******************************************************************* Dave Paradi's PowerPoint Tip Issue #125 January 9, 2007 Published & Copyright by Dave Paradi of ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com Circulation 8,476 *******************************************************************
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******************************************************************* In this issue: New Create Your Own PowerPoint Template ebook Transforming Text Slides into Visual Slides ebook PowerPoint Tip: How Attitude Affects Your Presentation Best of the Blog - When inserting isn't really inserting Dave's Travel Schedule *******************************************************************
New Create Your Own PowerPoint Template ebook Why spend hours searching for a background template for your slides just to find out others are using it and you won't be unique? Why not create your own custom template? Think you need a degree in design and expensive software? No way! All you need is my new e- book with expert advice on what colors, fonts and design work best along with the detailed step-by-step instructions on how you can create your own custom PowerPoint background template. Get your copy today at http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/customtemplate.htm
------------------------------------------------------------------- Transforming Text Slides into Visual Slides ebook
Many people have moved from sentences to bullet points on their slides, but are looking for ways to make their slides more visual. In this ebook, I apply dual-coding theory ideas to the design of PowerPoint slides. I have taken 15 common business topics and I show how you can use a visual slide instead of a text slide. There are 39 slide examples in all. And I also share what the best practices are in designing each of the visuals. Get your copy at http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/transformtext.htm
------------------------------------------------------------------- PowerPoint Tip - How Attitude Affects Your Presentation
When you are presenting, certainly your message and key points are important. But perhaps as important is your attitude towards your audience and your material. Attitude is not something that most of us consciously consider on a daily basis - but perhaps we should.
I am sure we have all seen presentations that suffered from a lack of interest in the topic by the presenter or contempt for the audience by the presenter. In either situation, the presenter may have tried to hide their true feelings, but the audience can pick it up in an instant.
I have been thinking more about attitude since I have been reading Jeffrey Gitomer's new book "Little Gold Book of Yes! Attitude". Jeffrey is someone I have admired for a number of years for his straightforward style and his approach to business. It doesn't hurt that he started switching to visual slides for his presentations years ago, well before many others were thinking about it.
This book is about how you can create a Yes! attitude in all aspects of your life. I highly recommend it and I am happy to be a part of the expert team he has involved in launching the book on Amazon today. Many of you know that I rarely recommend other resources because my quality standards are high. I can tell you that this easy to read little book certainly will have a place on my re-read shelf. And if you buy it on Amazon today the launch team has arranged for a whole host of bonuses for you - more on that later.
Here are two ideas that I think presenters can immediately apply. On pages 28 & 29 he talks about how it is so important to phrase your ideas in terms of the other person, not in terms of yourself. This is critical when structuring your presentation. You must always analyze the audience first before you decide what you will say or else the presentation won't be about what they need to hear. I have seen too many presentations where the attitude was clearly "Look how great I am" instead of "How can I be of service to help you".
The second idea is on pages 192 & 193, almost the end of the book. On these pages Jeffrey talks about how part of a Yes! attitude is quickly getting over the inevitable bad things that will happen in our lives. When you apply this to presentations, we must remember to get over the problems that will occur, such as equipment failure, poor room lighting, grumpy audience members and so many more. The quicker we get over these things, the quicker we get back to delivering the high quality information the audience came to hear.
There are many more great ideas of course, but these are two that I think presenters can immediately apply. I think you should buy this book for your own library, but why buy it today on Amazon? As part of the launch, Jeffrey has put together a list of experts including Ty Boyd, Jack Canfield, Harvey Mackay and Victoria Labalme who are offering some downloadable bonuses if you buy the book today on Amazon and send your receipt to yes@gitomer.com. These bonuses include reports, book chapters and audio files that will help you in many areas of your life (see the full list at http://www.gitomer.com/yes).
So, to get these bonuses, go to Amazon.com with this link http://snipurl.com/16mzr and buy the book. Then, e-mail your receipt to yes@gitomer.com and you will get a link to all the downloadable material.
------------------------------------------------------------------- Best of the Blog - When inserting isn't really inserting
When you click Insert - Picture in PowerPoint, it inserts the contents of the picture file into your presentation. While this could make your presentation file huge if you don't resample the picture first, you know that when you send the file to someone else they will be able to see the picture. So in this case, inserting really is inserting.
I recently helped a client understand that when PowerPoint says Insert, it doesn't always mean it. Here's what happened. They had an audio file that they inserted into a presentation. Sent the presentation to someone else and the sound did not play. Why not? It was "inserted" wasn't it? Well, not exactly.
You see, when PowerPoint "inserts" an audio file, it will only embed the audio file in the PowerPoint file if it is smaller than a certain size. By default, this size is 100 KB, much smaller than almost any sound file you will use. (Side note: You can change this default embedding size by going to Tools-Options-General tab and increasing the "Link sounds with file size greater than" value). This was done when it was thought that a PowerPoint file would get bloated if audio files were embedded and not making your PowerPoint file larger than it needs to be is still a pretty good idea.
So how do you make sure your audio file plays when it is sent to someone else? Make sure that you send all linked audio files as well as the presentation file. This issue also affects "inserting" of video files and making sure that they play when they get to their destination is one of the important topics I cover in my video tutorial "Incorporating Video into Your PowerPoint Presentations". Get your copy at http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/vtvideo.htm
Other recent blog posts at http://pptideas.blogspot.com : Why buy a PowerPoint background template when you can create your own? If the audience changes, so should your presentation Projector thoughts from PC Magazine
------------------------------------------------------------------- Dave's Travel Schedule
If you have been sitting through too many presentations that did not relay the key information needed to make critical decisions, you should schedule an in-house or web based seminar or workshop. You can save money by booking me to speak to your organization or conference when I am close to your area for other clients. Here's where I will be in the next few months:
January 29-30, 2007 Cincinnati, OH January 31, 2007 Lexington, KY February 19-23 St. John's, NF March 29, 2007 Haliburton, ON March 30, 2007 Toronto, ON April 10, 2007 Toronto, ON April 19, 2007 Toronto, ON May 25-26, 2007 London, ON July 6-12, 2007 San Diego, CA July 13-16, 2007 Los Angeles, CA E-mail me at Dave@ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com to discuss how my Think Outside The Slide(tm) sessions can help your organization be more productive and improve communication throughout the organization.
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