Denise Vorraber 7 mistakes you shouldn't make on stage

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Presenting Like a Pro: The 7 Mistakes You Shouldn’t Make On Stage

Learning how to conquer the stage and deliver a compelling presentation is an essential skill. The ability to present effectively can make or break your career, business, or idea. The good news is that you can drastically improve your presentation by avoiding these seven common mistakes.

1. Having No Goal

Before you step onto the stage, you should have a clear idea of what you want to achieve. Each presentation should serve a specific purpose and lead towards a certain goal, whether it's persuading your audience to buy a product or imparting knowledge. Amazon's CEO, Jeff Bezos, even insists his project managers write a press release before they start a new project to clarify their vision and goals!

2. Ignoring your "Why"

Passion drives people, and if you fail to transmit your passion to your audience, you risk losing their attention. A key part of your presentation should always focus on explaining why you are there and what drives you. Audiences are far more likely to engage with a presenter who is genuinely passionate about their topic.

3. Not Practicing Enough

Practice is the key to a successful presentation. There is no shortcut. You don't just practice the content, but also the delivery of your presentation. Pay attention to your body language, tone of voice, and overall delivery style.

4. Failing to Be Authentic

Authenticity is highly engaging. People are more responsive and receptive to a presenter who remains true to their personality and style on stage. Always remember, people are there to see you, so don’t be afraid to show them who you are.

5. Giving Into Nerves

It’s only natural to feel nervous before a presentation, but this doesn’t mean you can’t find ways to manage it. One of the most effective ways to reduce nerves is to change your mindset about public speaking, from a feared task to an exciting opportunity.

Another practical tip is to practice high-power poses. These poses are meant to make you feel larger and more confident, they are proven to reduce stress and increase confidence.

6. Not Familiarizing Yourself with the Venue

To create an atmosphere where you feel comfortable, familiarize yourself with the environment that you'll be presenting in. Whether it's an online venue or a physical stage, try out the equipment, visualise yourself on stage and clarify any doubt concerning the setup.

7. Ineffective Slides

Visual aids like slides should complement your presentation; they shouldn't be the main focus. Slides that are overly packed with information can become a distraction causing you to lose your audience’s attention. So, keep it simple and visually appealing.

In conclusion, being a standout presenter is about more than just the content you deliver. It's about how you channel your passion, how much you've practised, and how effectively you manage your nerves. Keep things simple, be yourself, and you'll become a more effective and engaging presenter in no time.

The most significant step you can take is to just get started, as quoted by George Dyer, "everything you ever wanted is on the other side of fear."


Video Transcription

Then I will start because it's 10 after seven. So let's start, I always want to start my presentations with a good quote. And for this talk, I picked Mark Twain's quote.The most important days in your life are the day you're born and the day you find out why. And I think that is just the most. Yeah, like I love this quote because my, why is that? I love teaching people, um, to present on stage. I love teaching people how, how not to sell themselves under their value. And I just want to live in a world where there is no woman on stage who undersells undersells, um, herself under her value and she, she just enjoys and rocks the stage she's on. And I really like to live in a world where everyone loves being on stage. So that is why I'm here today. I will talk about the seven mistakes you shouldn't do on stage. Um, so let's start, um, when with my presentation, ok, it's lagging a bit. I also want to give you actionable steps as well with every mistake. So you can really have like tips and tricks on what you can do exactly after that, I told you about the mistake. This picture was like, it has been taken in 2016 in August. It's actually the first time I ever was on stage, not really speaking but on stage. And that was me or that is me. And I was so scared even though I didn't have to talk, but it was just so scared.

But after this time, I evolved in my organization and I actually became the president of the organization. So I had the opportunity to talk a lot of times and I had to talk on stage even though I was scared as fuck. But um these experiences led me to being a speaker and the pitch trainer. And also this got me into the Forbes List 40 under 30. And I worked with so many amazing customers until now. Like, for example, one of my highlights is of course, the Bill Gates Foundation, Apple um like, um I've been, I've, I have been talking in in India and different countries in London and stuff like that. And I'm really proud of that and I want to tell you with my experience now, what you can and should avoid on stage so you can really rock it. First of all, having no goal. This is literally um yeah, one of the most important things to consider before you go on stage. So when you um start thinking about what do you want out of the presentation. What do you want to um the people do? After your presentation, there should be a goal you want to achieve something with your presentation. And for example, um there is an ex exciting, interesting way on how Jeff Bezos does it. I'm not a huge fan of him, but I like this method that he is doing.

So, for example, with new product managers in Amazon, he actually lets them write a press release before they start working on a new product. Because of um when they write the press release, they really have a clear vision and a clear goal on how the product should look afterwards. Like after it's done and after writing the press release, they can start working because what it does is that everyone has the same um level of where should we go? What, what is the goal and stuff like like such, I'm sorry. Um So it's always crucial to really have a goal in mind before you start working on the presentation. Also very important. Only pick one goal. So what do you want people to do with your presentation after presentation? What is your one goal? The next thing is that people go on stage or people present their, start up their business and they don't have a a why or even worse. They um yeah, they, they don't tell us the why or they just don't really have a why or like a passion inside. So I had um a start up pitch on stage where I was a sure member and he pitched. And afterwards we asked him, what is it? He says, why, why is he here now? And why did he start his start up?

And he actually told us he only does it because he um his father has connections in that industry. So that is the wrong answer. That is not really a why there is no passion with that answer. And we really always want to hear why you, why is that your favorite topic? Why is that your business? And I just love talking to people who have a strong why and who have a strong passion. And what you can do here is just really be yourself and show us your passion. Show us your why. It really helps with identifying with the person who is on stage and it always grabs the attention of the listeners. What is also nice if, if um people tell us the bigger picture of the desired future of like the desired outcome they have with their business, with their vision and that is always a great way to start with your presentation. The third tip is not practicing enough like it's crucial. There is literally no shortcut here. You need to practice. There is just, yeah, no shortcut for a good presentation. I once read that you should practice 5 to 10 hours an hour for each slide they would say or an hour for each, um, they like when you have like, yeah, for each slide, that was the right thing.

But I just thought to myself my presentation right now, what I, I'm showing you today it has 37 slides because I use a lot of pictures and I would need to, um, practice 37 hours. No one can do that. Not even, um, a speaker who does it on full time. So, what I would say to you is practice at least five times. Everyone can do it five times. That's perfectly fine, the more the merrier. But I would be happy if you practice five times. So what are the actionable steps? Practice, practice, practice. That is just so crucial. It also gets your nervousness away. And what I would always say is when you practice, do not only focus on the content of your presentation but also on how you deliver it. Like your body language, your speech, your dynamic of your voice and stuff like that. The fourth mistake is to not be a true self. Like to like to show up on stage and not being authentic. I've seen it so much and I really, it's just so sad because we have so many diverse and amazing people, different persons. So don't, don't try to be too formal and like if you aren't that type of person and don't wear suits, if you aren't that type of person, because you have to be yourself and really truly yourself. And that is like the most.

Yeah, like the best thing that we can see on stage is a truly authentic person. I just love it. There is always this one phrase out there like fake it till you make it. But I think it's not good that you like, it's the wrong approach that you need to change yourself until you become successful. I would say fake it until you feel it fake your confidence. Until you feel confident. That is a way better step to go for it. So the actual steps will be six most beautiful thing. And also one thing which always helps is wear something that you will feel most comfortable and or most powerful in because wearing a comfortable and also powerful clothes really pushes you and helps with your confidence.

The f um the fifth tip is I like the mistake people do on stage is to be too nervous. I know what you're thinking right now. Like I can't change that. I'm nervous as heck when I'm, when I'm talking on stage or something like that, but you can change that. And I am here today to tell you and to give you some tips and hacks that you can do. First of all, give your presentation a read, don't see it as forced. So for example, um oftentimes in school and university people forced us to present on a topic we don't care in front of people who didn't care. But as of now, as like grown people who decided to speak on a stage, for example, we want to be, we want to be there. We want to deliver our ideas and the people who are listening, they want to see you succeed. So you really have to change your mindset. There another hack is to always be in the present like 10 minutes before you go on stage. Don't think about your unread emails, your dishes in your sink, your to dos on your notepad. Don't think about that. Only focus on your presentation and that you're here and talking that is so crucial. An amazing tip also is Mantas like it's a confidence to take away five minutes before you go on stage.

You focus yourself, you close your eyes or you, you let it open and you talk to yourself over and over with short positive sentences. So for example, I believe in my idea, I believe in my idea. I will rock this. I will rock this. Everyone loves me. They wanna listen to me and just positive self talk. This will really pump you up to be on stage to also give you some hacks for your body to get confident and lower the stress level. I want to show you some high power poses. There's actually a study who showed if you do those poses, it will actually lower your stress level and it will um your self-confidence level will rise. So those poses are all about making yourself broad, taking up a lot of room and being just be just very, yeah, in a powerful position, very big, very wide and just be take a room on where you are. And also there are low power poses and I'm only showing it to you so that you know what not to do. So if you um see yourself doing those poses right before your um like presentation on stage, just stop and um not do them because all of those poses really make you um like small, they make you look down and they just, they don't take up a lot of room.

They aren't really that powerful, they aren't even like there is no powerful way in that and this will actually um your stress level will rise and your self confidence level will go down. This study was um it was um it took place with like 20 students and they only had those poses in for two minutes. So two minutes of like big high powerful poses and their confidence level rose. I can tell you this works. Let's go on to our sixth tip. It's to not familiarize yourself with the venue. This is a big mistake. Black people do because for example, if you go to an offline event, this will happen. Um hopefully soon again, um there is always ways like when you can go there early and really try everything out like how the venue looks where people are sitting. Um How big is the stage? Where will be like my screen? How do I stand on stage without um being in front of the screen? Um Do they have a microphone? Do they have a headset, stuff like that? And also with online events, you can try out the the technical tools you can try out your video, your microphone and how you want if you like want to sit on a stool when presenting or if you want to stand up while presenting, you can try out everything and you should try out everything because this also helps with your nervousness.

If you know, there can't get um be every like anything wrong because you have tried it out before and everything is safe. So for offline events, be there early and go on stage and try it out, like try it out being on stage and talking and visualizing yourself standing there and talking to the crowd. This will literally take away your nervousness because you have visualized and stood there and with online events also like a said, tried out the technical tools and stuff like that so that there aren't any hiccups, there will always be some hiccups. I've experienced it all but it gets a little bit. Um Yeah, like the, the chances are a little lower if we tried out before with the last um mistake, I want to talk about our infective slides you have surely seen it all. Like I've seen so many ineffective slides or ugly slides, completely packed slides. And what that does is that, um, it throws off the attention span of the attendees so I can show you some slides. I'm always taking pictures when I'm at an event and I see those slides because I'm always thinking like, oh my God, what are they doing? Because as you see no one can read that I actually was sitting in the fourth role.

So I should see what um the people are presenting, but like you couldn't read that and the attention span was gone. So the actual actionable step here is less is more use coherent styles, fonts, et cetera. Really don't skip around with your corporate identity too much. Really try sticking to your special fonts and colors and a crucial step is use your slides as an add on and um to your speaking and not something that you want. Like the whole paragraph is on the slides and you talk literally the same words as um as our on the slides. I've seen it so often and it's so weird. So um the less is more, as I said, um use pictures, use strong words, use um numbers if you have it and really see it as a visual aid rather than um the slides as their own. So we um I want to end my presentation as well. The quote from George Dyer everything you ever wanted is on the other side of fear. So really go out there and present on stage the first time if you want to or online, really try it out. It's so um rewarding, I would say I always get an adrenaline and energy rush after my um talks because I'm all for it on teaching you how to really speak on stage and just teaching you itself.

And if I can um empower women to be themselves on stage, I am happy as fuck. So, thank you all for listening today. I'm Denise. I'm a pitch trainer speaker and I would be happy to um uh to be like to connect on linkedin. And yeah, thank you so much for being a part of this presentation. And we have like two minutes left if you have like one quick question or something like that. And also if you have questions after my presentation, you can always hit me up on linkedin or Instagram or whatever and just write me on there. I'm always happy to help you out there. Thank you so much. Oh You missed 50 Let me, which was mistake number 50, mistake number five was actually quite long. It was um not being like the mistake was being too nervous and what you can do to not be nervous. So you can really work on your mindset to really see it as something amazing when you speak on stage and just get hyped and pumped to be on stage. And you can also do some tricks with your body language um that you make yourself big and powerful and stand there like that for two minutes.

And you will really get pumped up and get your, your self confidence level will rise and you will just have fun on stage. It's literally so much fun to go on stage and like teach someone about a topic. It's literally so much fun. So thank you all for coming today and have a nice and wonderful um woman Tech Global Conference. Thank you so much. Bye.