The Secrets To Great Virtual Meetings: Tips, Ideas & Tools

Meetings are hard enough to run when the participants are all in the same room, fighting over the last chocolate doughnut. But any meeting you call, nowadays, probably has at least one person attending who works in a remote location. In some cases, everyone in the teleconference is dialing in. You may be great at orchestrating an in-person meeting, but running an effective teleconference requires new skills.

Tip 1

As a host, it’s your job to keep the attention. You can suggest your audience to shut of any other online programs, like email or Facebook. Tell them to “allow yourself this hour of attention,” What you can do for them to reward that attention, is breaking your keynote into many smaller pieces of 3 -4 minutes of content. After that transition to doing something interactive with the audience. Ask them a quick question in the chat. Create breakout-rooms for 3 minutes to exchange about a statement. Print your slides instead of being stuck in the presenting mode. There are endless techniques to win back their attention. It isn’t easy, but your attention will be rewarded as well.

Tip 2

Ensure that you prepare everything in advance. Give the audience clear instructions like ‘go to the bottom of your screen, next to the little microphone and video icons, you’ll find the chat button. If you click that, a different screen will open where you can type a response to this question.’

Tip 3

Allow participants time to get a coffee or take a quick break before the start. Play some music, and say that the real content starts when the music stops. It may be beneficial to build in some reflection time at certain moments in your presentations to allow participants to see how the content can be used in their own circumstances. Or, do an exercise where they have to move in their own home. You could ask them to find a certain object & integrate it into your presentation (as a metaphor or example).

Tip 4

Look at the camera because this way the audience gets the impression that you’re making eye contact, instead of staring at your slides. It also helps if you can have some actual ‘human beings live in your room as an audience. Just a few people may be enough to feel their energy.

Tip 5

Invite participants to login 10-15 minutes earlier for an informal chat. It’s not quite the same as in person, but at least you get a chance to say hello to people as they come in.

Tip 6

I’m now recommending some of my clients who want to do a webinar or online presentation to hire an empty auditorium or theatre space with a professional camera operator. Most of those locations are now empty anyway (so it might even be possible to hire at a lower fee). I then have space to move around, bringing a stronger story because of that, while my slides are behind me. I’m once again in my natural professional environment, which helps me to embrace my professional top-speaker energy. It’s a completely different energy compared to delivering presentations from your home.

Tip 7

Preparation is key. You know that you will need to take on several roles, so make sure you prepared for the technical stuff coming up. Integrate the moderating role into your presentation, or ask the organiser to be the moderator. Let them explain the technical things that have to be shared at the start (where the chat box is, materials that participants may need), and you can prepare an introduction for the moderator to go through before you start.