Presentation Skills (Tip 58): Death by PowerPoint

Howard Berg can read an astonishing 25,000 words per minute. Therefore, if Howard sat in on most PowerPoint presentations, he would finish reading the entire presentation before the presenter finished his or her opening sentence.

What about the real world?

On average we can scan and read internally at a rate somewhere between 700 to 1,000 words per minute. The average presenter delivers words at a rate of 120 to 180 words per minute.

Which means… …if you take 70 seconds to read one slide to your audience, then your audience can and will read it in 10 seconds. Therefore, for the last 60 seconds of your remarkable presentation (on that one slide) … the audience was mentally elsewhere.

Please stop reading your PowerPoint presentation to your audience. Consider any of the following:

Use visuals instead of words. Visuals can include photos, artist impressions, maps, graphs, icons, symbols etc.

Have paper notes as your prompts, you are allowed to read them (because we will all be looking at your pictures).

Stop writing your presentations on PowerPoint. Plan, write and develop your presentation first, then determine where you require visuals to support your material. That’s when you open your PowerPoint programme.

Use the ‘Billboard Rule’. Billboards are designed to be comprehended in 3 seconds. That’s the maximum amount of time a driver has to ‘take in’ the message. Use the same concept in your presentation. Three seconds on the slide, then attention back on you as the presenter.

Remember the 5 x 5 rule? Only five points and no more than 5 words per point? Well, stop remembering it because it’s wrong. Same goes for the 7 x 7 rule and any other rule that suggests that you have any more words than absolutely necessary.

If your audience can totally understand your presentation by reading your slides,,, then do us all a favour and email them the slides and don’t bother with the presentation. Everyone will be happier.

Get your slides created professionally. That will ensure that your slideshow has a ‘Wow’ factor. You can email me and get a quote. Try getting an intern who is trained in PowerPoint. Train up one or more of your staff to be brilliant at PowerPoint so that they can add the Wow factor.

If your PowerPoint slideshow needs to be world-class, then engage the best in the world. His name is John Quinn and I’ve not met his match yet in the business. He is in a class of his own when it comes to PowerPoint slideshow. Check him out at Audience Alive.

Enough. I hope I have convinced you to stop using so many words in your presentation slideshows.

Of course, there is more to it than that. If you want to know more and or need to write effective and well-structured presentations so that your content is of great value, then book a place on my next Business Presentation Skills course. I hear that the content is great and that the PowerPoint is amazing!

Stay well, present even better.

Regards

David Nottage

World Champion of Public Speaking

Torque Limited

PS      You do realise that if Howard Berg reads this post (and he may well do so), then it will take him 1.2 seconds to finish it. But he would have looked at the picture a lot longer!