PowerPoint Tips for Better Presentations
PowerPoint Tips for Better Presentations - Following these simple PowerPoint tips will ensure that your next presentation is a memorable one.
Using PowerPoint or other presentation applications is a great way to support a speech or presentation and to focus attention on a subject. A bad presentation, however, can have less than desired effect on your audience. Worse, poorly designed slides with too much text or bad graphics can distract and even irritate your audience.
Here's a list of PowerPoint tips that you should consider when preparing your next presentation.
Above all, keep your Audience in Mind. What do they know? What do you need to tell them? What do they expect? What will be interesting to them? What can you teach them? Keep your slides as simple as possible and focus on these essentials. Choose your text, images, and multimedia wisely so they enhance not distract from your message.
Design
- Keep the design clean and uncluttered.
- Leave empty space around the text and graphics
- Limit the number of transitions that are used. Pick one and stick with it.
- It is often more effective to have one bullet appear on the screen at a time so the audience isn't reading ahead of the presenter.
Colors
- Limit the number of colors on a single screen
- Avoid extremely bright colors, hot pink, neon, lime green, etc.
- Do not combine red/green, yellow/purple or blue/orange
Backgrounds
- Backgrounds should never distract from the presentation. Keep it consistent and subtle.
- Use a background that is light colored with dark text.
- Colors appear lighter when projected. Don't use pale colors as they will look white when projected.
- Consider changing the background design when transitioning to a new topic
Text
- Choose only one or two font styles. Don't use too many fonts
- Select sans-serif fonts such as Arial or Helvetica. Serif fonts are difficult to read and should be avoided.
- Too much text makes slide unreadable. Stick to just a few key words.
- Use at least a Size 24 font so our slides can be easily read.
- Use a title on each slide, 35-45 point font.
- Don't overload your slides with too much text or data
- Don't use more than 6 to 8 words per line
- Don't use more than 6 lines of text per slide
- Don't use all caps
Graphics
- Use clear simple visuals -- Don't confuse the audience
- Use high contrast slides... light on dark or dark on light
- Use graphics to make a key concept clearer
- Let a picture or graphic tell the story instead of text
- Use quality photographs or clip-art and use it sparingly.
- Limit the number of graphics on each slide
- Avoid flashy graphics and noisy animation effects unless they relate directly to the content of the slide.
- Try to use the same style of graphic thoughout the presentation
Multimedia
- Sounds and transition effects can be annoying. Use them sparingly
- Animation effects can add interest to your presentation when used in moderation
- Too much animation is distracting
- You can insert video and audio clips in Powerpoint
- You can also insert hyperlinks.
Charts
- Charts and graphs should be clearly labled
- Keep charts simple -- don't show minute detail
- Use only enough text to clearly lable the graphic
Giving The Presentation
- Practice your presentation so you can speak from bullet points.
- Give a brief overview at the beginning. Then present the information. Finally, summarize the important points.
- Maintain eye contact with our audience
- DO NOT Read the slides to your audience
- Leave time for Questions and Answers at the end
- Summarize your main points
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