Visual Proof

Next week, I'm going to be giving a presentation about how speakers can convince skeptical audiences. One of the things I will be talking about is the power of visual proof.

Visual proof is a standard persuasion strategy in advertising, especially in infomercials. We watch as wrinkles disappear, shammies soak up spilled soda, people lose weight, and dogs sit still for pedicures. Advertisers know that when we see it with our own eyes, we're more likely to believe the product's promises.

Have you ever needed convincing that daily exercise can make you look sexier? Some of my favorite YouTube videos are the 365 day transformation videos that show us the effects of daily exercise. This one is great:


Here is another good one. Fewer days, even more dramatic results:


The visual proof is convincing. A daily exercise routine results in a much healthier appearance.

Visual proof is especially important when speakers are talking about problems that are not immediately apparent but grow worse over time. Check out this video about the long term effects of second hand smoke. We've all heard that second hand smoke leads to breathing problems in children, such as asthma. As the video shows, proof is in the MRI's.

Over the past ten years, Al Gore has become a master of visual proof. Facing resistance from people who do not believe that global warming is a serious problem, Gore now opens all of his global warming presentations with video clips and still photos that show the seriousness of the problem. Here is his presentation at a TED conference in 2009:


The melting ice cap, the methane gas bubbling up from the lake, the negative ice balance in Antarctica, the growth of "dead zones" where there is a radical depletion of oxygen in the oceans . . . it is all clear evidence of a very serious problem. Gore's visual proof is persuasive.

How can ordinary speakers who may not have Gore's resources achieve something similar? In an earlier blog post, I mentioned how Bill Gates used a series of PowerPoint slides to show how malaria had disappeared from the temperate zones. That's one example of cost effective visual proof.

Another example, is "The World of 100," a series of poster-infographics designed by Tony Ng. If the world were a village of 100 people, how many of the 100 would be Asian? How many white? How many would speak Spanish? How many would have access to clean water? To a college education? Ng's visuals show how much easier it is to process info on the scale of 100 than on the scale of 6 billion. The graphics help the audience see facts much more clearly. Visuals like these can be used to prove a point that runs counter to our own experience (such as the fact that most people in the world still do not have access to computers or the Internet).

When creating persuasive presentations, especially for skeptical audiences, it's critical to think about how facts and evidence can be communicated through visual proof. We need to go beyond bar charts and bulleted PowerPoints. The effort you put into making your presentation visually persuasive will help strengthen your case by helping people to literally see the problem, and the solution.

Statistics That Mean Something

I was watching Bill Gate's TED presentation on malaria on the TED website. This is the now-famous speech where he release a jar of mosquitoes into the audience. I was struck by how Gate's speaking style has changed in the past decade. He still keeps one hand in his pocket, but with the other hand he uses interesting, natural gestures. He speaks in a very comfortable, conversational style, and at times he is really funny. I enjoyed watching him speak.

I was also impressed by how he made his statistics meaningful to the audience. In one part of the speech, he talks about how the disease is now only in the poorer countries, which leads to it not getting much investment.

This is what he said:

"In 1900, it's everywhere. In 1945, it's still in most places. In 1970, the U.S and most of Europe have gotten rid of it. 1990, you've gotten most of the northern areas. And more recently . . . it's just around the equator."

The information could easily have been shared on one slide with four or five bullet points. The typical presentation of factual information.

But instead, Gates shows a series of slides demonstrating how malaria was eliminated from all of the temperate zones, which is where the rich countries are. The counties that have malaria are in red. The countries where it has been eradicated are in beige. As Gates speaks, we literally watch it disappear from the rich countries.

As a result, we better understand why the issue doesn't seem like a big problem to Americans, and therefore why it hasn't received much investment. Gates goes on to tell the audience that more money has been put into baldness drugs than malaria -- helping us better understand how little attention the issue has received. He makes the statistics meaningful, and gets us to care about the problem.