We all wish to deliver engaging PowerPoint presentations. But the million-dollar question here is what does an engaging successful presentation even mean?

It means how many business leads we get after the show. It means how much our sales grow.

To some extent all this is fine. But all such parameters give results after some time.

So, question now is how can we immediately determine that a presentation is really engaging or not?

And the one quick way to determine or judge a presentation straightaway is the Audience Reaction or Response. 

Right!

If a presentation fails to connect with audience, it will potentially fail to yield good results in terms of leads and sales too. That's pretty sure!

So, key to gain success with presentations is how well a presenter can connect with audience. Simple!

Good thing is that there are dozens of best practices or tips that presenters can adopt to engage audience.

We have figured out a handful of creative presentation secrets that can help presenters to craft PPTs to potentially magnetize their audience. Let's check them out!

1. Use Vector Graphics

Based on mathematical precision, vector graphics always have an edge over images as resolution of the graphics remains intact even on resizing. File size of vector graphics is also small making them easy to download and upload. Besides this, bold and lively colors of vector graphics make them favorite for illustrating business concepts. In short, going with vector graphics is the best choice for presenters seeking simplicity and minimalism with flat designs. Most exciting thing is that hundreds of vector graphics are available online to help presenters quickly get started.  

For example, in the slide given below we have applied vector graphics to grab audience attention.

Use Vector Graphics

 

2. Minimalism is the key

In 2019 minimalism is the key. Instead of using too many colors and designs, minimalism makes it easy to create a center of attention. To put in other words, by reducing the text, colors and designs on a given slide a presenter can make the audience focus on the main message. In short, it is a process to declutter the surplus to focus on what matters. So, by applying minimum elements on a PPT slide presenter delivers the rest information through speech. Less is more is the new key to present in a fresher style.

Keep it minimal

 

3. Metaphors a new trend

Metaphors are among the most potent artistic arrows in the quiver of a presenter. Metaphors not only turn a dry text look beautiful but also help audience easily understand a complex topic. In one line, using metaphors is a psychological technique to relate with concept and successfully magnetize audience attention.   

For instance, in the slide on project management below, the slow speed of a project has been compared with a snail’s pace. Such metaphors add interest to the otherwise boring slide.

Use metaphors and analogies

 

4. Icons add value

Similar in shape, size and color bullets are repetitive in nature and hence seem boring. However, icon is a graphical representation of a concept to quickly convey a message. Icons actually spice up an ordinary looking text thereby making it more attention grabbing. In fact, their wise application helps presenters to strategically communicate business goals, vision, mission and company values.

Here one thing that needs to be understood is that even a wrong selection of icons can also put a presenter in soup. Therefore, choose icons wisely so that they can perfectly compliment the text and concept.

Use Icons

 

5. Use spotlight to pop key elements

Not many people are good in both listening and reading simultaneously for a long time. This simply means text heavy slides are not going to resonate with audience. Considering this, intelligent presenters replace text with images or in other words apply visuals to lay emphasis on important information. To maintain a perfect balance of text and graphics, presenters first blur the image and then add a transparent layer. This effect helps to nullify the dominant effect of images and hence never distracts audience. Just check the sample slide shared below.

Use spotlight to pop Key Elements

6. Set in multimedia

To bring that wow factor in a presentation, presenters often use video or audio files. That’s perfectly smart. But the mistake presenters often do is they forget to embed video or audio files directly in the PPT. Because of this they switch to another window to run video or audio file. This casts an amateurish impression on the audience.

So, the tip here is to set in multimedia files in the PPT slide itself. This saves presenters time as well as gives a professional impression too. Bad news for Mac users is that they are not fortunate enough to use this trick. Never mind they still have other options to rock audience.

Set in multimedia

7. Use whitespace intelligently

Whitespace is like ‘dark matter’ of the universe it occupies maximum space but often goes unnoticeable. Remember no matter whether whitespace is active or passive, it plays an important role in making a PowerPoint presentation great. Creating separation, whitespace kicks readability a notch up to bring in the required balance between images and text. Whitespace also provides resting point to eye. Just check out the sample slide shared below.

Use Whitespace intelligently

8. Go for pattern backgrounds

On first go background seems like an insignificant element of a slide. But remember if a presenter is looking to deliver a 10-out-of-10 presentation then each single element needs attention. So, presenters need to set aesthetically pleasing background as well. Here patterned or textured backgrounds definitely have edge as they bring in rich look and visual evenness. Mind it! Trying patterned background with each slide is not judicious. So, try patterned backgrounds to bring in that much needed balance wherever it is required. Here’s a sample slide to give a little idea.

Go for pattern backgrounds

9. Say hello to blocks

Many-a-times presenters come across situations where they have little text to show and also lack related visuals to highlight content. In situations like this, maximum of presenters prefer to simply go with bullet points. Right? But if a presenter is looking to make the slide even more interesting and attractive then blocks is the answer.

Good thing is that without spending hours just by splitting a slide into blocks one can easily get amazing results. Since the slide is evenly distributed among blocks, it therefore efficiently manages whitespace and brings feeling of uniformity. Have a look at the sample slide given below to feel the striking difference blocks can create.

Say Hello to Blocks

Concluding thoughts

It’s no top-secret that it can take long time to evaluate the success of a presentation in terms of sales. However, presenters can judge the success by evaluating the audience reaction. And to get that encouraging cheer from audience as a presenter one needs to go an extra mile while designing PPTs.     

But always remember what worked last year might be out of rule book next year. Tactics that worked now could be outdated in coming year. The crux is to present your business and brand keep on applying new arty ideas while designing presentation slides. To help you out here we have castes spotlight on few. Try these to get the winning results.    

You can also get in touch with PPT experts at SlideGeeks to gain more such creative tips.