In a fast-paced era where time is of the essence, no one has time to sit through a lengthy PowerPoint presentation that bores them.
Everyone wants to attend and listen to a presentation that is engaging, to the point and effective. It is even worse if you are the one giving the presentation, and nobody seems to be enjoying it. To help you avoid the ‘yawns’, ‘sighs’ and the ‘walk-outs’ from your audience, we have ten great ideas to help you create and deliver an excellent PowerPoint presentation.
Here are some PowerPoint presentation tips to create a presentation that is out of this world.
1) Know your audience
One awesome idea for an effective PowerPoint presentation is knowing who your audience is. This is important as it will help you to plan and draft your presentation, ensuring it caters to the right audience. You would not want to start your presentation by making jokes about the latest Miley Cyrus music video to a large conference room of senior business executives or mature lawyers.
2) Deliver the right message
As you are drafting a copy of your script for your presentation, remember to outline your key points so that you know what and how to deliver them to your audience. Strategize the presentation in a way that the message that you would want to deliver to your audience is presented correctly.
Ensure that your audience gets the message that you have presented to them. Taking feedback from your previous presentation and using them for your next one is very useful – it helps you improve each time.
3) Create an outline
Another idea for an effective PowerPoint presentation is constructing a structure that clearly expresses your message so that the goal of the presentation is clearly delivered. In any typical storyline, remember to have an introduction, the main body and the ending.
Engage the audience with an interesting introduction, captivate them during your main body of presentation and finish off with a strong message for your ending.
4) Short and simple
Guy Kawasaki, a speaker and entrepreneur, outlines all of his presentations and uses the 10-20-30 Rule; 10 slides for a presentation, 20 minutes is the longest amount of time you should speak and 30 point font is the smallest font size you should use on your slides.
Read more about Guy Kawasaki’s Rule of PowerPoint
5) Use pictures and visuals
They say a picture says a thousand words, so why not include some pictures and visuals for an effective PowerPoint presentation. Use images or photos so that your audience does not have to read every slides. You could even use graphs and charts in your presentation to help get your point across to your audience quicker.
6) Adding video
Adding video to your slides is another idea for an effective PowerPoint presentation. At times, a video could add a little something extra to your delivery.
Whilst we advise you to use video, remember to only use them when they are beneficial. Make sure that the production value of the video is of good quality. The video should directly relate to your presentation and not be just some silly and meaningless advertisement.
7) Perfect your slides
Another awesome idea for an excellent PowerPoint presentation is perfecting your slides. From the PowerPoint templates that you would be using to your font sizes, your presentation should help to enhance what you have to say and give to the audiences.
Use bullet points on your slides as it gives your audience key points from your presentation. Do not overload your slides with bullets; the purpose is to keep your audience engaged with you and not reading your slides.
8) Fun and laughter
Giving a presentation does not have to be all serious, so let’s take a look into adding some fun and laughter into your presentation. You may be giving a speech to a room full of business executives, chartered accountants or a room full of barristers, however it is still worth having a couple of “How many accountants does it take to screw in a light bulb?” jokes up their sleeves.
9) Get comfortable
It is a best practice to bring your own laptop to use, as you are most comfortable since you have been rehearsing with it. You just have to make sure you have brought necessary connectors to link to the venue’s equipment. It would be great if you could bring your PowerPoint presentation on a USB flash drive as a backup just in case.
Even better, you could use Prezentt’s live slide-sharing application that works on any device with a browser. Not only does it help the presenters, it also assists the audience to get immediate access to the slides, other necessary documents and even the presenters’ contact details – just in case they have questions for you.
10) Make it actionable
So you are done with your slides and your presentation but it is not the end just yet. Finish off your presentation with your audience remembering you instead of them thinking it was just another presentation.
Provide something at the end of your presentation, that your audience can do immediately or put thought into. This is where you wrap everything up and at the same time, bring everything together.
Summary
While there are many other ideas and tips that could help you with your presentation, we believe the ideas mentioned here are the core essentials to an excellent PowerPoint presentation and will definitely help you in preparing for your next presentation.
Good luck!
