You’ve got the facts. Do you have the feelings? Show them!

When you’re making a presentation, you’re imparting information. Whatever your message might be—Vote! or Buy my new book! or Floss after meals! — you have some emotional attachment to it. (If you truly do not, I recommend you decline invitations to speak.)

Let your audience see and hear your emotions. I’m not saying every presentation needs to be a Hallmark moment. You don’t need to hand out Kleenex. But you need to impart more than mere facts if you want to motivate your audience.

Let’s take an easy example: Vote. Emotions you want to convey include pride in your candidate, optimism in the candidate’s abilities, a dash of patriotism, and perhaps even fear of the other candidates.

Then am I saying you need to manipulate people’s feelings? No. There is a big difference between manipulating and persuading.

Manipulating connotes that you control others. It also suggests that you’re manipulating the facts as well, so as to play with emotions. Bad, bad idea.

Persuading leaves control with the persuadee. You speak the truth, with the emotions that the facts support; it’s your listeners’ choice to agree.

We usually forget the facts before we forget the emotion. Whether it’s a business presentation or last night’s ballgame, we remember how it felt longer than we remember what was said and done. And most of us act on our feelings as much, if not more so, than we act on facts.

If you want to leave your audience feeling your message, take our upcoming class “Avoid Causing Death by Powerpoint.” MB/I contributors Scott Stiefvater and I will be holding this two-session workshop on September 23 & 30 in Walnut Creek. It’s $145 per person – space is limited – and you can register here or contact me or Scott for more information.