20 slides explaining the best ways to design and deliver a PowerPoint. Also it has ways you should avoid when making a powerpoint design and giving the presentations.
20. References
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http://www.forbes.com/sites/johngreathouse/2012/09/24/9-easy-ways-to-createpowerpoint-slides-that-suck-less/
9 Easy Ways To Create PowerPoint Slides That Suck Less
http://www.envision-creative.com/top-10-powerpoint-tips-do’s-and-don’ts/
Top 10 PowerPoint Tips
http://money.howstuffworks.com/business-communications/effective-powerpointpresentations.htm#page=5
10 Tips for More Effective PowerPoint Presentations
http://www.inc.com/ss/5-tips-for-a-great-powerpoint-presentation#4
5 Tips for a Great PowerPoint Presentation
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-tips-for-preparing-a-professional-presentation/
10 PowerPoint tips for Preparing a Professional Presentation
http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/18-tips-for-killer-presentations.html
18 Tips for Killer Presentations
http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/34274/7-Lessons-From-the-World-s-MostCaptivating-Presenters-SlideShare.aspx
7 Lessons From the World’s Most Captivating Presenters
Editor's Notes
Being an effective speaker and having well made PowerPoint's is key when giving presentations to crowds. Now that I am a college student I am starting to learn about effective presentation and preparing to give them. The next slides will be about the best way to give presentations and designing them as well.
Presentation design is huge. It can easily draw in your audience and hold there attention. The next several slides are what you should and shouldn't’t do for presentation slide design.
Do not use PowerPoint templates. Your audience has seen them numerous times and they are boring. Plus every presentation I have seen with the templates they are usually corresponding with long lists and lots of texts. Using high quality and interesting pictures draws the audience in. Personally when I see pictures and no text I tend to listen more to the speaker and what they have to say.
When I am watching and listening to someone give a presentation using PowerPoint, you do not want to use lots of text. I find myself reading off slides with lots of text and not paying attention to the what the presenter is saying. There really is no point to go up and present if you have a lot of text on your slide, the audience can read it. However, if you have limited text and you practice what you are going to say, your presentation will be awesome and everyone will listen and make eye contact with you.
Stick to a consistent color theme for all fonts and elements used throughout your slides. This is not the time for creative expression. This can cause the audience to get lost in your presentation and block you out as the speaker. Do not use crazy fonts, the crowd will just focus on that and not you speaking. Try to use the same font style for each slide and do not change the color every slide.
Showing the audience pictures and graphs will keep them concentrated. On the other hand, writing will bore them and have them not pay attention. Human beings are highly visual learners. It's much easier for our brains to remember a strong, unique image than a series of facts and figures. PowerPoint is a great, easy-to-use program for creating dozens of different types of graphs and charts. Remember that the simpler and bigger the graph, the better.
You want to use meaningful and memorable colors, but you don't want to get too busy or flashy. Some slides might have to much color or very bright colors making the slide too much to look at. The meaning of colors is very interesting and could help you in your presentations.
Having high quality images shows you are professional and care about your presentation. It also keeps the audience intrigued and ready to hear what the picture is about and what the next slide is going to be like. The best PowerPoint's are the ones that have interesting pictures and pictures you can easily tell a story about.
Using a lot of slides in your presentation can literally put the audience to sleep. You can get their attention for so long. Which means, if you limit the amount of slides and tell your story the audience will be hooked all the way until the end. We have all made extremely long slides and when you think about it, you could of removed some of the slides just because they contained little information and you couldn't’t talk about it for long. Keep your presentations short and to the point.
Do not use generic clip art. Most of us have seen them numerous times. Avoid using PowerPoint Clip Art or other cartoonish line art. Again, if it is included in the software, your audience has seen it a million times before. The only time you should really see Clip Art is whether you are telling the crowd not to use it or it is a presentation for young kids.
Once you have made your PowerPoint, it is all up to how you deliver it to your crowd. How you speak to the audience and your energy will keep them interested and listening. The next several slides will be showing you the do’s and don'ts of giving a presentation.
Reading off your PowerPoint defeats the purpose of being up in front of everyone and shows you have lots of text on your slide. This is just a boring presentation to sit through and it shows you don’t care. When you read off a slide the audience already knows what you are going to say and what the slide is about. They are ahead of the presenter.
Knowing what you are going to say and knowing what slide is next is crucial with presentations. A great presentation will come down to the speaker’s ability to capture the audience’s imagination—and keep their attention. The presentation and the speaker should work together, meaning the slides should complement the speaker, and the speaker should complement the slides. The best presenters won’t have to look down at notes, and they’ll never be reading from a script. Keeping eye contact with the audience and not looking back at the slide will keep everyone's attention on you and what you are saying. Speak with confidence. Be loud, make sure everyone can hear you clearly.
In front of an audience you must be loud and clear. Speaking at the slides will not project your voice and the crowd won’t be able to hear you. When you speak loud and clear the audience is almost forced to listen to you and it is easy to follow along and hear the speaker. Being a loud and confident speaker shows everyone that you are prepared and take whatever you are presenting about serious.
Face the crowd. Make eye contact. Be friendly, smile to the crowd. Make sure your feet are facing out and not towards the board, some presenters will have there feet parallel so they can turn back and forth. Which is not good. Dress appropriate, where business casual for school presentations, it shows the teacher and class you care.
Nervous and inexperienced speakers tend to talk way to fast. Slow down and put in pauses within your presentation. Most students will get up and give their PowerPoint's as fast as they can because they are nervous and do not want to be up in front of the class. If you take a deep breath and go at a slower pace, midway through your presentation you become comfortable and calm in front of your class.
Attitude in a presentation is huge. If you go up in front of everyone with a smile and are energetic, you will without a doubt have everyone's attention and everyone will enjoy your PowerPoint. But if you were to go up there unprepared and talk softly, you will start to lose the audience attention. If you ever have an opportunity to give a presentation on anything you want, you should pick something you really like and enjoy. That way you can really enjoy your presentation and put emotion into it.
Fight the nerves. Try to enjoy what you have to present. Since I am a college student, I am used to presentations. I admit I get very nervous right before I get up in front of the class. But, once I start talking I am very comfortable and enjoy speaking to the class about my PowerPoint's and seeing there reactions.
Having to give a presentation in front of a class is very stressful to some people. Everyone else is in the same shoes as you. They are nervous to present in front of a class as well. As soon as you get up in front of the class you may be nervous, but as you talk you start to relax and comfortable in front of everyone. Presentations is something you shouldn’tbe scared about. It has you work on your public speaking. Also if you rehearse and prepare yourself there is nothing you should worry about.
