Improve Your PowerPoint Presentation Skills

If you have good PowerPoint presentation skills you can use PowerPoint as a great tool to support your presentation delivery. As with all presentation skills, PowerPoint is something you can learn to be good at using, meaning that your good presentation can be turned into a great presentation.

By providing a visual stimulus for your audience, PowerPoint slides can reinforce your key messages. However, people often get carried away with PowerPoint’s ‘box of tricks’, creating slides that detract from both them and their messages.

Here are some examples of things you should avoid when creating at powerpoint presentation.

Do you try to put too much text on your presentation slides, so that the slide becomes cramped and people are too busy trying to read the text rather than listening to what you are saying?

REMEMBER:

· The presentation slides are meant to support what you’re saying – not say it all for you.

· The text on the presentation slides should be used as prompts or to back up your messages.

· Brief is ALWAYS best.

· Try not to let one point run for more than two lines.

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What do a dog, a cup and a setting sun have in common? Nothing. So why put them onto the same slide?

REMEMBER:

· Make sure images on the presentation slides are relevant to the points you’re trying to make or the messages you’re trying to get across.

· Watch where you place images on the slide so that they don’t overshadow everything else, or they become the focus of the presentation rather than what you’re saying.

· A good use of graphics is a consistent image in the corner of each slide of the presentation, such as a company logo, as we have done here.

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Do you overuse colours on your presentation slides, are you trying to make your audience colour blind?

REMEMBER:

· Your slides will be incredibly difficult to read if you overuse colour.

· They’ll also look amateurish.

· Choose a background colour that’s easy on the eye, and make sure your text colour is a suitable contrast.

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Is the size of your slide heading drowning the rest of your text?

REMEMBER:

Your slide text will have much less impact when paired with an overly-large heading .

Similarly, you need to make sure your text is large enough to read on screen – think of the people at the back of the room, straining to make it out.

A point of size of 20 or above should be used to ensure your audience can comfortably read the text, with around 10-14 points larger for headings.

Make sure that you are using sans serif fonts like Arial and Veranda which are generally the easiest on the eye and easiest to read.

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How cartoonish do you want the presentation to be?

REMEMBER:

· When used selectively, PowerPoint’s presentation animation features can be very effective.

· The odd animated effect in your presentation is fine, but consider if your presentation really needs it.

· You should avoid the temptation to overuse these effects during your presentation and have your text flying in from all angles - it will irritate your audience, and they’ll find it hard to concentrate.

· Keep to a simple style to present your text, and retain it throughout your presentation.

· This slide with the ‘dissolve’ setting, which can be a pleasant, yet unobtrusive, way to display text.

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• PowerPoint shouldn’t BE the presentation – it’s there to support you and your delivery of the key messages.
• Choose your wording carefully, and don’t drown your slides in text.
• Don’t over-animate your presentation with fancy effects, or pepper it with needless graphics.
• Make sure your audience can read what’s on screen – that means a decent font size and sensible use of colour.
• And, finally, make sure your message doesn’t get lost in transition.

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