Once Upon a Time: Why (and How) You Should Add Storytelling To Your Business PowerPoint Presentation
For centuries, people have told stories — to pass on information, to teach, to persuade and to entertain. The world of business is no exception.
If you are a regular presenter, you’re likely to already know about or to have experienced the power of storytelling. If you’ve ever listened to business presenters like Seth Godin or James Altucher, you’ll have seen and heard how a good story and a good storyteller can bring an idea to life.
Seth proposes the idea that all marketing is about telling stories: “Stories make it easier to understand the world. Stories are the only way we know to spread an idea. Marketers didn’t invent storytelling. They just perfected it.” (BTW: If you haven’t seen Seth tell a story, watch this or this).
If opening up in front of your business colleagues, clients or prospects is way out of your comfort zone, you aren’t alone. But it’s worth confronting your fear because the rewards of a presentation that includes a well-told story are many.
A good story helps you to establish a connection between you and your audience. The connection gets them ‘on side’, allowing them to empathize and relate to you better. According to the Harvard Business Review, good storytelling actually triggers a measurable increase of neural activity in listeners, which allows them to focus, connect and empathize more.
A well-told story also makes the information you are trying to get across more believable and meaningful, which will help persuade your audience to your way of thinking. Think of this as a “foot in the door” to achieving the ultimate goal of your meeting.
Stories are great for business PowerPoint presentations because they take the listener on a mental journey with a beginning, middle and end. This helps you organize your information more easily and lets you build towards an impactful conclusion. Also, stories add life to the usual table-graph-bullet page formula of bad PowerPoint presentations.
Finally, a good story will help your audience remember your presentation better (unlike straight facts and figures), and therefore make it more likely that they will share the information they’ve learned with colleagues.
So, how do you get to be as good a storyteller as someone like Guy Kawasaki, former chief evangelist of Apple, who has presented to some of the world’s top business organizations including Nike, Audi, Wal-Mart, and Hewlett Packard?
Here are five ways to improving your storytelling for your next business PowerPoint presentation.
- Make sure your story is relevant to your pitch. The link doesn’t have to be obvious immediately, but it should be obvious by the end.
- Be honest. Your story has to be true, and you have to come across as authentic when telling it. It’s ok to rehearse, but don’t memorize. Speak from your heart.
- Use detail. Be specific. Help paint a picture for your audience. Careful attention to detail will give your audience a way to enter your story, latch on and relate to it — and you.
- Identify the conflict early and make sure it gets resolved in the end.
- Get to the point. Your story should be part of your presentation, but don’t allow it to take over. You have to leave room to make your business case too.
One last note: it’s great if you can make your audience laugh, but only if it’s appropriate to your story. If your story is funny, your audience will respond if you tell it in a relaxed, natural way. But don’t try too hard – there is no rule that says humor is mandatory when presenting.
For more storytelling inspiration, check out The Moth. This non-profit is “dedicated to the art and craft of storytelling” and hosts live (and digital) storytelling events throughout the world.
Coming soon…
Next month is time for Back-To-School, so we’ll be looking at some of our best PowerPoint tips and shortcuts…
