Most presenters are familiar with the common lines you can use in PowerPoint. But many presenters haven’t used the Freeform line tool. It can be used to trace graphs or objects in order to superimpose an outline on another object for comparison. It can be used to create unique shapes, and it can be used…
Author: Dave Paradi
Dave Paradi has over twenty-two years of experience delivering customized training workshops to help business professionals improve their presentations. He has written ten books and over 600 articles on the topic of effective presentations and his ideas have appeared in publications around the world. His focus is on helping corporate professionals visually communicate the messages in their data so they don't overwhelm and confuse executives. Dave is one of fewer than ten people in North America recognized by Microsoft with the Most Valuable Professional Award for his contributions to the Excel, PowerPoint, and Teams communities. His articles and videos on virtual presenting have been viewed over 4.8 million times and liked over 17,000 times on YouTube.
Create a Speedometer graph
When you want to visually compare the proportions of two related items, a speedometer graph line this can be an effective visual to use. This is a visual you will see in newspapers and magazines. They have professional graphics staff create these visuals, but you can create it in PowerPoint. This video shows you…
Make the important data in a Graph stand out
After you have created a graph on your slide and cleaned it up, what can you do to make the important data stand out for the audience? This video shows you techniques for making a column, bar, or pie wedge stand out in a graph. Click the Full Screen button in the lower right of the…
Donut Graphs; Issue #295 September 17, 2013
For the last year or two I have noticed newspapers and magazines using donut graphs more often to show proportional data results. Donut graphs may look like they are hard to create, but they are actually built into PowerPoint, so any presenter can use them. Here is an example that shows how a donut graph…
Create a table where all the numbers line up perfectly
Many presenters have to include table of numbers on their slides to present operational or financial information. In an effort to make all the numbers line up properly, presenters use leading spaces to try to properly position numbers of different lengths. This almost never works and the misalignment makes the audience wonder what is going…
Zoom in on a portion of an image for a close up look
You may have to put a screen capture, image of a document, or other graphic on a slide where there is really only one or two parts of it that are important for the audience. You need the entire image to give context, but you would really like to focus the audience on just that…
Integrating Word, Excel, PDF, and other content into your presentation
Your slides just show the result or conclusion of your analysis, not everything you did. But what if the audience might ask to see the details of your work? Don’t do what too many presenters do and include all that detail in your presentation. And don’t drop out of Slide Show mode, open up another…
Build a complex image piece-by-piece so it is easier to present
Sometimes we have to use images that are complex, such as diagrams or charts that come from other sources. It would be easier to explain to the audience if we could build it one piece at a time so we can walk the audience step by step through each part of the image. But the…
How to create Calendar visuals to illustrate date-based information
A list of dates on a slide is accurate, but it does not illustrate the information the way a calendar visual does. A calendar visual is easy for the audience to interpret because they are familiar with calendars. They see it and instantly know how to understand your message. Calendars are not a built-in visual…
How to select any object on a slide no matter what level it is on
When you create a slide that has objects layered on top of each other, how can you select those objects that are covered up or behind others? Do you have to move the objects in front out of the way and hope you can move them back to the correct place afterwards? No. This video…