Giving a presentation can be a challenging task. Many people are nervous about the idea of public speaking and that is coupled with the pressure of delivering pertinent information in a way that will captivate their audience. Although this is no easy feat, visual aids play an important role in effective presentations. A visual aid is something that supplements words with pictures, illustrations, charts, or videos. There is a great emphasis on storytelling with pictures and the push for visual aids is only getting stronger. It makes sense, given that the brain processes visuals nearly 60,ooo times faster than it does text. This means that a good presentation needs to contain visual content in order to best reach its audience.
While it is a known fact that visual content has a profound effect on an audience, the challenge lies in that most people are not necessarily experts in putting together visual aids. More than likely you have been asked to present because of your knowledge of the topic, not because you are proficient with visual content. The following tips can help beginners put together a presentation that encompasses great visual content.
Plan your presentation before creating visual aids.
Create an outline of your presentation and define your main points. Once you decide which information is most important decide how you are going to convey this information to your audience. Finally, you are ready to create visual aids that will support your message.
Make sure your visual aids are relevant.
Don’t use visual aids just for the sake of putting up flashy animations or fancy slideshows. Rather, your visual aids should only be used to convey relevant information to your audience. For example, a chart could be used to display expenses or profits. A video could be used to illustrate your message. Remember, however, that visual aids are only used to support and highlight your key points. The entire presentation should not be filled with visual content.
Make sure your visual aids are visible to the entire audience.
If you project an image that is so small that only the front row can see it, you might as well be whispering to your audience when you speak. Choose visuals that can be seen throughout the room.
Explain the content of your visual aid when you first display it.
The moment you show an image to your audience they are going to look at it. This means their attention will be diverted to the image even if you are talking about something else. Don’t show the image until you are ready to discuss it. Likewise, remove the image as soon as you are finished with it.
Each visual aid should be intended to convey a single point.
What does this mean? Don’t slap up a PowerPoint loaded with bullet points on each slide. Rather, each slide should only be intended to demonstrate one key point. Too much text or too many graphics can become boring or confusing to the audience.
Use a variety of visual content in your presentation.
In this day and age there are countless ways to incorporate visual content into your presentations. Instead of using a PowerPoint slideshow as your only means of visual content, get creative with different techniques. Some examples of great visual aids include memes, eye-catching photography, videos, infographics, comics, animation, videos, and hand-outs.
As you create your presentation with visual aids, experiment with various tools until you find the ones that work best for you. There are a number of great presentation tools available that can add dimension and creativity to your presentation. Visual aids are not only more interesting, but they are necessary in order to deliver a dynamic presentation that audiences will remember.