Tips from an expert: 6 ways to build interactive presentations

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We’ve all been there, sitting at our desks, staring at a computer for an hour while someone screen shares and talks at us—boring! Presentations like this are not only disengaging but also ineffective. As a facilitator, you want to captivate your audience and create a memorable experience that leaves a lasting impact.

So, if you’re ready to ditch the stale, uninspiring presentations for ones that compel, engage, and motivate your audience, you’re in the right place. We had the chance to sit down with Cal Martin, one of Lucid’s customer trainers, to get his expert tips on how to make presentations more engaging and interactive.

Tip #1: Leverage real-time collaboration

Leveraging real-time collaboration is one of the best ways to make presentations more interactive and impactful. Traditional presentations are often one-sided, with the speaker talking at the audience rather than having a meaningful discussion as a group.

Incorporating a real-time collaboration platform into your presentation can turn passive listeners into active participants. This also breaks up long stretches of speaking time, making the presentation flow more naturally.

When the audience is actively engaged—whether by contributing ideas, answering questions, or interacting with the content, they become more invested in your presentation. Capabilities like polls, virtual sticky notes, and a chat option lower the barrier to entry for less vocal attendees, making it easier for everyone to participate.

Unlike video conferencing alone, real-time collaboration means that everyone can share ideas simultaneously rather than waiting for a turn to speak. In a platform like the Lucid Visual Collaboration Suite, everyone can share ideas at the same time and interact, making collaboration more intuitive and efficient.

Explore in-depth guides and expert tips for becoming a better collaborator.

Tip #2: Build powerful visuals

Strong visuals are invaluable for delivering a clear, compelling message. They create a shared language that makes complex ideas easily understandable. Here are a few best practices to consider for creating an interactive, visual presentation:

Less is more. Limit the number of visuals to avoid cluttering your canvas. White space helps your audience focus on and retain the most important information.
Don't be afraid to use color. Thoughtful color choices and sound design principles enhance your presentation.
Keep it consistent. Check your entire presentation to ensure it follows brand guidelines, or create your own design rules to follow.
Organize data. Present data by using internal and external links. Create boards with Dynamic Tables and timelines to synthesize information.

Learn design best practices.

Watch a recording of our webinar. “Design principles for wow-worthy visuals.”

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Tip #3: Incorporate activities

Whether you’re presenting to an in-person, hybrid, or remote group, incorporating interactive activities keeps your audience involved, improves content retention, and fosters meaningful discussions. Beyond being fun, they help build trust, enhance group dynamics, and focus the group before you dive into the main content.

If you’re presenting in Lucid, icebreakers and other activities help introduce people to the platform in a gradual, approachable way. These activities typically only require the use of a few elements like emojis and sticky notes. Starting with a focused, structured activity helps to simplify the product experience, allowing the audience to focus on one thing at a time. As the facilitator, this enables you to scaffold your content, slowly building complexity while keeping your presentation interactive.

Here are a few interactive activities for presentations to kick off your next meeting:

Get to know you icebreaker: Kick off your presentation in a simple yet meaningful way. This template can accommodate groups of all sizes, helping participants find common ground, connect, and engage with one another.

Get to know you icebreaker (click on image to edit)

Fist of five: Encourage consensus and collaboration by using the fist of five technique. This template drives collaborative decision-making and gives everyone a voice.

Visual Activities are another fantastic way to make presentations interactive. Engage your audience in a fun icebreaker and give everyone an opportunity to connect. Lucid has dozens of curated activities to choose from, or you can create your own!

Favorite chocolate icebreaker activity (click on image to edit)

Impact vs effort matrix activity (click on image to edit)

Learn more about how to use Visual Activities to make your presentations more interactive.

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Tip #4: Set an agenda

Creating an agenda may seem like a simple task, but it is essential for setting up your presentation for success. Outlining the chronology of your presentation in advance not only provides structure but informs people about what will be covered so they can prepare.

Agendas are especially helpful for neurodivergent individuals or anyone who needs extra time to process information. They promote collaboration equity and make the presentation even more engaging when the audience knows what’s coming. Additionally, anyone who is unable to join can come back to the agenda and see what was discussed and what they may need to follow up on.

Meeting agenda template (click on image to edit)

Tip #5: Use Facilitator Tools

No matter which platform you use for your visual presentation, check that there are tools within the product to help you flow confidently through your content and make your presentation interactive.

Within Lucid, there are several capabilities that are designed with the facilitator in mind. Check them out:

Facilitator Tools: Efficiently create interactive presentations with Facilitator Tools. This is your go-to toolbox for helpful and intuitive capabilities. Access tools like timers to help keep the meeting on track, the laser pointer to highlight or emphasize certain content on the board, and take the lead to prompt attendees to follow you as you move around the canvas.

Quick shape banks: Quick shape banks are simple, intuitive elements you can add to your canvas in seconds. These tools make it effortless for participants to engage with the content right away. Instead of spending time teaching your audience how to navigate the product, they can jump right in, reducing friction and minimizing the product’s barrier to entry. Drag out a bank of sticky notes, emojis, and dots for easy collaboration.

Quick actions: Quickly set up the board for smooth facilitation. Create and add buttons to your canvas so all you have to do is click the button and activate the feature. You can create buttons to summarize and sort ideas, generate ideas using AI, start a timer, and more.

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Tip #6: Organize content with Frames and Paths

Frames

Rather than simply sharing a slide deck with your audience, we recommend using Frames. Frames are a great way to organize your content while making your presentation interactive. You can do this directly on the canvas so that information is grouped and organized together, and the audience can still interact with it. They can add emoji reactions, leave comments, and even contribute their own ideas.

Paths

One of the main reasons that remote presentations are often unengaging is that people are quick to multitask. We work with multiple monitors and screens, and it’s easy to quickly become distracted by a Slack message or an email.

Leveraging Paths helps people refocus on the content without calling themselves out. Paths empower participants to move from frame to frame actively and autonomously. They can follow along with the facilitator and move at their own pace if they need to review previous content.

Paths are also great for teams who work in different time zones where not everyone is able to attend the meeting. Team members can still follow the flow of the presentation, see people’s reactions, and add their own thoughts.

And there you have it, six tips from an expert for making interactive presentations.

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About Lucid

Lucid Software is the leader in visual collaboration and work acceleration, helping teams see and build the future by turning ideas into reality. Its products include the Lucid Visual Collaboration Suite (Lucidchart and Lucidspark) and airfocus. The Lucid Visual Collaboration Suite, combined with powerful accelerators for cloud and process transformation, empowers organizations to streamline work, foster alignment, and drive business transformation at scale. airfocus, an AI-powered product management and roadmapping platform, extends these capabilities by helping teams prioritize work, define product strategy, and align execution with business goals. The most used work acceleration platform by the Fortune 500, Lucid's solutions are trusted by more than 100 million users across enterprises worldwide, including Google, GE, and NBC Universal. Lucid partners with leaders such as Google, Atlassian, and Microsoft, and has received numerous awards for its products, growth, and workplace culture.

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