Presentations | Blog | Strategy Compass

The Dos & Don’ts of Visualizing Data Through Charts

The ability to make figures visual is the mark of a good presentation. But there are some pitfalls that need to be avoided here. Read on to find out more.

How PowerPoint can sabotage a new corporate design

In a recent blog post, we described how important presentations are in anchoring a brand in employees’ hearts and minds. A little while ago, I had an interesting conversation with the head of communications at a not-so-small business. She told me that PowerPoint was the reason the brand was having trouble really taking off inside the company. Which only demonstrates once again that, like it or not, you should never underestimate the power of PowerPoint.

Neues Corporate Design scheitert an PowerPoint

Creating compelling presentations using the OSCAR Principle

What is it that actually makes a presentation compelling? We already asked ourselves this question many years ago (and continue to ask it). It essentially comes down to just a few criteria, which we’ve summarized into what we call the OSCAR Principle. If your presentation meets these five criteria, it’s likely to receive an OSCAR nomination – and get you the desired results.

Presentations give brands internal life

In this post, we’d like to take another look at the role of presentations in company internal communications. For indeed, more presentations are held internally than externally. Think of decision documents, projects, review meetings, sales conferences, departmental meetings, and a dozen other occasions. And here’s a small word that tells you something about their ascribed level of importance. That word is ‘only’. It is ‘only’ for internal purposes. ‘Only’ for co-workers. ‘Only’ for an info-update briefing...

Presentations bring brands to life

When it comes to presentations, there’s what you can be classified as routine craftsmanship and there’s rousing, passionate freestyle brand management. This includes company presentations as well as canvassing or sales appointments, results and project presentations or speeches and lectures.

Self-presentation versus client benefit

Why you don’t need to talk too much about yourself in a company presentation. Read four simple rules you should observe in your company presentation:

Action Titles: Providing orientation with well thought-out slide titles

Heard of Nicolas Boileau? Don’t worry if you haven’t. It’s just remarkable that this 17th century French author made an observation that provides the key to a good PowerPoint slide title: ‘What is well conceived well is clearly expressed’. Clear, well-phrased titles attune your audience to the content and purpose of each slide, providing rapid orientation and keeping them focused on your presentation. And there’s a useful side effect: when you’re done, you really do know what you want to say!

Concluding a presentation – The End is a new beginning

There will always be that last slide. You’ve given your presentation, taken a deep breath. It’s over. Or is it? In many cases it isn’t really. That’s why we’re dedicating this blog to a discussion of ‘the very last slide’.

Your PowerPoint Presentation as a Handout

At some point, you may want to hand out your presentation: in paper form or perhaps electronically. This may sound simple, but there are a few things you should consider first. In our experience, there’s more to this than simply clicking ‘print’ or ‘attach file’. Why? As is so often the case – the devil is in the detail.

Feel secure and be professional when you present

Have you read our previous blog on the subject of orientation, explaining that your audience members need orientation and security before they can give you their full attention? Then you are already well informed about the ‘receiving end’. But what about you, the speaker? In order to give a good presentation, you too need security and orientation before you begin.

The golden thread – how a well-structured presentation helps you hold your audience

You want to give a good presentation that holds your audience’s attention right to the end? One that creates enthusiasm for your topic? And for you as the speaker? Your presentation concept is the key. Based on your target group, aims and central message, and taking into account the time available, you need to create a clear structure with a golden thread running through it.

Ever tweeted? Then you know how to keep your slides succinct and to the point!

What does Twitter have to do with your PowerPoint slides? Can you learn about effective communication from Twitter? Yes, you can. Twitter has just about perfected the art of brevity. And your perfect slide convinces by being succinct and to the point. How does it work? With the Twitter transfer:

At a glance: which visualization for which message?

There are numerous ways to illustrate your messages in PowerPoint graphically. To help you find the right one quickly and easily, we’ve summarized various visualization types with hints for their use:

Welche Visualisierung für welche Aussage

Banish background noise: tips for clear PowerPoint slides

How much can you squeeze onto a slide? You’ve collated so much information and material, that it’s difficult to decide. In the process, you can easily overlook the fact that it’s not about cramming as much information onto the slide as possible, but about making a clear statement.

What’s the message? Using data to give clarity

You have data in Excel that you could use to make many different points. Which are important? Let’s take as an example the turnover figures of a nationally operating company over a number of years.

Horses for courses: Which diagram for which data?

Sound familiar? You have piles of data, most of it in Excel, and are trying to work out how best to get it onto a PowerPoint slide. The simplest way is ‘copy and paste’. But it’s certainly not the best way. Large amounts of data are often confusing, because it’s hard to single out what really matters.

Small mistakes, big impact: 10 tips for perfect slides

Many a little makes a mickle. Small mistakes in a presentation irritate and distract your audience. If you let them accumulate, the credibility of your presentation suffers – even if reasoning is flawless.

Tidying up: layout grids and drawing guides in PowerPoint

For your presentation to appear harmonious and professional, all elements should be properly aligned. Not just on one slide, but across all slides in the presentation. There are two things that make this easier: layout grids and PowerPoint guides.

A unified look: creating a presentation in corporate design

You know the feeling? You’re sitting in a meeting and the presentation is good as far as its content goes, but it’s somehow not very convincing. There is usually a very trivial reason for this: the individual elements of the presentation don’t match, each slide looks different, and some slides have obviously been recycled from other presentations. In short: the presentation doesn’t have a unified look.