How to Create a Great PowerPoint Presentation

chillibreeze writer — Dinesh Kaulgud

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Most business establishments and leaders cannot escape having to create and deliver a PowerPoint presentation. For some this can be a scary and unpleasant experience, whilst for others it’s a breeze. I have seen many presentations where the phrase ‘Death by PowerPoint’ takes on a new meaning. This article aims to distil 10 years of my experience using PowerPoint into 5 simple powerful principles and help you in creating attractive and effective PowerPoint presentations. I hope these principles can help you in avoiding ‘Death by PowerPoint’ and achieving your presentational goals.

PowerPoint is not the be all and end all – content is king
The first step in creating presentations is to remember that PowerPoint is a tool. Just using PowerPoint does not guarantee that million dollar contract. The key to a good presentation is content. The focus should always be on the message and conveying it in a clear manner in order to attain your objectives. If you are clear about what the goal of your presentation is, the job is already half done.
Signposting: The next step having a good structure or flow in your presentation. What works for me is a technique called signposting. It essentially consists of telling your audience what you would be presenting, then presenting it, and finally telling them what you presented. This way, you don’t lose track of your objectives, and neither does the audience. Further, try and limit the number of slides in your presentation to 10 or 15.
De-clutter: The secret to superb PowerPoint presentations is making sure that your slides are crisp and uncluttered slides. Steve Job’s presentations have minimal texts and yet he does an impressive job every time he takes the stage with Keynote – a presentation tool similar to PowerPoint. Our brains are constructed to unconsciously pick up keywords from presentations. If a sentence is too wordy you lose the audience’s attention. So remember to have only 3 to 5 bullet points on the slide. Any more or less and the effectiveness of the slide is lost.
A picture is worth a 1000 words: This is one of the key aspects of creating effective PowerPoint presentations. An image dramatically increases the chance of effective retention of the message.
Keep it simple: I have also seen many presentations ruined with fancy transitions, color and multimedia added into the presentation. A PowerPoint presentation is usually designed to be delivered by ‘people’ for ‘people’. The key here is interaction, involvement and that personal touch. If you add too many fancy effects to your presentation, it could detract from the message. Delivering a presentation which is well practiced and simple provides far more value than a presentation with fancy transitions and minimal interaction. I have noticed that presentations which are done with a lot of ‘bang’ are remembered for the ‘bang’ rather than the message. So if you would like the audience to remember your message, keep it simple.

PowerPoint is an effective tool, which, when used properly and can prove to be invaluable in the business world. My recommendation is to follow the above principles and continue to experiment with PowerPoint so you know what works best in achieving your goals.

Chillibreeze's disclaimer: This is a contributed article and was published on Chillibreeze in February, 2010. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the views of Chillibreeze as a company. Chillibreeze has a strict anti-plagiarism policy. Please contact us to report any copyright issues related to this article. The relevance of the facts and figures cited (if any) could change after a period of time.

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—About our writer:

Dinesh is a keen runner. When he is not running, he can be found hunched over his keyboard racking his brains to come up with that perfect word to complete an article or story. In another avatar, Dinesh works for a software company as an Account manager, based in UK. He believes he is delivering life changing software. He is married to a perfectionist, who ensures that he is one too.

How to Create a Great PowerPoint Presentation

chillibreeze writer — Dinesh Kaulgud

PowerPoint Production Services

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