PowerPoint has proved itself to be a great business tool which uses a well-known graphical approach to presentations, and helps you deliver a particular topic effectively. This program is widely used in contemporary business as well academic environments. It has also proved itself to be a great tool when used for training purposes. There are many others like Prezi, GoAnimate and Google Docs etc. for the purpose of giving presentations, but it still occupies the #1 presentation program used worldwide. MS PowerPoint has many benefits over other programs like ease of customization, people’s acceptance and effectiveness. You can manage your corporate branding by including your company logo and color theme etc., to astonish your audience. It has in-build professional templates designing,charts and diagrams, smart arts,shapes etc., which do not cost a single penny.
PowerPoint became a very useful tool immediately after it was created in 1987 by Robert Gaskins. PowerPoint is a visual tool to show the audiences things that enhances their comprehension of what the speaker is saying, displayed via a projector. It is a useful tool for illustrating your message, such as by showing images, graphs, charts, maps, etc., or by highlighting important points of your message, such as quotations or major ideas.Let's discuss a few points on making your PowerPoint presentations more effective:
1. Slides used in a presentation should use text sparingly, in terms of how much information is on each slide as well number of slides used. Don’t display charts or graphs with a lot of information - if it’s useful for the audience to see such things, pass them out as handouts.
2. Unless you’re an experienced designer, don’t use the transition and animation “tricks” that are built into PowerPoint, such as bouncing or flying text. This will cause the minds of your audience to wander off as these tricks add no real value to a presentation.
3. Above all, use high-contrast color schemes so that whatever is on your slides is readable. Unless you are a talented graphic designer, use the templates that come with PowerPoint or Keynote, and keep it simple. High concept design in a slide presentation doesn't help in most circumstances, unless you’re in fashion or interior design fields. If you use graphics or photos, try to use the highest quality you can find or afford - clip art and low-resolution graphics blown up on a screen and usually detract your audience from a presentation.
4. Rehearse your PowerPoint presentation and make sure to do it more than once. Make sure that you can deliver your presentation without fumbling if something goes wrong with your PowerPoint presentation; in other words, make sure you can give your speech without your PowerPoint presentation.
5. Get used to using black slides. If you include a black slide in your presentation, your audience will refocus on you, rather than on the screen, and you can direct them back to the screen when you have something else to show them. Put a black screen at the end of your presentation, so that when you’re done, the PowerPoint presentation is finished and off the screen.
6. Concentrate on keeping the audience focused on you, not on the screen. In short, communicate with your audience. You can do this by using slides sparingly, standing in front of the audience in a way that makes them look at you, and, if possible, going to the screen and using your hand or arm to point out things on a slide.
7. Don’t give the audience a “cue” that listening to your speech means getting through your PowerPoint presentation. If the audience sees that your PowerPoint presentation is the structure of your speech, they’ll start wondering how many slides are left. Slides should be used asynchronously within your speech, and only to highlight or illustrate things. Engage the audience, and use slides only when they are useful.
8. Learn how to give a good speech without PowerPoint. This takes practice, which means giving speeches without PowerPoint. Avoiding bad PowerPoint habits means, first and foremost, becoming a good public speaker.
So, do not forget to follow these few points while preparing your next PowerPoint presentations to make those more effective. Make your ppt presentation effective with above point and upload it!