powerpoint presentation ideas

powerpoint presentation ideas

Powerpoint Presentation Ideas

1. Introduction

With the onset of the new millennium, technology is fast changing and that too at a fast pace. And this change is nowadays taking place in the way the information is conveyed. During the previous years, a speaker using a chart sheet to convey his message was a complete turnoff to the audience, but nowadays people prefer to use computers for their presentations. At this point, Microsoft realized this and came up with a software to satisfy the needs of the people. This is how Microsoft launched a software called Microsoft PowerPoint, which was a part of Microsoft Office in the year 1990. With the increasing demand, later more Microsoft versions were introduced. The first-ever version was Microsoft Powerpoint 3.0, then 4.0 and 4.3 later with more changes powerpoint 95, powerpoint 97, 2000, 2002, 2003, and the recent one Microsoft PowerPoint 2007. Microsoft has improved its software each time with greater features and don’t forget reliability. At this point, one could imagine how useful and important the software will be. And one should be eager to learn to know about creating presentations effectively and to its best.

Powerpoint presentations are useful tools in the hands of a good speaker to help convey messages in meetings. It is developed to offer a time-saving and useful way for multi-slide presentation edited by the speaker. The powerpoint presentation reduces the production cost to a large extent, helping the user to make powerpoint slides and enter data. The powerpoint presentation also has a feature to directly type in notes view, this can be used as a speech for a seminar or an association.

2. Choosing the Right Theme

The theme is the overarching design of your presentation, and should reflect the subject matter. It acts like the ‘skin’ of your slides, and includes the background, colour, and fonts. Choosing the right theme can determine whether or not the audience will bother to actually look at your slides, so it is an essential piece of the puzzle. I have seen a lot of presentations on scientific subjects done with a bright pink, feminine background and Comic Sans as the chosen font. Although it may have been their favourite colour and font, neither the background nor the font matched the subject matter in the slightest. Scientific presentations are much more suited to a background that is a light, perhaps blue or grey colour, and the font should be a simple, clean one that is easy to read such as Arial or Verdana. With a serious subject matter, you do not want to detract from it with a font that is difficult to read, or colours that are too bright and detract from the actual information.

3. Engaging Visuals and Graphics

Creating a personable PowerPoint presentation has significant benefits when trying to put across an idea or gain an understanding. When a presentation catches more of the senses, it will have more of an impact, so it’s best to work on having both an informative and visually appealing piece of work. A slide show isn’t very popular as it’s time consuming to create, it’s easier to base your work around a comic strip. Comic strips are great as it gives straightforward dialogue and visual display with consistent concise points. Photography is a great way to capture the reader effectively, a balance between pictures and text is best to avoid confusion and make sure to display the image’s relevance to the topic by either putting the picture in context or providing a brief caption to describe it. Another effective way to represent an idea is to use a flow diagram; flow diagrams show progression by representing points in boxes/circles connected by lines to show directional movement. Animation in sequence offers a similar visual effect using motion; although animations can be distracting if too random so ensure the animation correlates with the idea being presented. Finally, a well-placed video clip can be a powerful way to summarize an idea or portray a snapshot of real life demonstrating the concept. Always avoid video as a poor substitute to presenting the idea yourself, videos are often overused to avoid speaking and in turn don’t represent an idea effectively.

4. Effective Slide Layouts

And the third proposed slide is the section title slide. This layout is composed of title text and a color rectangle behind it. This gives the look of a heading with content underneath it. Use this slide when you start a new section of your presentation and make it easy to distinguish sections.

Second, the bulleted list slide layout. This is the most commonly used slide layout and for good reason. Bullet points are a very effective way to summarize information. Make sure that each individual point gets its own line. One click per point is the best method for putting this information into the slide. A slide title should come before the list; this title is an effective way to make an explicit point.

There are three particular slide layouts that should be used to maximize the effectiveness of a presentation. First, a title slide. Every presentation should have a title slide which includes the title (and subtitle) of your presentation, your name and/or the name of your group, and the date. A vertical title is good for being space efficient, especially when there is a long title or when a subtitle is included. Text placed externally is just taking up more slide space. A “title only” slide layout could be chosen as a secondary layout in order to change the layout for any succeeding title slides. This could be done to make subtitle text smaller.

Effective slide layouts will create a professional look and enhance the readability of a presentation. The elements that make up a slide layout are consistent for each slide and include the placement and size of text, graphics, and other objects. Powerful slide layouts could be created by using the built-in layouts provided in PowerPoint. Once you’ve applied a layout to a slide, it can quickly be changed to another one. To further enhance an already existing layout, one can utilize the slide master. Also, keep in mind that some color schemes and font styles will look more professional than others. Choose one that will represent this.

5. Captivating Presentation Techniques

– Special Effects – Using the Slide Master – Slide Transitions – Incorporating Sound – Avoid Overcrowding – The 6 x 6 Rule: No more than 6 words per line and 6 lines per slide – The 66% Rule: No text or image should be placed within 66% of a slide – The “One Point Rule”: Each slide should make only one point – The Seven Line Rule: Slides with more than seven lines of text are less likely to be remembered – Presentation Content – Tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, then tell them what you told them. – The Power of Three: Information presented in threes is more convincing, more interesting, and more memorable. – Use Anecdotes – Using Quotations – Built-in Questions – Personal Touches – Presentations work best when the audience can relate personally to the presenter’s or organization’s message – Referencing current events, especially if they are specific to your target audience – Presentations that incorporate viewgraphs tend to feel more personal to the audience