this can make it really challenging to engage your audience.?

Let’s talk about presentations, particularly at conferences, and how you can maximize the real estate you have on your slides and engage your audience.?

Understanding Your Audience

First, it's important to understand who your audience is. We have a tendency to use a “one size fits all” approach to presentations. I've seen someone using a presentation for an institutional investor, an advisor, as well as a retail investor - and we know the knowledge level of all of those audiences is abundantly different. So, think about what you need in your presentation to educate those audiences and communicate your message appropriately.?

Disclosures

We all know we have to have disclosures. It's a fact of life, but they don't have to take over your presentation. The key is to boil down what you want to say. Try to show concepts graphically on slides versus through a bunch of lengthy copy that may require more disclosure. We have seen a trend with compliance that if we can boil down to a graphic, we have less disclosures than if we feature a lot of text.??

Think About Every Concept

Consider every concept that you're trying to convey and make sure to show the concept graphically in a compelling manner. This is particularly important at conferences.?

Conference setups can include deep rooms and poor lighting - issues that might be out of your control as a presenter. Make sure what you have on the screen is going to be understood from a distance - have a really clear message.?

If you're trying to improve your presentations, tailor them to the appropriate target audience, or improve the graphic representations to make them visually compelling and easy to see, give Marketing Intent a call. We'd be happy to help you.

About Marketing Intent

We are a sales-focused marketing group specializing in financial services with a track record in marketing that helps drive sales. We live by the mantra, “nothing happens until something is sold” – whether that’s an asset manager’s investment strategy or a financial plan for a client. Our marketing serves as the backbone of sales. Our work makes your prospects and clients take notice, ask questions and listen to your story. Learn how we help asset managers and financial advisors create marketing that grows their businesses.?