{"id":666,"date":"2019-01-03T16:56:28","date_gmt":"2019-01-03T16:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thoughts.futurepresent.agency\/?p=666"},"modified":"2024-04-12T15:56:43","modified_gmt":"2024-04-12T14:56:43","slug":"structure-powerpoint-presentation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thoughts.futurepresent.agency\/news\/structure-powerpoint-presentation\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Structure Your PowerPoint Presentation"},"content":{"rendered":"
Every book, film, TV show and theatre production is built around a thoroughly thought-out structure. Your PowerPoint presentation should be no different.<\/p>\n
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Before you start imagining which power outfit is going to impress your audience most, you need to plan your PowerPoint structure. Here’s how to make sure that structure makes sense, impresses the masses and keeps you on the right track.<\/p>\n
Who’s going to be in the crowd? What do they want? What do you want them to remember most clearly from the presentation?<\/p>\n
Researching your audience is a key step to understanding the best shape for your presentation story. It’ll also dictate the tone it’d be best for you to use, and ensures your messaging speaks directly to the core values of their organisation.<\/p>\n
What’s the purpose of this presentation? Are you trying to make a sale? Bag a new whale of a client? Promote your new product? Explain your company’s progress to internal stakeholders? Get everybody jazzed about the next big step in your marketing plan?<\/p>\n
Defining your intentions will make the presentation structure easy to nail down. Any info that strays from the goal should be nixed at this point, giving you a presentation structure that’s pared back and properly jazzed up.<\/p>\n
The beginning of your PowerPoint presentation is, obviously, hugely important. Simply standing up and introducing yourself might seem like the most effective way of starting, but it’ll hardly grab the audience\u2019s interest.<\/p>\n
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One famous public speaker who always nails his speech openers is Barack Obama. Even in serious surroundings, under the glaring spotlight of the whole world’s media, Obama often begins with a joke; one that immediately demands attention and warms the audience to him. It’s a solid power move, as well as a clever presentation structure technique. It points out that, even in a high-pressure, super-demanding scenario, he remains playful and witty.<\/p>\n
You might not fancy starting with a pun, but an interesting statement can work too. Something that produces an emotional reaction in your audience will work to get the ball rolling.<\/p>\n
Obviously, the information you’re there to communicate is very important to your PowerPoint presentation, but the way you make your audience feel should be of equal importance. Appealing to emotion is an effective way of capturing attention during a presentation, builds trust and should definitely be considered when planning your presentation structure.<\/p>\n
One way you can ensure emotion is to create a story your audience to follow and be invested in; a journey with a beginning, middle and end (more on that here<\/a>!). Begin by presenting a problem the audience can relate to and show them how, with your or your company\u2019s help, they can overcome it. Make them the hero of the tale.<\/p>\n To make your information easier for people to recall later, use the Rule of Three.<\/p>\nRule of three<\/h2>\n