Why is online presenting difficult? (2/2) What to do

The previous article explained why presenting online is much more difficult than presenting in real life, especially if you already have some experience of the latter. Now we will look at how to deal with this problem.

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We already know that the main issue is the lack of feedback, a situation that can easily lead to our trying to deliver too much information in a very short time span. This carries the risk of overloading the attention capabilities of our audience and thus possibly also losing that attention.

Try to obtain useful feedback online by the following means, as advised by the management-issues.com website.

Polling

Most web presentation platforms provide an interactive polling feature. This can provide some useful information about the audience and, what’s more, it gets them involved because they actually have to do something. Admittedly it is only a minor something but still it greatly enhances engagement. However, you should refrain from using polling at the very beginning and very end of your presentation: it is best used to test understanding during the course of a long presentation.

Follow the tool that measures attention

If your online platform for webinars and virtual meetings allows you to do so, keep an eye on the icon that lets you know how many people are looking at your screen. If you start losing viewers, that means people are doing something else on their computers.

To some extent, this is okay: occasionally people do just drift away. However, if large numbers of people are doing something else, you should do or say something that will draw their attention back to what you are presenting.

Ask for feedback

With large audiences, people are muted to prevent background noise and other distractions. Even so you can occasionally ask them for feedback. You might take advantage of chat or a "hands up" feature. The goal is for you to find out quickly what you need and, again, somehow engage your listeners.

-jk-

Article source Management Issues - British website cntaining practical information, tips and advice to managers
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Why is online presenting difficult? (1/2)

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Why is online presenting difficult? (2/2) What to do