Marketing with presentations: advice from a master

April 17, 2008

One of my most effective marketing strategies has always been to offer presentations on conflict resolution to audiences in my target market. In my first year of business over a decade ago, I gave more than 30 such presentations. Almost all of them created valuable connections and interest that helped me make mediation my full-time work in less than two years.

For a long time, I avoided PowerPoint in my presentations. I’d sat through far too many boring, bullet-point packed, read-word-by-word PowerPoint events and didn’t want my own presentations to be associated with a tool that’s been sorely misused. I didn’t want to be someone about whom PowerPoint comedy sketches could be made!

In the past year, thanks to Garr Reynolds’ blog, Presentation Zen, I reconsidered my vow and began reintroducing PowerPoint into my speeches and mini-workshops for prospective clients. And I learned that, used well, PowerPoint substantially improved my speaking gigs and made the material — and thus me — much more memorable.

If you want to — or already do — give presentations as part of your mediation marketing strategy, I highly recommend three Garr Reynolds resources: His blog, his superb book, Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery, and the video below.

The video is from Reynolds’ 21 March 2008 presentation to Google employees. Settle in with a cup of coffee, a note pad, and watch a master at work. It’s worth every minute: