As you gain experience presenting, one basic truth about public speaking gets clearer and clearer: the more you involve your audience, the more they'll focus on you and your message.

Start Before the Presentation
An accomplished consultant with an expertise in sales and marketing spends half an hour before a presentation going around the room introducing herself. She greets people warmly, then asks them questions like these:

"What kind of business are you in? What are your big challenges? Are your sales growing or declining? Why do you think that is?"

She follows these questions up with others designed to help her sharpen her content:

"How do you think my talk will help you improve your marketing efforts? What areas are you hoping I'll discuss?"

Such questions bring risks, of course. If an audience member thinks she'll devote the talk to solving his business problems, he'll probably be disappointed. But involving the audience in this manner before the talk ensures that her talk will be relevant to the needs of the audience. She may not be able to solve particular problems, but if she knows, for instance, that half the room is having trouble adopting an effective internet strategy, that's news she can put to good use.

Involve People During the Talk
You can keep an audience interested by interacting with them during the presentation. Here's how:

. Ask for a vote. "I can go two directions here - I can talk about reengineering order fulfillment or product development. Which would you prefer?"

. Ask for volunteers. "OK, now to show you how easy it is to run this video camera, I need someone to come up and act as guinea pig." Someone usually will.

. Ask for input from particular people. Sometimes it's useful to single people out and ask questions or have them speak briefly about something. But be careful here. You must appear to have perfectly good intentions-i.e., people must feel you're not going to ridicule them. A friendly demeanor helps, as does a sharp eye as to who might respond favorably.

. Ask the audience for an answer. If someone asks a question you can't answer, and it's appropriate, you might throw it out to the audience: "Gee I don't know. Does anybody here know the answer to that?" Note: Interacting with an audience is unpredictable, so be prepared to think on your feet if things don't go as planned. If you know you're going to ask a question or ask for volunteers, think about what could go wrong and have an escape route planned.

Maintain Eye Contact
It's also important to involve the audience by looking people in the eye as you speak. And don't look at people or over their heads. Look into their eyes and make a connection. Don't hold it too long; you don't want to intimidate or make people uncomfortable. Hold your gaze long enough that the person knows you are speaking directly to him or her. Maintaining eye contact helps the audience feel included. And it can remind you that you're really just having a conversation with individual people-not an intimidating "group."

Rest assured that the more you involve people, the better they'll respond to your message. And by winning their attention, you're well on the way to accomplishing your real goal: persuading or informing.

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