When I arrived at my new job last year, one of the responsibilities I was given was to help people build better presentations. To be honest at first I didn't feel like I was the right person for this. Who was I to tell senior staff that their slides needed a makeover? But when looking at why passed in my hands, it was not that hard to quickly improve the presentations, at least from a design perspective.
That's what I want to share with you, three simple steps you can take to instantly improve your presentations:
1. Choose a color scheme
Your background is green because it's your corporate color. You write in black, have orange titles, and highlight important text in red. That seems practical, but I bet the result will be simply…ugly.
A simple way to make a presentation slide look well put together is to select just two or three colors, ideally colors that go well together, and stick with them on all the slides. It's not something complicated, yet not many people apply this principle of choosing a color palette.
2. Use beautiful fonts
Fonts are another important aspect of design, one that Steve Jobs understood well, and that can also make or break your presentation. Most presentations are built with standard office fonts like Arial or Calibri. They read ok, but they don't really bring anything particular to your slide.
Consider adding a fancy font for your titles, like for example Lobster Two, and a more defined font for the text, like Din Condensed, you'll see already that your presentation will look like someone pro designed it. And please, please make sure you don't use Times New Roman. I just hate it.
3. Include stunning images
Last but not least, learn how to find beautiful images and use them extensively in your presentation. Use illustrations to explain something complicated in a simple way. Use photos to convey a feeling, show a product, or just enhance a slide.
Of course having pretty images is important and I would restrain you from jumping to the Clipart library. These small illustrations that come for free with Powerpoint are simply horrible and don't bring much to your slide. They're ok for a family reunion or your sports club gathering, but they don't help you look professional.
I could add a last tip: "to keep it simple", but simplicity is probably the hardest thing to get. It would be ideal to keep one argument per slide, one message only, but most people want to explain everything in their presentation so write a dozen lines of text in their slides. True it's a good reading support for you when you present, and people in the attendance can read if they are more visual learners, but it can work against you by complicating your story, and putting your audience to sleep…
Question: do you prepare presentations often? If so, what is your biggest struggle?
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