Create Better Slide Presentations: slide:ology
Ian Lurie Sep 25 2008
At conferences, three things are a constant:
- Lack of healthy food.
- Overabundance of alcohol.
- Really godawful Powerpoint or other slide presentations.
I’ve spent a long time huddled alone in the dark, thinking I was the only one who hated seeing 25 bullets on a slide, individual animated letters and various other forms of visual vomit up on the big screen. Then along comes Nancy Duarte, a brilliant presentation designer, and her book slide:ology: The Art and Science of Creating Great Presentations
Her book is stuffed with great information, from grid layouts to presentation brainstorming. Plus her examples alone will help you be a better presenter.
Even if you don’t do slide presentations, read the book for the design lessons. Anyone who creates content for viewing on a screen should read slide:ology.
Ian Lurie
CEO
Ian Lurie is CEO and founder of Portent Inc. He's recorded training for Lynda.com, writes regularly for the Portent Blog and has been published on AllThingsD, Forbes.com and TechCrunch. Ian speaks at conferences around the world, including SearchLove, MozCon, SIC and ad:Tech. Follow him on Twitter at portentint. He also just published a book about strategy for services businesses: One Trick Ponies Get Shot, available on Kindle. Read More
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I like it… “Really godawful Powerpoint or other slide presentations”.
I know exactly what you mean but Powerpoint is expected with any presentation these days.
Having said that, there are some great examples of really good Powerpoint presentations on the web.
I won’t put in the URL (just in case I violate your comment protocol) but I recently saw a video of Matt Cutts extolling the finer points of WordPress when it comes to SEO, and he was brilliant.
Not the most obvious topic to entertain people with, but if you want to see powerpoint used well, plus humour and rapport with the audience, try and find it in Google.
You can probably hear me shouting Amen from here! :)
Making half-way decent presentations isn’t all that difficult (making GOOD ones might be, fair enough) but the use of PowerPowerpoint is a real pain. It seams to me that there needs to be a shift in thinking style for presenters at conferences, so that instead using Powerpoint for their own benefit (as prompts as what to say next!) the need simply to start using them for their audience’s benefit.
Once that psychological shift is made, the rest is detail! :)
S