PowerPoint Archives

The Science of Effective Storytelling in Presentations

Posted on September 29, 2014 by Rick E

We often talk about the advantages of storytelling as a presentation technique.

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A presentation that’s filled with facts and figures can easily stray into a monotonous lecture that slowly lulls the audience to sleep. But if you choose to tell a story, you can give your audience something personal, concrete, and relatable to listen to. You can elicit very strong emotions that allow them to participate and engage with what you’re sharing.

As Dr. Paul Zak of the Center for Neuroeconomic Studies found, narratives can trigger powerful responses when told the right way.

The science of effective storytelling

In this short film made for the Future of Storytelling Summit, Dr. Zak carefully explains how the human brain responds to effective storytelling:

After observing the neural activity of respondents who viewed the story of a terminally-ill two-year-old boy, Dr. Zak found that effective storytelling can evoke powerful feelings of empathy that come from the release of particular neurochemicals, including oxytocin and cortisol. Furthermore, these powerful responses often turn into concrete and positive action.

This, however, doesn’t happen by telling just any other story. In order to be effective, the narrative has to follow the dramatic arc outlined by German playwright Gustav Freytag: exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution. Otherwise, as Dr. Zak concluded, listeners will have “little if any emotional or chemical response.”

What does this mean for presentations?

To elicit the same powerful emotions from your audience, craft a story that follows the solid structure Gustav Freytag first envisioned 150 years ago:

Exposition

In a literary story, this is where the author lays out some “ground work” by presenting the characters, setting, and basic conflict.

For your presentations, this is where you establish some context. Introduce the point of view you’re presenting, and share some background information. If the story focuses on an experience you had with a client, set the scene and introduce important details.

Rising Action

After presenting the context of your story, it’s time to build tension and increase conflict. This is where you identify obstacles that prevent your character from feeling fully satisfied or happy. If your story is from a target customer’s POV, tell your audience about the challenges they face.

Climax

As the turning point of your story, the climax is the part where your character comes face-to-face with their problem. This is where the conflict becomes fully-realized and a solution is seen on the horizon. For your presentation, the climax marks where you start driving home your core message.

Falling Action

Slowly, as a solution becomes clearer and clearer, your character takes a course of action towards the identified goal. In the traditional sense, this is where the protagonist battles the antagonist. For your presentation, this is where you continue explaining your core message, focusing on how it helps resolve the problems you introduced early on.

Conclusion/Resolution

Finally, describe how your character meets their goals. This is where you explain how you and a difficult client came to an agreement. In another example, the conclusion is the part that details how your target customer finally achieves full satisfaction.

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Powerful storytelling can change the outcome of your presentations. Share stories that engage your audience by following an age-old technique that has always been universally effective.

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Featured Image: Screen shot from Future of StoryTelling: Paul Zak

Designing PowerPoint Decks for the Smartphone

Posted on September 24, 2014 by Rick E

Millions of Americans are glued to their smartphones. According to data gathered by Statista Dossier, there are currently around 163 million smartphone users in the US. The numbers are also expected to rise to 220 million by 2018. This comes as no surprise, considering that industry giants like Apple and Samsung release innovative new designs almost every year. In fact, Apple just released the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.

Luckily, it doesn’t take a lot of work to make sure that your PowerPoint decks are compatible for viewing on smartphones. All you have to do is follow these four basic rules:

1. Big and bold text

sample slide for smartphones 01 — Matthew Smith / Note&Point

Even if the iPhone 6 Plus has a screen size of 5.5 inches, that’s still a lot less room than where you’d commonly show a PowerPoint deck. Make sure that the font type and size that you use is extremely readable. Go for 30 points or higher. Stylized fonts should always be larger than your usual sans serif text. You don’t want the audience to squint just to read what you’re trying to say.

2. High-contrast colors

sample slide for smartphones 02 — Idan Gazit / Note&Point

Another way to increase the readability of your PowerPoint designs is through high-contrast colors. Use either a dark background with light-colored text or vice versa. Similarly, avoid using colors that are too bright. Try for a more muted palette with only a few vibrant pops of color every so often.

3. Powerful images over bullet points and paragraphs

sample slide for smartphones 03 — Stephen P. Anderson / Note&Point

Don’t overwhelm your target audience with too much text. Visualize your key points with powerful images instead. This will help keep your PowerPoint deck simple and straightforward. Don’t try to discuss too much concepts at one go. Explaining complicated concepts will require more sentences and paragraphs. If you feel like there’s something in your content that needs further explanation, simply link to other resources instead. You can also try to make a flowchart or an infographic using free online tools like Piktochart.

4. Simplicity

sample slide for smartphones 04 — Stephen P. Anderson / Note&Point

Despite the need for visuals, it’s also important that you don’t complicate your PowerPoint designs. Remember, you don’t have much space to work with. Always be mindful of white space and maintain balance in your design. You can still add some animations and transitions, but keep them to a minimum. Aim for a seamless viewing experience. Having too many elements will cause your presentation to lag.

The Takeaway

Smartphone users love the flexibility and convenience it offers. From your phone, you have access to a host of information. If you want to settle a silly argument, you can simply ask Siri for the answer. If you want to keep your work on track, there are plenty of apps that help you organize your ideas and to-do-list.

Among the other things you can do on a smartphone is deliver and view a presentation. You can share your PowerPoint deck through SlideShare or Brainshark.

In the boardroom, you won’t have to set-up a laptop and projector. With interactive apps like SlideShark and SlideKlowd, you can share your presentation directly to your audience’s devices.

Reference

“Smartphone Users in the US 2010-2019.” Statista. Accessed September 24, 2014.

The Case for Videos in Presentations

Posted on August 20, 2014February 20, 2023 by Rick E

How important are videos in presentations? In an age where 19% of online traffic comes from YouTube, it can definitely help.

The biggest hurdle you have to face as a presenter is engaging your audience. People are a fickle bunch, and you can never tell how your audience will react. It’s up to you make sure you’ve prepared as much as you can to keep them focused and attentive. Otherwise, your presentation will likely fall on deaf ears.

This is where videos in presentations can make a huge difference. Videos are a great format that engage both sight and hearing. Because of that, there’s plenty of opportunity to share a huge chunk of information in just a short amount of time. Think about it this way: In a novel, an author will probably spend a full chapter to introduce the setting of a story.

For a movie adaptation, this can be cut to just a few scenes. Instead of vivid and lengthy descriptions, you get to see the real thing. Considering that the average attention span lasts for only a couple of minutes, videos are an effective way to get your point across.

The Catch

Despite this advantage, videos in presentations can also prove to be harmful. As Christian Heilmann puts it, videos are very engaging. So engaging that they can become distractions. If you’re not careful, the information you’re sharing could fall to the background. In order to avoid this scenario, you have to learn how to strike a balance.

These are a few things to keep in mind about videos in presentations:

What videos to include

Keep your audience focused on your presentation by showing them videos that contribute to your discussion. In other words, videos in presentations should always drive a point and serve a purpose. You can go ahead and add funny clips in your slides, just as long as it’s connected to your overall message.

If you’re pitching a product or service, adding a video demonstration is a must. Another thing you can include are videos from your ad campaigns or content marketing strategy.

Video length

In order to stop your audience from getting too distracted by videos in presentations, use clips that are just a few minutes long. If the video you want to share is runs for more than five minutes, trim out some parts that aren’t too important to the main message.

You can use a video-editing software to cut your clips shorter. Here are a few user-friendly options for beginners:

Placement in presentation

You should also know where to place videos in presentations. It needs to come out at a strategic time so you can make the most out of it. According to brand communications expert, Carmine Gallo, videos can serve as a soft break for your presentations. Most people tend to tune out every 10 minutes or so. To reel them back in, trying placing videos after an in-depth discussion. For example, you can show a video demonstration after you explain the features of the new app you’re launching.

Videos can also serve as a good starting point. To immediately catch the attention of your audience, start with a short clip. Make sure the clip you choose has great impact, and can elicit shock or curiosity.

Engaging your audience can be a difficult task. Adding videos to your presentations can make that task easier.

To learn how you can add videos to your PowerPoint deck, read our previous tutorials:

Featured Image: woodleywonderworks via Flickr

Webinar PowerPoint Tips: Creating a Presentation that Speaks through the Screen

Posted on June 30, 2014 by Rick E

In today’s world, distance is no longer an issue when it comes to effective communication. With web conferences or webinars, you no longer have to hop on a plane to sit in meetings with those in another time zone.

But there’s more to webinars than just talking in front of a webcam, especially if you want to share crucial information or leave a lasting impression. It’s important that you enhance your audience’s experience with a webinar PowerPoint deck.

When you’re presenting in front a live audience, you’re physically available to command their attention. Your PowerPoint slides serve a secondary purpose. However, when you’re presenting online, your webinar PowerPoint deck is the main attraction.

With that in mind, consider these specific tips to make sure that your webinar PowerPoint speaks through the computer screen.

Sequence: What your webinar PowerPoint should contain

It’s important that your webinar PowerPoint follows a structure with a logical flow. Begin with a quick introduction, delve in the main body of your topic, and end with a concise conclusion.

Introduction – Include slides introducing yourself and other presenters in the webinar. Include a picture and relevant credentials so your audience can feel like they’re not just talking to a computer screen. It’s also useful if you can include a slide that explains the logistics of your webinar.
Body – The body of your webinar PowerPoint deck will depend on the topic you’re discussing. Whatever it is, keep your discussion clear but brief. Stick to discussing only one point at a time. There are plenty of ways to arrange the body of your webinar PowerPoint, just make sure that each point is structured into main segments.
Conclusion – The conclusion of your webinar PowerPoint should be short and sweet. Don’t drag it out by repeating everything you said before. Instead, create a slide that summarizes your main points. To encourage your audience to participate in a discussion, include an action plan or a call-to-action question.

Design: What your webinar PowerPoint should look like

Your webinar PowerPoint should be efficiently designed for online sharing. Lags on your presentation look unprofessional and can be frustrating for your audience.

Opt for a simpler, sleeker design. As always, avoid using too much text and bullet points. Most importantly, avoid using huge picture files, videos, and animations which might cause problems for connectivity. This doesn’t mean you should go completely without graphics. Just make sure the file sizes aren’t too large or are compressed before sharing.

Consider the following when designing your webinar PowerPoint deck:

When explaining something that requires several steps, consider making use of “build” slides. This is a type of animation that allows you to reveal a slide bit by bit as you talk.
Make use of PowerPoint’s SmartArt graphics to illustrate key points without having to use complicated images.
For your the background of your slides, opt for a solid color or gradient effect. Lower quality images might not be big enough to fill the entire background. And if you resize them, your background will look distorted and pixelated.

Reference

“Reduce the File Size of a Picture.” Office Support. Accessed June 30, 2014.

Featured Image: Ministerio TIC Colombia via Flickr

What Marketing PowerPoint Presentations Can Do For Your Business

Posted on June 25, 2014 by Rick E

Marketing is the bridge that connects producers with consumers. It involves the development, promotion, and distribution of products with the aim of satisfying the needs and demands of consumers. It’s a process that’s fundamental to your business, forming the lifeblood of what you do. Every step demands clear and effective communication between different parties. This is where

Every step demands clear and effective communication between different parties. This is where marketing PowerPoint presentations can come in handy.

Marketing PowerPoint presentations can help facilitate communication in the following areas:

Product Management

By definition, product management involves all decisions made in the production and sale of goods or services. It serves to determine details like improvements that can be made on the product, whom it should be marketed to, and how it should be promoted. Information that can answer these queries is gathered through research. This is best shared through marketing PowerPoint presentations.

The visual component of a PowerPoint makes information engaging and easy to follow. Translate data about customers, trends and competitors through concise slides. Focus on the most important details and offer brief explanations on how it could affect the development of your new product. Adding relevant images will also make your presentation memorable.

Pricing

Presenting financial data through a marketing PowerPoint will help your company make sound decisions about pricing. Since plenty of people are inclined towards visual learning, it might be beneficial for both presenter and audience to break down statistics and numbers in engaging visuals.

Using charts and graphs, translate all the dizzying numbers and statistics into digestible illustrations. This also leaves room for your verbal elaboration, which will let you establish a personal connection with the audience.

Promotion and Advertising

A marketing PowerPoint can also work as a great promotional tool for your product. If you find yourself presenting at industry or press events, make use of PowerPoint slides that visually translates the message of your brand.

Let your marketing PowerPoint illustrate the best thing about your product. Answer the questions your consumers will likely ask:

What is it?
Why is it important?
How does it work?

Conclusion

All types of presentations should be given plenty of thought. Specific presentations especially require specific types of elements on the deck. As an expert in your own field, you know the content best. However, not everyone has time to design a perfect deck, especially just days before the deadline.

If you need more insight about marketing PowerPoint presentations, don’t hesitate to contact us for a quick consultation. Our expert PowerPoint designers are ready to help you take your products to the next level.

Reference

“What Is Product Management? Definition and Meaning.” BusinessDictionary.com. Accessed June 25, 2014.

Featured Image via Flickr

Get Free PowerPoint Templates to Jump Start Your Presentation Design

Posted on June 23, 2014June 14, 2023 by Rick E

In the past, we wrote about several ways you can enhance your technology PowerPoint design. But if you’re still grappling to get started, you can try some of the free PowerPoint templates available at Microsoft.com.

There are experts who will tell you to avoid using free PowerPoint templates at all cost. They say most templates are cliched and overused. While it’s definitely great to have a unique design for your slides, beginners might feel overwhelmed starting out with just a blank slide. Starting with a PowerPoint template can help you visualize where you want to take your design. You have plenty of choices, especially if you take the time to find a template that suits the theme of your presentation.

Here’s a template you can use for technology PowerPoint presentations:

One of the free PowerPoint templates you can download from Microsoft.com — Business Digital Blue Template – Download HERE

Just like this one, all free PowerPoint templates from Microsoft are customizable. Use this template as a starting point, and from there, edit the slides as you wish. You can add your own images, fonts, or backgrounds. You can change color schemes. You can change animation styles and slide transitions.

Still need inspiration? Check out our technology PowerPoint portfolio. It’ll give you some great ideas on how you can enhance your free PowerPoint templates.

Featured Image: Paul Inkles via Flickr

Adding Visuals to Your Technology PowerPoint

Posted on June 18, 2014June 7, 2023 by Rick E

Visuals are crucial to technology PowerPoint presentations. Whether you’re an engineer or a software developer, your content will have concepts most people are unfamiliar with. Despite its specific nature, which does cater to a specific type of audience, not everyone might appreciate long walls of text in your tech presentation.

Using diagrams and content inspired images will definitely help an audience overwhelmed with technical talk. Aside from this, your pitch will benefit from catering to people’s responsiveness to visual stimulus. Short attention spans may be alleviated with visual representations of data that present your key points statistics neatly.

Here’s what you should know about creating visually-engaging technology PowerPoint presentations:

Use images that illustrate content

According to presentation expert Dave Paradi, visuals in PowerPoint presentations fall into two categories. The images you use are either ‘design’ visuals’ or ‘content visuals’. The first one serves a purely aesthetic purpose. The latter refers to pictures that illustrate key points.

Your technology PowerPoint should make use of content visuals. Choose images that perfectly illustrate the concepts you’re trying to impart.

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Don’t get us wrong—your PowerPoint shouldn’t be without design. The pictures you use serve a double purpose: 1) helping your audience understand a difficult concept; and 2) engaging their aesthetic sensibilities.

Here’s an example from our extensive technology PowerPoint portfolio:

You’ll see how a complex concept has been cut down to the gist. With minimal text and expressive graphics, the objects on the slide portray its core message. This shows that you don’t need an entire excerpt from your reference and research. You can cut this down while still being substantial with images.

Where does the rest of the information go? Showing instead of telling on the slide actually leaves more room for you to verbally expound on your points. This helps you establish an emotional connection with your audience, and further engage them with your body language and tone of voice.

Simplify complicated concepts through diagrams

Some concepts are more complicated than others, requiring detailed explanations. In your technology PowerPoint, use diagrams to break down concepts into their most essential parts.

PowerPoint makes this easy with the SmartArt function. Just look for it in the Insert tab and you’ll find a gallery of diagram templates. All you have to do is choose the one that’s most appropriate for your content.

Although these options are available in PowerPoint, there are specific sites online that specialize in just diagram creation. If you’d like to design your own diagram, you can head to Gliffy.com. Gliffy is one such site that lets users experiment with diagrams until they find one that’s fit for their purposes.

technology powerpoint 04 — *Note: You’ll need to register to save your creations

Get as creative as you’d like. Just remember to keep your diagram as simple as possible. Having too many arrows branching out to too many shapes might end up baffling your audience even more.

Reference

“Design Visuals vs. Content Visuals.” Think Outside The Slide. February 05, 2013. Accessed June 18, 2015.

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Featured Image: Kate Ter Haar via Flickr

Map Out Your Presentation With Mind Mapping

Posted on June 13, 2014 by Rick E

Designing an effective PowerPoint requires careful planning and preparation. You can start by writing an outline with a pen and paper.

If you’re more comfortable using a computer, then you may use a word processor such as Microsoft Word. If you want to take it up a notch, think about using a mind mapping tool instead.

Visual Representations

Mind mapping offers you a great way to brainstorm and give your ideas visual representations. It’s a process that combines imagery, color, and strategic arrangement of other visual elements.

Compared to manual note-taking, mind mapping has been proven to improve information recall mostly due to the use of images. With a large number of the population leaning towards visual learning, graphic representations of data is more easily processed than just walls of text.

In other words, it’s a perfect way not just to plan but also to deliver your PowerPoint presentation. It’s not just for your audience’s eyes, either. You yourself can benefit from this by looking at organized ideas that are easier to digest.

Powerful Program

Although you can create mind maps manually, there are different mind mapping tools available online that you can either purchase or download for free. Leverage your mind mapping skills with the use of powerful programs that help you organize your ideas more efficiently.

iMindMap, for example, is one of the most powerful mind mapping programs available today.

With this tool, you can create topic “branches” organically as if you are manually drawing a visual map. The program will draw and arrange the topics as you focus on typing the keywords of each topic.

One of the best features of iMindMap is its presentation mode. This feature animates your maps easily, allowing branches of topics to grow spontaneously. It also features a “presenter” view.

As you present, your own notes are made visible to you along with the menu bar that controls the presentation. What your audience can see, however, are just your mind maps.

iMindMap also offers the capability to make a recording of your voice, which you can then attach to a map branch.

Exportable Ideas

Another advantage of using mind mapping software is that your ideas become more exportable and accessible to collaborators.

ConceptDraw is an example of an efficient mind mapping tool that works by connecting mind maps and business processes such as sending tweets and making a presentation.

Using ConceptDraw’s presentation mode, you may zoom or pan around your mind map and collapse or expand the nodes in ways that would make sense to your audience.

If you prefer to deliver your presentation using PowerPoint, you can simply export your mind map, either as a text outline or as a series of slides.

There’s a good reason why mind mapping is suitable for creating presentation. It can engage the audience’s attention faster, thanks to its visual structure. The process also allows you, the presenter, to explore ideas in a larger space.

Reference

“Mind Maps®: A Powerful Approach to Note-Taking.” MindTools.com. Accessed June 13, 2014.

Adventure Time Lessons for Preparing Your Presentation

Posted on June 4, 2014 by Rick E

Cartoon Network’s Adventure Time is one of those kid shows that have crossed generational boundaries and become a hit among adult viewers. Sure, animated shows for older viewers have been produced before (Beavis and Butthead comes to mind. And then there’s The Simpsons). Adventure Time, however, is a charming, honest-to-goodness children’s cartoon that just happens to appeal to adults.

So what is it about the show that pulls the grownups? Maybe it’s nostalgia (the old-school RPG Dungeons and Dragons was an inspiration) or the characters’ dark and witty sense of humor. Whatever it is, Adventure Time has made many of us look beyond the cartoon’s candy-colored fairy-tale exterior and appreciate the lessons in each episode. BuzzFeed has even created a post, “lessons for living a better life,” in reaction to the shows’ positive appeal.

In response, we are also creating our own list of things that we have learned from the show and how they apply to PowerPoint design.

Focus on what matters

The show follows Finn, a young boy, and his dog friend Jake, who possesses super stretching powers, as they fight candy zombies and foul gnomes in the Land of Ooo. In one episode, Finn overanlyzes a conversation he had with his ex-girlfriend, Flame Princess. The princess didn’t laugh at Finn’s joke. This prompted our hero to overthink their relationship and jump to conclusions. Thankfully, Jake the dog knocked some sense into him.

What he told the boy can also be applied to presenters who are too absorbed in unnecessary PowerPoint details. Stop being hung up on imaginary problems but rather, focus on what’s real.

In designing PowerPoint slides, many of us tend to be anxious about what elements to include in hopes of creating an impact. We forget that the message is more important than any flashy graphics or fancy animation and sound effects.

Never underestimate people

Many characters in the show appear unassuming yet capable of surprising you in the end. Cinnamon Bun is one of them. A typical lovable oaf, this guy was always underestimated by everyone. Nobody expected him to do anything extraordinary. Until in one episode, wherein he saved the day and got the girl. Finn’s reaction was priceless. “Did I just get shown up by Cinnamon Bun?”

One of the mistakes that you can make in delivering a presentation is underestimating your audience. This may show in the poor quality of your slides and lack of interest in making proper preparation. “They are just there to listen. Why should I even prepare?” You’ll get your answer after the presentation, when the audience starts throwing questions at you.

It’s okay not get it right the first time

Novice presenters can learn so much from this line from Jake:

You can apply this to any situation but if you’re being hard on yourself because of an initial presentation failure, take heart and remember this advice.

Stay optimistic – even if you don’t have enough sleep

And after several sleepless nights of designing your slides and practicing your speech, you may feel worried that you won’t be able to pull it off. Don’t worry. Princess Bubblegum (the ruler of the Candy Kingdom and friend of Finn and Jake) has something to say about that.

Jake: Princess Bubblegum, are you okay?

Princess Bubblegum: Yeah, I’m fine. I’m good. Haven’t slept for a solid 83 hours, but… yeah, I’m good.

‘Nuff said.

Case Study: Creating Professional PowerPoint for Email Professionals

Posted on May 23, 2014 by Rick E

Email Professionals is an email marketing company. Their services include developing winning email campaigns for clients by creating a unique email strategy, writing winning copy, and performing quality assurance on every email. Part of their strategy is to track results in order to know how to improve their campaign, if necessary.

What they essentially do is match their email marketing services according to their client’s situation. As every client has different needs, they propose different strategies. Incidentally, when we were tasked to create a PowerPoint presentation for their company, it was the same thing that we had in mind. Well, because naturally, that’s our principle as well.

We at SlideGenius strive to meet our clients’ expectations by creating presentations that are tailored exactly to their needs. We don’t just create slide decks from ready-made templates. Our goal is to create unique presentations, whether we are building from an existing one or creating from scratch.

The Challenge

Our task is to create a PowerPoint presentation that highlights the benefits of doing business with Email Professionals and at the same time, encourage an emotional response from the target audience. The audience members, by the way, are most likely other business entities. So the “challenge” that we have here is to make the slides look professional yet keep them from looking dull and boring. Since we’re going to talk about emails, we don’t want to simply spam the audience, so to speak.

The Solution

Even with our years of experience creating unique PowerPoint presentations, our team handled this project with utmost care. We don’t want to rest on our laurels. We just want to do an excellent job. With that in mind, we started by looking into the qualities of Email Professionals, what makes them unique and then put those thing front and center..

Basically, we made sure that the colors and font styling were consistent in order for the slides to convey a level of professionalism. We also managed to make the entire presentation interesting by adding snappy, copy. In the end, we were able to achieve what we had set out to do. To give the slides a professional look and feel without making it too dull and boring.

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