PowerPoint Presentations Rules

Date: 2005-08-23 | Tags: marketing, presentations

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I was recently asked how to build a great PowerPoint presentation, so I decided to write an blog entry on what I have learnt over the years.


1) Don't use PowerPoint...

Unless you are presenting or summarizing information, PowerPoint is not the best tool to use. This is because it forces you to communicate in a certain way. Bullet points and large font sizes on a slide don't allow for much detail. It is better to use a word processing and/or spreadsheet application for the bulk of the information and to use PowerPoint only to summarize that information. Some advertising agencies would even go one step further and state that PowerPoint limits creativity due to its forced layout structure.

2) Pick a Template and stick to it

Your audience will thank you for sticking to a common template throughout your presentation. You will also thank yourself in the future when you want to re-use some slides. By only using the slide layouts contained in a single template, you force your presentation to have a common look and feel. It also allows for slides to be copied to other presentations without losing much of their layout.

A consistent template across your presentation will also force you to use similar fonts, font sizes and font colours. Never use multiple font styles, unless you use another style for quotes or code samples.

Keep your bullets the same shape and colour even for different levels.

The background of your slides should be something simple and should be able to be printed, shown on an overhead projector and shown on a monitor. Typically, dark backgrounds don't print well, but can be seen very well on a overhead projector. Lighter backgrounds can be seen ok and print great, so I would recommend them over darker backgrounds.

Most professional (expensive) presentations have fancy images as backgrounds. If you aren't presenting to investors, then I would forego the fancy image background as it really gets in the way of the message that the content is trying to give.

3) Three Bullet Points Period

Each slide is an idea or a common message that you want to get across to your audience. Pick a catchy title and then pick the top three messages that you want your audience to remember. You may add sub-bullets to give a 'little' detail, but don't over do it. What you talk about during the slide can be much, much more than your top three bullets. Don't ever read the slide contents verbatim as your audience can do that with you. When you add more than three bullet points your message becomes to busy to remember. This Marketing 101 rule - 3 key messages - cant be used for anything.

4) Don't Animate

For normal business presentations, animation of images can get in the way of the message. While some animation is worthwhile to get the audience to focus on a message, too much animation will quickly bore and annoy the audience. Sound effects are cheap gags and may work once, but never twice.

If you know what you are doing, animating the text can provide a powerful way to keep the attention of your audience, although it can quickly become bothersome if it doesn't keep the same cadence as the presenter's speach.

5) Remember the Visual People

Not everyone learns from listening to a speaker. About half of the population (including me) needs to visualize the topic to remember it. Thus make sure you add images that are either relevant to the message or that are so memorable that the audience will remember your message based on that image.

6) Break up Sections

Most longer presentations need to have sections. A section is a slightly different topic or group of information. When you add a section title slide, it will allow your audience to follow you much better and allow you to catch your breath and focus on the next section.

7) Reuse, Reuse, Reuse

Although you may think that you will never reuse the presentation again, I would bet that you will. In my experience, I have reused slides from all of my previous presentations. Keep that in mind when you build any presentation.

If you are using a template and don't make any slide-specific alterations to layout, fonts, colours, then you will be able to copy that slide and paste it into your new presentation without any problems.

If you aren't reusing your old slides, then you are wasting your time.

8) Tell a Story

Put yourself in the shoes of your audience when you write the presentation. Your audience will not have heard the presentation and may not know much about the topic. Your presentation needs to start off with basic information and progress from there.

It also needs to flow. This is the hardest part of a presentation and should take a long time to get right. If your audience loses you because the flow of the slides is confusing, it is very difficult to get them back.

Remember that humans remember stories better than facts and figures.

9) Tell them what you want them to remember

At Cisco, I had a marketing colleague who excelled at presentations. His major focus was always on telling the audience what the key messages were right up front. Then he would go through the presentation and he would then finish off with the exact same slide he used at the beginning with the messages.

This way, you are telling your audience to focus on specific messages throughout your presentation. The Agenda slide is not what I'm talking about (although you always do need an agenda).

10) Present like you are part of the audience

Don't stand up on the stage behind a podium while you present. This is a sure-fire way to get a unidirectional presentation that most of the people in the audience will forget. If you can, get a wireless microphone and walk around. Walk back and forth at the front and LOOK directly at people. Talk to them like you are having a conversation. If someone asks a question, then walk towards them and answer the question directly at them, but loud enough for everyone to hear.

If no one is asking questions (like Germans who neither ask questions nor laugh at jokes), then you should ask them questions. Make sure that people are following you and that your assumptions are correct. If the feedback that you get is that the presentation isn't relevant, then scrap it and answer their questions directly (ie. have a conversation). A presentation should never be a one-way monologue.

And when you don't know the answer to a question, tell them that you will get back to them, take their card at the end of the presentation, ask someone who knows the answer, then email that answer back to them.

Also, always, always keep smiling.

11) Use Humor whenever possible

Humor breaks down barriers and makes people feel more at ease. Humor is the best way to get a tough audience to pay attention and to remember you. Humor isn't just putting funny pictures on your slides...It can be funny stories that you tell to prove a point or other 'jokes' that are relevant to the message.

But be careful not to use too colourful humor! Also, don't use humor on every slide... Use it in moderation and have it timed with relevant key points.

12) Keep the Presentation Short

You will almost always go longer than you planned when giving a presentation. Thus keep the number of slides small and plan on 1.5 to 2 times the time per slide than you think you will achieve. I like to have at least 2 minutes per slide for a normal presentation, but I have been known to go 10 minutes per slide on a topic that I'm extremely comfortable with.

Keeping it short will also allow you to add to the slide verbally. You can't just read from the words on the slides as that will make you look stupid. So, use the content on the slides as a reference for your audience and speak volumes on the topic that is on that slide. Most times I won't even mention the same information that is already on the slide. What's the point since the audience can read it just as well as you can.
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