Teleconferencing can be a great way to reach hundreds of people all over the globe without having to leaving your home or office. But if you are the only presenter during a teleconference, there are several guidelines you need to follow to ensure success.
- Stand, don’t sit while speaking. Your breathing, energy and volume will be much better if you stand.
- You can’t take visual cues from your audience, therefore you can’t count on natural dialogue happening in your teleconference the way it would in a normal small group presentation.
- Because no one else is asking questions during the first part of your presentation (the usual structure of a tightly timed 60 or 90 minute teleseminar is to hold questions until the end), you will find that you will get more tired and your throat may get drier than when giving a normal presentation.
- Without visual cues from your audience, you can not be quite as interactive. Therefore you need even more material and stories than usual.
- Your lips may get dry. Keep a lip balm handy.
- Keep tissue nearby.
- If you spot an error in your slides, don’t panic! (You can make it seem planned by offering a gift to the first person who spots the error)
- Without an audience to play off of, a teleconference may seem “harder” to do than a normal speech. This just means you need to do a little more practice in advance.
- Your audience can’t see you read during a teleconference, but don’t try to read! If you read during a teleconference you will sound boring, flat and monotone and everybody will tune out instantly.
- You can drink a lot more water during a teleconference without anyone noticing. So that leads to the final tip. Make sure you go to the bathroom right before the teleconference begins.
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