Learn how to end a presentation powerfully
The most significant sections of your PowerPoint presentation are the beginning and end. The beginning is the first impression that you give to your audience and hopefully persuade them you are worth listening to for the next few minutes, and the ending will be where you précis your key points and main message in such a way that it will be easier for them to remember and take home.
In this article, I would like to talk about the best practices for ending your talk confidently and with impact. Most presentations are forgotten as soon as the audience leaves the room. If you are going to invest the time and effort into giving a presentation, then you want to leave the audience with something to remember. However, all of the tactics depend on the tone of presentation that you are giving.
To finish a presentation strong, you have to amalgamate the actions and goals in a proper mix. In the beginning, section, what kind of elocution strategy do you follow to hold the audience in the presentation hall, you start from there for the closing sections.
Recollect something from the beginning.
When you start your closing section, sometimes you are summarizing your entire speech in a synopsis, it is the best idea to repeat or connect to an idea from the opening of your discussion. One brilliant way to do this is to start your talk with the first half of an appropriate personal story and end your talk with the second half. Or, if you discuss a problem in a particular context at the beginning, refer back to that situation at the beginning of your ending. Or, if you start with an impactful image, show that picture repeatedly at the end. Doing this will indicates to the audience that you are coming to the end of your talk.
Besides, it completes your presentation circle- you end up back where you started. This is the organized structure of a story that narrates a journey. Doing this will make a feeling that you touch all parts of the presentation theme, and it will give a sense of harmony and completeness to your talk.
Show how your key points support your overall discussion
Before you going to deliver your concept or theme, it is important to map out the main ideas you will talk about. An audience doesn’t know the twist and turn of your story and what lies ahead. At the end of your talk take them back over what you have spoken about and display how your findings or ideas related and support your key points. So, if you talk with supporting and cemented facts, it will make your closing section more authentic and reliable.
Avoid your “Thank you” slide.
At the end of the talk, many presenters show a slide that says, “Thank you!” Some even include pleasant photos or happy faces to make the slide more visually effective. Actually, these slides create an artificial atmosphere in the presentation hall. Neither of these slides is a good idea nor helps the audience in any way. “Thank you “should come naturally from your heart with eye contact and with a smile on your face.
Putting your feelings on a graphical image cheapens your sentiment and looks awkward. The summary slide is the only slide that repeatedly comes into the audience’s mind. So, try to sum up your important points (including the Q&A session in a single slide that helps the audience to remember your whole presentation in style). This is the only slide that can contain a lot of text; you will probably need to use bullet points to separate the text.
A summary slide shows all points that you have made, along with your key argument and your call to action. It should also show your designation and contact details. And many people will take photos of this summary slide with their phone to take home as a concise of your speech and to have your contact details. It will be interesting to watch for them while you are answering questions they are not interested in. So, use a summary PowerPoint slide instead of a “Thank you slide”. However, you can use simple thank you slides without having images in the end.
download simple thankyou slide ppt
Be a strong finisher, even if you feel tired.
It is obvious that you’ll feel tired when you get to the end of your presentation. But you must face the important session of Q&A with full energy and enthusiasm. In this session, you can expose your talent and knowledge by giving accurate and logical answers to the questions. It is crucial that the audience feels that you are enthusiastic and open to questions.
Normally, there may be a poor response, nobody may ask questions first. What happens if no one has any questions? A good way to do this is for you yourself to ask questions to the audience. Ask the most confident looking person in the room for their opinion or tell them to discuss the question with the person sitting beside them, this will give them a chance to rehearse their answer and make answers confidentially. Afterwards, everybody gets ready for asking questions and the session will nurture with audience questions.
Don’t wind up your presentation with questions and answers.
Close with a more or less condensed version of your conclusions and an insightful summary of the Q&A. When the question and answer session is over, go to the mid of the audience and give your main argument again, your call to action and deal with any doubts or criticisms that out in the Q&A. Try to impose main arguments in the audience memory that you can wisely execute during the repetition phase.
You can’t just stop talking when it’s time for you to wrap up your presentation. Instead, finish by noting how these points relate back in some way or another with what we’ve discussed so far–and then let them go! This will help keep listeners engaged because they want the lesson/pointing continued at least until the completion of the final Thoughts statement (which should also include any additional thoughts that popped into mind during delivery).
From the beginning, you should create a better emotional rapport with the audience. if they feel, this man has come from our life circle, then the audience will blow away by your speech. With new concepts and styles, you don’t have to be a cult speaker to rank top on the list.
