Your Presentations are Boring and How to Fix Them

Let’s face it – most decks put people to sleep.

While presentations are intended to embed relevant information into people’s heads, most send audiences daydreaming of grabbing a cappuccino after the meeting – or worse – nodding off.

Here are a few ways to help you improve your presentations’ performance.

Before we get into tactics, first determine the “type” of presentation you are creating. Content quantity and complexity typically determines presentation type. To help you define your deck type, put it into one of three categories:

1. Simple Transfer
2. Moderate Influence
3. Complex Engage

Simple Transfer

Simple Transfer presentations are pretty much what the title suggests; basic conveyance of information. They outline facts, rules, processes, etc. They are typically short, 5-8 slides. An example of a Simple Transfer presentation might be “Social Media Don’ts for Our Department”.

Improve Simple Transfer presentations by:

• Adhering to a well-designed presentation template to eliminate inconsistencies in style and to support information perception and absorption
• Using large photos with single line headers to support broad thoughts
• Augmenting slides with additional information through speaking points
• Using simple icons to categorize information
• Using basic infographics or smart art to illustrate a process
• Leveraging light humor in the form of images and/or verbiage to drive messages
• Keeping bullets to 5-8 per page and ensuring points are short and simple
• Not adding opinions, ideas, or strategies
• Resource: How to Write Powerful Bullet Points

Moderate Influence

Moderate Influence presentations are more involved than Simple Transfer presentations. They may still outline facts, rules, and processes, but they substantiate them. Often, an important goal of Moderate Influence presentations is to effect change in people’s minds or actions by outlining a cause, then supporting the cause with convincing points. Traditionally between 10-20 pages in length, Moderate Influence presentations could be titled, “Applying Best Practices for Social Media Responsibility for Our Company”.

Improve Moderate Influence presentations by:

• Adhering to a well-designed presentation template to eliminate inconsistencies in style and to support information perception and absorption
• Using photos with single line headers to support broad thoughts
• Creating separator slides to announce high-level topic direction changes
• Removing, reducing or merging redundant and/or similar content
• Using icons to categorize information
• Keeping bullets to 8-12 per page and ensuring points are short and simple
• Including meaningful, non-typical images to support concepts and/or ideas
• Leveraging minimalist infographics to illustrate ideas, processes, statistics or timelines
• Supporting infographics with bullets, callouts or short copy

Complex Engage

Complex Engage presentations are high-end decks. They are typically comprised of information and data from multiple sources and can be quite long – dozens of pages in length. One important differentiator with Complex Engage presentations is that they are designed to educate and influence an audience by engaging them on multiple levels. Complex Engage decks are typically called upon to bring clarity to complex ideas and processes. An example of a Complex Engage presentation might be “Infectious Disease Clinical Case Presentation”. When done incorrectly, Complex Engage presentations can be extremely lengthy (and long-winded), bland, and threaten to put audiences into REM sleep.

Improve Complex Engage presentations by:

• Adhering to a well-designed presentation template to eliminate inconsistencies in style and to support information perception and absorption
• Using simple shapes, color floods and tasteful gradients
• Leaving white space to support thought processing
• Creating a well-thought-out table of contents
• Removing, reducing or merging redundant and/or similar content
• Creating separator slides to announce high-level topic direction changes
• Using icons to categorize information
• Using same-page transitions for infographics to help communicate progress or evolution of ideas or processes
• Keeping bullets to 8-12 per page and ensuring points are short and simple
• Including meaningful, non-typical images to support concepts and/or ideas
• Leveraging infographics and illustrations to illuminate ideas, processes, statistics or timelines
• Adding video snippets when relevant and meaningful

Presentation decks don’t have to send your audiences daydreaming of the espresso line. By applying a few of the above tips to your next presentation, be it simply about proper kitchen etiquette or something more complex, like digital campaign strategies for technology ABM, you’ll keep your audiences awake, receptive and even entertained.