Tips for Developing Effective PowerPoint Slide Presentations

There are many tools you can use when making professional presentations. One very powerful yet sometimes misused tool is PowerPoint. PowerPoint allows you to create attractive and effective slide presentations to support (note the word “support”) your verbal presentation. When used effectively and with care, PowerPoint can help you to stay on track, support your message with a variety of media options, and educate and entertain your audience. When misused, PowerPoint can make your presentation a bust.

Here are some tips for making excellent PowerPoint presentations.

r Be consistent. Consistency is important in order to make the audience feel comfortable. Consistency means that there is a design that flows from the first slide to the last slide. Design includes color, font size, background, slide template, building of bullets and other features, slide transitions, and so forth. Inconsistency tends to put the focus of the audience on what will come next rather than on your message. Remember—the purpose of any slide presentation is to support you presentation. The focus should be on your message!

r Select colors that are easy on the eye. Think of your audience when you select colors for your background, bullets, text, and other features of the slide. Bright orange or red background may be annoying to view after about two slides. Excellent colors include those from the blue, green, and purple families. These are thought to be cool colors. They have a calming and pleasant feel to them. Hot colors (reds, oranges, and yellows) are not as comfortable to view. If you do need to use hot colors, consider toning down the colors and making them less intense. In graphics terms, this means that the colors are best used when less saturated. Hot, bold colors are excellent for use in graphics where the viewer sees them for only a limited time or when you want to highlight something important, such as in a pie chart or graph. Consider sticking with the PowerPoint color schemes. These have been developed by color professionals and tend to work well for audiences.

r Select your text font and size carefully. First, TrueType font is supported by all Windows PCs automatically. The other option is PostScript, which requires a separate program for viewing. Most Windows programs support most PostScript fonts, but you are definitely safe if you stick with TrueType fonts because they are supported by all Windows programs.

Be sure that your font size is large enough to be read by your audience. A good rule of thumb is to maintain a minimum font size of 24 point. Also, think carefully about the font type itself. Times Roman and Arial are excellent choices. More elaborate, difficult-to-read fonts can be hard for the audience to read.

r Use phrases rather than complete sentences. Remember that the purpose of a PowerPoint slide is to provide an outline from which you can elaborate. You should not put so much content onto the slide that you are merely reading the slide. PowerPoint slides do not take the place of your presentation. They may help guide you and remind you of the important points; however, they should not be the presentation itself.

r Avoid too much on a slide. Too much means too much text, animation, color, building, font animation, and so on. Keep your slides simple and sleek. Think carefully about why you are using a PowerPoint feature. Do you want to emphasize something? Do you want to focus your audience’s attention to a specific place on the slide? Do you want to control the speed at which your audience reads the slide? What is the purpose of the PowerPoint feature you are using? If you do not have a purpose, do not use the feature.

r Be visual. Remember that many people are highly visual learners. You will probably be making a verbal presentation along with your PowerPoint slides, so use your slides to include as many visual elements as possible. Use images, photographs, charts and tables, graphs, line drawings, and other similar features.

r Edit your work! Never present a slide with a type or spelling or grammatical error. Even one mistake can impact your credibility. Check and recheck each line in each slide, even the tables and charts.

Developing excellent PowerPoint slides to effectively support a presentation takes thought, planning, and hard work. In the long run, however, excellent slide support of your talk will make a highly effective and professional presentation.

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