Whether you’re speaking to a dozen colleagues in a meeting or hundreds at a conference, follow these pointers to give a great presentation.

• When preparing your presentation, ask what is the problem or opportunity you are addressing? Why is it important to your audience? Write down the answers and revise them until they are succinct and clear. Your opening should cover these points.
• Include stories, examples, and analogies to explain ideas. Back up those ideas with statistics and emotional appeals.
• No matter how great your delivery is, people’s attention will wander. So, use signal words to keep their attention: “This next point is very important …” and “If you don’t remember anything else, remember this ...”
• Make eye contact with people in all parts of the room. Maintain eye contact with one person until you complete your sentence.
• Use gestures when you feel strongly about an idea. 
• Vary your voice level. Increase it to demonstrate passion and lower it to command attention.
• Use pauses to give the audience a chance to digest what you have said. Pauses also build suspense for what you say next.
• Wrap up by restating your big idea, the payoff for the audience, and what they can do next.
• Practice as many times as needed to get your delivery just right!

For more advice, read “Upgrade Your Next Presentation.”