Jamie Oliver and the Power of the Presentation

Everyday millions of dollars are spent on marketing and advertising and yet in so many organizations the power of the presentation is an afterthought. In the last two weeks I have a friend who has been given the task of organizing a group of presentations from people in his company for a convention. The audience for these presentations are their very own clients--an audience that is tenuous at all times. There is no such thing as a customer for life anymore. So one would think that A LOT of time, effort and expertise would be invested in the creation of quality presentations and presenters.

This has not been the case.

It has been the opposite.

High levels of anxiety, frustration and well anger have been felt on the part of the organizer because he has not been given the time or resources to adequately prepare this group. He texted me a few days back and told me I would kill myself if I saw their slides. That is probably a bit of an overstatement but I got his point.

So let it be said:

YOUR PRESENTATION IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT
MARKETING TOOLS AVAILABLE TO YOU. STOP MESSING IT UP

If you want to see it done right, take 20 minutes of your day and watch Jamie Oliver's TED presentation on his food revolution. Here is what you will find: it is not highly polished or manipulative at all. It is engaging, funny, serious, human. Jamie is totally transparent. His audience shows their appreciation with applause and enthusiasm for his message. Jamie engages all our senses, uses technology to HELP the presentation, not become the presentation. All in all, it is not a perfect presentation and for me that is what actually makes it perfect.

There is much to be learned from Jamie. Take a look: