Try an unveiled magic trick.

I'm obsessed by a famous magic trick by Penn & Teller called "Lift Off."

Three things happen the first time you watch it.

1. First, you're amazed (but confused) with how Teller is being disassembled and still showing up in all the different places.

2. Then, at the half way point, once revealed, you're amazed (but unconfused) about how the trick is actually done.

3. Finally, at the end, you're confused by when you were more amazed-- before or after you saw the trick revealed.

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Strategy people are taught to write presentations like classic reveal-magic tricks.

To establish how deeply you understand the brief/issue/challenge/consumer, introduce a clever strategic twist and land a big creative reveal.

Cue client standing ovation.

In fact, the stronger the creative reputation of an agency, the more pressure there is on the strategist to write a presentation that creates this profound reveal effect.

Classic reveal presentation techniques include:

1. Dramatic slides with just one word or sentence, center justified, center of the slide, ending in "..." (bonus for a full-bleed evocative background)
2. Elaborate Venn diagrams, brand houses, campaign architectures with a shape at the prominent box holding a "?"
3. Big, rhetorical questions followed by pregnant pauses.

The client asked the agency for a marketing/communications solution and gets a theatrical performance for free.

My point of view is not to stop doing the classic reveal-magic trick presentation as they are predictably effective for most projects, most clients, most of the time.

My point of view is to also try the 'unveiled' magic trick sometimes, too (i.e. just start with 2nd half of Penn & Teller's "Lift Off").

As in, include it in your rotation of client interactions.

Used correctly and in the right moments, it can demonstrate a tremendous respect for the clients' time. (Cue famous Churchill quote about writing short letters).

It can jolt them into paying attention. (Let's be honest, they're usually not paying attention to the first five minutes anyway).

It can unlock time for what's usually the most valuable part of any presentation-- the conversation afterwards.

It can convey a strange confidence-- that the proposed solution stands on its own absent of all jazz hands.

Most importantly, it can focus your own time and effort on the best solution and not the best performance of a solution.

Unveiled presentation techniques include:

1. Slide 1 stating the full solution with the entire presentation being 5 slides total.
2. No diagrams, arrows, houses, ecosystems of any kind.
3. The creative person presenting before the strategy person (gasp).

The last time I did this, the meeting ended 15 minutes early, including adequate time for debate, clear decisions and with a befuddled client asking if we could just to this style every time? (Nope, we can't).

Fair warning: never try this without your team's (or boss's) explicit consent.

It's disruptive.

(Personally, I've only worked at one place where it was allowed. Like 15% of the time. It was also, by far, the best I've been at because it was indicative of its high-trust culture).

One of the most powerful governing beliefs in the creative business is implied triangular correlation between time-length, quality of work and quantity of slides.

Longer deadline means better work means more slides needed to explain (and reveal) the work. Duh.

We all know that's not true.

In fact, these variables are often inversely related.

But we must all pretend.

And the unveiled magic trick presentation reveals our own absurdity.

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