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Conducting meetings and presentations online have become commonplace since 2020. Still, delivering these well may not come naturally to most of us. Minimizing distractions, keeping your audience engaged, staying on point and effectively delivering your messages should be your number one goal. 

If you are conducting a workshop, making the sale and filling seats is just one part of the proposition.  Keeping your audience engaged and having a smooth virtual session are more than likely the harder part. There are many ways to break up the monotony of talking and moving from slide to slide in your presentation. It is your responsibility as a presenter to keep things engaging, impactful and even fun. Let’s explore some techniques you can put into practice immediately.

Help your audience find more value in your next virtual presentation or workshop  with these simple steps:

1. Prepare in Advance

Preparing for your virtual meeting, presentation or workshop will help take it from an ordinary event to a stellar one. Meticulously plan and practice the activities you would like to conduct during your virtual event. Also, practice responding to potentially difficult questions and plan contingencies for tech & other pitfalls. The more you anticipate and prepare for the unexpected, the more confident you will be. 

2. Own the First 5 Minutes 

Take advantage of the first five minutes to set the tone of the impending virtual session. I like to set a friendly, relaxed and fun tone early in the session. The more you can do to make everyone feel they are physically in the same room, the more engaging your virtual session will be. will also help deliver to their expectations later. Get everyone to introduce themselves, and use virtual icebreakers to help this process along in a fun way. Laughter really has a way of bringing people together.

3. Ask Questions and Build in Opportunities for Rapport

Asking questions doesn’t mean putting the audience on the spot or testing them. You can ask questions to find out more about your audience, or their opinion about something. You can also ask questions you believe they have on their mind but are hesitant to ask.

Here are some examples of questions you can ask: 

• How many of you have experience in this topic? 
• What is the first thing that comes to your mind when I talk about this? 
• Raise your hand if you’ve experienced something like this before. 
• What is your biggest takeaway from this section?
• Any ideas on how to best manage a situation like this?

4. Share Videos and Images 

The great thing about conducting your sessions online is that you can easily share your screen to show slides, videos and images related to your topic. This can help break up the monotony of just seeing the presenter and infuse a mixed media experience into your virtual session. Be sure:

• Your slides are well designed, clean and not wordy. 
• Your images are relevant, well designed and uncluttered.
• Your videos are short, punchy and purposeful.

5. Energizers, Quizzes & Apps

If appropriate, you can intermittently inject jokes, anecdotes, quick virtual energizers and riddles that have relevance to your virtual session. These small diversions can reenergize the session and be designed to provide a segue into the next segment of the session.

With diminishing attention spans and lots of distractions in virtual environments, presenters need to constantly look for new ways to deliver meaningful sessions. Think of and look for new & novel ways to use available tools and applications like Zoom breakout rooms, screen shares, virtual whiteboards, virtual games and applications. 

Ultimately, nothing beats preparation, anticipation and practice. As the famed Harvard professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter said, “Competence breeds confidence”. Competence is the fruit of practice. So keep at it. And develop the habit of always viewing things from your audience’s perspective. It will make you a better communicator in every respect. 

About Jessica 

Jessica Dang has developed and delivered bestselling face-to-face; virtual and learning programs internationally. She was instrumental in building the largest ‘hands-on’ education company in Asia. Additionally, she has conceptualized and built leading education businesses, learning tools and software for clients. An innovative educator, Jessica has also developed and managed large scale, multi-location learning events and outreach programs for leading international organizations. She brings her super fun, trademark chaos & mayhem learning technique to all her programs.

Jessica is a Certified Workplace Learning Specialist, a Specialist Adult Educator and a Marshall Goldsmith Executive and Team Coach. www.jessicadang.com | service@jessicadang.me .