******************************************************************* Dave Paradi's PowerPoint Tip     Issue #151 January 22, 2008 Published & Copyright by Dave Paradi of ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com Circulation 8,533 ******************************************************************* Please forward this newsletter to executives and professionals who want to create PowerPoint presentations that sell their ideas, products or services more effectively.  If this newsletter has been sent to you by a friend, sign up to get your own copy at http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/newsletter.htm . ******************************************************************* In this issue: What's on your self-development plan in 2008? PowerPoint Tip - Making Accessible Slides Best of the Blog - PowerPoint a force in the NFL Dave's Travel Schedule ******************************************************************* What's on your self-development plan in 2008? It's the start of a new year and whether you make resolutions or not, you should have a plan for getting better this year.  If you have "being more effective with my presentations" on your list and others in your organization do as well, listen up.  You can wait until the end of the year and then hurry to take any old course you can find, or you can act now.  Look for courses that are practical and taught by experts.  Search out books and resources that can help right away.  Your results in 2008 will improve if you act now. Check out my learning resources on the web site and calculate the benefits of bringing me in to your organization to conduct a customized Think Outside The Slide workshop.  If we have 20 people in the room and your improved sales presentations help each of you to sell only $1,000 more of your services or products this year, your Return on Investment is over 300%!  Take that to the boss and see how the ROI compares to other investments they could make.  I have a few days available in the first quarter and am starting to book the second quarter of the year, so call or e-mail me today. ------------------------------------------------------------------- PowerPoint Tip: Making Accessible Slides Last year I worked on a project for my publisher, Prentice Hall, that was interesting and highly informative.  The topic was how to make PowerPoint presentations accessible to those who have hearing or sight impairments.  It is a requirement on some college campuses and we would all do well to be aware of some of the ideas in order to be able to make our messages accessible to everyone in our audiences. In today's article, I want to share some of the key techniques for making your PowerPoint slides accessible.  Not only will these ideas help when you have someone who is visually or hearing impaired in your audience, but in many cases the suggestions will make your slides clearer for everyone. First, pay attention to the design of your slides.  Make sure you have selected colors that have enough contrast.  Someone who has trouble seeing needs a high degree of contrast between text or shapes and the background.  Use the Color Contrast Calculator at http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/colorcontrast.htm to check the contrast of the colors you select.  Use sans-serif fonts that are at least 24 points or larger so they can be easily seen. Next, make your content clear to your audience.  Two ideas from my upcoming book work well here.  One is to create a meaningful headline for each slide instead of a generic topic title.  A headline tells the key message of the slide and makes it easier to understand.  Next, use callouts on visuals to make the point clear. Someone who is hearing impaired can't hear where you are asking others to look on a slide, so use a callout to direct everyone's attention. When your presentation is going to be delivered to someone who is hearing or sight impaired, you should also give them a version that contains what you will say on each slide.  To capture your commentary, use the Notes section of the slide and fully describe what you want to say on that slide.  Describe any visuals with context and meaning.  Elaborate on text bullet points.  Include a transcript for any media clips along with a description of the setting and context for the clip.  For animations that show a specific movement, describe the movement fully.  To see if your explanation is clear enough, read the explanation to someone who has their eyes closed and see if they can correctly tell what the slide looks like and means. The next step is to create a document that hearing impaired people can read and sight impaired people can have read to them using screen reader software.  The easiest way to do this is to use the PowerPoint feature to Send the presentation to a Word file (found on the File menu in PowerPoint 2003 and in PowerPoint 2007 it is Publish Create Handouts in Microsoft Office Word on the Office menu).  Select the format that has the slide image at the top of the page and the Notes underneath the image.  You will now create a document that others can read or listen to and get the full meaning of your presentation. With PowerPoint presentations becoming more of a standard way to communicate information of all types, we need to keep in mind that our first responsibility is to our audience.  We need to use the ideas above to make sure that we make our presentation accessible for everyone. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Best of the Blog - PowerPoint a force in the NFL      Wow, PowerPoint has come a long way. Recent reports are that the Atlanta Falcons of the NFL hired their new General Manager based on a web conference interview in which the new GM outlined his ideas in a PowerPoint presentation. For those of you who keep holding out hope that PowerPoint will just go away, I hate to break the news that it isn't going anywhere. If you want to advance your career, you need to learn how to create persuasive visuals and deliver presentations both live and over the web. If you've never delivered a presentation via a web conferencing service before, check out the webinar I did last year that shows you how to get started: http://www.speakernetnews.com/tsem/ts20070213.html (done for SpeakerNetNews). I wonder if I'll get an invite to the Super Bowl as a consultant for a high ranking NFL executive looking to move up - not likely, but nice to dream. Other recent blog posts at http://pptideas.blogspot.com : PowerPoint and Presentation Blogs ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dave's Travel Schedule I work with business people who struggle with the effectiveness of the PowerPoint presentations they use to sell ideas, products and services to other business people. My research based PowerPoint Presentation Effectiveness System helps my clients achieve greater productivity and deliver presentations that close more sales.  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 23-24 - Cincinnati, OH February 4-8 - St. John's, NL February 11-13 - St. John's, NL February 15 - Toronto, ON February 23 - Las Vegas, NV February 25 - Chicago, IL February 29 - West Palm Beach, FL March 1 - Jacksonville/Sawgrass, FL March 4 - Tampa, FL March 29 - Grand Rapids, MI April 4 - Toronto, ON (tentative) May 9 - Ottawa, ON 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. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Privacy Policy: I will never sell or distribute your e-mail or information to anyone. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Need articles for your newsletter?  Check out my many articles at: http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Check out the books, e-books and other learning tools at: http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/resources.htm ------------------------------------------------------------------- If you want to read back issues of this newsletter, click on the following link to go to the Archives: http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/archives.htm ------------------------------------------------------------------- Microsoft, PowerPoint, Windows and other terms are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.  Microsoft product screen shot(s) reprinted with permission from Microsoft Corporation.  All books, products and seminars are independent publications and are not affiliated with, nor have they been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Microsoft Corporation.