Using Storytelling For Powerful Presentations

We use presentations to convey an idea or information to an audience, be they prospective customers or top management. Presentations that use stories to convey these ideas or information work better because they help the audience understand. Though we may present plenty of dry statistics and raw data to supplement what we are saying, only when we present them in the context of a story do they gain meaning. In fact, even the most complex information can be visualized better through stories. Stories also bring to the presentation an element of emotion and this helps people remember what they have heard so far.

Let us see how we can use the technique of story telling to increase the effectiveness of our presentation.

• First, choose or adapt your stories so that they fit in with the context of your presentation. If you are telling a story that does not tie in with your presentation or the audience gets a feeling that it is being forced in to the presentation, they will not be able to connect with it. Also, if you try to put your presentation on hold for a few minutes while you tell a completely unrelated story, that too will not work.
• Pick stories that have relevance to the varied interests of your audience. Tell the story so that the listeners can easily understand what the main point of the story is and identify with it.
• Ensure that your stories are short, are used to clarify a particular point in the presentation and do not contain any unnecessary details.
• A good storyteller is one who is able to paint a picture with his or her words. Get your audience involved in the story and identify themselves with the characters. Then make something happen at a particular place and time. Make it gripping and emotional so that it stays in the mind of your audience.
• Just because you have had great success in your presentations when you have used the story telling technique, you should not get carried away and try to use too many of them. They will then fail to impress and bring about the desired result. Use them sparingly.
• You can look for stories in many places. You can certainly find many from personal experience or those of others. You can look for them in books, magazines, newspapers, the TV and the Internet. If you hear a story that you feel is worth repeating, you can use it after giving the source due credit.
• While telling a story, you have to convey every emotion that the characters are going through. Use your eyes, voice, posture and gestures to convey the story more forcefully.
• Last but not the least, you will need to practice your presentation and the telling of the story till you are sure that you will be able to tell the story in a convincing manner. Practice till you are sure that you will be to get on stage and deliver a smooth performance.