10 Ways to Make Your Power Point Slides Better

It was the absolute Hell of a never-ending, horribly executed Power Point slide presentation that put me over the edge and made me decide to become a presentation coach and trainer over twenty years ago. To this day, when I am forced to sit through a lousy slide-based presentation I want to stand up and shout “TURN OFF THE? %%##*%*@ slides and just TALK to us!”? (and, when I’m wearing my coaching cap and working with a client, that’s often what I actually do!!!)

If You're Going To Use A Slide Deck, Make Sure It's Helping and Not Hurting You!

It’s not that I don’t like slide presentations, per se.? It’s that I don’t like poorly conceived and poorly delivered slide presentations—of which there are far too many!? When used properly, slides, and images in general, can be a striking and powerful way to help make a spoken point sticky.? All too often, however, slide presentations (meaning the slides themselves, and often the technology delivering the images, like fancy fonts and animations) simply take away from the speaker.? And, if you don’t know this already, I’m all about the speaker. ?The speaker (YOU) is the star, and the Power Point slides are merely the supporting players (well, more like the extras in the background; or, to mix my metaphors, they are like the Salt and Pepper, and you are the steak or tofu).

I could spend hours laying out the do’s and don’ts of Power Point creation and delivery (and, in the context of day-long trainings, I often do).? But for the sake of brevity, let me spell out ten ways you can make your Power Point slides work for, and not against, you—for your sake, and the sake of your audience:

10 Ways To Make Power Point Slides Better

1.?????? ?Ask the All IMPORTANT question:? “Do I really need slides?”? Just because Power Point/Slide technology is out there doesn’t mean you have to use it!? Remember, people are there to see and hear YOU, not your slides! ?Think about it:? How many American Presidents and major public figures have you elected based on their slide deck?? Probably none!

2.?????? Dare to be Bare:? Keep slides your slides uncluttered and spare, with as little text as possible.? Yes, I know, this means you won’t be able to use your slide deck as notes or impress your audience with your ability to cram four complicated graphs onto a single page. Bu ?you—and your audience—will be better off for it.?

3.?????? The Bigger the Better:? Your Font, that is.? The bigger the font, the fewer words you’ll be able to put on your slides—which is a good thing, trust me. 24-point Font is a good starting point.? Remember that there are people in your audience whose eyesight is challenged—don’t make them struggle to see your images or text.

4.?????? Banish Bullet Points:? I double dare you!? Instead of bullet points (or entire sentences), use bite sized clumps of 3 to 5 words. This will discourage your audience from lingering on your slides instead of listening to you.

5.?????? Use More Images: ?A picture really IS worth a thousand words.? How about filling a slide with a mind-blowing image, without a title or any other text whatsoever?? Yes, really!!! And think outside the box: Instead of using the usual stock photos (a flower growing out of a sidewalk to represent resilience) try something more surprising (the image of a cockroach—talk about resilience! They’ve been around forever and survive no matter what we throw at them literally and figuratively).

6.?????? Make Numbers Sexier:? Instead of miniscule, crowded graphs, use big, bold bar graphs or pie charts with few words. Highlight in bright color what you want your audience to focus on. If you have more than one chart, put one on each page rather than putting them all on ?one page. If you have a number you really want to emphasize, dare placing it all by itself on a slide, enlarged and in a bright color, for all to see and for you to explain.

7.?????? Leave Breathing Room:? I know it’s tempting to cram everything you can onto a slide.? Try, try, try to keep things simple, with space for the eye to amble and settle.? Keep it simple and elegant.

8.?????? Limit Your Animations:? The eye follows movement.? So don’t use animation unless you really, really, really want your audience to pay attention to the screen instead of you.

9.?????? Limit Your Slides.? I beg you.? The fewer slides, the better.? Ask yourself, “do I ABSOLUTELY need this slide?”? If the answer is no, scrap it. For example, do you really need an agenda slide? Or can you just tell your audience what the agenda is?

10.?? Go Blank:? When you want all eyes on YOU, instead of on the screen behind you, press the B or W key on your computer to black out or white out your computer screen.

Slides can either help you or hurt you as a presenter. If you need some support putting together a slide deck for your next presentation that adds and doesn’t detract from your message, let’s talk ! Or check out my website and learn a little more about how I help professionals like you rock their talks and show up and shine in the spotlight!