ideas for visual presentations

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Blog Graphic Design

15 Effective Visual Presentation Tips To Wow Your Audience

By Krystle Wong , Sep 28, 2023

So, you’re gearing up for that big presentation and you want it to be more than just another snooze-fest with slides. You want it to be engaging, memorable and downright impressive. 

Well, you’ve come to the right place — I’ve got some slick tips on how to create a visual presentation that’ll take your presentation game up a notch. 

Packed with presentation templates that are easily customizable, keep reading this blog post to learn the secret sauce behind crafting presentations that captivate, inform and remain etched in the memory of your audience.

Click to jump ahead:

What is a visual presentation & why is it important?

15 effective tips to make your visual presentations more engaging, 6 major types of visual presentation you should know , what are some common mistakes to avoid in visual presentations, visual presentation faqs, 5 steps to create a visual presentation with venngage.

A visual presentation is a communication method that utilizes visual elements such as images, graphics, charts, slides and other visual aids to convey information, ideas or messages to an audience. 

Visual presentations aim to enhance comprehension engagement and the overall impact of the message through the strategic use of visuals. People remember what they see, making your point last longer in their heads. 

Without further ado, let’s jump right into some great visual presentation examples that would do a great job in keeping your audience interested and getting your point across.

In today’s fast-paced world, where information is constantly bombarding our senses, creating engaging visual presentations has never been more crucial. To help you design a presentation that’ll leave a lasting impression, I’ve compiled these examples of visual presentations that will elevate your game.

1. Use the rule of thirds for layout

Ever heard of the rule of thirds? It’s a presentation layout trick that can instantly up your slide game. Imagine dividing your slide into a 3×3 grid and then placing your text and visuals at the intersection points or along the lines. This simple tweak creates a balanced and seriously pleasing layout that’ll draw everyone’s eyes.

2. Get creative with visual metaphors

Got a complex idea to explain? Skip the jargon and use visual metaphors. Throw in images that symbolize your point – for example, using a road map to show your journey towards a goal or using metaphors to represent answer choices or progress indicators in an interactive quiz or poll.

3. Visualize your data with charts and graphs

The right data visualization tools not only make content more appealing but also aid comprehension and retention. Choosing the right visual presentation for your data is all about finding a good match. 

For ordinal data, where things have a clear order, consider using ordered bar charts or dot plots. When it comes to nominal data, where categories are on an equal footing, stick with the classics like bar charts, pie charts or simple frequency tables. And for interval-ratio data, where there’s a meaningful order, go for histograms, line graphs, scatterplots or box plots to help your data shine.

In an increasingly visual world, effective visual communication is a valuable skill for conveying messages. Here’s a guide on how to use visual communication to engage your audience while avoiding information overload.

4. Employ the power of contrast

Want your important stuff to pop? That’s where contrast comes in. Mix things up with contrasting colors, fonts or shapes. It’s like highlighting your key points with a neon marker – an instant attention grabber.

5. Tell a visual story

Structure your slides like a storybook and create a visual narrative by arranging your slides in a way that tells a story. Each slide should flow into the next, creating a visual narrative that keeps your audience hooked till the very end.

Icons and images are essential for adding visual appeal and clarity to your presentation. Venngage provides a vast library of icons and images, allowing you to choose visuals that resonate with your audience and complement your message. 

6. Show the “before and after” magic

Want to drive home the impact of your message or solution? Whip out the “before and after” technique. Show the current state (before) and the desired state (after) in a visual way. It’s like showing a makeover transformation, but for your ideas.

7. Add fun with visual quizzes and polls

To break the monotony and see if your audience is still with you, throw in some quick quizzes or polls. It’s like a mini-game break in your presentation — your audience gets involved and it makes your presentation way more dynamic and memorable.

8. End with a powerful visual punch

Your presentation closing should be a showstopper. Think a stunning clip art that wraps up your message with a visual bow, a killer quote that lingers in minds or a call to action that gets hearts racing.

9. Engage with storytelling through data

Use storytelling magic to bring your data to life. Don’t just throw numbers at your audience—explain what they mean, why they matter and add a bit of human touch. Turn those stats into relatable tales and watch your audience’s eyes light up with understanding.

10. Use visuals wisely

Your visuals are the secret sauce of a great presentation. Cherry-pick high-quality images, graphics, charts and videos that not only look good but also align with your message’s vibe. Each visual should have a purpose – they’re not just there for decoration. 

11. Utilize visual hierarchy

Employ design principles like contrast, alignment and proximity to make your key info stand out. Play around with fonts, colors and placement to make sure your audience can’t miss the important stuff.

12. Engage with multimedia

Static slides are so last year. Give your presentation some sizzle by tossing in multimedia elements. Think short video clips, animations, or a touch of sound when it makes sense, including an animated logo . But remember, these are sidekicks, not the main act, so use them smartly.

13. Interact with your audience

Turn your presentation into a two-way street. Start your presentation by encouraging your audience to join in with thought-provoking questions, quick polls or using interactive tools. Get them chatting and watch your presentation come alive.

When it comes to delivering a group presentation, it’s important to have everyone on the team on the same page. Venngage’s real-time collaboration tools enable you and your team to work together seamlessly, regardless of geographical locations. Collaborators can provide input, make edits and offer suggestions in real time. 

14. Incorporate stories and examples

Weave in relatable stories, personal anecdotes or real-life examples to illustrate your points. It’s like adding a dash of spice to your content – it becomes more memorable and relatable.

15. Nail that delivery

Don’t just stand there and recite facts like a robot — be a confident and engaging presenter. Lock eyes with your audience, mix up your tone and pace and use some gestures to drive your points home. Practice and brush up your presentation skills until you’ve got it down pat for a persuasive presentation that flows like a pro.

Venngage offers a wide selection of professionally designed presentation templates, each tailored for different purposes and styles. By choosing a template that aligns with your content and goals, you can create a visually cohesive and polished presentation that captivates your audience.

Looking for more presentation ideas ? Why not try using a presentation software that will take your presentations to the next level with a combination of user-friendly interfaces, stunning visuals, collaboration features and innovative functionalities that will take your presentations to the next level. 

Visual presentations come in various formats, each uniquely suited to convey information and engage audiences effectively. Here are six major types of visual presentations that you should be familiar with:

1. Slideshows or PowerPoint presentations

Slideshows are one of the most common forms of visual presentations. They typically consist of a series of slides containing text, images, charts, graphs and other visual elements. Slideshows are used for various purposes, including business presentations, educational lectures and conference talks.

2. Infographics

Infographics are visual representations of information, data or knowledge. They combine text, images and graphics to convey complex concepts or data in a concise and visually appealing manner. Infographics are often used in marketing, reporting and educational materials.

Don’t worry, they are also super easy to create thanks to Venngage’s fully customizable infographics templates that are professionally designed to bring your information to life. Be sure to try it out for your next visual presentation!

3. Video presentation

Videos are your dynamic storytellers. Whether it’s pre-recorded or happening in real-time, videos are the showstoppers. You can have interviews, demos, animations or even your own mini-documentary. Video presentations are highly engaging and can be shared in both in-person and virtual presentations .

4. Charts and graphs

Charts and graphs are visual representations of data that make it easier to understand and analyze numerical information. Common types include bar charts, line graphs, pie charts and scatterplots. They are commonly used in scientific research, business reports and academic presentations.

Effective data visualizations are crucial for simplifying complex information and Venngage has got you covered. Venngage’s tools enable you to create engaging charts, graphs,and infographics that enhance audience understanding and retention, leaving a lasting impression in your presentation.

5. Interactive presentations

Interactive presentations involve audience participation and engagement. These can include interactive polls, quizzes, games and multimedia elements that allow the audience to actively participate in the presentation. Interactive presentations are often used in workshops, training sessions and webinars.

Venngage’s interactive presentation tools enable you to create immersive experiences that leave a lasting impact and enhance audience retention. By incorporating features like clickable elements, quizzes and embedded multimedia, you can captivate your audience’s attention and encourage active participation.

6. Poster presentations

Poster presentations are the stars of the academic and research scene. They consist of a large poster that includes text, images and graphics to communicate research findings or project details and are usually used at conferences and exhibitions. For more poster ideas, browse through Venngage’s gallery of poster templates to inspire your next presentation.

Different visual presentations aside, different presentation methods also serve a unique purpose, tailored to specific objectives and audiences. Find out which type of presentation works best for the message you are sending across to better capture attention, maintain interest and leave a lasting impression. 

To make a good presentation , it’s crucial to be aware of common mistakes and how to avoid them. Without further ado, let’s explore some of these pitfalls along with valuable insights on how to sidestep them.

Overloading slides with text

Text heavy slides can be like trying to swallow a whole sandwich in one bite – overwhelming and unappetizing. Instead, opt for concise sentences and bullet points to keep your slides simple. Visuals can help convey your message in a more engaging way.

Using low-quality visuals

Grainy images and pixelated charts are the equivalent of a scratchy vinyl record at a DJ party. High-resolution visuals are your ticket to professionalism. Ensure that the images, charts and graphics you use are clear, relevant and sharp.

Choosing the right visuals for presentations is important. To find great visuals for your visual presentation, Browse Venngage’s extensive library of high-quality stock photos. These images can help you convey your message effectively, evoke emotions and create a visually pleasing narrative. 

Ignoring design consistency

Imagine a book with every chapter in a different font and color – it’s a visual mess. Consistency in fonts, colors and formatting throughout your presentation is key to a polished and professional look.

Reading directly from slides

Reading your slides word-for-word is like inviting your audience to a one-person audiobook session. Slides should complement your speech, not replace it. Use them as visual aids, offering key points and visuals to support your narrative.

Lack of visual hierarchy

Neglecting visual hierarchy is like trying to find Waldo in a crowd of clones. Use size, color and positioning to emphasize what’s most important. Guide your audience’s attention to key points so they don’t miss the forest for the trees.

Ignoring accessibility

Accessibility isn’t an option these days; it’s a must. Forgetting alt text for images, color contrast and closed captions for videos can exclude individuals with disabilities from understanding your presentation. 

Relying too heavily on animation

While animations can add pizzazz and draw attention, overdoing it can overshadow your message. Use animations sparingly and with purpose to enhance, not detract from your content.

Using jargon and complex language

Keep it simple. Use plain language and explain terms when needed. You want your message to resonate, not leave people scratching their heads.

Not testing interactive elements

Interactive elements can be the life of your whole presentation, but not testing them beforehand is like jumping into a pool without checking if there’s water. Ensure that all interactive features, from live polls to multimedia content, work seamlessly. A smooth experience keeps your audience engaged and avoids those awkward technical hiccups.

Presenting complex data and information in a clear and visually appealing way has never been easier with Venngage. Build professional-looking designs with our free visual chart slide templates for your next presentation.

What software or tools can I use to create visual presentations?

You can use various software and tools to create visual presentations, including Microsoft PowerPoint, Google Slides, Adobe Illustrator, Canva, Prezi and Venngage, among others.

What is the difference between a visual presentation and a written report?

The main difference between a visual presentation and a written report is the medium of communication. Visual presentations rely on visuals, such as slides, charts and images to convey information quickly, while written reports use text to provide detailed information in a linear format.

How do I effectively communicate data through visual presentations?

To effectively communicate data through visual presentations, simplify complex data into easily digestible charts and graphs, use clear labels and titles and ensure that your visuals support the key messages you want to convey.

Are there any accessibility considerations for visual presentations?

Accessibility considerations for visual presentations include providing alt text for images, ensuring good color contrast, using readable fonts and providing transcripts or captions for multimedia content to make the presentation inclusive.

Most design tools today make accessibility hard but Venngage’s Accessibility Design Tool comes with accessibility features baked in, including accessible-friendly and inclusive icons.

How do I choose the right visuals for my presentation?

Choose visuals that align with your content and message. Use charts for data, images for illustrating concepts, icons for emphasis and color to evoke emotions or convey themes.

What is the role of storytelling in visual presentations?

Storytelling plays a crucial role in visual presentations by providing a narrative structure that engages the audience, helps them relate to the content and makes the information more memorable.

How can I adapt my visual presentations for online or virtual audiences?

To adapt visual presentations for online or virtual audiences, focus on concise content, use engaging visuals, ensure clear audio, encourage audience interaction through chat or polls and rehearse for a smooth online delivery.

What is the role of data visualization in visual presentations?

Data visualization in visual presentations simplifies complex data by using charts, graphs and diagrams, making it easier for the audience to understand and interpret information.

How do I choose the right color scheme and fonts for my visual presentation?

Choose a color scheme that aligns with your content and brand and select fonts that are readable and appropriate for the message you want to convey.

How can I measure the effectiveness of my visual presentation?

Measure the effectiveness of your visual presentation by collecting feedback from the audience, tracking engagement metrics (e.g., click-through rates for online presentations) and evaluating whether the presentation achieved its intended objectives.

Ultimately, creating a memorable visual presentation isn’t just about throwing together pretty slides. It’s about mastering the art of making your message stick, captivating your audience and leaving a mark.

Lucky for you, Venngage simplifies the process of creating great presentations, empowering you to concentrate on delivering a compelling message. Follow the 5 simple steps below to make your entire presentation visually appealing and impactful:

1. Sign up and log In: Log in to your Venngage account or sign up for free and gain access to Venngage’s templates and design tools.

2. Choose a template: Browse through Venngage’s presentation template library and select one that best suits your presentation’s purpose and style. Venngage offers a variety of pre-designed templates for different types of visual presentations, including infographics, reports, posters and more.

3. Edit and customize your template: Replace the placeholder text, image and graphics with your own content and customize the colors, fonts and visual elements to align with your presentation’s theme or your organization’s branding.

4. Add visual elements: Venngage offers a wide range of visual elements, such as icons, illustrations, charts, graphs and images, that you can easily add to your presentation with the user-friendly drag-and-drop editor.

5. Save and export your presentation: Export your presentation in a format that suits your needs and then share it with your audience via email, social media or by embedding it on your website or blog .

So, as you gear up for your next presentation, whether it’s for business, education or pure creative expression, don’t forget to keep these visual presentation ideas in your back pocket.

Feel free to experiment and fine-tune your approach and let your passion and expertise shine through in your presentation. With practice, you’ll not only build presentations but also leave a lasting impact on your audience – one slide at a time.

2024’s Must-See Visual Presentation Examples to Power Up Your Deck

Anh Vu • 05 Apr 2024 • 6 min read

Keep on reading because these visual presentation examples will blow your boring decks away! For many people, delivering a presentation is a daunting project, even before it turns to hybrid and virtual displays due to the pandemic. To avoid the Death By PowerPoint phenomenon, it is time to adopt new techniques to make your presentations more visual and impressive.

This article tries to encourage you to think outside of the slide by providing essential elements of a successful visual presentation, especially for the new presenter and those who want to save time, money, and effort for the upcoming presentation deadline.

Table of Contents

What is a visual presentation.

• Types of Visual Presentation Examples

How to Create a Visual Presentation

• What Makes a Good Presentation Visual?

Frequently Asked Questions

How ahaslides supports a good visual presentation.

As mentioned before, you need a presentation tool to make your presentation more visual and engaging. The art of leveraging visual elements is all intended visual aids make sense and kick off audiences’ imagination, curiosity, and interest from the entire presentation.

The easiest way to create interaction between the presenter and the audience is by asking for rhetorical and thought-provoking quizzes and quick surveys during the presentation. AhaSlides , with a range of live polls , live Q&A , word clouds , interactive questions, image questions, creative fonts, and integration with streaming platforms can help you to make a good visual presentation in just a second.

• Types of Presentation
• College Presentation
• Creative Presentation Ideas
• AhaSlides Free Public Templates

Start in seconds.

Get free templates for your next interactive presentation. Sign up for free and take what you want from the template library!

So, what are the visual presentation examples? When providing as much information as possible, many presenters think that text-heavy slides may help, but by contrast, they may lead to distraction. As we explore the characteristics of good presentations, illustrations and graphics play an important role in delivering compelling content and turning complex concepts more clearly, precisely, and instantly to understand. A visual presentation is the adoption of a range of visual aids on presentation to ensure information is easier to understand and memorize. 

In addition, visual aids can also help to keep presenters on track, which can be used as a cue for reviving a train of thought. They build better interaction and communication between presenters and the audience, making them notice more deeply what you are saying.

Types of Visual Presentation Examples 

Some possible visual presentations include infographics , charts, diagrams, posters, flipcharts, idea board , whiteboards, and video presentation examples. 

An infographic is a collection of different graphic visual presentations to represent information, data, or knowledge intended more visually quickly and clearly to grab the audience’s attention.

To illustrate quantitative data effectively, it is important to make use of graphs and charts. For both business use and research use, graphs and charts can show multiple and complex data in a way that is easy to understand and memory.

When it comes to presenting information systematically and logically, you can use diagrams. A diagram is a powerful tool for effective communication and brainstorming processes. It also is time-saving for people to read and collect information.

A poster, especially a research project poster, provides brief and concrete information about a research paper straightforwardly. The audiences can grab all important data knowledge and findings through posters. 

A flipchart and whiteboard are the most basic presentation aids and work best to supplement lecture slides. Excellent whiteboard and flipchart composite of well-chosen words, and clear diagram will help to explain complex concepts.

A video presentation is not a new concept, it is a great way to spread ideas lively and quickly attract the audience’s attention. The advantages of a video presentation lie in its animation and illustration concepts, fascinating sound effects, and user-friendliness. 

In addition, we can add many types of visual aids in the presentations as long as they can give shapes and form words or thoughts into visual content. Most popular visual aids include graphs, statistics, charts, and diagrams that should be noted in your mind. These elements combined with verbal are a great way to engage the listeners’ imagination and also emphasize vital points more memorable.

It is simply to create more visual presentations than you think. With the development of technology and the internet, you can find visual presentation examples and templates for a second. PowerPoint is a good start, but there are a variety of quality alternatives, such as AhaSlides , Keynote, and Prezi.

When it comes to designing an effective visual presentation, you may identify some key steps beforehand:

Visual Presentation Examples – Focus on Your Topic

Firstly, you need to determine your purpose and understand your audience’s needs. If you are going to present in a seminar with your audience of scientists, engineers, business owners… They are likely to care about data under simple charts and graphs, which explain the results or trends. Or if you are going to give a lecture for secondary students, your slides should be something fun and interesting, with more colourful pictures and interactive questions.

Visual Presentation Examples – Animation and Transition

When you want to add a bit of excitement to a slideshow and help to keep the listener more engaged, you use animation and transition. These functions help to shift the focus of audiences between elements on slides. When the transition style and setting are set right, it can help to give fluidity and professionalism to a slideshow.

Visual Presentation Examples – Devices for Interactivity

One of the approaches that improve communication between audiences and the use of visual aids is using technology assistance. You don’t want to take too much time to create well-designed visual aids while ensuring your presentation is impressive, so why not leverage a presentation app like AhaSlides ? It properly encourages participant engagement with interactive visual features and templates and is time-saving. With its help, you can design your presentation either formally or informally depending on your interest.

Visual Presentation Examples – Give an Eye-catching Title

Believe it or not, the title is essential to attracting audiences at first sight. Though don’t “read the book by its cover”, you still can put your thoughts into a unique title that conveys the topic while piquing the viewer’s interest. 

Visual Presentation Examples – Play a Short Video

Creative video presentation ideas are always important. “Videos evoke emotional responses”, it will be a mistake if you don’t leverage short videos with sound to reel in and captivate the audience’s attention. You can put the video at the beginning of the presentation as a brief introduction to your topic, or you can play it as a supplement to explain difficult concepts. 

Visual Presentation Examples – Use a Prop or Creative Visual Aid to Inject Humour

It is challenging to keep your audience interested and engaged with your audience from the whole presentation. It is why to add a prop or creative visual aid to pull your audience’s focus on what you say. Here are some ideas to cover it:

• Use neon colour and duotones
• Tell a personal story
• Show a shocking heading
• Use isometric illustrations
• Go vertical

Visual Presentation Examples – Rehearsal and Get Feedback

It is an important step to make your visual presentation really work out. You won’t know any unexpected mirrors may come out on D-day if you don’t make the rehearsal and get feedback from a reliable source. If they say that your visual image is in bad-quality, the data is overwhelming, or the pictures are misunderstood, you can have an alternative plan in advance.

What Makes a Good Visual Presentation?

Incorporate visual or audio media appropriately. Ensure you arrange and integrate suitable data presentation in your slides or videos. You can read the guidelines for visual aids applications in the following:

• Choose a readable text size about the slide room and text spacing in about 5-7 doubted-spaced.
• Use consistent colour for overall presentation, visual aids work better in white yellow and blue backgrounds.
• Take care of data presentation, and avoid oversimplification or too much detail.
• Keep the data shown minimum and highlight really important data points only.
• Choose font carefully, keep in mind that lowercase is easier to read than uppercase
• Don’t mix fonts.
• Printed text is easier to read than handwritten text.
• Use the visual to emphasize punctuation in your verbal presentation.
• Say no to poor-quality images or videos.
• Visual elements need to be strategic and relevant.

What well-designed visual aids should have?

To make an effective visual aid, you must follow principles of design, including contrast, alignment, repetition, and proximity.

Why is it important to keep visual aids simple?

Simple ads help to keep things clear and understandable, so the message can be communicated effectively.

What is the purpose of visual aids in the classroom?

To encourage the learning process and make it easier and more interesting so students would want to engage in lessons more.

More from AhaSlides

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1) structure your presentation like a story, 2) make it minimalist, never design a presentation again, 3) color theory is your friend, 4) black and white with pops of color, 5) add music to your presentation, 6) ask your audience questions, 7) visualize your data with engaging graphics, 8) pop culture can be your friend, 9) pair fonts to keep your presentation dynamic, 10) make the right impression with visual metaphors, 11) place your images into unique frames, 12) juice up your presentation transitions, 13) turn your presentation into one moving slide, 14) make room for quotes, 15) get your presentation ideas from history, 16) engage your audience with activities, 17) give your presentation a seasonal theme, 18) be forward thinking with a futuristic design, 19) keep it fresh with a modern presentation, 20) enter a new dimension with 3d graphics, 21) come up with a motif inspired by your content, 22) include your logo in every slide, 23) color code your themes, 24) make it fun with gifs, 25) shoot for the moon with an outer space theme, 26) keep it lighthearted with humor and memes, 27) format each slide like a social media post, 28) bring your presentation to life with motion graphics, 29) get everyone involved with interactive elements, 30) make it cohesive with photo overlays, 31) alternate your slide formats, bonus: give your presentation a pro polish with penji, 31 creative presentation ideas to captivate your audience.

Presentations are about sharing important info with the right folks – bosses, coworkers, or future clients. Making a good impression matters, and a creative presentation can push you ahead.

Stuck on how to begin? Check out these 31 awesome presentation ideas to spark your next successful pitch.

A fantastic presentation carries its audience through a journey. Consider your key message as the driving force that propels the audience through the storyline of your presentation. You can deconstruct it as follows:

• The current situation : Where are we now?
• The transition : What’s changing?
• The future : What’s on the horizon?
• The conclusion : Where will we ultimately land?

Especially in a business setting, you want your PowerPoint design to be simple, stylish, and inviting. Minimalism can be a great way to give your presentation slides a professional look without sacrificing style. A simple backdrop also helps important facts and figures stand out.

Get unlimited presentations + any designs you need with Penji

As you’re designing your presentation, remember to use colors that complement each other. Is your company’s color pale green? Combine it with an equally pale pink. To get more in-depth, there are plenty of tools online like Coolors that help you make full color palettes.

On the other end of the spectrum (no pun intended), sometimes one color is all you need. For a more minimal presentation, a black and white aesthetic with a single accent color can really stand out. You can use that color to emphasize key facts and figures, because the audience is already drawn to it.

Want to take your presentation up a notch from mere static slides? Harness the power of musical cues – a swift and engaging strategy. While incorporating music into slideshows can sometimes lead to technical hitches, mastering the technique can yield remarkable audience engagement.

“How do I engage my audience?” Have you tried talking to them? Question and answer sections can be a great tool for team-building presentations, and they can turn potential buyers into engaged participants.

Try creating questions that will feed into your point. Rather than saying “You need ___,” ask your audience what they need and bring it back around to your product or service.

Data visualization is a key part of any presentation (okay, most presentations). Looking for presentation ideas to make your data pop? Don’t settle for basic charts.

Highlight key figures with bold fonts and colors. Use imagery that conveys what your data means. It’s easy to zone out in a meeting—it’s up to you to visualize data in a way people can’t ignore.

Whether you’re guiding a team meeting or captivating customers, pop culture references can pique interest and bridge gaps. Even in formal presentations, a quick pop culture nod can foster connection. But always consider your audience—avoid references that might leave them puzzled.

A common error among novices in presentation design is sticking to a single font. To maintain visual interest, embrace diversity. Experiment with eye-catching fonts for titles, complemented by polished sans-serif fonts for body text. Further enhance variety with distinct weights, styles, and colors for various text elements.

Ideally, everyone would pay attention to you. But since you can’t account for that, you want your audience to understand the ideas behind your presentation no matter how much attention they’re paying. On top of emphasizing key data and words, visual metaphors are a great way to ensure that even the least attentive listeners are getting the gist of it.

Is your presentation appearing outdated, confined, and lacking in dynamism? The reason might be your fixation on squares and rectangles.

Incorporating distinctive image frames isn’t just visually appealing; they also expand your slide’s spatial dimension. By steering clear of rigid squares and borders and opting for circles, hexagons, and other shapes, you create a sensation of suspended freedom.

One of the classic marks of a middle schooler’s first PowerPoint: every transition under the sun. Using different transitions for each slide will make your presentation feel amateur. Instead, stick to one style of transition, or make your use of transitions thematically consistent (e.g. moving in the same direction).

This is an advanced transition technique for all you presentation design pros out there. Elevate your slideshow by giving it the sense of a literal living document. You can create a flipbook or folder motif (as in the example above) or create a scrolling graphic format. If nothing else, you can mesh transitions and design to make each slide seamlessly morph into the next.

Whether you’re getting a point across or just trying to inspire your audience, a quote is a great addition to any presentation. Quotes by experts can help lend your point some authority. Meaningful quotes can open up the floor to discussions. Funny or inspirational quotes can provide some levity without sacrificing professionalism.

Much like references to pop culture, integrating historical elements into your presentation provides a shared language with your audience. Like the alien species from the Star Trek episode “Darmok,” incorporating historical moments can resonate deeply with your audience. For instance, if you’re aiming to evoke a sense of romance, a backdrop inspired by Shakespearean times could be remarkably effective.

First of all, yes, a presentation is a great idea for facilitating a group game in a classroom or office setting. But believe it or not, any presentation can benefit from capturing the audience’s attention through activities.

For team-building presentations, build trust and relationships through simple games. For pitches, create space to “test out” your product or service. The possibilities are endless.

Pop culture references can ensure your presentation is current, but depending on your audience, you may have to avoid being too current. Seasonal themes, on the other hand, keep you timely no matter who you’re presenting to. You can go all in on a theme, like the Halloween example above, or incorporate subtle elements for a more corporate presentation.

In the business world, particularly in the tech sector, projecting a cutting-edge image is paramount. When presenting a novel product, service, or strategy, it’s crucial that your audience perceives you as a forward-thinking entity.

That’s where a futuristic design can help. Implement sleek shapes, dark colors, and interactive elements to make your presentation futuristic. Sometimes, it’s as simple as adding images of modern tech products.

Futurism has its place, but if you want to convey a cutting-edge feel in a more subtle way, a modern, artistic presentation design is the way to go. Unique shapes and color combinations—as well as bold, sans serif fonts—can help your slides look effortful and fresh. You can work with an expert designer or design service to really make your presentation unique.

3D illustrations are relatively novel, and even freely available models are underused in presentations. Even in 2022, they still convey a sense of novelty, whether they’re playful, artistic, or scientific. On top of lending flair to your slides, they can also be great for visualizing data in informative presentations.

Elevate your presentation to a masterpiece with a well-chosen motif. Delve into your key presentation points and the emotions you aim to stir.

For instance, a lighthouse motif can symbolize navigating challenges or pioneering innovative solutions. Meanwhile, a whimsical animal theme can evoke a sense of coziness and tranquility. Embrace creativity, while ensuring meaningful content takes the lead.

A presentation can be a great way to propose a new logo design , but your logo is a great fit for any type of presentation. For pitches, they make your brand look professional. For internal meetings, they help make it feel official, boosting engagement from your audience. Design your slides to make room for your logo and try to balance colors and fonts to fit your brand.

While we’ve emphasized the importance of a central theme in your presentation, it’s also true that many presentations encompass various topics or subcategories within the overarching theme. Employing diverse colors to mirror distinct subjects or slide types can infuse your presentation with nuanced depth.

GIFs have become a crucial part of the online ecosystem. However you pronounce it (team “jif,” for the record), a GIF is a casual, effective way to evoke emotion, humor, or otherwise build a relationship with your audience. There’s a reason Twitter is overrun with these things; there’s a GIF for every occasion.

Space is one of the most versatile themes to use in a presentation design . Where a futuristic slideshow places you on the cutting edge, space creates the impression that your ambitions go even bigger. Whether you’re trying to pump up your coworkers or attract new clients, placing your presentation in the final frontier is bound to inspire them.

While certain presentations are all business, remember that public speaking often centers around forging a connection with your audience. A surefire approach to achieve this is by strategically incorporating a meme or a clever punchline.

Yes, it’s true that meme culture travels fast, and it can be hard to tell what will still be fresh when you’re presenting. But if there’s one place where you can get away with an old-school, impact-font -over-JPEG meme in 2022, it’s in a business presentation.

Here’s an out-of-the-box idea: what design layout are people most familiar with today? Chances are, a format inspired by social media is one of the best ways to make your audience feel at home. This is best for a presentation where social media is relevant, but it can also serve a similar function to memes, creating a fun dynamic with your audience. Your slide text shouldn’t be longer than a tweet, anyway.

We’ve already gone over transitions, the animations taking you from one slide to the next. But that doesn’t have to be the only animated thing about your presentation. Motion graphics can help each slide come alive, as well as emphasizing key facts and helping visualize data. Just try not to make the graphics too distracting.

Ever sat through dull vacation photos? Well, a lackluster presentation can feel the same. To truly involve your audience, interactive elements are a must.

Think animations and clickable transitions or even a lighthearted quiz. It’s all about sparking engagement.

Maybe you’re showcasing your photography work. Maybe you’re presenting a product with a series of photos. You might just be using stock photos to illustrate your point.

Either way, most presentations will involve at least a few photos. If you want a slick, artistic look, you can use color overlays and filters to make these photos part of your slides’ aesthetic. Use complementary colors and keep them consistent for each photo you put in, or go black and white for a luxury look.

Here’s a common rookie blunder, and it’s easy to overlook. Even with a striking design and captivating content, if you sense something’s amiss, your presentation could be too monotonous.

To infuse dynamism, mix up slide formats, particularly for text-heavy ones. Just shifting text from left to right can work wonders. It’s a vital trick to keep your audience engrossed.

These presentation ideas are all about shaping a presentation that delivers real results. But if you’re aiming to craft a truly impactful PowerPoint, you might not want to go the DIY route. Opting for a presentation crafted by a certified pro is the ultimate method to impress your audience. And if you want consistently professional designs every time, then you want Penji.

Our unlimited design service works with the world’s top design talent to provide you with stunning presentations, logos, websites, packaging, and everything else you need.

Still have questions? You can request a design today from our marketplace with no strings attached, or sign up for a demo to see how Penji can work for you.

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How to Create an Inspiring Presentation for your Workshop

Have you ever been at a presentation or workshop and found yourself forcing your eyes to stay open? 

Bored out of your mind, and struggling to focus, the host is bleating on… and on. The concepts are too hard to follow, the words becoming a meaningless, tiresome cloud. Next time you struggle to sleep, it’ll be this guy’s waffling drivel that’ll send you to the land of nod.

Together, we’ll discover how to put the “Pow!” back into PowerPoint.

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A step-by-step guide to planning a workshop, how to create an unforgettable training session in 8 simple steps, 47 useful online tools for workshop planning and meeting facilitation.

In this article we’ll explore: 

• Why visual presentations are important
• What to consider when planning presentations

How to design an engaging visual presentation

• How to choose an engaging format
• Which tools are best for designing presentations
• Tips on how to deliver your workshop presentation

Why Are Visual Presentations Important?

The purpose is to share brilliant ideas with an audience. This might be a piece of work or an educational concept in a workshop; the aim is to communicate with people, make them feel something , and take action. We all want our audience to leave an event feeling motivated and inspired, and that the workshop was of value.

The importance of visuals is often overlooked, either due to a lack of confidence in working with visual design, lack of time or both. For a workshop facilitator, using visual aids could actually save time, better represent our ideas and concepts to a group, and help you present more confidently. “How?”, you ask.

When it comes to saving time, a picture is really worth a thousand words. There is no need to type up your presentations or make wordy bullet points on every slide when a simple image can share the message for you. 

Visual presentations put across an immediate message. Images are emotive and can deliver a story much faster than words, visuals are processed 60,000 times faster in the brain than text . An image that can share an idea, can be more memorable than trying to remember very specific terminology. 

Creating visuals becomes part of a wider conversation in inclusive communication. Images are universally understood, and the eyes can “read” a picture with less effort than reading and comprehending several paragraphs. Imagine describing the color blue as a phrase. It is much easier to present it as it exists. 

Graphics are easy to share, and 65% of us are Visual learners . For anyone who has missed out on the meeting, a visual booklet can do the job of sharing the subject with them, and the added benefit of being able to view it in their own time. The power of social media also plays a huge part in the spreading of information and well-designed infographic slides can take your presentations and workshops outside of the room, with the potential to make a global impact. Sharability goes further with visual elements.

For me, a visual presentation is a lifesaver! Using slides has saved me a lot of time and made me feel more confident whilst presenting too. I don’t fumble around with notes, as the visuals can act as a prompt to remind me of where I’m at in my talk.

When presenting online, I find the value of visuals and slides even more important. It takes the attention away from my actions, and onto the graphics themselves. The participants can hear what I’m saying, but their eyes focus on the visual information which helps in retaining information and ideas beyond the workshop.    

What to consider when creating a visual presentation

I’m naturally quite a visual person, and I’ve often wondered if I could make a visual presentation without planning first what it is that I want to say. As an experiment, I gave it a go and it was a huge struggle. So, if you think that designing visuals is something that only designers can do and that they find it easy… it doesn’t and they don’t. 

As a starting point: get out a pen and paper and write down everything you want to say. This ensures you have all of the ideas and information out in black and white . I find that by leaving space between the writing and structuring, coming back at it with fresh eyes is a perfect way to work without feeling rushed. I rarely add to what I’ve written, it’s mostly about removing.

Recently I had written a LOT of information for an event. A day later, I took a second view to edit. A lot of writing is quite self-indulgent, so it helps to consider the audience . I cut up sections of the paper, keeping only what was the most necessary information , and collated it together. The rest of the sentences didn’t make the cut. You can try the editing exercise here . 

Less is More- an exercise in editing   #presentation   #presentation skills   #writing   #workshop   #meeting design   This exercise is ideal for editing written content in a hands-on way. A simple and effective exercise for editing workshop content or presentation text for talks. Use it when you have to write for a specific audience and want them to stay focused on the most important information.

As an expert in your field, it’s likely you’ll have a lot of content, and editing is so valuable to ensure your audience has relevant details. Don’t bore their socks off 😉

So now that you have an idea of your core content, you can move along the process, considering these factors before jumping into the design stages:

 Let’s start by asking, “ who is your audience? “

• if you are being commissioned to present a topic to a pre-determined group, then you’ll need to cater to their understanding of the topic. You’ll want to ensure that the information will be relevant and meets or goes beyond their expectations.
• if the topic is of your own choice, and the angle you’ve chosen to take, who do you want to take part? Finding them, and attracting them to the workshop will be part of your marketing efforts, as well as how you plan your structure and content.

We wouldn’t plan a workshop for ten-year-olds in the same way we might for adults. Consider what tone of voice you might use, the style in which we present how we use slides, and the content itself. You won’t be able to do this for each and every individual, but how you determine and empathize with your listeners can be done by creating a persona, or several personas . 

Create an overarching idea of who might be present, then consider how to engage them and meet their needs by asking yourself the following in more depth:

Why are they there?

Let’s look at their reason for attending your event. Have they come to learn from you in particular? If you are a specialist in your field and the workshop is an area of great interest to people, you’ll most likely have a deep understanding, and along with that, expectations to be filled. 

Have they come to gain a better understanding of the topic? Are they there to challenge themselves and their existing views, or perhaps yours?

How much do they know already?

Are your participants already proficient in the topic you’re delivering? You’d hopefully know this in advance of your workshop so you can adapt your material, and create a pitch in line with the group’s knowledge. If their experience level is unknown, an opener to your discussion might be to ask about their subject knowledge, ideas and expectations. That way you can tailor your language and approach.

It helps to be well versed in your workshop, to select sections you can skip out in favor of diving deeper into more advanced information. Improvisation isn’t usually a skill you’d immediately connect with presenting, but with practice, learning how to improvise can become an empowering tool to have.

For beginners, you’ll most likely take an introductory approach. This doesn’t mean it has to be dry or boring. Make it more interesting and engaging by weaving in an interactive exercise, or team debate within your presentation design. That way, the participants can gather more hands-on experience to support their understanding. This can of course use visual handouts, such as a workbook, or include a well-designed visual exercise on an interactive whiteboard.

What is their background and communication style?

Your presentation style, language, and cultural references should be considered in the writing and designing process. I recently attended a workshop on how we can create better inclusion for diverse audiences by considering the language we use. It really made me think about how we often lean towards using English as a “default” language, and how words often hold different weights and contexts in other languages.

Remote workshops and presentations mean we may have a very diverse audience than if we were presenting in-person, in one location. Online could mean 140 people in different time zones across different countries with different backgrounds. Being aware of differences makes it easier to use inclusive, easy-to-understand language in your presentation so that no one feels alienated. Speaking with clear articulation will make a big difference in how you are understood. 

You might have the best workshop on the planet, but if you don’t communicate in the style of your group, the impact will be lost. Do they want a short and snappy talk with a clear outcome at the end? Some audiences appreciate a motivational and inspirational talk that is led through emotional storytelling. Knowing their communication preferences can win over or lose your audience.

Before you begin designing your presentation, it’s important to consider what your purpose is. This is your mission statement, your project brief and your raison d’être. Here is where you want to ask yourself, what is it that you want your audience to think, feel or do? Are we creating an emotional impact or an educational goal?

Be as clear as possible with your core message, making it as specific as possible, so that you can keep this in mind throughout the process of writing, editing, designing and delivering presentations. This will keep your focus sharp, and avoid any unnecessary derailments taking your viewers away from what it is you hope to achieve.

Common purposes are to: inspire, inform, persuade or entertain .

• I want to inspire the audience to help reduce food poverty by leading a cookery workshop using supermarket waste.
• I want to inform the group about the future of rural tourism, so they might consider how they could adapt their own farming businesses to host visitors. 
• I want to persuade my team to reduce our use of plastic in the fashion industry, by presenting a viable alternative made from mushrooms.
• I want to entertain by pretending to be a Martian visiting Earth for the first time . My purpose is to help the participants understand their product from a new perspective!

A Martian Sends a Postcard Home   #creative thinking   #idea generation   #remote-friendly   #brainstorming   #energizer   #team   Use Craig Raine’s poem A Martian Sends a Postcard Home to spur creative thinking and encourage perspective shifting in a group. After a warm-up, you can then use this martian perspective to describe your product or service and gain new insights and ideas.

I recently designed a workshop called Design Thinking for Beginners and ran a SessionLab show and tell session aimed at facilitators who would like to run the workshop for teams new to design thinking. If you missed it, you can watch it back here. My purpose was to inform the attendees of the challenges newbies have with design thinking, and how they can make it a fun and digestible process.

I chose to relate each stage of design thinking to an everyday project of choosing or baking a birthday cake. My presentation was broken down into manageable chunks. Describing design thinking could be a laborious task, but keeping the text definition simple, with plenty of white space highlighted the point in one sentence. 

For the workshop itself, I incorporated interactive exercises throughout the process to lock in the understanding of design thinking and how we generate ideas. For the ideate stage of design thinking- I created a game show style exercise called the Ideas Vault where I chose to create a fun layout like a 90s computer game. The design process worked by gathering inspiration using a mix of pre-made Canva templates and adding my own twist. I talk more about Canva and design tools here .

The way you choose to structure a visual presentation will depend wholly on the purpose. The way you communicate your key message should be crafted in a way for the audience to follow along easily and act on those all-important takeaways at the end.

A solid structure will also make sure your points are clear so that you stay calm and on track when presenting. The structure of your topic, when written down and broken into manageable chunks will help hugely when it comes to creating the visual elements later. (we’ll get to that in the next section!)

Some common ways to structure your presentation could be

• Problem > Solution > Impact. Which you might use if your purpose is to inspire the audience to take action on a topic, by showing them a viable solution.
• You may start with an informative session and create a workshop as we mentioned before, to lead people through a learning process.
• A creative structure might be through storytelling , which might inspire and entertain. Once upon a time, this event happened, followed by the outcome and moral of the story.
• In any case, your presentation could follow the classic layout of: introduction, main body & conclusion, and you’d have a good foundation for your content.

Introduction

You have the first few seconds to grab people’s attention. First impressions are just as important as they’re made out to be! The introduction is the most important part, where the group will connect with you and decide if they want to listen to you or not. What would be a great hook for the audience to immediately buy into your presentation from the start?

Some people introduce themselves at the beginning- but you don’t have to. If you’re beginning with a story, this can be a very effective way to warm up your participants and make sure they’re really listening to you. Then you can introduce yourself when you know they have your attention, and they value what you have to say.

A quote or a provocative question or fact can get people thinking. You may use a thought-provoking image, which could be a prop, a video or a photo that introduces your presentation from the get-go. If you are offering a solution, go straight to the problem in your introduction.

Main body of presentation

Now that you’ve got your audience’s attention, and they have gathered an understanding and are intrigued to learn more, we can delve into the juice of your subject.

The main body involves presenting the data, and the important pieces of information. If you are offering a solution to the problem you introduced, expressing this with a visual, we place the subject right in front of them, and they don’t have to work so hard and use their imagination.

The main body doesn’t have to be a one-sided conversation. Listen! You might ask the group to interact, asking for their perspective. A talk or workshop can be a dialogue between the presenter and the group.

Your conclusion should be as snappy and engaging as your introduction. It may even loop back to the provocative question, or challenging problem. You’ll want to consider the impact on the attendees and most importantly, what you want them to do next! What action do you want them to take beyond the workshop?

What are the key takeaways? Highlight them as  Problem  > Solution  > Impact.

An effective class should tie up the opening question and objective, but still leave space for further exploration and discussion. Like a great film! They should not be saying, “I’m glad that’s over”. If it’s been designed with the audience in mind, they should feel something- energized or excited.

Now that you’ve written the content and designed the structure, here are our top tips to get you creating impactful visuals to complement what you present verbally. We’ll cover:

• How to design your slides and what information to include
• How typography impacts accessibility and design 
• Making smart color choices for both emotional connection and accessibility

Designing your slides

When approaching a blank canvas, it can be hard to know where to start. Some people start with deciding how many slides they’ll use- the question, “How many slides are too many slides?” crops up regularly in these types of articles. Expert presenters say not to go over 20 visual slides, but this will of course depend on the length and complexity of your subject. Another tip is not to spend more than a minute on each slide to keep it snappy and people engaged.

If I am creating a presentation from scratch, I’ll start with the first slide, and keep it very simple before moving on to the next one. Always asking “what is this slide saying? ” The first slide will be the title of my discussion, which will be visible to everyone joining the room. It sets the tone for what the topic will be about. If we were creating one around the topic of designing workshop slides, it might look like this:

I think the most important thing to remember is that each slide should have its own purpose, and not be overloaded with text. Where possible, use an image rather than words and think about how we might convey this message visually. Always start by defining the message and asking what the key takeaway for participants is. You can always further explain verbally.

When choosing an image, consider the audience and their context- a local photograph they can relate to, or a familiar face will often have more to say than a generic stock image.

Text will likely be used on your slides, and how much text is too much? If you begin planning your content by writing it all out and keeping only the most important parts, designing your slides will be a lot easier. I’d always recommend editing continuously throughout the process to create a meaningful message. If you can say something in 3 bullet points rather than 10, please do! Your audience will have a much easier time retaining the information.

“Good design is invisible”

Unless the subject of your presentation is about typography, it’s probably not the best time to be cracking out your most recently found, favorite font that’s “a bit different” or unusual. Stick to standard, trusted and most legible fonts that audiences can read and are familiar with. Otherwise, they’ll distract from the content. And content is King. 

“Good design is invisible”, a true and very useful phrase from Dieter Rams, who considers functionality in design as honest, long-lasting and with as little design as possible. This is a good theory to take throughout the design process. When looking for the right font, consider the tone you are using throughout your delivery too, and the overall message you are giving.

Good typography is your best friend for a presentation. When creating visuals for screens, as mentioned before, we are not typing out our speech word-for-word. Any text that is visually presented will have a very definite purpose as to why it is being displayed. This might be a quote, some data or the title of a book along with some further information in short form. Presentation slides are not a book.

Legibility is the most important thing when it comes to designing your visuals. Sans serif fonts are typically the best option for reading on a screen. Help your audience understand what you are communicating as quickly and easily as possible by ensuring the font sizes are easy to read. 

Create contrast and visual interest by choosing two fonts, one for headers and one for any body text. The contrast should still be harmonious, and not jarring to the eyes. Font hierarchy can help the audience differentiate between key points and more specific information. By choosing different weights and sizes, you can ensure your message is clearly heard and understood. 

• Minimum font size for main copy and bullets: 18 points
• Preferred font size for main copy and bullets: 24 points
• Preferred font size for headers or titles: 36 to 44 points

Personally, I like to choose font sizes slightly larger than recommended for body text. When we have a text-heavy page, I prefer to give the text plenty of surrounding white space and edit the copy as much as possible. From a design perspective, it helps legibility; and from a content perspective, it doubly ensures only the relevant text is presented on screen. I would definitely edit again at this stage. In this example for screens, the body text is 28pt and written in Open Sans, and the “Ideate” heading is 44pt in Agrandir wide.

Before creating any printed material for presentations, consider if it will truly be used and the environmental impact. I’d usually opt for sharing a digital version for people to refer back to after the workshop. It’s good practice to create a black and white version so that if it is printed out, the printing costs will be lower. There are of course digital accessibility issues, and some people might prefer a printed version. If so, select a serif font for any long text in a workbook or feedback form, with a minimum font size of 10-12pt.

Key points:

• Use Contrast

Deciding on the color scheme for a presentation is one of my favorite parts! Of course, you may have been given a branded color scheme to use, but if you have free reign in color choice and you enjoy the creative process, it can be a lot of fun.

For my show and tell on Design Thinking, I used the analogy of baking a cake and I felt that they conjure up an image of pastels. I used a gradient on the background so that I could use an array of colors without it being overbearing. I selected five key pastel colors for each stage of design thinking and to evoke a playful feel throughout. I was careful not to allow the colors to take over, so you’ll primarily see black and white use of color at the forefront for legibility.

Here are the key elements of how to choose a color scheme to complement your content :

The first, and most important point when choosing colors, is to use contrast. Make sure your text and graphics stand out from the background and are easily seen. Contrast is the difference in opposing colors so that they don’t blend in together A light background should use dark text and perhaps one or two bold accent colors to highlight key points. A dark background should use light fonts.

If you’re unsure of how easy a slide is to read, there are an array of online tools that can check the contrast for you by following the web accessibility guidelines. On Contrast Checker , you can enter the HEX code of the background and foreground colors, and you’ll get an idea of legibility. The sliders in the tool can be used if you need to improve the contrast and amend the color choices. There are also resources to guide you in how to select the color with an online eyedropper tool in case you’re not familiar with the HEX color codes.

Another contrast checker tool also shows the background and foreground with text examples and gives a rating to the accessibility of the text. This website has a whole host of tools, and can even pick a suitable palette for you.

If you’re working with a client, they may already have their own brand packaging and presentation template, including their colors. You may feel that this removes your choice of colors as it has been decided already, for example, they may use an in-house color language to refer to particular data on a graph. But the opposite may be true and might mean further considerations for visuals. It is important to know how to choose because when you create graphics or diagrams because you may have to select colors so that explanatory text can be seen on top of a shape or part of a graph.

When working with a client, it is important to share any documentation with their design team, and the best way to do this is by providing editable files. Working with a designer can massively lift the load on creating your presentation visuals. If there is no design team, but you are given design assets to work with, sharing both your visuals and your presentation agenda for collaboration and sign-off is a must. Create your agenda in SessionLab , and attach your visual presentation for ease of sharability. 

Studies have shown that color has an effect on expressing or feeling emotions. It will help to consider the tone that you are using throughout your presentation, the message you are delivering, and how you might want your audience to feel.

Warm colors, in the middle of the color spectrum, that aren’t too bold or too light create a warm and comfortable feeling. Bright reds and oranges can feel energetic and powerful. Or even create a sense of danger. In contrast, cooler colors such as greens, blues and purples can feel calm or evoke a sense of sadness.

We have an exercise that can help identify emotions and grow a better emotional vocabulary, the feelings wheel . It includes a visual attachment displaying the emotions in a range of colors- this may help select a tone for your color scheme. 

The Feeling Wheel   #emotional intelligence   #self-awareness   #icebreaker   #team building   #remote-friendly   By growing our emotional vocabulary, we can better identify our emotions, and check in with ourselves. Doing so can help bring a level of self-awareness, and a better understanding of others.

How to choose an engaging presentation format

We are almost there! The content is edited and your visual slides are ready, the next stage is to consider the format in which you’ll deliver your workshop or meeting. This is when you can consider any additional tools that you can use to your advantage when presenting. This might be video, photography or visual data. Or even props. Consider which other visual aids may help people to better understand the process or story you are conveying.

What presentation method will keep them engaged? How will you inspire and capture their imagination?

I’d recommend simplicity, and not try to include every form of media. Consider the purpose and message and select which format delivers it most effectively. Used with intention, video can be great. But animated graphics or flashy text is unnecessary and will add to the cognitive load of your audience, especially if they have any visual impairments.   

Video can be very effective, so long as it’s kept brief. If it’s longer than a minute, you may lose the attention of the audience, and the momentum of your presentation. A film clip should be creative and add another dimension, not an infomercial or promo piece, it’s a tool to say something that you cannot put across otherwise.

Films can have great benefits of showing a story. In a TED Talk about the intelligence of crows, the scientist showed a clip of the crow bending a hook to create a tool and fish a piece of food out of a tube. It put across his point better than anything he could’ve said.

I use recordings in situations like this, to demonstrate a case study. It’s often more powerful to have the original storyteller sharing their experience than me giving a second-hand account of the tale. Bringing in other voices in this way can add further diversity to your workshop.

Still images

JPEGs are compressed files and are used for photo formats. When a photo is taken, it is a RAW file that is editable. Once it’s compressed to a JPEG, it retains around a tenth of the information, meaning it is a smaller and less detailed file. JPEGS are used in photography, but not in vector graphics (drawings, typography, graphs, etc), as the detail lost can create pixelation if you aim to blow the image up to a larger size.

PNGs retain detail and are editable. They are still compressed files, but the pixels aren’t lost. Any graphics you create should be saved as a PNG, as you’ll be able to keep the image sharp, regardless of the size.

The photography you choose must be relatable. I’m definitely not against stock imagery per se, it’s amazing to have access to a library of searchable images to strengthen what you are saying. But, often you’ll see the same images repeated in different workshops and presentations and they’ll start to lose their meaning, or become too familiar. There are great free resources like Unsplash and if you spend time looking for a more unique way to put your point across, there are lots to choose from.

I’ve also had an Adobe Express subscription which gives access to photography and graphics and templates which you to customize in editing with little design skills. Ideally, being able to take your own photographs, or work with a professional photographer to capture exactly what you want is going to give your audience a far more unique experience. This is often a luxury.

As facilitators, a way around this could be to create our own library of photos that we capture at each presentation. When I’ve run crafting workshops, it feels quite natural to take photographs of the work we are creating. And those who are camera-shy, they’re more open to photographs of their hands in action. Over time, we’ll have a whole collection of resources.

If you enjoy photography, having a good camera as part of your kit might intrigue people, invite people to take photos of each other and the workshop process. This could be an exercise that you do to open or close your talk. Or in some cases, especially if it’s a visual presentation, and not too distracting, invite people to take their own photos and share after with a #hashtag (promo and photos in one!) And of course, get everyone’s signature attesting they are OK with photos.

Visual data & symbols

Visualizing data makes it more interesting, engaging and memorable than cold hard figures. For the majority of audiences, it’s easier to understand in a visual format than in a list of forgettable numbers. By creating charts, graphs or maps, we are able to see patterns and understand the context of the statistics. A pie chart displaying percentages in corresponding colors tells our brain quickly which section has the largest number.

Even when we analyze word-driven data, a visual representation is easier to see straight away. When I’ve worked with community groups in the design thinking process, we’ve often used Google surveys to capture written evidence. This type of qualitative data can be a challenge to sift through, so for an initial overview, a tool like word cloud can show how many times a particular word or phrase appears and turns it into an image. The more times a word appears, the larger it is on the image.

The use of icons and emojis (sparingly! And in context 😉) can add another element of visual understanding to presentations. Illustrations and hand-dawn symbols might better express your point than a photograph too. An opportunity to work with a live scribe or graphic facilitator whilst presenting could add an interesting dimension to a talk. If it involves audience participation, having someone on hand to capture the conversation visually can keep engagement and attention going!

The best tools for designing your presentation

Canva has become a much more powerful tool than it was. You can even edit your workshop recordings with it now! It’s perfect for anyone with little design knowledge as it has great templates for presentations, lots of which are free. It has social media templates too, which are perfect for advertising your upcoming workshop.

Adobe Creative Suite

I do love Creative Suite , and it still is a great package of tools for designers. Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign are the industry standard for design tools and have all the capabilities you’d need as a graphic designer. If that package is beyond your scope, Adobe Express is a great option for pre-made templates and stock imagery. Like Canva, it also works well as an app on a smartphone.

Keynote 

Keynote comes as standard with MacBook and has had a whole new upgrade including being able to use the camera on your Mac or an external camera to show yourself directly on the slides. Super handy for an online event! You can also show the screen of a connected iPad or iPhone and it now has co-hosting capabilities. 

Of course! SessionLab is where you can keep all of your presentation notes, and break down the agenda into blocks, so if you decide to switch up parts of your presentation- you can drag and drop to a different section of your talk. It is a much easier process, as it will also keep any other attachments or exercises in that block neatly collated in one place. It’s easy to share with any co-hosts or clients before the presentation day arrives!

How to deliver a workshop presentation with visuals

Some people memorize their speech word for word, which can work well if you’re a dab hand at amateur dramatics. 

On the other hand, that might feel too stressful or rigid. Bill Murray is famously known to read a script once and throw it away! For you, it may be better to consider the key points you’d like to make, and really know your subject matter so whatever arises, you’ve got it covered. Your visuals might act as a prompt for you too, the main message will be communicated visually, and you can feel free to go into more depth.

The best way to ensure that you nailed the slide design for your session is to practice. It’s important to practice noting your timing, that you’ve covered all the important points, and that each slide transitions smoothly from one to the next. You want the presentation to be as seamless as possible. The best way to practice is in front of someone and gather feedback.

Before our design thinking for beginners show and tell, I rehearsed in front of my fellow team members, instructing them to wear their “facilitator’s hats” whilst listening, so they could hear from a facilitator’s perspective and give constructive feedback.

Afterward, you can continue to add and edit, removing some sections, and making room for more key discussions to be had in-depth. If it is an informal presentation that you will run more than once, it could develop over time. If it is a one-off very important meeting, it’s vital to get as much preparation practice as possible.

Expect nerves

If I get nervous, I purposely talk slightly slower than I usually would naturally, and it calms the nerves down. There’s also no harm in mentioning that you’re nervous, it’s an honest approach and can create an authentic connection.

We’re all human. And no one would expect you to not be nervous. Nerves, to an extent, can be a good thing. They bring a bit of energy and focus to your talk, and a little adrenaline. If you know your subject matter inside out, all you really need to do is breathe, and talk. 

Speaking with one of our community members, Yvonne Chin Irving on the subject of nerves, she suggested diaphragmatic breathing, or more a more fun term, “balloon breathing”:

Belly breathe. Slowly. Imagine your tummy has a balloon that fills up when you breathe. Exhale all the air. Notice your tummy as it flattens. Next, breathe in slowly and fill your “balloon” with breath 🎈. Do this a few times to help calm yourself down. You can start this on the way to your session, do it in the car or while you’re setting up for your session. (It really works) Yvonne Chin Irving

We’d love it if you joined the conversation in our SessionLab community!

Having a technical rehearsal beforehand can help avoid blips. Ensure the right people have screen-sharing abilities, and that screens in the in-person space work. Iron out any microphone issues or problems with echo prior to the big presentation! On the day itself a technical disaster could strike, so here are some practical tips to circumnavigate these and stay professional:

• Create different formats for your presentation. If it’s a Keynote or Powerpoint, have a PDF version available in case of any tech issues you’ll still have a high-quality version available.
• If including video, have backup screen-shots as images to demonstrate your points in case the video doesn’t run.
• Be analog ready. Know your presentation without the use of slides- or print them out so that if there is a complete technical breakdown, you can confidently present. This might include creating printed handouts for people to refer to when you direct them to do so. Or, if they have their own smartphones, send them the link to your visuals or any important videos to watch back after your talk, to avoid distractions as you speak.

Accessibility

Ensuring your audience has the best experience, requires being aware of accessibility needs. Is access to the building easy for anyone with physical disabilities? Are the seats comfortable, and allow for ease of viewing for people of different heights? 

We’ve discussed the best way to use typography for ease of reading for anyone with visual impairments, and when setting up your screen, it is a good idea to see how it will look in the actual event environment. Additionally, you may share larger-print handouts on yellow paper for anyone with dyslexia. This is another reason why knowing your audience in the planning stage will make sure your presentation is enjoyable and accessible for everyone.   

Agenda planning

SessionLab is an agenda planning tool that makes presenting a lot smoother! You are able to allocate time to each section of content to keep yourself on track throughout. In your preparation stage, you can attach all of your materials to your SessionLab agenda, knowing exactly when you’ll use each of them. It’s so neatly organized and easy to edit and shift blocks if you decide to change the order of content for a future session.

In conclusion

I hope you have found this guide valuable, and that it inspires lots of ideas when planning your next presentation! There are a wealth of resources dotted around this article, and I’ll include a few more here that I highly recommend:

Lean Presentation Design A whole website by Maurizo la Cava dedicated to presentation strategy

Ted Talk: How to Write Less, but say more is an excellent talk by Jim VandeHai about short and effective communication.

Five Things to Know About Your Audience Before You Present if You Want to Be Successful useful tips on how to empathize with your group for a more successful presentation.

Let us know below in the comments if you have any questions, or any tips of your own to add to the conversation!

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Going from a mere idea to a workshop that delivers results for your clients can feel like a daunting task. In this piece, we will shine a light on all the work behind the scenes and help you learn how to plan a workshop from start to finish. On a good day, facilitation can feel like effortless magic, but that is mostly the result of backstage work, foresight, and a lot of careful planning. Read on to learn a step-by-step approach to breaking the process of planning a workshop into small, manageable chunks.  The flow starts with the first meeting with a client to define the purposes of a workshop.…

How does learning work? A clever 9-year-old once told me: “I know I am learning something new when I am surprised.” The science of adult learning tells us that, in order to learn new skills (which, unsurprisingly, is harder for adults to do than kids) grown-ups need to first get into a specific headspace.  In a business, this approach is often employed in a training session where employees learn new skills or work on professional development. But how do you ensure your training is effective? In this guide, we'll explore how to create an effective training session plan and run engaging training sessions. As team leader, project manager, or consultant,…

Effective online tools are a necessity for smooth and engaging virtual workshops and meetings. But how do you choose the right ones? Do you sometimes feel that the good old pen and paper or MS Office toolkit and email leaves you struggling to stay on top of managing and delivering your workshop? Fortunately, there are plenty of online tools to make your life easier when you need to facilitate a meeting and lead workshops. In this post, we’ll share our favorite online tools you can use to make your job as a facilitator easier. In fact, there are plenty of free online workshop tools and meeting facilitation software you can…

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What you need to know about human perception to be great at presentations

One of the most important factors that contribute to a team’s efficiency is communicating your ideas in the right way. Visual presentations (which can be easily created in Miro) are probably the most widespread way to share your ideas, so we decided to dig deeper and find some studies of human perception that can educate you on how to give an effective presentation.

• Think of how people digest information

How does human visual perception work and how can you make presentations that are easily digestible for the viewers? These are the questions that Stephen M. Kosslyn, the Dean of Social Science and John Lindsley Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, poses in his book, Clear and to the Point . Together with a number of colleagues, he came to the conclusion that there are three steps to digesting information: it needs to be acquired, processed and then connected to existing knowledge. Without any of these phases, people don’t process the presentation’s content.

To complete the first step, the scientists recommend setting a clear structure, using easily distinguishable colors and fonts and visually highlighting the most important concepts, ideas or terms. To help people process the information, you should avoid unnecessary visual elements that can distract the viewer and make everything easily understandable (imagining you’re explaining something to a child or a novice in your field often helps). The third step, connection to the viewer’s knowledge, is related to the second step; you need to avoid jargon, think about how the information is relevant to your audience’s life and explain the difficult concepts.

• Help the majority in the room

According to a 2004 Social Science Research Network study, 65% of the world’s population are visual learners (the research also shows that around 30% of people are verbal learners, “who benefit from class lectures and from discussion of class materials in study groups or in oral presentations,” and 5% of people are experiential learners who learn by doing and touching). This research explains why visuals are so important in a presentation. Also, the study states that “variations in learning styles have been linked to gender: women tend to be more visually oriented than men, who are generally more kinesthetic.”

William C. Bradford, the author of the study, points out that these results can be used to enhance the teaching style at US law schools (the paper was originally published in The Law Teacher), but you can easily implement this learning in your work life. If you bet on visuals, the majority of people in the meeting room will be likely to appreciate it.

• Be more persuasive

According to the often-cited study Persuasion and the Role of Visual Presentation Support by Douglas R. Vogel, Gary W. Dickson and John A. Lehman from the University of Arizona and University of Minnesota, presentations that provide some visual aid are 43% more persuasive than unaided presentations. This study is falsely cited by multiple companies and blogs that claim that visual information is processed 60,000 times faster than text. But both the scientists behind it and commentators are sure that this is wrong.

After conducting the research, the authors created guidelines that can help people create better visual presentations. They claim that adding visuals can improve the perception of the presenter, audience attention, comprehension and agreement, and influence audience action. They also recommend using different colors instead of just black and white and using illustrations if you want to increase the density of visual information, display multiple dimensions, organize complex issues, support abstract concepts or illustrate trends.

• Choose your colors wisely

There multiple studies on color psychology that can help us with creative visual presentation ideas. They show how how different colors can affect our mood, perception and overall mental state. For example, in 2011, psychologists from the University of Rochester found out that color red increases the speed and strength of reactions. Other colors are often associated with specific emotions and reactions — a lot of us probably noticed that many companies, and especially tech startups, often choose blue because it’s often read as a symbol of trustworthiness and reliability.

However, other studies point out that one should be very careful when choosing color accents. Researchers from the University of Toronto realized that people who used Adobe Kuler , a web-based tool that helps to create color schemes or browse color combinations, usually stick to their 2-3 favorite colors, and there is a reason for that. Susan Weinschenk, a behavioral psychologist who has been working in the field of design and user experience since 1985, says : “If you have five different colors on the screen, nobody’s going to notice anything. But if you have everything in black and white, but the button to register has color – and it’s the only bright color on the screen – that’s what people will notice.” Paying attention to your audience’s background is also important because often colors have different meaning in culture from across the world. (This article features more of Weinschenk’s suggestions for using neuroscience in design work.)

Don’t overdo fonts

Similarly to colors, typefaces can have a considerable role in the way people perceive your work and in the way you can make an effective visual presentation. When Errol Morris, a documentary filmmaker, first read Saul Kripke’s book Naming and Necessity, he was excited to learn that fonts can affect our perception of truth. A couple of years ago, he got the chance to further investigate this subject when the New York Times published a two-part essay on a recent study about optimism. After reading it, the newspaper’s audience could take a quiz and vote on whether they trusted the study’s result. The article was presented in a number of different typefaces including Baskerville, Comic Sans, Computer Modern, Georgia, Helvetica and Trebuchet. More than 40,000 readers took the quiz, and overall, Baskerville was considered the most reliable – curiously, statistically more reliable than a very similar typeface, Georgia.

The Morris study sparked a conversation among design professionals. “Considering these findings, can we state once and for all that we should use Baskerville whenever we want to persuade our audience?” wondered Alessio Laiso, a type designer who worked for IBM. In 2016, he ran a small experiment to study how different typefaces work for different products. He applied a number of fonts to four different types of websites: a bank, a news site, a fitness app, and a clothes shop. He realized that for the bank and news site, Baskerville was still the most trustworthy type. For the fitness app, Fira won; and for the shop, participants liked Helvetica. Although this study might not be completely relevant to your specific industry, considering it can help you pay attention to the choice of specific fonts and think about your audience. Regardless of your choice, you should avoid using too many typefaces and, of course, avoid using something like Comic Sans that people perceive as untrustworthy.

• Remember that sensory channels compete

According to Weinschenk, the visual sensory channel trumps all others. This means that if you are giving a presentation, talking and showing slides with text simultaneously, people stop listening as soon as they start reading. However, slides that are easy to understand and illustrate what you are talking about – like photos, diagrams, illustrations or easy-to-grasp infographics – can serve you well.

So what can you do to ensure that your audience fully understands you? One of Weinschenk’s effective presentation techniques is to write down your main points first without any visual aids and then think about how your slides can illustrate your main arguments better without interrupting the viewer. Weinschenk also recommends using just a few words on each slide.

• Avoid creating long presentations

Now when your work is ready, it’s important to demonstrate your effective presentation skills. When you think about timing, it’s important to consider another trait of human perception: the amount of time people can maintain concentration and digest new information. Susan Weinschenk and other psychologists suggest limiting your presentation to 20 minutes or breaking down a longer talk into chunks with breaks, quizzes or other changes in activity.

In 2007 Maureen Murphy, a psychologist from the University of North Texas, studied the impact of shorter learning sessions on people who participate in workforce training. She observed two groups of adults; for one of them, an hour-long session was broken down into three 20-minute sessions, and the second group had a single, continuous one-hour lecture. The study showed that people in the first group remembered the talk better, the knowledge retention was higher, and the overall reaction was more positive.

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120 Presentation Topic Ideas Help You Hook Your Audience

Updated: January 15, 2024

Published: August 09, 2023

Cooking is easy. The puzzle is figuring out what to eat. As soon as you know that, you can get started. The same holds for presentations. The sooner you can whip up a good, informative, and catchy topic, the easier the rest of the process becomes.

Pick a good topic that resonates with you and your audience to set a strong foundation. But select the wrong topic, and it becomes difficult to connect with your audience, find mutual interests, or hold their attention.

So, let’s learn how to develop thought-provoking and relevant topics for your presentations. You’ll also find some best practices to make your presentation memorable.

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Table of Contents

How to Choose a Great Presentation Topic in 5 Steps

120 presentation topic ideas, 5 presentation tips.

4. Choose an appropriate presentation style.

There are many ways to present a topic. Your personality, the topic at hand, and your audience’s personas will help you determine which style would best fit you and your audience.

Select a presentation style that will communicate the main idea clearly and have a lasting impact on your audience.

For instance, explore a freeform style presenter by Sir Ken Robinson.

5. Engage with your audience.

Work on your presentation skills to make a strong connection with your audience, get through to them and leave a mark.

Think of the presenter as the link between the topic and the audience. A strong or a weak presenter can make a difference between a presentation being a thriving success or a boring failure.

Hone your skills by engaging and interacting with your audience. Make them feel like a part of the presentation and not just spectators. 70% of marketers have found presentations with interactive content to be more effective than those without.

Here are a few ways you can make your presentation interactive:

• Start your speech with uncommon questions to your audience. Involve them from the get-go, like ask to raise their hands if X.
• Make eye contact to build credibility and show confidence. Don’t stare at your slides or notes. Smile occasionally and talk to the audience directly.
• Have an active and confident body language. Don’t stand in the same place the entire time. Move around the stage.
• Don’t be monotonous. Speak as you would to a colleague — with enthusiasm.
• Ask close-ended questions in between to keep the audience engaged without losing time. Address them using their names to keep things interesting.
• Share personal experiences and stories that your audience will find fascinating and relatable.
• Practice thoroughly before you present so you’re fluent with the material and delivery.
• Energy and excitement can be quite contagious. Make sure you exude enough to spread some to your audience.

Feeling Inspired Yet?

Now you have all the right ingredients for choosing amazing topics and a hundred ideas to drive inspiration from. So, go ahead and start cooking presentations that will blow your audience away.

Don’t forget to choose a super-relevant topic and add meaty information. Do it with excitement to make it enjoyable for you and your audience. Best of luck!

Don't forget to share this post!

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75 Unique School Presentation Ideas and Topics Plus Templates

Are you tired of seeing the same PowerPoints repeating overused and unoriginal school presentation ideas covering repeated topics in your classes?

You know what I’m talking about; we’ve all been there, and sat through yawn-worthy demonstrations, slides, or presentation videos covering everything from the solar system, someone’s favorite pet, past presidents of a country, to why E=mC squared.

From grade school to university, first graders to college students, we are obligated to create, perform, and observe academic presentations across a plethora of curriculums and classes, and not all of these public speaking opportunities fall into the category of an ‘interesting topic’.

Yet, have no fear! Here at Piktochart, we are here to help you and your classmates. From giving examples of creative and even interactive presentation ideas, providing presentation videos , and suggesting interactive activities to give your five minutes of fame the ‘wow’ factor that it deserves, this article is your guide!

Our massive collection of unique school and college presentation ideas and templates applies if you’re:

• A teacher looking to make your class more engaging and fun with student presentations.
• A student who wants to impress your teacher and the rest of the class with a thought-provoking, interesting topic.

A Curated List of Interesting Topics for School Presentations

Did you know that when it comes to presentations , the more students involved improves retention? The more you know! Yet sometimes, you need a little help to get the wheels moving in your head for your next school presentation .

The great thing about these ideas and topics is you can present them either in face-to-face classes or virtual learning sessions.

Each school presentation idea or topic below also comes with a template that you can use. Create a free Piktochart account to try our presentation maker and get access to the high-quality version of the templates. You can also check out our Piktochart for Education plan .

Want to watch this blog post in video format? The video below is for you!

The templates are further divided into the following categories covering the most popular and best presentation topics. Click the links below to skip to a specific section.

• Unique science presentation topics to cultivate curiosity in class
• Engaging culture and history presentation ideas to draw inspiration from
• Health class presentation topics to help students make healthy lifestyle decisions
• Data visualization ideas to help students present an overwhelming amount of data and information into clear, engaging visuals
• First day of school activity ideas to foster classroom camaraderie
• Communication and media topics to teach students the importance of effective communication
• Topics to help students prepare for life after school

We hope this list will inspire you and help you nail your next school presentation activity.

Unique Science Presentation Topics to Cultivate Curiosity in Class

Science is a broad field and it’s easy to feel overwhelmed with too many topics to choose for your next presentation.

Cultivate curiosity in the science classroom with the following unique and creative presentation ideas and topics:

1. Can life survive in space?

2. Do plants scream when they’re in pain?

3. What are the traits of successful inventors?

4. How vaccines work

5. Massive destruction of the Koala’s habitat in Australia

6. Left brain versus right brain

7. What are great sources of calcium?

Get access to high-quality, unique school presentation templates by Piktochart for Education.

Create and collaborate in the classroom using Piktochart’s customizable and printable templates for your school reports, presentations, and infographics.

8. Recycling facts you need to know

9. Do you have what it takes to be a NASA astronaut?

10. The rise of robots and AI: Should we be afraid of them?

11. How far down does the sea go?

12. The stages of sleep

13. Will Mars be our home in 2028?

14. A quick look at laboratory safety rules

15. The first person in history to break the sound barrier

Engaging Culture and History Presentation Ideas to Draw Inspiration From

History is filled with equally inspiring and terrifying stories, and there are lessons that students can learn from the events of the past. Meanwhile, interactive presentations about culture help students learn and embrace diversity. 

16. Women in history: A conversation through time

17. The sweet story of chocolate 

18. A history lesson with a twist 

19. The history of basketball 

20. The origin of the Halloween celebration 

21. AI History 

22. What you need to know about New Zealand 

23. 1883 volcanic eruption of Krakatoa 

24. Roman structures: 2000 years of strength

25. The most famous art heists in history 

26. Elmo: The story behind a child icon 

27. 10 things you should know before you visit South Korea 

28. 8 things you didn’t know about these 8 countries 

Health Class Presentation Topics to Help Students Make Healthy Lifestyle Decisions

Want to learn how to engage students with healthcare topic ideas? Then consider using these templates for your next interactive presentation.

According to the CDC , school-based health education contributes to the development of functional health knowledge among students. It also helps them adapt and maintain health-promoting behaviors throughout their lives. 

Not only will your presentation help with keeping students engaged, but you’ll also increase class involvement with the right slides.

The following examples of health and wellness interactive presentations include fun ideas and topics that are a good start. 

29. How to look after your mental health?

30. The eradication of Polio

31. How to have a healthy lifestyle 

32. 10 handwashing facts 

33. Myths and facts about depression

34. Hacks for making fresh food last longer 

35. Ways to avoid spreading the coronavirus

36. Mask protection in 5 simple steps 

37. Everything you need to know about the flu

38. All about stress: Prevention, tips, and how to cope 

39. The importance of sleep 

40. Is milk tea bad for you?

41. How to boost happiness in 10 minutes

42. How dirty are debit and credit cards 

43. Why do you need sunscreen protection

Data Visualization Ideas to Help Students Present Overwhelming Amounts of Data in Creative Ways

Data visualization is all about using visuals to make sense of data. Students need to pull the main points from their extensive research, and present them by story telling while being mindful of their classmates’ collective attention span.

As far as student assignments go, storytelling with data is a daunting task for students and teachers alike. To keep your audience interested, consider using a non linear presentation that presents key concepts in creative ways.

Inspire your class to be master data storytellers with the following data visualization ideas:

44. Are we slowly losing the Borneo rainforest?

45. Skateboard deck design over the years

46. Food waste during the Super Bowl

47. The weight of the tallest building in the world

48. Infographic about data and statistics

49. Stats about cyberbullying

50. How whales combat climate change

First Day of School Interactive Activity Ideas to Foster Whole-class-Camaraderie

Calling all teachers! Welcome your new students and start the school year with the following back-to-school creative presentation ideas and relevant templates for first-day-of-school activities.

These interactive presentations grab the attention of your students and are remarkably easy to execute (which is the main educator’s goal after all)!

51. Meet the teacher

52. Example: all about me

53. Self-introduction

54. Tips on how to focus on schoolwork

55. Course plan and schedule

Give our class schedule maker a try to access more templates for free. You can also access our presentation-maker , poster-maker , timeline-maker , and more by simply signing up .

56. Interpreting a student’s report card (for parents)

57. Introduction of classroom rules

58. Assignment schedule

59. Daily planner

60. Course syllabus presentation

61. How to write a class presentation

Topics to Teach Students the Importance of Effective Communication

Visual media  helps students retain more of the concepts  taught in the classroom. The following media topics and infographic templates can help you showcase complex concepts in a short amount of time. 

In addition, interactive presentation activities using these templates also encourage the development of a holistic learning process in the classroom because they help focus on the  three domains of learning:  cognitive, affective, and psychomotor. 

62. Interactive presentation do’s and don’ts 

63. How to create an infographic 

Recommended reading : How to Make an Infographic in 30 Minutes

64. How to improve your internet security and privacy

65. What is design thinking?

66. What are your favorite software tools to use in the classroom? 

Presentation Topic Ideas to Help Students Prepare for Life After School

One of the things that makes teaching a rewarding career is seeing your students take the learning and knowledge you’ve instilled in them, and become successful, productive adults.

From pitching a business idea to starting your podcast, the following topics are good starting points to prepare students for the challenges after graduation (aka adulting 101):

67. How to make a resume

68. How to start a startup

69. Credit card vs. debit card

70. Pros and cons of cryptocurrency

71. How to save on travel

72. How to do a SWOT analysis

73. How to pitch a business idea

74. Habits of successful people

75. Starting your own podcast: A checklist

Find out how a high school teacher like Jamie Barkin uses Piktochart to improve learning in the classroom for her students.

Pro tip: make your presentation as interactive as possible. Students have an attention span of two to three minutes per year of age. To keep minds from wandering off, include some interactive games or activities in the lesson. For example, if you conducted a lesson on the respiratory system, you could ask them to practice breathing techniques.

Maintain eye contact with your students, and you’ll get instant feedback on how interested they are in the interactive presentation.

Make School Presentation Visuals Without the Hassle of Making Them From Scratch

School presentations, when done right, can help teachers engage their classes and improve students’ education effectively by presenting information using the right presentation topic. 

If you’re pressed for time and resources to make your school presentation visuals , choose a template from Piktochart’s template gallery . Aside from the easy customization options, you can also print and download these templates to your preferred format. 

Piktochart also professional templates to create infographics , posters , brochures , reports , and more.

Creating school-focused, engaging, and interactive presentations can be tedious at first, but with a little bit of research and Piktochart’s handy templates, you’re going to do a great job!

The future of learning is interactivity and collaboration.

Foster interactive and collaborative learning using Piktochart for Education. Share your work, get feedback, and brainstorm on the fly. With Piktochart, everyone’s on the same page. Finally.

Kyjean Tomboc is an experienced content marketer for healthcare, design, and SaaS brands. She also manages content (like a digital librarian of sorts). She lives for mountain trips, lap swimming, books, and cats.

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15 Infographic Examples for Students (Plus Editable Templates) 

Do you want to be part of these success stories, join more than 11 million who already use piktochart to craft visual stories that stick..

.css-1qrtm5m{display:block;margin-bottom:8px;text-transform:uppercase;font-size:14px;line-height:1.5714285714285714;-webkit-letter-spacing:-0.35px;-moz-letter-spacing:-0.35px;-ms-letter-spacing:-0.35px;letter-spacing:-0.35px;font-weight:300;color:#606F7B;}@media (min-width:600px){.css-1qrtm5m{font-size:16px;line-height:1.625;-webkit-letter-spacing:-0.5px;-moz-letter-spacing:-0.5px;-ms-letter-spacing:-0.5px;letter-spacing:-0.5px;}} Best Practices The #1 rule for improving your presentation slides

by Tom Rielly • May 12, 2020

When giving presentations, either on a video conference call or in person, your slides, videos and graphics (or lack of them) can be an important element in helping you tell your story or express your idea. This is the first of a series of blog posts that will give you tips and tricks on how to perfect your visual presentations.

Your job as a presenter is to build your idea -- step-by-step -- in the minds of your audience members. One tool to do that is presentation graphics, such as slides and videos.

Why graphics for your presentation?

A common mistake is using slides or videos as a crutch, even if they don’t actually add anything to your presentation. Not all presentations need graphics. Lots of presentations work wonderfully with just one person standing on a stage telling a story, as demonstrated by many TED Talks.

You should only use slides if they serve a purpose: conveying scientific information, art, and things that are hard to explain without pictures. Once you have decided on using slides, you will have a number of decisions to make. We’ll help you with the basics of making a presentation that is, above all, clear and easy to understand. The most important thing to remember here is: less is more.

Less is so much more

You want to aim for the fewest number of slides, the fewest number of photos, the fewest words per slide, the least cluttered slides and the most white space on your slides. This is the most violated slide rule, but it is the secret to success. Take a look at these examples.

As you can see in the above example, you don’t need fancy backgrounds or extra words to convey a simple concept. If you take “Everything you need to know about Turtles”, and delete “everything you need to know about” leaving just “turtles”, the slide has become much easier for your audience to read, and tells the story with economy.

The above example demonstrates that a single image that fills the entire screen is far more powerful than a slide cluttered with images. A slide with too many images may be detrimental to your presentation. The audience will spend more mental energy trying to sort through the clutter than listening to your presentation. If you need multiple images, then put each one on its own slide. Make each image high-resolution and have it fill the entire screen. If the photos are not the same dimensions as the screen, put them on a black background. Don’t use other colors, especially white.

Your slides will be much more effective if you use the fewest words, characters, and pictures needed to tell your story. Long paragraphs make the audience strain to read them, which means they are not paying attention to you. Your audience may even get stressed if you move on to your next slide before they’ve finished reading your paragraph. The best way to make sure the attention stays on you is to limit word count to no more than 10 words per slide. As presentation expert Nancy Duarte says “any slide with more than 10 words is a document.” If you really do need a longer explanation of something, handouts or follow-up emails are the way to go.

Following a “less is more” approach is one of the simplest things you can do to improve your presentation visuals and the impact of your presentation overall. Make sure your visuals add to your presentation rather than distract from it and get your message across.

Ready to learn more about how to make your presentation even better? Get TED Masterclass and develop your ideas into TED-style talks.

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11 Creative Presentation Design Ideas with Examples

• Written by: Rishabh Pugalia
• Updated: July 18, 2023

Did I miss any points? Let’s connect on LinkedIn .

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Presentation Design is vital for effective communication. It involves creating visually appealing content that improves your marketing strategy keeping in line with your branding guidelines , graphic design principles, and business goals.

• How does presentation design engage prospects effectively?
• How does strategic presentation design influence decision-making?
• What impact does effective presentation design have on brand perception

In this blog, we’ll explore presentation design examples and discover creative ways to enhance your marketing efforts with the best presentation ideas.

What is a Presentation Design?

Presentation design is the process of visually presenting information in an interesting and easily digestible way to your prospects.

It involves graphic design and using images to make the information more interesting and easy to understand. The goal is to make the presentation look nice and help people understand the message better.

So, what are some presentation design ideas that can be used? Here’s why you should consider using them:

• They showcase your brand: Visual presentation ideas like infographics or videos can strengthen your brand recognition.
• They facilitate easy understanding: Ideas for presenting complex information in digestible formats are valuable. These could be creative ways to present a presentation or neat design ideas on PowerPoint.
• They keep your audiences interested: Fun presentation ideas can grab your audience’s attention.

When designed effectively, presentations can be a effective tool for marketers. It’s all about conveying your message in an impactful way to engage, inform, and persuade your audience.

FURTHER READING

• 50 Banner Ad Design Ideas for B2B Marketers
• 18 Inspiring Brochure Design Ideas to Elevate Your Marketing

11 Examples of Creative Presentation Design Ideas

Knowing when and where to use presentations is crucial for their impact. For important meetings, using marketing presentation ideas can make a lasting impression. For creative brainstorming sessions, a cool presentation design can be more fitting.

Here are a few creative ways to present a presentation to help you stand out from the competition:

Examples of Employee Testimonial Videos

1. double up: slide deck and infographic.

Leverage the layout and content of your presentation design ideas to create a complementary infographic, doubling your content output from one concept. Reuse your presentation’s layout and style to convert it into an infographic, offering two content types from one idea.

2. Minimalist Presentations: Less is More

Use a simple, minimalist presentation design idea to keep your audience focused on the content like this presentation design example from QuickBooks. Few colors and uncomplicated graphics ensure legibility and aesthetic appeal.

3. Be Unique: Break Presentation Stereotypes

Consider a unique and out-of-the-box presentation design idea like a comic book, as Semrush did. Bold, creative choices can make your presentation stand out.

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4. Bold or Thin: Mix Font Weights for Impact

Just like this presentation design example from HubSpot, use multiple font weights in your presentation to emphasize key points. Bold fonts on cover slides can highlight the central topic right from the start.

5. Make it Personal: Humanize Presentations

Make your presentation design ideas more engaging and relatable by utilizing images of people, even team members. This adds a human touch and keeps your audience engaged.

6. Structuring Presentations: Stick to Threes

To maintain clarity and focus, use the rule of thirds in your creative group presentation ideas. This could mean three columns, three key ideas, or three icons. Check out slides 2, 7, 8, and 9 in this Uber sales presentation.

7. Color Coding: A Powerful Guide in Presentations

Design ideas on PowerPoint and guide your audience through the presentation using color coding. By allocating a unique color to each point or section, you create a visual cue for topic changes.

8. Design Motif: A Reflection of Your Content

If your topic is interesting, use it as a theme for your design ideas on PowerPoint. A custom design motif in line with your topic can help your audience connect with the material.

9. Repurposing Content: Dual-wield Presentations

Turn an existing ebook or, white paper into an attractive presentation design idea, presenting key ideas in a refreshing, digestible format.

10. Anchor Icons: Draw attention to Text

Prevent your text from floating in the presentation’s white space by anchoring it with relevant icons, like in slides 3 and 4 of this presentation design example. This improves the presentation design’s visual balance and directs the audience’s attention.

11. Creative Risk-Taking: Presentation Layouts

Experiment with unconventional layouts, like Weekdone’s 8-Bit video game presentation design idea. Creative risk-taking can lead to memorable, impactful, and fun presentation ideas.

Presentation Design Best Practices

Here are some best practices for creating effective presentation designs and creative ways to present a presentation:

1. Start with a Plan

Before you dive into designing, outline your content. Understand your audience, define your message, and set your objectives.

2. Keep It Simple

Avoid clutter. A clean, minimalist design often makes the strongest impact. Keep your text concise and let visuals carry the narrative.

3. Consistency Is Key

Maintain a consistent look and feel throughout your presentation. Consistent fonts, colors, and design elements contribute to a professional look.

4. Make It Interactive

Use interactive elements like quizzes, polls, or live Q&A sessions. This keeps your audience engaged and makes your presentation more memorable.

5. Use High-Quality Visuals

Images, infographics, charts, and videos can show complex information easily. Ensure they are high-quality and relevant to your content.

6. Leverage Storytelling

A convincing narrative can make your presentation more attractive. Connect your points in a story-like fashion for a more profound impact.

7. Highlight Key Points

Make important points or statistics stand out using larger fonts, different colors, or animation.

8. Balance Text and Visuals

Too much text can be overwhelming. Balance it with visuals to ensure your message is easily digestible.

9. Use Professional Templates

A well-designed template can provide a strong foundation for your presentation. Sites like SlideModel offer professional PowerPoint templates.

10. Stay On-Brand

Your presentation should reflect your brand’s identity. Use your brand colors, fonts, and include your logo subtly.

11. Consider Accessibility

Design your presentation keeping accessibility in mind. Use high-contrast colors and avoid overly complex graphics.

12. Practice Visual Hierarchy

Arrange elements in a way that guides your audience’s eyes in order of importance. This can be achieved by playing with the size, color, and position of elements.

13. Incorporate Data Visualization

Make use of charts, graphs, and infographics to present data. This helps make complex information more understandable.

14. End with a Clear Call to Action (CTA)

Ensure your audience knows what to do next. Whether it’s visiting your website or scheduling a meeting, make your CTA clear and compelling.

15. Proofread and Test

Always proofread your presentation to avoid typos or mistakes. Also, test your presentation on different devices to ensure it looks good on all platforms.

Get Your Audience Hooked With Killer Presentation Designs

Content Beta ’s experience in creating exciting designs can give you a strong understanding of what works and what doesn’t in presentations.

We’ll pair you up with the best creatives to craft presentations, video ads, product demos, and more, that achieve your business goals and guarantee success. Click here to learn more about our presentation design services.

Great presentation design ideas can be your most effective marketing tool. From interesting slide design to unique visual storytelling techniques, it’s time to redefine your marketing presentations.

Remember, it’s not just about looks; it’s about impact. Make every slide count and turn ideas into compelling visual stories.

Presentation design is the process of planning, implementing, and coordinating every aspect of a presentation. It’s about conveying your message in an impactful, interesting way to your audience.

Presentation design is crucial in B2B marketing because it helps break through the noise, grab attention, and deliver information in a digestible format. A well-designed presentation can reduce the sales cycle, enhance your brand image, and ultimately decrease the customer acquisition cost (CAC).

Fun presentation ideas could include interactive quizzes, storytelling with visuals, using humor appropriately, and incorporating creative group presentation ideas that engage the audience.

PowerPoint slide design ideas can enhance your presentation by making it visually appealing and easy to follow. Effective use of color, fonts, graphics, and layout can make your presentation stand out and better engage your audience.

Creative ways to present a presentation could include the use of memes, infographics, interactive elements like quizzes or polls, or leveraging storytelling techniques.

Visual presentation ideas help your audience understand and remember your message more effectively. They aid in making complex information more digestible and can evoke emotions, leading to a more impactful presentation.

The best presentation ideas often involve clear messaging, engaging visuals, interactive elements, and a strong call to action. They should align with your brand and resonate with your audience.

Design ideas on PowerPoint could include using consistent color schemes and fonts, incorporating images or infographics, using varied slide layouts, and leveraging animations and transitions.

Decoration presentation ideas could involve the creative use of colors, patterns, and textures, using themed templates, or incorporating visually engaging elements like icons, shapes, and diagrams.

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10 Audio Visual Presentation Ideas to Make Your PPT Shine

• November 21, 2023
• Interactive Presentation Maker , multimedia presentation software , Uncategorized

How can your message be effectively conveyed to your audience in just a few minutes? In fact, most people won’t have any follow-up after watching the traditional PPT. Compared with a slideshow, an audio visual presentation can help you leave a memorable impression on your audience. We discuss why you should choose audio visual presentations to share your information and list 10 audio visual presentation ideas to engage your audience. With these audio visual presentation ideas, you can easily create a super eye-catching video presentation in any presentation software.

Make Your Own Animated Presentations

Why Should You Choose Audio Visual Presentations

According to Social Media Week, viewers remember 95% of information if they choose to learn about it through video. All kinds of data show that audio visual presentation is the best choice for you. Here are three benefits of using audio visual in your presentations.

1. Audio visual is persuasive

Audio visuals can convince the audience more than plain text. For example, if you choose Mango Animate ‘s audio visual presentation maker, you can use arrows, icons, and fonts of different colors and sizes to highlight your key information. Supplementing your message by adding a voice-over is more likely to get your audience to accept your ideas.

2. Audio visual is attractive

Audio visual can capture the audience’s attention easily, which makes your whole presentation atmosphere more relaxed and pleasant. By practicing audio visual presentation ideas, you can utilize dynamic animation, animated roles, GIFs, and screen recorders to grab your audience’s attention and keep them engaged. These audio visuals will help your audience understand your content and strengthen their memory.

3. Audio visual is accessible anytime, anywhere

Audio visual presentations are easy to share and create online. In this digital age, people use mobile devices to kill time or do their work every day. These requirements make audio visual presentations more accessible. The birth of the audio visual presentation solved problems for teams working across geographies and even time zones.

10 Audio Visual Presentation Ideas to Engage Your Audiences

We believe you have understood the advantages of audio visual, you can pick the best free animated slideshow maker to start your design journey. In your design process, please keep in mind the following 10 video presentation ideas for students, they will definitely take your presentations to the next level.

1. Design an Eye-catching Cover

The first impression is very important, and determines the audience’s interest in your presentation topic. If you want your audience to engage with your presentations the entire way, why not start on the cover with suspense that they will probably keep in their minds until the end of your presentations?

2. Tell a Story

Telling a story is one of the most effective audio visual presentation ideas for raising audience interest. Think of some representative examples of human stories that relate to the theme of your presentations. The best example of this is telling your own story to create an emotional connection with your audience. They will subconsciously substitute themselves into the story’s plot, or imagine that they are the story’s core role.

3. Keep Simple

An excellent audio visual presentation example is sure to keep it simple. Spend energy and time on the information you most want your audience to know. If you convey too much information to your audience at once or use too much decoration, it will make it difficult for them to concentrate. The simpler the audio visual presentation, the more effective information your audience will receive.

4. Insert Music

Music can be used to suggest an emotional state to the audience and help to deepen memory. With Mango PM, a free photo slideshow maker with music , you can find various background music suitable for any topic, and you can even upload your own music to the audio visual presentation.

5. Add Audio Narration

Audio narration is the best choice for creating interactive presentations to create different situations for your speech, but it is also the most overlooked audio visual presentation idea. You can use the voice to change the tone and pace of your presentations so that your audience can focus on your audio.

6. Create Animations and Transitions

Interesting animations and transitions make your audio visual presentations more unique and fluid, which can be viewed as a video presentation idea for students. Various animations will draw your audience to focus their attention on specific areas. The dynamic 3D transitions that come with Mango PM, such as fast panning, zooming, and rotating, will help your audience create a feeling of being in a movie theater, and connecting with this happy factor will help them remember your message subconsciously.

7. Ask Questions

Asking questions is the most effective audio visual presentation idea for increasing audience engagement. Is your audience falling asleep during your lengthy presentations? Ask questions! They will wake up immediately. Both the questions and the Q&A session turn a boring presentation into an exploratory activity for the audience to use critical thinking.

8. Use Humor

Humor is a great way to help you connect with your audience and put them at ease. Skillful use of humor at the right moment will bring your speech to a climax. Of course, don’t overdo it either.

9. Incorporate Quotes

Quotes will enhance the authority of your PPT. You can use quotes from famous historical figures, entrepreneurs, or writers that fit your topic to get your point across. It works even better when combined with other audio visual presentation ideas. For example, you can add a quote on the cover, as if handing the audience a bright light in the dark.

10. End on a Meaningful Note

If you end it right, your speech will leave a unique memory for the audience. It’s important to let your audience know what they should do next after hearing your presentations. For example, take action towards a goal, ponder a new idea, or visit a website.

How to Make an Audio Visual Presentation with Mango PM

Looking for unique audio visual presentation examples that stimulate your imagination? Mango PM is sure to be your ideal audio visual presentation maker , whether you have design experience or not. It has all the features you need to create audio visual presentations for free, and you can implement all the audio visual presentation ideas mentioned above in Mango PM.

• Choose an audio visual presentation template from our library to get started
• Upload your own photos and videos
• Use our powerful material library to personalize your audio visual presentations, such as adding animated roles and background music
• Record voiceovers or turn on the screen recording
• Export your presentations and publish them to the world

Start Creating Animated Presentations Easily

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How to Create Slides That Suit Your Superiors: 11 Tips

When you’re pitching ideas or budgets to execs in your organization, you need to deliver slides that fit those particular people just right. This checklist identifies the key considerations.

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I recently interviewed 20 of my customers, all in senior roles at Fortune 100 companies, and asked them their biggest pain point in presenting to higher-ups and even colleagues. What I heard consistently was that it can feel like Goldilocks bouncing from one option to the next, testing to figure out what’s “just right.” Does the audience want deep reports? Sparse slides? Something in between? Like … what?

Teams often come to presentation meetings with vast amounts of backup content just in case an exec wants to take a deep dive on any given point. There’s often a struggle to anticipate every direction attendees might want to go. It’s frustrating, and it’s not efficient.

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There are many ways to build slides. I’m not just talking about crafting them well versus poorly. I’m talking about all of the important decisions regarding how to organize them, how much text to use, when to lean into a chart, the best ways to use bullets and color, and whether to include an appendix with additional information. Before you make your next proposal or request of the executive team, use this list of 11 tips for your next set of slides as a guide.

Four Things You Must Have in Every Exec’s Slides

Before we drill down into the harder aspects, the ones where your executives’ tastes may vary widely, let’s quickly cover four aspects that you can consider the building blocks — the basics you should never proceed without.

Start with an executive summary. Begin the slide deck with a tight executive summary that follows a three-act structure. First, start with stating the current realities. Second, clearly state the problem or opportunity your idea addresses and its potential impact. Third, explain how your recommendation solves the problem or exploits the opportunity and the next steps you’re proposing.

Have a logical organization. The arc of the deck — the package from beginning to end — should make sense. If your audience reads only the headline of every slide, the order should be coherent and make most of the case for you. The content below each slide’s headline must support the statement made in the title. Remove everything that doesn’t support your point; as writers will tell you, you sometimes need to “kill your darlings” when you’re editing.

Begin the slide deck with a tight executive summary that follows a three-act structure.

Make it skimmable. Help your audience to quickly grasp the point without getting bogged down in details. Create a clear visual hierarchy. Guide the reader’s eye through the content: Use bold headings, bullet points, and numbered lists to break down information into digestible pieces. Highlight key takeaways or conclusions in a different color or font size to draw attention to these critical points.

Focus on concise insights. Succinct statements with clear insights are everyone’s jam. Every slide should serve a purpose and contribute directly to the decision-making process. Distill complex information. Don’t use 100 words when 20 words will nail it. If you’re having difficulty trimming, consider using company-approved AI tools to help you take out the fluff.

Five Preferences to Confirm With the Person You Want to Reach

Now we’ll delve into what your particular audience does and does not want. If you haven’t yet, start by asking the person you’re presenting to what they generally prefer. They probably know themselves well but have not been asked to articulate how they like to receive information.

Ask how dense is too dense. Some executives prefer detailed slides with comprehensive data. Others favor a more high-level approach. You’re weighing how to balance informative content with readability, ensuring that slides are not overloaded yet are sufficiently detailed to support decision-making.

Confirm the delivery format and timing. Some execs like information presented to them. Others prefer a pre-read of the material followed by a discussion. I always recommend our tool Slidedocs (I’ve written a free e-book on them), which are visual documents using both words and images. The templates help presenters organize their thoughts into a document for a pre-read or a read-along. They are designed to be skimmable and able to travel through your organization without the help of a presenter.

I’m a huge fan of pre-reads and prefer to use my time in meetings to ask questions and build alignment. If your audience didn’t review your material in advance, ask at the top of the meeting whether they would like you to present it or would prefer to read through it and then discuss it.

Find out how much data visualization they prefer. Charts, graphs, photos, and illustrations often communicate complex data more clearly than words alone. When execs can see what you’re saying, they often can better understand the impact of your idea. Does the exec want to understand exact numbers? Bar charts allow them to move their eyes across a series of specifics. Does the exec want to know the shape of a trend over time? Line charts can show the pattern. (See “Classic Charts Communicate Data Quickly.”) Some prefer charts with annotations that draw attention to what you think is the most important point. Others want to make their own conclusions from the data.

One of my clients, the CEO of a massive commercial real estate company, doesn’t want anything visualized. He prefers numbers, only in a table, and only in two colors — black and red. You might think this is archaic. But the fact that he’s clear to his teams about what he wants takes all the mystery out of how to communicate with him.

When the stakes are high, have a conceptual thinker help with diagrams and concepts. If you don’t have one on your team, and when it’s high stakes, find an internal designer to help you or hire one. You can’t afford to have the baby (your idea) thrown out with the bathwater (terrible slides).

Identify which details need spelling out. How well do the people you’re presenting to know the landscape and function of the company and products you’re talking about? For example, if your engineering team threw a slide into a deck about an issue that requires executive approval, do the execs all speak geek? Or do you need to explain the technology so that they will really understand the ask? Either eliminate internal jargon and acronyms or unpack those bits, especially if your proposal deeply involves expertise outside of the executives’ domain.

Ask whether appendices will be useful. When you’re organizing a presentation, you often troll data, read through complicated reports, and even hire external experts to figure out what’s best for the company. Do your execs want access to that supporting data? You can add a document to the end of the presentation as an appendix to show all of the data and source material. This allows the main content of the slides to remain focused and accessible while still providing comprehensive background information for those who want more.

Two Tips to Improve Your Presentation Skills

Getting materials in place is the biggest step. They will be your best tools for selling your ideas. But there are two extra areas to pay attention to as a presenter: how you handle questions and how you use every experience to improve.

Anticipate questions, and practice your answers. Before you have your meeting, gather a small team to challenge every point you make. Invite colleagues you trust to role-play as “a rapidly inquisitive exec” or “the doubting naysayer exec” so you are prepared to present your idea well. They’re gonna grill you, and practicing will help you remain unruffled when it happens.

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Ask for feedback after the presentation. Establish a feedback loop with those you presented to. Ask what worked well and how you can improve. If attendees don’t have the time, find people who have had their ideas funded and talk to them about what they did that worked. Advice and some perspective will help you nail your performance even better next time.

Empathetically understanding your audience members and how they process information, whether it’s executives or peers, sets up your ideas for success. Clarity creates efficiency. When a presentation fits just right, you’ve given your great thinking the best chance of moving through your organization and having maximum impact.

About the Author

Nancy Duarte is CEO of Duarte Inc. , a communication company in the Silicon Valley. She’s the author of six books, including DataStory: Explain Data and Inspire Action Through Story (Ideapress Publishing, 2019).

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