Do you make these mistakes with your slideshows?

PowerPoint is easy to use if you want to put together a quick presentation.

It’s also easy to spoil your work by not considering your audience.

In this article we’ll identify the most common mistakes and suggest ways to avoid them, starting with:

Guideline 1 = Keep your text to a minimum

If there’s load of words on a slide:

Will the audience listen to the presenter or read the slide?
Is the presenter going to read the slide to the audience? (Why have a presenter?)
How many people will switch off?

So, you need less words – some say a maximum of 35 per slide. Others would use no more than 7. Yes, seven.

If you’ve a lot to say, speak the words then share them with a handout. Not on a slide.
Limit your slide to brief essentials. Use a picture.

Guideline 2 = If you’re going to use bullets, no more than 5 on a slide

On this slide there are 8 bullets and 3 sub-bullets.

Can your audience absorb that many points?
Do sub-bullets give detail which should be in a supporting handout?

You need to stick with 1 main concept per slide – if there’s many points to bring out then consider a handout.

Five bullets per slide as a maximum.
Some presenters consider three to be enough.
Others refuse to use bullets. Ever.

Guideline 3 = Simplify statistics with simple charts

We’ve looked at amount of text and bullet points, now let’s turn to graphs and charts.
Pictures of any sort help to get messages across, but not every picture does it right.
This slide definitely gets it wrong:

Too many statistics
Complicated statistics – ‘78.57%’
Main point unclear
Too much information

Instead of all the detail, make it simple to read and understand.

Break one slide into three if necessary.
Limit the number of statistics and keep them simple = 79% instead of 78.57%.
Even better, round the numbers: 79% becomes ‘4 out of 5′, especially when talking.

Guideline 4 = Make sure your slide has a message for the audience, not just the presenter

We’ve just suggested that the amount of text should be kept within certain limits.
At the other end of the scale we have the crime of using too few words.

Let’s just clarify that. Not necessarily too few words, but too few meaningless words.
It’s all very well being minimalist, but what’s the point of a slide that says nothing?

There are 5 points on this slide. They say nothing that the audience will remember.

What is it about the results in 2002 and 2003?
What’s increased?
How has performance changed?
How high are the targets?

More than likely, these points are prompts for the presenter.
They would have been better as titles, with nice simple graphics or statements to illustrate the point.

Guideline 5 = Keep titles short

Having looked at meaningless words, now let’s consider meaningless titles.

A title (if, indeed, you use titles – there’s no law that insists on it) needs to tell the audience what to expect in the slide.
So it should be easy to read.

Can the audience read the title at a glance?
Does the title summarise the content?
Does it prompt thought, engage attention or call for action?

A title can be very powerful.

Look at the title to the articles in this series.
It’s not a statement. It’s a question.
It’s a question that forces you to think about what you do currently.
It sows seeds of doubt.
It makes you curious.
You want to read more (I know this because you’ve just read down to here).

Guideline 6 = Eliminate buzzwords and jargon

Use plain English. Or at least words that your audience understands.

We’ve established that meaningless words and titles are out.
But what about jargon and cryptic phrases?
This slide uses TLAs (Three Letter Acronyms) and references to in-house terminology, which may not be known to all members of the audience.

Is the presenter hiding behind labels? Trying to impress?
Or simply using phrases that are only common-place in their role.

Does the whole audience understand the phrases that you commonly use?
Be selective and purposeful in the use of jargon and buzzwords
There’s no need to show off how much you know.

If your audience is trying to work out what you just said, they’re now missing your important message.
You may gain short term (false) credibility, but you stand to lose audience attention.
Which wastes their time and yours.

Guideline 7 = Maintain a consistent ‘look and feel’.

The themes built into PowerPoint help us to keep slides looking and feeling the same, but it’s really down to us to do the same for the contents.

Remember the old Western movies – when they had a reward poster nailed to a tree?
Tthe printer must have used every typeface available.

The slide opposite only uses 2 typefaces and some italics but still manages to create an untidy mess.

Also, there’s a question, 2 facts, a recommendation and an observation – quite a disjointed mixture which stops the flow of information.

Use typefaces sparingly
For emphasis, use bold, italics, colour or a small increase in font size
Decide the intent for a slide, then use all verb, adjective or noun phrases accordingly

Emphasise for effect.

Guideline 8 = Check punctuation, capitalisation, spelling and grammar

It should go without saying that spelling and grammar must be correct throughout any presentation, and it’s not enough to rely on the checking that’s built into PowerPoint (or any other application).
That’s the easy way out and it’s foolish to depend on it.

Punctuation and capitalisation deserve equal consideration.
The slide opposite misuses capitals and punctuation; most punctuation can be dropped and other means of emphasis often look better than capitals.

Check every word of every slide for spelling and grammar yourself
Emphasise your key message with bold or colour
Capitals are the equivalent of SHOUTING

A quick way to distract your audience is to get them to play “spot the spelling mistake”, “count the commas” or worst of all “apostrophe catastrophe”.

Guideline 9 = Leave special effects to the movie makers

Don’t you just love bullet points flying in from the left, humorous sound effects and clip art.

Well, they do have their place in the right circumstances, but more often than not all these are overused. Yes I do speak from personal (guilty) experience!

Consistent transitions are useful for consecutive slides displaying a horizontal process – they can give the effect of one large, wide slide.
Effects for emphasis are ok as long as they’re kept to a minimum and not used ‘just because I know how’.
Stale, overused clipart is better replaced with an original photograph or one from a stock photo site.

Effects can emphasise specific points
Overuse of effects ruins the effect!
Pick 2 or 3 point to which you want to draw specific attention
Avoid clipart that’s built into PowerPoint – it’s all been used before

Animations / transitions may be used to emphasise process, precedent or structure quite effectively, as long as they’re integrated seamlessly.

Guideline 10 = Align text boxes and/or graphics for neatness

This really annoys me when I see it! A presenter has put together a great presentation with meaningful messages, only to spoil it with text boxes and graphics that are out of alignment.

This slide shows what I mean; the flow arrows don’t line up, neither do some of the rectangles. It’s such a simple thing to get right.