How to Make a Presentation: Simple and EffectiveTips | WowEssay Research

9 min readOct 20, 2021

Presentation is a method of delivering some information to the audience. Its success depends on how responsibly the presenter prepared the material. Indeed you faced a situation where the text from the slide was simply impossible to read, or the image itself was too distracting from the main point. The impression of such computer presentations left much to be desired. And what about the inarticulate and unstructured presentation of the creator himself? That’s quite a treat for the audience.

It is not essential whether you make a presentation for the first time or a regular part of your work or studies. Whether large or small, you should always consider the basic nuances of making slides, handouts, and oral presentations. So how to make a presentation on your computer with slides, prepare for the report and conquer the audience. The secrets of successful presentations of famous speakers, wowessays will tell you in our article.

The essence aims and functions of the presentation

Presentation is an informational or promotional tool that allows you to give the necessary information about the subject of your presentation convenient for the recipient. Three main formats are usually used in combination: a computer presentation, a presentation on large sheets of paper, and a live speaker.

Depending on the purpose, visuals, and distribution method, the presentation is divided into several types.

According to the way the information is conveyed, a computer presentation can be:

Static: the slides have the text and a corresponding picture.
Animated: a dynamic text and a picture are added to it. It could be transitions and different effects of the material on the slide.
Multimedia: besides all mentioned above, audio files, video materials, and interactive elements like active buttons are used in the presentation.

To understand which one of these presentations is better to make, you must first decide on the purpose of its creation and the format of the meeting with the audience. What is suitable for business negotiations is unlikely to be correctly perceived by participants in an informal conversation.

Depending on how it is delivered, a computer presentation can be in the format:

Sequential slides: slides go one after another and switch either with the help of a person or automatically after a fixed time.
Video: The finished presentation can be saved as a video file and uploaded to YouTube as a clip. Often, this option requires a voice-over.
Flash: this type of presentation is the most interesting compared to the usual flipping slides. It allows you to add interactive elements (games, active menus, etc.).
PDF: This format helps save static presentations and print them out for handouts.

Computer presentations can either accompany the speaker or be used separately. For example, suppose you need to tell the customer about the properties of a new product. In that case, this is one effective way, as such a presentation can be posted on the company’s website or sent to a personal email upon request. Simply put, the format of the display depends on the purpose of its creation.

A presentation can be informational. For example, they can include business presentations, tell about various projects, provide reports on the work done, etc.

Teaching presentations tell about people, events, phenomena. Their task is to teach the audience something new, to make the audience/viewers remember the necessary information.

Persuasive presentations are used to sell something (a product, an idea), while inspirational presentations are more entertaining. They raise the mood, morale, motivate. Of course, an expression can have several purposes at once, because before you can convince someone to buy a product, you need to tell them about it and even teach them how to use it, emphasizing that it is evident and easy to use.

A top-class presentation is worked out “from” to “up” and made with love for the listener. All the stages of its creation require particular attention to analyze each of them in detail.

Preparing Your Presentation

Even if you are going to improvise in your presentation, you need to prepare for it. It is impossible to present information well if you do not identify the key points that need to be conveyed first and the target audience.

Regardless of the presentation format, there are five basic steps to prepare for the presentation:

Gather information: you should clearly understand what you want to talk about in your presentation. Think about the material you need to create it.
Write down the information: write down the information in electronic form, divide it into parts according to the presented scenario.
Highlight the essential points: put the most critical thoughts in the slides, the rest can be narrated.
Decide on the audience: Your audience needs individual presentations of information. Everything depends on the audience: style, language, pictures, presentation format. Maybe your audience is an entrepreneur? Then everything should be in a business style. If they are a group of students, humor and contemporary slang will be helpful.
Rehearse: As soon as you have the presentation script in your hands, you can start reciting it aloud and memorizing it. This way, you will assimilate the material more quickly. You will understand what needs to be improved and supplemented, what information is better placed in a computer presentation, and what can be given in person.

And now, let’s go into more detail.

Why is it important to know the audience?

Few speakers are interested in their audience, although learning about their target audience is one of the first and critical steps in any marketing event. A presentation promotes an idea, sells a product, and delivers the information, so it’s important to know your customer (buyer).

If you meet your audience for the first time, pay attention to your audience’s age, position, and profession. Conventionally, people can be divided into fact lovers, emotional, and visionaries.

Emotional people are those who are creative. They are ideological, love to create beauty around them, and live with feelings, so it is vital to make a particular impression on them, even at the initial stage of the presentation. It can be a joke, an original image, or something that will evoke in them the emotion you need.

If your audience is primarily fact-lovers (accountants, lawyers, programmers), emotional tricks and vivid pictures will not work with them. They want accurate data, statistics, charts, and only specifics without water. For them, the presentation should be low-key, concise, and any information should be supported by expert opinions, research results, etc.

Visionaries include all people who think strategically. They are executives, managers. They like both facts and emotions, so you should use bright images, attractive design, charts, draw numbers and diagrams on the board — it will focus their attention on the main point even more.

Understanding who’s in front of you will help you find common ground with your audience. The outcome of your presentation depends on this, among other things.

Main Point

Typically, a presentation focuses on one or more central ideas that need to be communicated to the audience. The main idea should be traceable from beginning to end at every stage of communication with the listener and be very simple and memorable.

Your main idea should bring some benefit to people, make the world a better place. You can talk about how important it is to exercise and give up bad habits, showing this in the example of successful people, explaining how the human body functions, etc. It also applies to the computer presentation: each slide should reflect the main idea of the whole action.

Order of Thought

Whatever the purpose of your presentation, it’s essential to follow a specific structure for presenting the information. It’s just like having a business negotiation. Can you imagine what happens if you do it chaotically, without a clear outline?

In order not to lose the main idea in the general flow of information, stick to the following structure:

Start your presentation with some challenge, a provocation: this will help focus the audience’s attention from the first minute. For example, ask the audience the question, “Are you sure you’re happy?” (if it fits your topic) or make a spectacular gesture.
Describe the problem: the listener must understand why they are wasting their precious time listening (watching) your presentation. Provide statistics, facts, and research that relate to the problem you raised.
Provide evidence of the problem and offer a solution: real-life stories and personal experiences will do because they catch on the most.
Use the Explain Like I’m five principles: simplify your idea, don’t overload your audience with information, refrain from abstruse phrases that everyone will not understand. Explain your picture so that even a child can understand it.
Conclude: at the end of the presentation, the listener should receive short conclusions, cheat sheets, and a list of valuable resources for studying the topic.

So, the first crucial stage of preparing a presentation is passed, understanding of the process is formed, now you can start developing a presentation in PowerPoint.

How to Make a Computer Presentation Effective

There is nothing worse than a presentation with unreadable text, poor quality pictures, or the use of standard templates, which are already outdated. Such a presentation can ruin even the most excellent presentation, so you need to take its creation seriously.

To make your presentation as attractive as possible, follow the advice of experts:

Slides should be simple in content: the less information placed on each slide, the better. A structured decline attracts the audience’s attention and does not distract from listening to the central part of the presentation.
Use as few words as possible: avoid circle markers, use bullet points rather than paragraphs.
Use good quality pictures and graphics: If an image of poor quality complements the text, you will not want to read it, and such a presentation is unlikely to leave a positive impression.
Use straightforward graphs and charts: if your material needs to be supported by statistical data in a visual form, make sure that your viewer can easily understand and read the graphs. Take care that the information is up-to-date.
Use new high-quality templates or create them yourself: PowerPoint offers many ready-made options for slide designs that make work a lot easier. But do not use outdated templates because indeed your audience has already seen them, and similar copy presentations are sure not to attract attention. But the best option would be if you come up with your design slides. Yes, you will spend more time, but your work will be a different personality.
Select the appropriate fonts: the font should fit the overall concept of the presentation. If you want to talk about a business idea, the text should be designed in a business style. If it’s something less formal or creative, don’t be afraid to use creative font options. The main thing is that they should be readable and not outdated.
Pick the colors: Just like the font, the color palette should match the presentation’s theme. Make sure that all selected colors match each other well and do not distract from the main point. It is recommended to use no more than three colors.
Make a simple layout and align all the elements: the slides must have order like any information image. Make sure there are no excessive indents, spaces, uneven lines, etc.
Avoid excessive punctuation: your speech should convey emotion and mood, not excessive exclamation points in the text.
Use speaker mode: this tool is built into PowerPoint and Keynote (speaker’s monitor). In presenter mode, you will see the following slides, as well as notes and a timer. Listeners, on the other hand, will only see the slide on the screen.
Show emotion through presentation design: Samsung in 2019 broadcast the presentation of the new Galaxy A Samsung Galaxy Event smartphones from Bangkok. The spectacle resembled a rock star concert or a music award. Large screens showed vivid photos and videos that were taken with the phone’s camera.
Dedicate one of the slides to the team: any product, any idea is the result of teamwork. Show the working moments, the process of team interaction, open your “inner kitchen” to the viewer with a photo or a short video. But don’t get carried away because it can bore the viewer.

Agree, it’s simple enough, but combined, these techniques will help you make an excellent computer presentation. Now it’s time to start preparing for the production, and there are a few secrets here as well, which we are happy to share with you.

To summarize

Preparing for a presentation is not an easy process, but it is exciting and developing. Here our mental, technical, and creative abilities come into play all at once. Now it is not enough to copy a beautiful picture from the Internet and write a text to interest the viewer. A presentation is a sale of your idea, so it should look like a first-class product, glittering on the shelf of an expensive boutique. Otherwise, what’s the point of it?

Do not forget that you are the central figure of the presentation, so make sure that your presentation is memorable in a good way. Treat the preparation of each stage responsibly because if something goes wrong with the transmission of slides, you can always bail out the situation, conquering the audience with your oratory skills, and vice versa. All processes are interconnected, and one won’t work without the other.

We wish you creative inspiration, energy, and success, and let your presentations become an example of professionalism for others!