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Imagine this is what will happen to you the next day. You are going to give a presentation to a group of people whom you have not met before. The presentation topic is something you are familiar with because this is not the first time you present this topic. As a result, you believe that you can do a good job to deliver this topic smoothly to your participants. On the day of your presentation, unexpected events happened. You have unconsciously used a wrong phrase to explain a concept and you participants spotted your mistake. You have just discovered a typographical error on one of your slides. You were challenged by one of your participants who disagreed with a point you made in your presentation. How would you react to these unexpected events?

Here is the truth. In all presentations, always expect the unexpected. If you were hesitant, your confidence level would go down immediately and this could affect the flow of your presentation. The question is what you could have done to maintain your confidence level notwithstanding these unexpected events. In this article, I am going to share with you 4 tips that could help you to exhibit your confidence when giving a presentation.

Dress appropriately

As a speaker and trainer, I do presentation on different topics, for example, tax training and personal development training. I have my own dress code for different types of training.

In my tax training, most participants will be working professionals. Hence, I will put on my business suit to make me look professional. This is always my way of building rapport with this group of participants and raising my credibility.

When it comes to my personal development training, I will dress differently. The reason is that my participants can come from all walks of life and it does not make sense to wear business suit. Instead, I tend to wear black shirt because studies have shown that black colour signals power and authority. Whenever I am in black, I feel strong and unstoppable, and this helps to boost my confidence level and prepare for the unexpected events during my presentation.

State clearly your purpose

Have you come across with speakers who are experts in their relevant fields but do not look confident when giving presentation? Based on my own research, I discovered a secret. That is, they do not have a clear purpose of giving the presentation. There is a saying that “the bigger the why, the easier the how”. What this means is that we must know why we are giving the presentation before doing it.

Here is what I do for my presentation. I will write down my purpose of giving that presentation. I will put myself into the shoes of the participants and ask this question – “Why should I listen to you?” Very often, what I have written down becomes part of the introduction of my presentation and this is another powerful technique of building rapport with my participants and maintaining my confidence level.

Learn to say “Yes”

I am not sure if you notice that we are surrounded by a lot of negative people and negative thoughts. I was told before that for each positive statement we made, there would be 14 negative statements before and after that. In my presentation, I do my best not to allow any negativity to be present because I know that it will affect my confidence level.

Here is what I do in my training. I encourage my participants to say “Yes” with me whenever opportunity arises. When saying “yes’, say with conviction and make sure that all the people in the training room can feel the positive energy. Positive energy in my view is clearly a booster of my confidence level.

Put on our listening ear

Here is my final tip – to put on our listening ear. As mentioned above, one of the unexpected events is that my participants do not agree with what I said in my presentation. Even though I feel strongly that I am right, I will remain silent and let my participants finish their point. I will listen carefully to what they say and handle the objection tactfully based on my business training. Sometimes it may be useful to handle such objection offline because the longer it drags on, the more negative energy will be built in the training room, resulting in a drop of my confidence level.

I hope you enjoy my sharing. Use these tips if they make sense to you and share with me your success stories in my website. I would love to hear from you.

“How To Project Value To Win More Negotiations”

The projection of value in a negotiation and how well you do so is directly related to whether you’ll win or lose the negotiation. To win more negotiations, be laser focused on how you project the value that’s in your offerings. Observe the following when doing so.

1. To project value in a negotiation, you have to know what value looks like to the opposing negotiator. When seeking her insights per why she’s asking for whatever she requests, you can ask:
   1. Is that really important to you?
   2. Why is it important?
   3. If we can’t agree on this, what might be a good substitute?

Don’t pass off lightly the value that can be gleaned from the insight which comes from posing such questions. Someone can say they want a car and upon further probing you discover they want a form of transportation. That form can be addressed by offering a motorbike, car service, etc. If you became fixated on their request for a car, you might offer a Mercedes, thinking you were offering them the value they were seeking. If the person was one once prone to thinking such was ostentatious, you’d be detracting from your attempts to project value by having your personage perceived as someone that’s out of touch with the opposing negotiator’s perspective of value.

2. Be Mindful of Labels. When considering how you’ll project value, consider the label you’ll place on your offerings. Reflect upon:
   1. What’s her real source of motivation per what she’s seeking and how can I label it to convey more perceived value? You can gain insight to this question by listening to the words she uses to represent her thoughts. Word choice gives you a peek into someone’s mental thought process because it reflects the thought process per how someone feels about a particular entity. Remember, a diamond has more perceived value than a stone, although the diamond can be concealed in a stone. Thus, if you want to extend an offer, as an example, you might say, I’ll give you a diamond versus, I’ll give you a stone.

3. Consider what obtaining your offer will do for the other negotiator per her value proposition (i.e. how she values something). That means you really have to understand how she thinks. You can do so by asking yourself:
   1. How will possessing my offer make her feel?
   2. Does she want to appear [position herself] to look a certain way to a particular person/group? Does such convey status that she’s seeking and if so, why is that important to her?
   3. Speak in terms that will allow her to experience the outcome she seeks, if you were to grant her the request(s) she’s asking of you.

To become more adept at negotiations, you must understand the other negotiator’s perspective of value. In addition, you must be very mindful of how you project the perception of value. Once you master this aspect of negotiations, you’ll enhance your negotiation abilities, which will lead to more winning negotiations for you… and everything will be right with the world.

Remember, you’re always negotiating!

There’s a popular saying concerning your business and the internet and it goes like this…”If your business isn’t online, then you AREN’T really in business…” This may seem like a harsh statement, but the fact is, business today is incredibly reliant on the internet. If your business isn’t online, then you are missing out on INCREDIBLE opportunities. Opportunities to get in front of clients, build trust, and create leads in a turnkey fashion. Many fear the jump to the online world, but actually, it is much easier than you might think.

Below are a few simple steps to help you get your offline business online to start getting more clients NOW:

1.     Define what you want your website to do – Do you want people to be able to buy your products online, or are you just trying to get them to call you? Make sure to define what action you want visitors to take as that will be important in how the website is designed.

2.     Gather logo/images you will want on your website – You want your website to have the look and feel of the rest of your marketing and your business in general. Be sure to get digital files of your logo and other images you may want on your website.

3.     Meet with local website designers to get quotes and proposals – You don’t HAVE to go with a local designer, but it can help to work with someone who knows your market and who you can build a relationship with. It is always nice to have someone local who can update your site on a regular basis.

4.     Don’t forget to promote the site! – Once the site is built, it won’t do ANYTHING unless you promote it. The designer may or may not have experience with helping you generate traffic, but you definitely want someone who can help your site show up highly in the search engines. In addition, but your website address on ALL your marketing materials from now on.

These are just a few tips to help you get your business online. The internet represents the largest market that one can have a presence in the entire world. Don’t miss out on the clients that may never find you any other way…get online TODAY!