Recently I got the chance to see a video of Elaine, the vice-president of the company I was beginning to work with, present to a room of prospective clients. Slide after slide went by, each filled with 5-10 bullets. Elaine read the full text on every one to her audience. I am sure those possible clients sitting in that room were neither impressed with Elaine nor with her message about her company.

Too much (bad) PowerPoint — not enough Elaine.

It is easy to create a mediocre presentation in PowerPoint. Simply take everything you know, dump it into dozens of multi-bulleted slides and you are ready. No presentation skills necessary. Just read to the audience from one slide to the next. But the focus will not be on you and that is a problem.

You should be the star of your presentation. The audience wants to hear your unique perspective. Instead they are experiencing a distilled, text-heavy, bullet point version of you. Not a good substitute.

The typical PowerPoint deck grabs maybe 70%-80% of the audience’s attention leaving just 20%-30% of the focus for you. Don’t let PowerPoint steal your spotlight. Use slides to assist you as explanations or backgrounds or embellishments. Don’t give away your power.

As far as the audience is concerned it is you or the PowerPoint. Make it you.

Analogous colors are friendly, happy, harmonious combinations. They are located next to each other on the color wheel and often are used to portray peace and calm. Examples are blue and green; purple and blue; red and orange; and orange and yellow. Think of the pastoral harmony of a blue sky against a green pasture or the comforting warmth of an orange sun setting in a bright red sky.

A few random observations:

• Use them to show compatibility, safety, peace or cooperation.
• Analogous color combinations generally convey low energy.
• There can be contrast problems with design elements like type against analogous backgrounds. Think of how difficult it may be to read blue text against a green background.
• To create separation consider matching the full-strength version of one color with a more subdued version (darker or lighter) of the second color.

Analogous colors may lack the power and energy of action-packed complimentary colors but in the right situation they can deliver a cooperative and collaborative message.

Peace.

Simply put, complementary colors are color opposites. They reside opposite each other on the color wheel like orange and blue, green and red and, yellow and violet. Combinations of complementary colors stand out. Life rafts are yellow-orange because they will be easily noticed in a blue sea.

Being opposites, like people, these color combinations can convey energy, excitement and, quite often, tension.  But sometimes these energetic combinations can be too distracting. Their energy can be overwhelming to the viewer when placed immediately next to each other in equal strengths and proportions. To capture their excitement without going over the top try using one of the colors in a large area while keeping the other small. Another way, is to subdue one of the colors by making it lighter or darker in tone (adding white or black).

With the power of complementary colors comes great responsibility — use them to brighten up your visuals while keeping their aggressive tendencies under control.

Presenters often have great difficulty avoiding the beam of light from their projectors. The projection device is often on a table or hanging from a low ceiling in a conference room or other small space. And the speaker, being correctly concerned to not stand in the path of the light, will often anchor him or herself back into a corner to one side or the other of the screen.

So where can you go? Where can you stand? And can you effectively move when presenting a PowerPoint deck? The answer is that you have to actively look for and think about your movements.

• Before you begin, check out the room and your speaking area. Be aware of the placement of the projector, the audience, the screen and where there is light for you to stand in and be seen.
• Avoid standing back next to the screen — this will probably put you in the shadows and in a weak and ineffective position.
• Consider beginning your presentation without visuals. You can then blank out the screen and stand in the power position directly in front of and close to your audience. (This is another good reason for dumping your lame title slide!)
• Build in black screens where you can move back to the center of the room and establish your position of authority.
• At appropriate points you may consider crossing the path of the projected image to get to the other side of the room. This can be a little disruptive so don’t do it too often or when you are asking the audience to concentrate on an important visual. Transition points are best.

Often, because of the room layouts, your movement options are limited. But you don’t have to just stand there and take it.

When creating an effective visual presentation (a.k.a. PowerPoint) it is extremely helpful to have sources of good images to draw from. Access to a good stock image house is more than helpful. So is a good set of photography skills. Being able to take reasonably high-quality photos of coworkers, processes, locations, products and the like is a real ace-in-the-hole when assembling a presentation. And with today’s amazingly advanced cameras, it has never been easier.

A few tips: