Since starting my digital marketing consulting business in late-2008, one of the most interesting and challenging aspects has been making presentations. I hadn’t done a lot of them before, perhaps because there wasn’t much demand to hear from a high-tech reporter.

But given the emergence of social media, there is a lot of interest from companies and organizations looking for people who can explain what’s happening and what to do. Presentations are a lot more work than I had imagined but they are good for business because being able to demonstrate your expertise first-hand is a great way to connect with people.

While I haven’t taken the plunge and signed up for a presentation course, I have been spending a lot of time reading about best practices and watching videos of people who are good at delivering presentations that captivate and resonate. Thee biggest lesson I’ve learned is while there are people who are natural presenters, many of the best speakers do well because they’re prepared and experienced.

Here are some of the key lessons I’ve learned about making presentations:

1. Being prepared can’t be under-estimated. It’s not enough to know your subject matter inside out, a good presentation happens because the speaker knows what they’re going to deliver and how it’s going to be done. A crucial element is rehearsing your presentations, which means going through everything as if you were doing it for real. It is always surprising to discover while rehearsing that some parts of your presentation don’t work, which is something you’d never know until it was late otherwise.

2. Think of a presentation as a story or narrative. It’s more than a series of slides with interesting facts and graphics. Instead, you’re drawing people into your presentation by delivering an interesting, engaging or enlightening tale that starts with an introduction, provides some drama or entertainment, and then ends with a conclusion of what you’ve told the audience. An effective technique is telling stories that involve personal experiences so people can relate to the person on-stage.

3. Arrive early to prepare and get a lay of the land. I like to get to a venue at least 30 minutes before the presentation starts. This lets me learn about the technical set-up, the layout of the room, and get a sense of the audience from the organizers. Ideally, the room is empty so I can set up the presentation and run through a few slides, including those featuring videos.

4. Make yourself available before and after the presentation. It’s not enough to get on stage and deliver what you were asked to do. It is important to connect with the audience so they can get a sense of your personality and skill-set. Again, you want to make a connection as opposed to simply being a performer.

5. Turn everything off on your computer to avoid any technical surprises. I learned this lesson the hard way when during a presentation, there was soft music playing in the background. At first, I thought it was the audio system but soon learned I had left iTunes running. Needless to say, it was embarrassing but an important lesson. You should turn off applications running the background such as Twitter and DropBox that may provide notification alerts.

6. Be prepared for things to go wrong. As much as you’re prepared and well-rehearsed, not everything always goes according to plan. It could be that the videos you created don’t work or there’s no audio system.

7. Be ready to shift the focus on your presentation if you discover it’s not resonating with the audience. It could be something you learn before the presentation in talking with people attending the event. Or it could be something you sense during the presentation itself. It may not be a matter of abandoning your presentation but shifting gears and doing some ad-libbing. It means you need to be aware of the visual clues. Are people nodding their heads or writing notes as you speak? Are they laughing in the right spots, or not laughing at all?

8. As much as it would be great to create a presentation that could be used repeatedly (aka shampoo, rinse, repeat), the reality is presentations need to be customized to meet the needs and interests of the audience. In particular, case studies or examples have to feature companies within a particular sector. If you’re doing a presentation for event planners, for example, show them event planners, hotels and caterers using social media.

9. Thank the audience for attending. As much as you’re the “star attraction”, it takes two to tango. A good and engaged audience can make a presentation work really well. An audience not into it can easily kill a presentation.

10. Think of your presentation as a script that constantly changes and evolves. The parts/slides that resonate are retained while sections that don’t work should be replaced. I’m amazed, for example, how dramatically my social media presentation has changed and improved over the past six months.

Resources: Some of the good books I’ve read about presenting include the “The Naked Presenter” by Garr Reynolds and “Confessions of a Public Speaker” by Scott Berkun. Scott Stratten has a good post offering 30 quick tips for speakers.