Presenting from a Distance
By Dave Paradi, MBA, co-author of "Guide to PowerPoint"

With business travel declining due to costs and other factors, presentations that would traditionally be held in a conference room have been forced to change as well. More presentations are being delivered remotely, either through a webcasting technology or by teleconferencing with each person having a copy of the slides in advance. If you are delivering presentations where most of the people are not in the same room, here are some ideas to keep in mind.

The Internet will limit what you can do
Whether you send your slides ahead of the presentation or are delivering the slides live through software that shares your slides in a browser window, you will be limited in what you can do. When slide files are sent ahead, embedded graphics and multimedia can clog e-mail systems and fill users inboxes, not allowing the file to be received and causing participants in your meeting to be frustrated at you before you even start. When sharing slides live, bandwidth limitations can cause animations, transitions and multimedia clips to stop and start at random while playing, causing a disjointed message for the viewer. You should design slide files to be small and using only the simplest of movement effects to make the slides appear their best when displayed.

Your audience is multitasking
No matter how good you are as a presenter, your audience knows you can’t see them and they will be doing other things while you are speaking, such as checking e-mail, eating lunch or reviewing documents. So you need to keep them engaged during the presentation with more audience interaction through discussion questions, polls or brainstorming exercises to keep them involved with what you are presenting.

Graphics need more explanation
When you use a graphic, such as a photo, chart or diagram, you will need to have more explanation on the slide than you would in a face to face presentation. When the attendees are not in the same room, they can’t see you point to something on the screen. So you need to add explanatory arrows and callout text that builds on the slide to make it clear what you are referring to when you are speaking.

A remotely delivered presentation can still be effective, as long as you understand the differences in the presentation environment and adapt to meet the needs of the participants wherever they may be.