– Clearly state the purpose of the presentation
Creating a presentation outline is an essential step in delivering a successful and impactful presentation. A well-structured outline helps you organize your thoughts, maintain a logical flow, and ensure that you cover all the key points you want to communicate to your audience.
Start by brainstorming ideas and determining the main objectives of your presentation. Consider what information you want to convey, the key messages you want to deliver, and the desired outcomes you want to achieve.
From your brainstorming session, identify the main points you want to address in your presentation. These should be the key ideas or concepts that support your objectives and help you effectively convey your message to the audience.
Once you have identified your main points, organize them in a logical sequence that flows naturally. Consider using headings and subheadings to create a hierarchical structure that guides your audience through the presentation.
Think about the supporting content that you need to include for each main point. This can be facts, statistics, examples, case studies, or visuals that help reinforce your message and provide additional context to your presentation.
At the end of each main point or section, summarize the key takeaways or messages you want your audience to remember. These should be concise and impactful statements that leave a lasting impression.
Once you have created a draft of your presentation outline, take the time to review and refine it. Ensure that the structure is clear, the content is well-organized, and the flow is logical. Make any necessary adjustments or additions to improve the overall effectiveness of your outline.
1. What is a presentation outline?
A presentation outline is a roadmap or blueprint that helps you organize your ideas and content for a presentation. It outlines the structure, flow, and key points of your presentation, ensuring a logical and cohesive delivery.
2. How can I engage my audience throughout my Business presentation?
To engage your audience throughout your presentation, consider using storytelling techniques , interactive elements, or thought-provoking questions. Encourage audience participation through activities, discussions, or Q&A sessions. Use visual aids, such as images, videos, or graphs, to enhance understanding and maintain interest. Finally, deliver your content with enthusiasm, clarity, and confidence.
3. What are the three basic parts of a presentation outline?
When creating a presentation outline, it is crucial to include three essential components. The first part is the introduction, which sets the stage for the presentation and provides background information. Following the introduction is the body, where the main points and supporting details are discussed in depth. Finally, the outline should include a conclusion that summarizes the key points and reinforces the main message.
4. What are the 5 pieces of presentation Outline? The 5 key pieces of an outline include the introduction, main points, supporting information, visuals, and conclusion. Each section plays a vital role in delivering a clear and impactful message to the audience.
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When you’re writing an important speech, you must start with a clear outline. However, I find that many speakers are uncertain of how to write a good outline for their presentation. This is why I decided to write a guide for you, in hopes that learning to perfect your outlines will help you give better presentations in the future.
How do you outline a presentation? Always start with your introduction and end with your powerful closing. Flesh out the body by listing topics in the order that you want to cover them in. Never skimp on the important details of your speech. Remember that an outline is only a draft.
I know at this point that you still have questions, and that you still be confused at how to write the best outline for your speech. But writing a good outline for your presentation does not have to be stressful! This is my complete guide from a pro for you, in hopes that you can take the stress out of this important step.
Table of Contents
Outlining a presentation can be done with a regular piece of paper, or on a word processing program on your computer. If you are hosting a PowerPoint presentation, you may prefer to do the entire thing from the comfort of your computer. But if you do decide to write your outline on a piece of paper, make sure you use a pencil and eraser so that you can make changes as you go along.
The very first step in creating an outline is to ask yourself what the purpose of your presentation is.
Write your main message or a one-sentence summary of your thesis at the top of your outline when you get started. This may help you stay on task, and it will keep the purpose of your speech right in your eye’s sight. After all, you don’t want to stray too far off the main topic of your presentation !
Remember, a quality outline is meant to enhance the purpose of your presentation. If you do not write a proper outline, you may risk not properly conveying the right message to your audience.
Or you may even forget to cover essential points that you wanted to talk about. A thorough outline is especially important if you are planning to speak without notes.
You should remember to properly summarize what you want to say with every sentence of your outline. After all, this is not a full script, so a summary is all you really need. Remember to rehearse and practice with your outline, so that you can remember what you have written.
Your introduction is where you start strong by grabbing your audience’s attention from the very beginning. But if that makes you feel stressed out, just remember to stay calm! Creating a great first impression from the beginning of your speech is not as difficult as you might be worrying.
When you create a strong beginning, you should try some of the following:
Be reminded thought, that sometimes it is wise to write your introduction last as only you know what you’ll be introducing. This way, you’ll also avoid including something in your introduction that you won’t be actually talking about.
Once you have written out your introduction, you have completed the first step in creating an excellent outline for your presentation.
In my experience, it can be easier to create ending before you flesh out the body of your presentation. However, it is up to you if you prefer to create your outline in a different order.
If you are a regular reader, you might have realized that I already posted an in-depth article here about how to end a presentation in a powerful way . Right now we are going to talk about the same thing in somewhat less detail.
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Just like with your beginning, make sure that you’ve made it obvious you are ending. After all, few things are more awkward than your audience sitting there long after you’ve finished, feeling confused about whether they should leave or not.
If the point of your speech is to motivate your audience to do something, you might consider ending your speech with a call to action . A call to action is simply an instruction that you give your audience about something you want them to do.
You could also potentially end your presentation with a powerful quote or an entertaining story . And if you have a unique tagline that exists to help promote your personal brand, consider ending with it.
But if you are planning to have a question and answer period at all, make sure you are not directly ending with one. Plan to wrap up your question and answer period before delivering your speech’s closing at the end.
This is because ending with a question and answer period is not only not memorable, but a negative question from an audience member can leave a bad taste in everyone’s mouth . This is not the last thing you want your audience members to remember as they’re leaving!
And as always, you should thank your audience at the end of your speech. This will make them feel valued, and impressed with your gratefulness.
So, you’ve got your beginning and ending all figured out, but now what else do you do with your outline? This is the stage where you work on the body of your speech. That is, you will want to think about what you want to say in between your beginning and end. Here are some speech writing tips I have written about previously.
It may be easier for you to write bullet points or even a numbered list. List your main points in order of what you want to talk about. If at first glance the topics don’t seem to flow, it is okay to re-arrange them.
You can also decide at this point if there is anything you want to add or subtract. If you feel like you’ve made a mistake, don’t worry! It is okay to make any changes along the way.
Add sub-points to your main points in order to further flesh out your outline. Even if you want to keep it simple, sub-points may help you to stay on track and remember what you were going to say.
You can also add to the ideas that your main points present. Make sure that the transitions from one point to another flow smoothly from one thing to the next.
Are there any special details that you need to remember for your presentation? Put these in your outline so that you don’t forget them. This can include important names, dates, and locations that you need to remember.
If your speech is supposed to cover a certain amount of time, try listing times for each of your main points. This may help you not go over or under your time.
Also, take a look at these articles:
You may be thinking that you don’t need an outline for your PowerPoint presentation. However, don’t rely on your slides alone ; you need a proper outline, too. An outline for a PowerPoint presentation should also include images that you intend to use for your slides.
Fortunately, the PowerPoint program itself also allows you to view an outline of your slides. This can help give you a visual of your overall presentation.
If your outline isn’t the way you want it to be, remember that it is only your very first rough draft. Your outline doesn’t have to be perfect, because it is not your final product. While you should work hard to make your outline as good as possible, you don’t need to stress about it.
And remember that if you finish your outline, and you are not satisfied with how it looks? It is okay for you to scrap it and start all over again. There is no reason that you should stick with an outline that you don’t feel confident about.
An outline is a great place to start whether you intend to read from a full script, read from cue cards, or speak without notes. If you are an avid reader of Speak and Conquer, you’ll remember that I recommend creating an outline in many of my articles.
There is no reason that you have to go any of this by yourself. If you have a friend or mentor who is experienced with public speaking , why not ask them to take a look at your outline for you? They may see something that needs to be changed that never even occurred to you.
You could also give a practice round of your speech in front of a friend, family member, or mentor. Give them a chance to make suggestions about whether or not there’s anything that you should change. After all, it’s better for you to realize if something needs to be done differently before the actual day of the presentation.
If you don’t have someone who you can rehearse in front of in person, try recording your presentation in front of a video camera . Show it to someone you trust via email or social media. If they have any suggestions for change, you can alter your outline accordingly.
While reading this article, you may be wondering why you even need an outline for your presentation. This may be especially puzzling to you if you are planning to give a speech without notes . But I find that an outline can be incredibly useful no matter what kind of presentation you are planning to give to your audience.
Like I said before, the main point of an outline is to enhance the main purpose of your speech further. But I’m also going to give you a list of some more reasons why I believe an outline is absolutely essential.
Some other good reasons for creating an outline for your presentation are:
No matter what kind of presentation you are planning to give, a solid outline with help you be prepared and ready to go.
Today, I have compiled a thorough guide about writing a quality outline. We discussed creating a good beginning, ending, and body of your presentation. We have even talked about why a good outline is important, too. If you have any other tips to share about creating an outline for your presentation, make sure to share them in the comments section.
If you are looking to improve your public speaking and presentation skills, check out the rest of my articles on Speak and Conquer. The purpose of my site is to help you succeed in becoming a better public speaker. For example, I have covered popular topics such as how to memorize a speech in less than an hour , and how to use hand gestures effectively during a presentation .
What software should I use to outline my speech? Preferably, you should have a program that allows you to use bullet points or numbered lists. Bullet points and lists are a good place to start when you are outlining. Microsoft Word, Word Processor, or Notepad are acceptable for basic outlines.
How do I decide what the purpose of my speech is? Decide if you are there to inform, educate, motivate, or entertain your audience. When you have narrowed it down to just one of those, you will be able to decide the main idea of your speech. You should preferably speak about a topic that you are well-educated about.
How do I write a speech? Start with a purpose, and then create a detailed outline. Flesh out the points and sub-points from your outline. Decide very early on if you want to give your speech with or without notes. Revise your drafts as much as possible until you have created a full speech. If you are going to speak with notes, write some of the information from your outline onto cue cards.
Public speaking is just like any other area that has its gurus. However, public speaking is also an area in which many fear to fail.
You’ve been nominated for an award and now you have to give an acceptance speech. It might be an Academy Award where the whole world
There are a bunch of public speaking related questions that I keep hearing (and probably will keep hearing) during my training sessions or business consulting
Who is janek tuttar.
My name is Janek Tuttar , and I am the founder and author of Speak and Conquer website.
I have been teaching public speaking at Estonian Entrepreneurship University of Applied Sciences
Here, I am sharing the wisdom of how to cope in different public speaking situations.
More information about Janek »
Hi! My name is Janek Tuttar, and I am the founder and author of SpeakAndConquer.com.
I have been teaching and blogging about public speaking since spring 2007. Here, I am sharing the wisdom of how to cope in different public speaking situations.
Send me an e-mail: [email protected]
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August 13, 2024
Four methods to create a presentation outline and example outlines for inspiration
Co-founder, CEO
Like it or not, if you work in an office or go to school, you'll probably have to make a presentation sooner or later. But creating a great presentation can be challenging, especially if you're short on time or suffering from writer's block.
Luckily, there are many ways to get a head start on your presentation outline. In this article we'll walk through four options for creating a presentation outline and show you several examples of great presentation outlines.
An outline helps you organize your ideas in a clear and logical way . Instead of getting bogged down on details like formatting or word choice, an outline presents the overarching story of your presentation with just a few main points. This helps to make sure you have a cohesive narrative before you dive into the nitty gritty work of wordsmithing individual bullet points or selecting the perfect slide theme.
If this sounds like a lot of work, it often is! But spending time writing a great outline will save you time and effort down the road because it will be easier to organize your work and create each slide when you understand how it fits in to the broader presentation.
Here are four ways you can get a start on creating your next presentation outline.
Creating an outline from scratch may sound intimidating if you have never written a presentation outline before, but this is the most straightforward way to get started.
Start by jotting down the three main points you want to make in your presentation. Once you have your main ideas in order, write down a few supporting details and examples for each point.
Then, add an introduction (find an interesting image, quote, or question to help grab the audience's audience) and a conclusion (decide on the best way to summarize the takeaways from your presentation) to the outline, and you are ready to go.
This method is great for those who prefer to have complete control over their presentation and want to create a custom outline that works best for their needs.
If you're short on time or looking for a quick way to get a first draft of a presentation outline that you can then refine, using an AI presentation maker is a great option.
Plus AI lets you type a short prompt like "Create a presentation that provides an overview of the Norwegian oil industry," and it will automatically generate an outline of a presentation for you. After Plus creates the outline, you can change the titles of slides, rearrange slides, and remove any pieces of the outline that are not necessary.
From there, once your outline is created, you can click the "Generate presentation" button, choose a template, and let the AI create the first draft of your entire presentation.
This method is a good option for those who want to create a polished presentation without getting stuck with a blank piece of paper. Instead, it frees you up to take a first draft presentation and customize it for your needs.
ChatGPT is an AI chatbot that can help with a wide variety of tasks - everything from acting as a therapist, to sharing recipes, to helping you come up with presentation ideas and creating content for a presentation .
To have ChatGPT help you generate a presentation, you can take two different approaches:
Both approaches will yield similar results, but a custom GPT like Plus AI presentation maker will be more fine-tuned to helping people create presentations. It will also provide additional functionality like providing a visual preview of the slides and feedback on how to improve your presentation.
Last but not least, using a template is a good way to speed up the process of creating a new presentation outline. Similar to using an AI presentation maker, a template can give you a first draft of an outline that is easier to edit and refine than starting from scratch.
Presentation templates often come pre-designed with example text and images, so all you have to do is fill in your own content. For example, this TED Talk presentation template provides some instructions on how to create an outline for a TED Talk-style slide deck.
The secret to using this method is to find the closest template to the type of presentation you want to create. You should use detailed search terms to and look across multiple sites and resources to find one that matches the content and style that you would like.
Once you have your template, start by reviewing the overall outline or structure and tweak it to meet your needs. Then, you can fill in the specific content (e.g., text and images) with your materials to make it your own to quickly make a beautiful presentation.
Basic presentation outline example.
Let's take a look at a presentation outline and accompanying notes for a persuasive presentation on encouraging people to meditate every day:
I. Introduction
II. Main point 1 - Meditation is one of the easiest ways to improve your health
III. Main point 2 - Meditation is backed up by thousands of years of practice and research
IV. Main point 3 - You can get started with meditation today
V. Conclusion
As you can see, this is a relatively lightweight plan for the presentation, but it provides an easy-to-understand framework that we can fill in with slides.
There are rough notes on specific content for the different points in the presentation, but we don't need to write out everything in fine detail, just the broad strokes.
Now let's review an outline for a pitch deck that someone might use to present their startup idea to prospective investors. This is for a startup that uses autonomous food trucks to deliver meals to people's homes and workplaces.
I. Problem statement - "Food delivery sucks, and here's why"
II. Value prop - "FoodDrive revolutionizes the food delivery model"
III. The product - "Customers love our trucks"
IV. Why now? - "Our self-driving technology is ready for prime-time"
V. Business model - "Each truck can generate $2-3M of revenue per year with a 60% gross margin"
VI. Competitive landscape - "FoodDrive's closest competitors don't come close"
VII. Go to market strategy - "We've tested FoodDrive in 2 markets so far. Here's how we win in new markets"
VIII. Team - "Our team has experience in autonomous vehicles, food delivery, and quick service restaurants"
IX. Traction - "We generate $5M of revenue per year with our 2 trucks, and we can ramp up new trucks immediately"
X. Fundraising goal - "We are raising $50M to expand FoodDrive to 10 more markets"
Even though a pitch deck is a specialized type of presentation that often requires specific content, it's helpful to start with an outline to build out the 'story' behind the content. That way, you have a cohesive story rather than a set of disparate slides.
Once you have your presentation outline written, it's time to start writing your slides. Since you already know the main points you are trying to make in your presentation, the main decisions here are
To get a head start on creating a first draft of your presentation, you could enter your outline into an AI presentation maker.
This will provide a first draft of the slides so that you can focus on making sure they tell a cohesive story or tweaking individual slides to leave a memorable impression.
Here are some resources to help you create great presentations:
Creating a presentation outline can be one of the most time-consuming parts of the creative process for making a new slide deck. Luckily, there are many tools and templates that can help you kickstart this process.
With these four methods, you can choose the one that works best for your needs and get started on your presentation outline today.
And once you have your outline, make sure to try out a tool like Plus AI presentation maker to quickly get your slides as well!
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Looking for Presentation Outline Examples ? Do you want to take your presentations from mediocre to magnificent? The secret weapon in achieving that transformation is a well-crafted presentation outline. A clear and organized outline not only guides you through your content but also ensures your audience stays captivated throughout your talk.
In this blog post, we're going to share practical presentation outline examples and 8 key elements for constructing your own outlines that will leave a lasting impression.
What is presentation outline, why is presentation outline important, 8 key elements of presentation outline , presentation outline examples, key takeaways , faqs about presentation outline examples.
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What is a presentation outline? | A structure that highlights the main points, ideas, and key elements in your presentation. |
How many basic parts should be in the presentation outline? | 3 main parts, including the introduction, body, and conclusion. |
A presentation outline is a plan or structure that helps you organize and deliver a presentation or speech. It's like a map that guides you through your talk.
In essence, it's a tool that helps you stay on track and communicate your message effectively.
A presentation outline is a valuable tool that enhances both the organization and delivery of your presentation.
Whether you're giving a business presentation, a school lecture, or a public speech, an outline is a key element in ensuring your presentation's success.
A well-structured presentation outline should include the following key elements:
Begin your outline with a clear and concise title or topic that represents the subject of your presentation.
Under each main point, list the specific details, examples, statistics, anecdotes, or evidence that support and elaborate on that main point.
Include transition phrases or sentences between each main point and subpoint to guide the flow of your presentation smoothly. Transitions help your audience follow your logic and connect the dots between ideas.
If your presentation includes slides or other visual aids, indicate when and where you plan to use them to enhance your points.
If applicable, mention when you'll open the floor for questions and discussion. Be sure to allocate time for this if it's part of your presentation.
If you're presenting information that requires citations or sources, include them in your outline. This ensures you give credit where it's due and can reference them during your presentation if needed.
Here are some additional tips for creating a Presentation Outline
Here are a few presentation outline examples for different types of presentations:
Title: Introducing Our New Product: XYZ Tech Gadgets
Introduction
Main Points
A. Product Features
B. Target Audience
C. Pricing and Packages
Transition: "I'm glad you're interested in our product. Let's talk about the different ways you can purchase it."
Purchase and Support
Q&A Session.
Title: The Evolution of Jazz Music
A. Early Origins of Jazz
B. The Jazz Age (1920s)
C. Bebop and Modern Jazz (1940s-1960s)
Transition : "Let's now turn our attention to the diversity of jazz styles, which is as vast and complex as the history of the music itself."
Different Styles of Jazz
Influence of Jazz on Popular Music
Presentation outlines are indispensable tools that can elevate your presentations from good to great. They provide structure, organization, and clarity, ensuring that your message reaches your audience effectively. No matter if you're delivering an educational presentation, a convincing sales pitch, or an interesting speech, these presentation outline examples aim to offer you valuable information.
To take your presentations to the next level, leverage AhaSlides. With AhaSlides , you can seamlessly integrate interactive features into your presentation, such as spinner wheel , live polls , surveys , quizzes , and audience feedback features.
These interactive features not only enhance audience engagement but also provide valuable insights and real-time interaction, making your presentations more dynamic and memorable.
So, let’s explore our template library !
📌 Tips: Asking open-ended questions help you to create an outline for presentation easier!
Title, Introduction, Key points, subpoints, transitions, visuals, conclusion, Q&A , and time allocation.
Introduction, main points, visuals, conclusion, and Q&A.
Define objectives, list key topics, organize content logically, and allocate time.
Yes, an outline helps structure and guide your presentation effectively.
Ref: Indeed | EdrawMind
A writer who wants to create practical and valuable content for the audience
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May 24, 2024
Whether you’re building a house, baking a cake, or creating a killer presentation — having a plan in place before you begin work will make the task much easier. Planning saves time and enhances the quality of your work. This is especially true for business presentations, which is why you should always start with a presentation outline.
A presentation outline is a streamlined version of your talk, capturing the general direction and key points. Its purpose is to shape your thinking, organize your thoughts, and ensure your material is presented logically.
In this article, we’ll explore what a presentation outline is, how storytelling can engage your audience, and how to create a flawless outline. Let’s dive in.
What are you trying to achieve with your presentation? A good starting point is to think about the overall purpose.
There are six main types of presentation goals:
In a business setting, ‘to inform’ is most common, but it’s usually coupled with at least one other. For example, if you’re there to talk about quarterly results, then you’ll want to inform and motivate. However, if you’re a business coach, your goals will likely be to inspire, motivate, and entertain.
Once you’ve defined your goal, you’ll want to understand the impact you hope to have on your audience. To answer this, ask these questions:
From here, you should be able to create a summary of your presentation’s goals and purpose in one or two sentences. Put that on your first slide for easy reference.
Knowing your audience is crucial for crafting a presentation that resonates. Consider their knowledge level, interests, and what they hope to gain from your presentation. Tailoring your content to meet their expectations will make your presentation more engaging and effective.
Stories are powerful tools for bringing people and ideas together. Great stories persuade and inform; the best stories inspire and stay with us. But we don’t often see this happening enough in the boardroom.
Stats and numbers are important for supporting claims, but if you want to inspire your audience, you need to weave those stats into a story. T he truth is, most stories are formulaic, so once you’ve chosen your formula, filling in the blanks is pretty easy.
Let’s look at a few popular story structure formulas below.
Mixing storytelling with facts works in a kind of mutually supportive cycle. Facts add substance to the story; the story adds interest to the facts.
In this structure, you weave the two together and move back and forth between the two.
From Odysseus to Chihiro , adventure stories typically feature a hero who goes on a journey fraught with peril and learns a vital lesson at the end of it. It’s a formula employed by thousands of writers — and you can draw from it to add some drama to your presentation.
This structure works really well for inspirational personal stories, or tales about a company from its humble beginnings to the success it is today.
The ‘pitch’ style of presentation is commonly used by salespeople. The goal is to show how a product or idea can help an individual overcome a hurdle toward a positive outcome. The story should be relatable, so the audience can picture themselves in the situation and, therefore, benefitting from the solution.
This presentation format is for when you want to teach your audience something — whether that’s a process, a new skill, or a way to overcome a problem. It has similarities with the fact and story structure, insomuch as facts should weave into the story.
A close relative of the pitch, this three-part structure swaps a hurdle for an opportunity. Here, you want to show your audience that a problem they thought they had actually had an easy fix.
Now you’ve worked out your structure, it’s time to start building your presentation. Storyboarding is the best way to do this. In the same way that directors use storyboards to map out their films scene-by-scene, you’re going to use it to map out your presentation slide-by-slide.
(Don’t worry, you can do stick people and squiggles if drawing isn’t your strong point.) Image Source
The trick here is to avoid adding too much detail too quckly. Ideally, have one or two sentences on each slide summarizing what each one will address. Stick to one main point per slide and no more than 3 subpoints.
You can do this with pen and paper, but since you’ll likely end up going digital eventually, you might as well start there. It looks far neater, and it means that if you need to change something, it’s as simple as deleting or editing a cell or slide rather than starting over.
If you don’t want to start from scratch, a business presentation template is a great place to start. You can storyboard directly on the template, and then flesh out each of the slides in more detail once you’re ready.
Once you’ve got your storyboard mostly ready, all that’s left is to fill in the details! And of course: make it look great.
Proper formatting is crucial to ensuring your presentation is visually appealing and easy to follow. Effective formatting helps to highlight key points, maintain audience engagement, and enhance overall comprehension. Here are some guidelines and best practices for formatting your presentation:
By following these formatting guidelines, you can create a presentation that is not only visually appealing but also effective in communicating your message. Proper formatting helps to keep the audience engaged and ensures that your key points are clearly conveyed.
For those looking for an intuitive and efficient way to create professional presentations, consider using Cacoo , our online diagramming tool. Cacoo allows you to collaborate in real time, offering a variety of templates and design tools that make planning, designing, and presenting a breeze. Whether you’re working solo or with a team, Cacoo helps you streamline the presentation creation process, ensuring that your final product is polished and impactful.
Ready to take your presentations to the next level? Try Cacoo for free today and experience the difference it can make in your workflow.
This post was originally published on April 07, 2021, and updated most recently on May 24, 2024.
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Whether you are solving a puzzle, cooking a meal, or writing an article – the tasks can be significantly easier if all the pieces are present before you start. A presentation outline is a tool that will help a presenter arrange the ideas and make the conversation flow logically to give an efficient and effective presentation.
It may feel like wasting time planning the presentation when you could get started directly. But the facts and experience of great presenters in history give premises for the opposite. Planning saves time, and the same applies to business presentations or writing a speech. Start with planning; start with the presentation outline.
In this article, we’re going to understand the presentation outline, discuss its significance, provide a step-by-step guide on how to create one, and provide some expert advice.
A presentation outline is a simplified summary of your speech. Its purpose is to help you shape your thinking, make your presentation presented in the most logical manner, and organize the material in the most efficient way. It should follow the basic structure of your presentation and include concise summaries of your major points.
A presentation outline can guide you in preparing for your presentation or speech. It provides you with a simplified version of the synopsis of your thoughts and a direct route for moving your audience from where they are now to where you desire them to be. Some of the key advantages of the presentation outline are:
· Helps the speaker review the content’s scope and check the applicability of supportive arguments
· Helps organize a message that the audience can understand by creating a visual aid showing the balance and proportion of a speech
· Saves time by helping you brainstorm the presentation
· Assisting with what ideas to keep in the presentation
· Gives general direction to your presentation
“A person without a plan is lost before they start.” – Lewis K Bendele
Here is a step-by-step guide to creating the outline for your presentation:
The essential part of creating a presentation outline is to determine the goal of your presentation. To find this, consider what you want your audience to learn or support following your talk. For example, a non-profit organization that takes care of street dogs may give a presentation to persuade listeners to take care of street dogs by giving them some food. The goal for the presentation should be very concise and measurable so you can have a particular point of focus for your presentation. The most common goals for presentations include:
· Motivating
· Educating
· Inciting an action
· Informing
· Entertaining
· Persuading users to do something specific
To build a great skyscraper, make sure the structure is right! The same goes for building an efficient presentation outline. While building the structure of your presentation outline, consider in which direction each of your discussion points is going in your talk and what premises you can use to support those points. The most popular way to organize the structure is by writing each point on sticky notes so that they can move around and see how each point contributes to the purpose of the presentation. To make better use of the audience’s time, you can also write how much time each segment of the presentation takes. The three major segments into which a presentation is divided are:
· Introduction
· Body
· Conclusion
Have you wondered why great presenters always start their presentations with a rhetorical question, or share a relatable story, or use a quote? The answer to this is they create a backstage for their presentation and engage their audience early on by setting the tone they want for the rest of their presentation. These are the ways they grab the attention of the audience, which leads to better engagement and response.
When you plan your presentation outline, always plan how you want to start the presentation, as it will set the tone and backstage of your presentation.
We’ve all been there; those long lectures and corporate meetings, where you give it all to stay attentive to the data being shown and slowly being read off of a boring spreadsheet.
Don’t make that same mistake in your presentation. Incorporate your data in a visual and engaging way. Take a thought about adding pictures, videos, or other content to your presentation. The style and color scheme you choose for the text on your slides should be taken into account as additional visual material. You can communicate some emotions through color; for example, the color red portrays passion.
While outlining your presentation, mention which visual aids you want to use, where, and how you want to use them.
Add a call-to-action for your audience to get a better outcome from your presentation. For example, a businessman in a presentation to the audience will try to persuade them to buy his company’s product. Call-to-action brings the audience to the desired place that you want them to. Make your audience aware of the benefits they will get by coming to your desired place.
Clearly mention in your presentation outline which CTA you will be using.
A presentation outline is a tool that can be used for creating a presentation in the most logical manner. It helps improve the presentation on an all-rounder basis. Moreover, it gives your audience a visual representation of what you will be talking about and supports in capturing their interest.
It takes meticulous planning, close attention to content details, and a keen eye for design to produce an effective presentation outline. If not properly outlined, even the best presentations can be disastrous.
“Practice makes a man perfect,” as they said. “Practice can make your presentation perfect,” we implied.
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What is a presentation outline.
A presentation outline is like a roadmap for organizing your thoughts and delivering your message smoothly during a presentation. It helps you structure your content logically, ensuring that your audience can follow along easily. By providing a clear framework, an outline enhances the clarity and effectiveness of your presentation.
1. Clarity and Focus
Using an outline keeps your presentation organized and focused, preventing you from going off track. It ensures that your presentation has a clear purpose and that all the information you share is relevant to your main points.
2. Logical Structure
A well-crafted outline ensures that your presentation flows logically, guiding your audience smoothly from one point to the next. This helps your audience follow your train of thought and understand your message more easily.
3. Enhanced Delivery
Having a clear outline can boost your confidence and make your delivery smoother. With a structured plan, you’re less likely to forget important points or ramble on, resulting in a more professional presentation.
4. Time Management
An outline helps you manage your time better by estimating how long each part of your presentation will take. This ensures that you stay within the allotted timeframe, keeping your presentation on track and engaging for your audience.
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1. Purpose of Presentation
Understanding why you’re giving your presentation is crucial for planning its structure. Identifying your goal means thinking about what you want your audience to get out of it. This clarity forms the basis of your whole presentation. There are six potential reasons you might be presenting:
Thinking about your goal will help you make a presentation that really grabs attention. Answering these questions can help you figure out what your goal is:
Once you have the answers, you’ll have a good idea of what your presentation should cover and where to start.
2. Consider Color and Design
How you present your pitch matters just as much as what you say. Take a moment to think about the fonts and colors you’ll use on your slides. Research suggests that red can convey excitement and grab your audience’s attention, while white gives off a sense of simplicity and clarity.
3. Establishing Structure: Arrange Your Ideas in a Logical Order
When crafting your presentation, it’s important to structure your ideas in a clear and logical sequence. Start with an introduction to set the stage, followed by the main body where you delve into your key points, and wrap it up with a conclusion to summarize your main ideas.
4. Engaging Your Audience
When you’re getting ready for your presentation, think about how you can start off in a way that grabs everyone’s attention. You could ask a thought-provoking question, share an interesting story, or begin with a meaningful quote. The main thing is to get your audience interested right from the beginning and set the tone for the rest of your talk.
5. Adding Visuals
Give some thought to whether you want to include pictures, videos, or other visual stuff in your presentation. Even if your outline doesn’t mention exactly what visuals to use, you can suggest where they might fit in to help explain your ideas.
6. Encouraging Action
Come up with a clear and compelling message to encourage your audience to take action. Whether it’s encouraging customers to try out a new product or inviting people to join a demo, make sure they understand what’s in it for them. And if your presentation doesn’t really need a specific call to action, just wrap up by summarizing your main points and saying thanks for listening.
Alternatively, you can skip the hassle of crafting a presentation outline manually – try SlidesAI for seamless assistance .
1. Understanding Your Audience
Take some time to know your audience by researching beforehand. This helps you adjust your presentation to connect with them better.
2. Enhance with Quotes, Testimonials, or Data
Make your presentation more interesting by adding extra info like quotes, testimonials, or data. It can make your audience more engaged and reinforce your message.
3. Visualize Your Concepts
How you show your ideas matters a lot. Tools like SlidesAI can help you express your concepts clearly and effectively.
4. Highlight Key Takeaways
Figure out the most important points you want your audience to remember. This makes it easier for them to recall and understand your message.
5. Seek Feedback
Ask for feedback to improve your presentation. It’s a good way to make sure it connects better with your audience.
Topic: The Impact of Social Media on Mental Health
Target Audience: College students
Time Limit: 15 minutes
I. Introduction (2 minutes)
Attention Grabber : Briefly discuss a real-life example of how social media can negatively impact mental health (e.g., cyberbullying, unrealistic beauty standards).
Introduce the topic : Clearly state the topic and its significance (e.g., “Today, I’ll be talking about the increasing impact of social media on mental health, particularly among young adults like yourselves”).
Preview : Briefly outline the key points that will be covered (e.g., “We’ll explore the positive and negative aspects of social media use, discuss common mental health concerns associated with it, and offer some tips for healthy social media habits”).
II. Main Body (10 minutes)
Positive aspects of social media:
Connection and community : Highlight how social media can help people connect with friends and family, build communities based on shared interests, and combat feelings of loneliness.
Information and self-expression : Discuss how social media can be a source of information, news, and inspiration, and provide a platform for self-expression and creativity.
Negative aspects of social media:
Social comparison and envy : Explain how constant exposure to curated online profiles can lead to social comparison, feelings of inadequacy, and envy.
Cyberbullying and harassment : Discuss the prevalence of cyberbullying and online harassment, their potential to significantly impact mental health, and the importance of online safety.
Addiction and anxiety : Explain how excessive social media use can lead to addiction, anxiety, and sleep disturbances.
III. Conclusion (3 minutes)
Summary : Briefly recap the key takeaways discussed in the presentation.
Call to action : Encourage the audience to be mindful of their social media usage and offer practical tips for developing healthy habits, such as setting time limits, curating their feed, and prioritizing real-life interactions.
Question and Answer : Allocate time for audience questions and address them thoughtfully.
This is just a sample outline, and you can adapt and modify it based on your specific topic, audience, and time constraints. Remember, a well-structured and engaging presentation will effectively communicate your message and leave a lasting impression on your audience.
How can ai help you create a presentation outline .
With the assistance of AI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini, crafting outlines becomes a breeze. Furthermore, you can utilize user-friendly online AI presentation tools such as SlidesAI to effortlessly generate your presentations.
Using a presentation outline can be helpful. It makes things clearer, boosts the speaker’s confidence, and helps manage information better. It also keeps the audience more engaged. But, if your presentation is fast-paced, casual, or focused on a specific area of expertise, you might want to keep the outline short and sweet. Just pick what works best for your situation and audience.
There are various formats, but a common approach is using bullet points, numbered lists , or headings and subheadings. Choose the format that best suits your content and visualizes your information.
Adapt your presentation outline by tailoring:
There’s no set rule; it depends on the complexity of your topic and presentation length.
Yes, mind maps can be a good way to visually brainstorm and organize presentation ideas.
You can use pen and paper, a word processing software like Microsoft Word, or dedicated outlining tools. Presentation software like PowerPoint also offers built-in outlining features.
Every presentation is different, reflecting your unique business and the information you share. But, some common presentation types are used across various fields and teams. Before diving into specific slides or organization, consider the type that best suits your audience.
Have you ever encountered a lengthy PowerPoint presentation where finding specific information felt like a challenge? Tables of contents (TOCs) are a common feature in various writing formats, helping users navigate content easily. Similar to Microsoft Word’s TOC functionality, PowerPoint offers methods for creating your own TOC. This guide will explore these methods, enabling you […]
A well-structured presentation is the key to delivering your message clearly and persuasively. An effective presentation outline not only organizes your content but also ensures a smooth flow that keeps your audience engaged from start to finish. Whether you’re preparing for a sales pitch, a board meeting, or a conference talk, having a strong outline is essential.
Here’s a guide on how to create a presentation outline, along with tips for each section and examples for different presentation scenarios.
Your opening is your first impression, so it needs to grab your audience’s attention and set the stage for what’s to come. The introduction should clearly state your topic, establish your credibility, and give a preview of what the presentation will cover.
Before diving into your main content, it’s important to set the stage by providing context or background information. This section helps your audience understand the significance of your topic and why it’s relevant.
The body of your presentation is where you’ll dive into the details of your topic. Organize your content into clear, logical sections, each focused on a specific aspect of your topic. Make sure each point builds upon the last to create a cohesive narrative.
Audience engagement is key to retaining attention and making your presentation memorable. Incorporating interactive elements like Q&A sessions, polls, or short activities can make your presentation more dynamic and participatory.
Anticipating and addressing potential questions or objections before the Q&A session can help reinforce your credibility and make your presentation more persuasive. This section can be woven into your content or addressed in a separate segment.
Your conclusion should reinforce your main points, tie everything together, and leave your audience with a strong final impression. Whether you’re aiming to persuade, inform, or inspire, end with a clear call to action or key takeaway.
If your presentation includes a Q&A session, plan how you’ll manage it. Anticipate tough questions, and be prepared to handle them confidently while staying on topic.
A well-crafted presentation outline serves as the backbone of a successful presentation. By carefully structuring your content and considering each key section, you can guide your audience smoothly from the introduction to the conclusion while keeping them engaged and interested. Whether you’re preparing for a pitch, a seminar, or an internal meeting, following this outline template will help you deliver your message clearly, effectively, and with confidence.
A presentation outline is a roadmap to a more successful business pitch — a general plan that summarizes what you want to say to prospective customers, clients or investors. It lets you organize your thoughts, group ideas into main points and present your material logically. But what should you include in your slides?
We've compiled 11 tips for more effective pitch prep.
If you came here looking for presentation templates , here's an a couople of examples from of our most popular ones. If not, just carry on.
What is a presentation outline.
An outline for a presentation is a helpful tool that organizes the main points and flow of the presentation. It acts as a guide for the presenter, outlining the order in which information will be presented and the main ideas that will be covered. A good outline should include headings and subheadings that outline the main topics and supporting details, ensuring a clear and logical arrangement of information. Creating a presentation outline helps the presenter stay organized and focused, and makes it easier for the audience to follow the content and understand the main concepts of the presentation.
1. decide on a goal.
Before you brainstorm, and before you scribble down any notes, come up with a goal for your presentation. What do you want your pitch deck to say to your audience? What message do you want to convey? What do you want it to achieve?
Perhaps you want your pitch to raise seed funds. Maybe you want to introduce a new product or service to customers. Whatever the reason for creating your pitch, decide on a specific, measurable goal. This will guide the rest of your preparation.
Every good presentation includes an introduction, main body, and conclusion. These three components form the "skeleton" of your presentation — the bare bones of your pitch. You don't need to think about all the small details at this stage — you can flesh out your presentation slides at a later date.
Your introduction is probably the most important part of your pitch. After all, you only have seven seconds to make a good first impression, according to research. Use your intro to introduce your brand, greet your audience and give a taster of what's to come.
The body of your presentation includes your main ideas and any supporting ideas. Use it to feature testimonials, financials and fundraising info, traction and milestones, and, of course, your marketing plan.
Finally, your conclusion summarizes all your points in a few slides. This should leave your audience wanting more.
Visual content is an essential ingredient. The human brain processes visuals 60,000 times faster than regular text, so including images in your pitch is a great idea. Don't forget about videos, either. Consumers are 64 percent more likely to purchase a product after watching an online video, making visual content a good choice if you want to generate leads and boost sign-ups.
The most successful pitch decks incorporate striking visuals. Others have fancy fonts and graphics. All of this visual content demands attention from your audience and creates a cool aesthetic that will help you outrank your rivals.
At this early stage of pitch deck preparation, you don't have to finalize the images you are going to include in your pitch. However, we think it's a good idea to point out where you are going to use images in your presentation. This way, you can organize your ideas and make sure everything flows properly.
No two presentations are the same. The most successful pitch decks, however, certainly have a lot in common. When creating your outline, discover what makes a brilliant pitch. The University of Hawaii says great presentations rarely cover more than five points. The University of Cambridge in England says there should be four key points in every 45-minute presentation.
Here at Slidebean, we think one idea per slide, good design, lots of images, and quotes all make presentations so much more interesting. We're not fans of the 'thank you' slide, though — the one that recognizes your audience for sitting through your presentation. It's completely unnecessary.
A call-to-action is much better than a 'thank you' slide. This encourages your audience to take action after your presentation. When creating your outline, think of a short, snappy call-to-action that prompts a response. A call-to-action is your final chance to engage with your audience during your presentation. You might want to encourage people to sign up to your mailing list, for example. Alternatively, you can include a link to your website so people can download a trial version of your product.
"No matter what form your CTA takes, the most important aspect is the copy," says growth marketing expert Sujan Patel and Voila Norbert co-founder, writing for Forbes magazine . "You’re telling the visitor what you want them to do, so it needs to be persuasive. Remember, your audience is looking for an answer or a solution to a problem. Connect with them by telling them exactly what they’re going to get if they take action."
Every day, more than 30 million presentations are created on PowerPoint alone. Then there are the hundreds of thousands of pitches designed in Keynote, Prezi, and Slidebean. With so many presentations out there, how do you inspire people to invest in your services? One way to create a successful pitch is to identify a solution to a problem that your audience might have.
Slidebean recently reviewed some of the best presentation examples from successful startups. Most of them provide solutions to common problems early on in their respective pitches. Customer messaging platform Intercom, for example, says analytics, customer base browsing, and customer research is the answer for businesses who find it hard to engage with customers. They include these solutions near the beginning of their pitch deck.
If you want to have a more successful presentation, think about solving problems in your niche when creating your outline.
Quotes from senior management help you convey abstract ideas and make your presentation more engaging. You should obtain any quotes you want to use in your presentation during the planning stage. Testimonials from customers and clients also prove popular. Research shows that positive reviews influence purchasing decisions and increase trust.
Finally, statistics add some depth to your presentation. Industry facts and figures back up any claims you make and increase engagement. Discover relevant statistics when creating your outline. You don't need to include any actual quotes, testimonials or statistics yet. Just jot down where you want to place them in your presentation.
The way you present information in your pitch is just as important as the information itself. Now is the time to start thinking about the font/s you want to use or the color of your slides. Research shows that red conveys passion and excitement and catches the attention of your audience. White, on the other hand, conveys simplicity and purity.
Slidebean has a range of color palettes that transform the look of your slides. You can choose up to three color sets and play around with different text, backgrounds, and highlights.
Think of your presentation outline template as a very rough first draft. Decide on what types of slides you want to use, and decide on a final running order. You might feature quotes early on in your presentation, for example, and leave testimonials until the end. Don't forget to include a slide with your contact details — website, phone number, address, etc. — and your brand values.
Your presentation outline should be a group effort, too. Ask your colleagues for input.
Your outline should include enough information so you can visualize what your final presentation will look like. Once you have finished your outline, read it back and identify the key takeaways from the document. Is the structure of your presentation clear, for example? Does it convey your brand message? Will it engage your audience?
Every slide in your presentation should achieve the goal you created at the beginning of your outline. If something isn't working, make changes. You might want to switch slides around or remove unnecessary information, for example.
Once you have completed your outline, it's time to start putting everything together. Yes, you could create a PowerPoint pitch deck from scratch, but this is often time-consuming and complicated. Instead, use a template, which provides you with all the presentation slides you need.
Here at Slidebean, we have presentation templates for business of all sizes, including startups and scaleups. You can create a professional pitch deck in just a few minutes by following the on-screen prompts. Everything's included — bullet points, graphics, headers, footers, and more. Take the time to plan your pitch to produce a powerful sales document that helps you communicate with your audience.
Once you have created your presentation outline template, sign up to Slidebean and design a pitch that provides you with a huge return on your investment.
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This is a functional model you can use to create your own formulas and project your potential business growth. Instructions on how to use it are on the front page.
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Ineffective communication and a well-structured presentation can be a game-changer. It has the potential to inform, persuade, inspire, and captivate your audience. However, the road to a successful presentation is not paved with improvisation and haphazardly organized content. Instead, it begins with a solid presentation outline—a roadmap that guides you through your topic, ensuring clarity, coherence, and impact. In this article, we will explore how to make a presentation outline, from its fundamental components to the reasons why it is an indispensable tool for presenters across various Presentation design services .
Table of Contents
A presentation outline is like the skeleton of your presentation. It serves as a blueprint that defines the structure and flow of your content. While the exact format may vary depending on the nature of your presentation and personal preferences, a typical outline consists of key components that help you organize your thoughts and ideas logically. Here’s a breakdown of these components:
Your title previews what the audience should anticipate during your presentation. The introduction, often including a hook or attention-grabbing statement, engages your audience and establishes the context of your topic.
These are the core sections of your presentation, each addressing a distinct aspect of your topic. Each main point should be clear, concise, and supported by evidence, examples, or data.
Subpoints elaborate on the main points, offering additional information, explanations, or examples. They provide depth and context to your presentation.
Transitions are bridges that connect one point to the next, ensuring a smooth flow of ideas. They guide your audience through your presentation and make it easier to follow.
This section includes any visuals, multimedia elements, or references you plan to incorporate into your presentation to enhance understanding and engagement.
The conclusion summarizes your key points, reinforces your main message, and leaves a memorable impression on your audience.
An outline is a tool used to organize your thoughts and ideas before writing a paper or presentation. It helps you to determine the main points of your talk and organize them in a way that will be easy for your audience to understand. There are many different ways to create an outline, but there are some common elements that should be included in all outlines.
The first step in creating an outline is to decide on the main points you want to include in your presentation. These points should be related to the overall topic of your talk and should be arranged in a logical order. Once you have determined the main points, you can start to fill in the details.
When creating an outline, it is important to be as specific as possible. Include all of the details you will need to make your presentation successful. For each main point, list the evidence or supporting information you will use to illustrate that point. Be sure to include any visual aids you will use, such as charts or graphs.
Once you have created your outline, you can use it as a guide when creating your presentation. Be sure to refer to your outline often, especially when you are first starting out. As you become more comfortable with the material, you may find that you do not need to refer to it as often.
Creating an outline is a helpful way to make sure your presentation is well-organized and informative. By including all of the necessary information in your outline, you can be sure that your presentation will be a success.
A presentation outline is a valuable tool that can help you plan and organize your thoughts before creating a presentation. By including all of the necessary information in your outline, you can be sure that your presentation will be a success. An outline can also help you to determine the main points of your talk and to organize them in a way that will be easy for your audience to understand.
Now that we have a clear understanding of what a presentation outline entails let’s explore why it is such a vital component of any successful presentation:
Organization and Clarity: Having good outlines help you write your ideas in a logical manner. By doing so, it allows the flow of the presentation thus simplifying the understanding of the message by the audience.
Time Management: Having an outline ensures that one distributes their time effectively between sections of a presentation. This helps you not run out of time, and avoid wasting a lot of time on the same topic, therefore ensures that you are on target.
Reduced Anxiety: Knowing you have a well-thought-out roadmap reduces anxiety and boosts your confidence as a presenter. You’ll feel more prepared and in control.
Audience Engagement: An organized presentation is more engaging for your audience. It keeps their attention and makes them more likely to absorb and retain the information you share.
Adaptability: A presentation outline is not set in stone. It provides flexibility, allowing you to adapt to changes or unexpected developments during your presentation while still maintaining a coherent structure.
Enhanced Credibility: An organized and structured presentation reflects professionalism and competence. It enhances your credibility as a presenter and instills trust in your audience.
Crafting a compelling presentation outline is a step-by-step process that begins with understanding your audience and your message. Here’s how you can create an effective presentation outline:
In order to make your presentation as effective and engaging for the audience, it is important that you choose a topic with which they can connect. From there on out depends on how much time will be allocated towards entertaining or educating them – so think carefully!
Come up with a catchy title that accurately reflects the content of your talk!
This is a crucial point – the more concise your list, the better! Your audience will thank you for it later.
One of the most important decisions you make when giving a presentation, especially one with many points or details to cover in order from start to end, is how they will be structured. Will your audience get their attention drawn out by starting off slow and building up? Or do what feels right for them – whether that means going into depth on some topics before moving on to others matter more immediately at hand In any case, though there isn’t necessarily a “right” answer here as every situation calls for something different.
Outline your talk so you can be prepared and confident. Outlines are a great way to organize thoughts, especially when it’s time for public speaking! From this outline, you’ll know what points need more attention than others or which order works best with the audience – all without having spent hours wasted on preparation because there was no plan beforehand.”
Your outline should be as perfect and concise for this type of audience. If you’re giving a presentation, make sure there are no mistakes in your speech before it’s delivered so that the grading criteria will reflect positively on you!
Practice makes perfect! The more you do it, the better your performance will become. You’ll know exactly what to say and how much time each section should last without any hesitation at all because every detail has been planned out beforehand – this is one skill that can’t be learned through natural talent alone; practice works wonders on these kinds of things too (in addition with other skills such as research).
To make a presentation outline, start by deciding on the main points you want to include in your talk. These points should be related to the overall topic of your presentation and should be arranged in a logical order. Once you have determined the main points, you can start to fill in the details. When creating an outline, be as specific as possible. Include all of the evidence or supporting information you will use to illustrate each point. Be sure to also include any visual aids you will use, such as charts or graphs. Once you have created your outline, you can use it as a guide when creating your presentation. Refer to your outline often, especially when you are first starting out. As you become more comfortable with the material, you may find that you do not need to refer to it as often. Creating an outline is a helpful way to make sure your presentation is well-organized and informative. By including all of the necessary information in your outline, you can be sure that your presentation will be a success.
But if you want these things in 8 steps you can also use these steps:
Ineffective communication, a presentation outline is your North Star. This hand guide takes readers through the dynamics of the topic; it makes certain that the intended message has been clearly put across and leaves the audience interested. Whether you are a business professional, an educator, or even a presenter, making a good presentation outline is a skill that will add on to your communication skills. Therefore, take it into consideration that in case of the upcoming presentations the map or an outline which will guide you to the point of understanding, inspiration, and persuasion, is an essential tool for success because it will lead both you and your audience on a fruitful journey towards desired goals.
Like other forms of academic writing, a presentation can be divided into three parts: an introduction detailing the purpose and structure of the talk, a body covering the main points, and a conclusion summarizing and highlighting the significance of your talk.
In a new PowerPoint presentation file, click the first slide. Or, in an existing presentation file, click the slide that you want the Outline to appear after. Click the arrow next to New Slide on the Home tab, then click Outline.
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A presentation outline is an organizational tool that will help you organize your thoughts and summarize what you want to share in your presentation. A well-written outline can help you create a logical flow for the information you present and keep you on track as you present. This can also help you make your message more clear and keep your audience interested in what you have to say.
Chances are that at some point in your career, you will be asked to give a presentation to your team, department, or senior management. And that’s a good thing because presentations are a great way to share your ideas and communicate important information in a compelling, visual format.
An essential but sometimes overlooked part of an effective presentation is an effective presentation outline. A well-crafted outline can help you to:
Ultimately, an effective outline will help you create an effective presentation that will get the support you need from your intended audience.
Before a director shoots a frame of a movie, they first create a storyboard that outlines the sequence and flow of the movie’s story. In a similar way, you can create a presentation outline as a blueprint for the story you want to tell your audience. A presentation outline can help you to stay on message during your presentation, keep your audience engaged, and make the information you share easier to understand.
Some people don’t like to create outlines because they think of them as time-consuming and tedious, but taking the time to create a well-structured presentation outline is important. An outline can help you:
The following steps can help you to create a presentation that will keep your audience engaged and informed.
It’s hard to create an outline for a presentation if you don’t understand why you are making the presentation, what it’s about, or who your audience is. To understand the presentation’s purpose and its audience, answer these questions:
A structure helps you determine how and where to present your key points. There are several different structures you can use in your presentation, including:
Choose the structure that works for your needs. You can also mix and match structures to customize your outline. It doesn’t matter which structure you choose. Just understand that the structure needs to include an introduction, main body, and conclusion.
This is where you consider how you want to start your presentation. Grabbing your audience’s attention will help them to engage early and remain interested in your presentation. For example, you can ask questions that lead into your subject, share a related story, or tell an amusing anecdote. Your opening can help to set the tone for the presentation.
Step 5: include a call to action.
The goal of a call to action is to motivate the audience to take a particular action when your presentation is completed.
For example, if your presentation is about the importance of writing weekly progress reports, your call to action should motivate your audience to make the process of writing progress reports a standard procedure in their work week. The presentation itself should illustrate why you need their reports and help them understand what’s in it for them if they write their reports.
In a perfect world, your audience will understand everything in your presentation and there will be enthusiastic applause when you finish. But in case that doesn’t happen, make sure you include in your outline some time to address any questions your audience might have.
After you’ve created your presentation outline, you might want to review it with other people to see if they catch something you missed.
When your outline is completed, it’s time to create your presentation. Here are a few tips that can help you to make your presentation more effective.
Templates are a great starting point for creating documents like a presentation outline. You can create your own template or use an existing template. A basic presentation outline example is:
[Presentation Title]
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In this tutorial, you'll learn how to write a PowerPoint outline for a presentation . You'll see a presentation outline example that shows how beneficial the process can be. It might seem like an extra step while building a presentation. But creating a presentation outline saves you time in the long run.
Presentation outlines are a great way to save time. So are advanced PowerPoint templates. You'll see examples of professional PowerPoint templates from Envato Elements (unlimited downloads) in this tutorial while you learn how to write a presentation outline.
You might think that learning how to write a presentation outline is an extra step. Writing a presentation outline takes time. But you might be surprised by how much time it ultimately saves in later steps.
It's important to see writing a presentation outline as a helpful step instead of extra work. Investing time in creating a PowerPoint outline helps you avoid rewriting and reworking your presentation.
When I was a rookie presenter, I made a lot of mistakes while writing a presentation. I'd open PowerPoint, spend too much time picking a theme, and then start writing my content. I jumped back and forth between slides adding points.
In short: this created an unfocused presentation. You could tell that there was a scatterbrained approach to writing content. When I started using outlines, the presentation felt more cohesive, and every point fell naturally into place.
But don't think that a PowerPoint presentation outline will be tossed in the trash when your presentation is finished. With a bit of creativity, PowerPoint presentation outlines can serve multiple purposes:
Think of writing a presentation as a series of steps. Writing a presentation outline is the first step that saves time on all future steps. Learn how to do a presentation outline and more in our tutorial below:
Now, let's dive into our tutorial on PowerPoint presentation outlines.
Once you've committed to writing a PowerPoint presentation outline, you might be wondering what the process looks like. Let's learn the keys to writing a presentation outline. Then, you'll learn how to incorporate that presentation outline into your PowerPoint.
The PowerPoint screenshots that you'll see in this section use a template called Brusher from Envato Elements .
Now let's look at how to create PowerPoint outlines:
If PowerPoint is open, close the application! If it's not open, don't even think about heading for the Start menu to launch it.
That's right. The most important part of writing a PowerPoint presentation outline is to leave out the app for the time being. If you don't do this, you risk spinning your wheels and redoing parts of your presentation over and over.
You might be surprised at how much focus a presentation outline brings to the process of learning how to write a presentation outline.
How many tutorials tell you to close the app while learning how to make a presentation outline? Well, this one just did, and it's crucial to the process of writing a presentation outline.
It's vital that every presentation has a single, unifying goal. A PowerPoint presentation is a series of slides with supporting points that all tie back to that goal.
This goal is the guiding principle for everything you write. Setting the presentation's goal is the first step for writing your PowerPoint outline.
As you set your presentation's goal, it's also crucial to think about the type of presentation that you're giving. I divide presentation purposes into three key types, each with their nuances when it comes to writing. Here are the three types of presentation goals:
Before you start filling in the presentation outline, make sure that you've set this singular goal. Otherwise, you risk your presentation diverging into many ideas that don't support a common cause.
In summary, your first outline step is to write your presentation's goal . It's that singular measuring stick that you use as you add more content. Every time you add a new slide or supporting point, ask yourself, " does this content support my presentation's goal? "
Supporting points help reiterate the presentation's goal. But you can't support the key goal if you don't define the goal! Learning how to do a presentation outline comes back to setting a goal.
Now that you've set your presentation's " north star ," you can begin to block in the critical sections that support the goal. Each section should give a new angle but play a part in reinforcing the central goal.
I tend to aim for three or four key sections per presentation. Each of those sections might include multiple PowerPoint slides.
This is commonly called the " body " of the presentation. It's the meat and bones of the presentation with the content that helps you drive your key point home. Fill in a goal as you see in the presentation outline example below:
Let's walk through an example. Let's say that I'm attempting to inspire my audience to learn Power Query, a popular Excel data tool. The goal is to encourage them to action. I'll use three key sections that support the goal:
No two presentations are the same. The way that you support your points will vary based on the presentation's goal. Remember: Y ou're the presenter. It's your story to tell.
Now, start filling in the details for each supporting section. Just as we expanded on the goal with crucial sections, each section should have supporting points.
In your medium of choice, write several supporting sentences for each of your key sections. This gives you several points that support your idea. Use these support points to create individual slides.
See the screenshot below for a sample presentation outline in progress:
Learn more about the writing process in this tutorial:
"You can't boil the entire ocean... The best way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time... Divide and conquer the task at hand..."
All these phrases mean the same thing: the best way to tackle a project is to divide it into parts. When you're creating a PowerPoint, writing a presentation outline first is the best way to break the project into easy-to-conquer tasks.
Once you've finished writing your PowerPoint presentation outline, it's time to jump back to the app finally. You've laid the groundwork for writing a presentation rapidly. Now, it's time to drop it into PowerPoint.
There are many ways to approach this task. For me, I paste the entire outline on the first slide. Then, I'll start carving that outline up, pasting the sections, and supporting points out to their slides. I use this PowerPoint outline slide to plan my presentation.
Now, start pasting those sections to their own sections. Using Outline view in PowerPoint or another tool, gradually pull your outline apart into unique sections. Instead of typing them one-by-one, just paste the sections onto new slides.
You don't have to stick with the exact text you wrote. Instead, paste the sections out and use them as the inspiration for content. By doing this, your presentation stays true to the original outline and on topic!
PowerPoint even has a helpful feature to focus on outlines in the app. Learn more about Outline view in PowerPoint in the tutorial below:
It might seem odd that we saved this step for last, but this approach helps you stay focused. Instead of jumping around inside PowerPoint while writing a presentation outline, consider using a separate tool.
Before writing your presentation outline think consider the following:
Your slides should just have your main points. If there's too much on your slide, it can be overwhelming for your audience. It can also be distracting. Instead of listening to you, your audience might be reading the text on the slide.
Instead of having complete sentences on your slide, you can reduce text by having simple sentences.
For example, instead of saying, " When you study before a test, you will remember the material, raise your grade and be knowledgeable about the subject. " You can simplify the statement to look like this:
Benefits of Studying
Simplifying your sentences, as shown above, makes it easier to follow the rules on minimizing text on your slides.
Visuals engage your audience, especially when they're eye-catching. They can also show what you’re discussing in the presentation.
If you want to add an emotional element to your presentation, a high-quality image is a great way to do that. If the image is low-quality or irrelevant, it can distract the audience. It’s best to think carefully about your visuals and what you want to add to the presentation.
While writing your outline, remember who you’re writing for. One of the things you need to know about your audience is their knowledge of the subject you’re discussing. Are you speaking to a group of professionals who understand the terminology and the subject well? Or are you talking to a group of students who don’t know much about the subject?
You must also keep your audience in mind if you’re adding humor to your presentation. If you offend your audience, even accidentally, they'll stop listening to you.
Don’t read off your slides. This is a common mistake that people can make. The audience can read your slides, so it can be boring to hear you repeat what’s written on the slide.
It’s more effective when you give the audience new information. If you want to have notes, you can use the speaker notes tool in PowerPoint. This tool lets you add notes that the audience won’t see.
Before we dive into how to write presentations quickly, let's take a look at another timesaver: presentation templates . PowerPoint templates already have most of the design work done for you.
On Envato Elements, you can source unlimited PowerPoint templates for a flat rate. The singular subscription gives you everything you need to create a presentation—fast! Many of these options include PowerPoint outline templates already built.
Explore PowerPoint Templates
Not only will you unlock unlimited PowerPoint templates, but you'll also gain access to many other creative assets. That includes stock photos, graphics, illustrations, and more!
As you finish up your PowerPoint outline, why not pair it with a presentation outline template to rapidly craft your presentation? Here are three of our favorites in the Envato Elements library, all included as a part of the subscription!
The name might be a coincidence, but this PowerPoint presentation titled Outline is a perfect choice for many purposes. You've got 30 slides across five color schemes that are ready for practically any topic.
Flexible PowerPoint templates like this make it easy to adapt your presentation outline easily thanks to their well-designed structure.
The strategy is the unifying direction for a business or project plan. They work well with PowerPoint outlines thanks to the focused approach. This template captures many of the most popular strategy deliverables like:
Are you running a creative agency? This PowerPoint template is sure to be a hit. It's useful for pitching projects or showing off your design chops. It's easy to update and has a fresh design that's certainly on-trend.
If you're still looking for presentation outline templates that save you time, Envato Elements might be right for you. Grab a template and design it rapidly!
We've just scratched the surface of what's possible with templates for PowerPoint. Templates are the best way to save many hours of design work. Here are several articles with the best selection of PowerPoint templates:
Learning how to write a presentation outline is just one of the many skills you need to become a confident presenter. Think of your learning journey in PowerPoint as a series of building blocks. Each skill gives you a steadier foundation.
Also, check our top-rated learning resource, How to Use PowerPoint (Ultimate Tutorial Guide.) It's a comprehensive source of the best learning materials to master PowerPoint.
You've already learned how to write an outline for a presentation. Keep learning with these three excellent tutorials:
You learned how to make a PowerPoint outline for a presentation. Writing a PowerPoint outline is a surefire way to save time and improve your presentation. It brings a focus and consistency to the content.
Every presentation is different. That means that every PowerPoint outline will differ. This guide offers general guidelines to help you. But remember to be confident in your subject knowledge.
Before you start writing a presentation, remember that writing an outline first is the best way to do it. Set a goal, write a few key sections, and fill in your supporting details. Then, rapidly build the slides with your content.
Don't forget! PowerPoint presentation templates from Envato Elements are major time-savers too! Use them alongside your outline to write presentations quickly.
Editorial Note : This post was originally published in February of 2020. It's been updated for accuracy with help from Sarah Joy .
It is inevitable that on certain occasions we would be asked to give a presentation. Some people may find this terrifying and become hesitant, especially when the topic assigned is unfamiliar to them. However, acing a presentation is possible if you would prepare properly. Mostly overlooked, and a step that many skips but this is the key to saving yourself from having self-doubt and anxiety caused by i nsufficient readiness. If you are wondering how to begin, then it’s best to start digging for information to draft your outline.
A presentation outline is a blueprint or framework of your speech. It is a textual arrangement that gives a picture of the entire speech you are preparing. It is an important planning tool which guides you logically through all the aspects that you need to consider prior to writing the presentation itself. It helps you to think of the elements to include and how do they correspond to one another. It also allows you to analyze and test the order of arrangement of your ideas and makes identifying weak and unnecessary points in your speech easier. Thus the preparation outline helps in giving your speech a structure.
Since outlines are used to arrange all the elements in a presentation, it has organizational hierarchy and a common format There are a variety of outline styles, however, they all generally follow the same pattern. Below is a sample of a generic speech outline that can support your core message and works for a wide range of speech topics.
_________________________________________________________
: ________________________________________________________
__________________________________________
____________________________________________
(often written out in full) A. Interesting Opening (Technique to get the attention of the audience) B. Preview of the Speech (Establish topic and core message) (Transition)
A. First Main point 1.Sub-point/ Supporting Argument a. Further subpoint or supporting material (details) (1) Evidence, examples, etc. (2) Evidence, examples, etc. b. Further subpoint or supporting material (details) (1) Evidence, examples, etc. (2) Evidence, examples, etc. 2. Supporting Argument 3. Supporting Argument B. Second Main Point C. Third Main Point (Transition) (usually written out in full) A. Summary of Major Ideas (recap main points; summary of the core message) B. Significant Closing (prepares the audience for the end of the speech)
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As shown in the generic outline structure above, the following basic principles can be observed when organizing ideas and preparing your outline.
Some may be writing their presentation without an outline, however, having it saves time. The speech you are writing will almost develop itself by having an adequate and detailed outline, therefore allowing you to craft a coherent and more focussed presentation. Exceptional English presenters and public speakers understand the value of having an outline. They know that is an effective device to write and deliver a successful presentation.
Special Bonus Tip: Writing a presentation outline is often perceived to be reserved for planning purposes only. However, your outline can function both as a tool when organizing your points and as a reference when delivering your speech. The only difference is that with your preparation outline you utilize full sentences. If you decide to convert it as a speaking outline then you just have to tweak it and use words or short phrases instead of full sentences.
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What is a presentation outline? A presentation outline is an initial plan for your future presentation. It lets you understand which points to concentrate on and which structure to apply. A plan helps creating a presentation outline much easier and saves time and money. So, let’s dive straight into some useful tips!
Answering these questions will make you understand how to direct your future work and write a basic presentation outline. Deciding on your presentation’s goal is the outline foundation. Make sure your goal can be evaluated appropriately, and we can go right to the next step!
Creating a structure is essential for an informative outline in a presentation. Usually, presentation services provide the foundation of your presentation the three main parts: introduction, main part, and conclusion. Your goal is to hook the audience in your introduction and make sure you have caught their attention. Then, you can elaborate on your ideas in the central part and finish with a summary of your points.
The next step in the outline for a presentation is good visuals. Here, you must decide what visual materials you would like to use on the slides. At this point of the presentation outline, you don’t need to decide on the exact visual materials, but rather what type you’d like to use and where: graphs, photos, infographics, etc.
It is a quality control step. Think of what makes a good presentation, and most importantly — how do you define a great presentation? There is no universal answer — some concentrate on the lengths, while others focus on design. Your goal here is to evaluate all the points that seem important to consider in the outline for the presentation. Studying other presentations may help!
Now we’re getting to the content, starting from the end of your presentation . A call to action is a short phrase encouraging your audience to do something related to your presentation: buy a product you advertise, dive deeper into the field you’re researching, and so on. A call to action is much better than a simple “thank you” since it encourages interaction among your audience.
Remember your presentation structure? The solution refers to the conclusion part and can be a highly effective way of summarizing your material. While the other parts of your, e.g., business presentation outline may be dedicated to a market problem you want to highlight, the solution, in conclusion, will be a logical ending satisfying to the audience.
We’ve come to one of the most important parts of your PowerPoint presentation outline. Primary sources, like quotes and especially statistics, are the most persuasive arguments you can use to prove your point. Moreover, a good quote can also open your presentation, so think of several places to put them.
Design is a feature that can’t be overlooked. In this part of the outline for a presentation, you can choose the theme for your slides, the color scheme, and the layout of the slides. Think of where the text and visuals would be and what background is the most fitting to your presentation type.
No presentation outline can’t be complete without the slide order creation. This step is pretty easy — just place your slides logically, depending on what information they display and to which part of the presentation this information refers. Don’t forget the “technical” slides, such as the title or the slide with your contact info.
You can perform quality control once again at this point of your presentation outline — only this time, you check the outline itself. By this point, your outline should provide you with a functional presentation slab, with only some details to insert into it — basically, the content itself. You might want to make some changes here and there — and that’s the reason for quality control! Once satisfied with the outline, you can start working on a presentation and feeling all the missing parts.
As you can see, the outline creation is effortless. We hope this article will enrich your knowledge of “how to write a presentation outline”. The presentation will compose itself with a good outline, leaving you with only minor details to fill in.
If you still need help with a strong outline that includes all critical points, feel free to contact us .
Whether you’re pitching a new idea to investors or putting together an inspiring talk for potential customers, you’ve got your hands full. Presenting is tricky. Like tightrope walking tricky.
First, you need to convey a huge amount of info to make an impact. And second, it’s too easy to lose your audience’s attention. One boring slide or organizational slip-up and your whole presentation might tumble to the ground.
But there is a way to balance informational depth with curiosity. If you plan ahead and start out with a clear, well-organized presentation outline, you can walk the presenter high wire. You’ll have a clear flow of ideas that carries your audience from start to end.
And the best part? No snoring. 😁 No one’s going to tune out when you have a captivating story to tell.
But just like creating your presentation design, making your presentation outline design is a process. It requires forethought, planning, and organization.
What It Takes to Design Visual Presentations with Impact
So what do you need to get started? Let’s look at what a presentation outline is, why it matters, and how you can create one.
A presentation outline is the roadmap that guides your talk. It clarifies your main points, your structure, and the movement or flow of the underlying story. Critically, this is where you hone in on why this information matters to your audience and what you want them to take away from it.
Without a presentation outline, you might have the most compelling stats, facts, quotes, and illustrations in the world. But, no string to thread them all together.
This is why creating an outline – even a simple presentation outline design – should always be step one. 🤓 It’s a critical tool for marketing, sales professionals, motivational speakers, educators, entertainers, and anyone else who presents.
Whether you’re putting together an inspirational talk, a sales pitch, or internal training, an outline should always be your starting point. It’s the visual aid that will guide your talk and ensure your presentation resonates with your audience .
With a well-designed outline, there’s no way your presentation will go off track. That’s why so many brands and professionals turn to design services. Experienced designers know how to create a super-useful, easy-to-follow visual aid.
With a knockout outline design, you can say goodbye to pre-presentation jitters and hello to a captivated audience.
Want to present with confidence? Expert design services ensure your presentation is a success.
Okay, so I know what you’re thinking. Why should I create a full outline design? Won’t that take more time?
In the long run, no. Believe it or not, the better your outline design, the more time you’ll save. But there’s a bigger why behind creating an outline. Ultimately, it’s going to ensure your presentation is a hit.
Without it, you have something to share, but no guidelines to give your ideas and supporting points structure.
Here’s the thing: when you present – versus telling a story through written content or a video – you have to work harder to hold your audience’s attention. People are listening to your words .
You might have visual slides to accompany your talk. But if you lose them for even a moment , there’s no paragraph of text or video clip to fall back on. It’s just you, your slides, and them.
Also, everything happens in real-time. So there’s no assurance your audience is following you once you start talking.
That’s why you have to create your success guarantees beforehand. And the way to do this is with a simple, clear presentation outline.
Planning ahead with an outline helps you:
There’s no one way to create an outline for a presentation. From visual-forward storyboards to descriptive text and everything in between, what works for you depends on the type of presentation and your personal preferences.
But no matter what direction you choose, there are a few key components you need. Let’s unpack what you should include in your outline.
The first part of your outline is the why. Why are you presenting this information?
To figure this out, name your goal. Here are some of the most common presentation goals:
Besides this overarching purpose, you need to get clear on your presentation’s underlying agenda. Here are some questions you can answer to help you dig further.
Once you answer these questions (the ones that are relevant to your presentation), distill your purpose into a one or two-sentence summary that you can fit on a single slide. This summary is the first part of your outline design.
Okay, enough philosophizing about your purpose and goals. Time for the meat and bones of your presentation: the story structure. 😎
Storytelling is the best way to keep your audience hooked. Not just because your audience will relate to what you’re saying and form an emotional connection. A good narrative goes way further. It has the power to put you and your audience on the same wavelength .
That’s any presenter’s dream, but it’s real. A Princeton University research team found that the brain wave patterns of the listener and storyteller sync up during a story .
And the better your audience’s understanding, the closer the alignment, which is why it’s so critical to get your story structure right in your outline. The better you organize your structure, the easier it will be for your audience to follow along and absorb your main points.
So, how do you design an effective story structure? You follow a formula. Remember the plot formulas you learned in middle school English class? Hook and exposition, rising movement, climax, falling action, and resolution?
The formulas are slightly different, but the idea is the same. All you need to do is choose the best story formula for your presentation.
So, let’s dive in – here are the formulas you can use to create the story structure for your outline design:
The hero’s journey starts with the call to adventure and ends with the return. Along the way, there’s some sort of initiation through trials or challenges. When you create your presentation outline, your designer can make a storyboard or map out a chart of events showing how your hero moves through those stages, changes from the experience, and comes back with a solution or better say.
Let’s take a beverage company as an example for a presentation outline. They have a new, exciting product to introduce to the market – herbal coffee. 😮 It doesn’t have any caffeine but tastes like coffee. So it appeals to health-conscious consumers who are trying to limit their caffeine intake.
Now, the company has to convince its partners – the grocery stores and coffee shops that sell their products – to stock this new herbal coffee on their shelves.
So they need a compelling story that makes their new product out to be the next hot trend in the beverage world.
When to use it
The hero’s journey is a good story structure when you’re talking about a company’s history, introducing a new product, or using a personal story in a motivational presentation.
This story structure uses a combination of hard facts and interesting story points.
In your presentation outline, you’ll flow back and forth between the two to keep the momentum going. It can go something like this:
📜 Story: What if you needed to cut back on coffee for health reasons, but you don’t want to give up on the comfort you get from your daily coffee ritual?
✅ Fact : 54% of coffee drinkers say that the caffeine in coffee makes them feel anxious, and 71% believe it impacts their sleep cycle.
📜 Story: NewX Drinks (our example company) traveled to France to find the best chicory, Finland for the most nutrient-rich chaga powder, and the mountains of China for naturally harvested cordyceps.
✅ Fact : Studies show that the ingredients in our herbal coffee can help raise energy levels without causing anxiety or dehydration.
Continue alternating facts and story points until your closing slides. Finish with a wrap-up of how noteworthy this new information is, and what your audience can do next to take action based on what they learned.
When to use it:
You can use this formula for almost any type of presentation. It’s a good fit when you have a lot of statistics, quotes, and other facts to weave into your presentation.
When your presentation is educational, use the how-to story formula to organize your ideas.
The how-to is linear, which makes it perfect for when you are showing how to get from point A to point B.
The beginning of the outline design shows the current situation and your end goal. Then, your subsequent blocks or storyboard cells illustrate each step someone needs to take to get from that starting point to the endpoint, whether the objective is to learn a new skill or how to resolve a challenge.
For example, if you want to show your team how to protect their work devices from hackers, you can prepare a how-to style presentation to depict:
Any time you want to demonstrate how to use a product, follow a process, or resolve a problem, you can use the how-to formula. It’s useful for employee training presentations and any scenario where you are teaching your audience how to do something.
Want to make your solution seem irresistible to stakeholders? Use the solution-pitch formula to create a presentation they resonate with.
The goal here is to set up your storyboard so your audience can see themselves in the situation. They should walk away with a clear sense of the immense benefit they’re in for if they get on board with your idea or product.
Here’s how the formula works:
The solution pitch is a good fit for sales. But it’s not just useful when pitching to prospects. It’s also useful when trying to get investors or executive decision-makers on board with your great idea.
Visual content helps tell your story. Well-designed data visualizations, images, animations, and other visuals play several critical roles.
So how do you pull all these benefits into your presentation?
You guessed it – by integrating your visual content into your outline design.
There are different ways to do this:
Another component to include in your outline is the design guidelines. Color palette, typography, font size, style – they should all be uniform throughout your presentation.
And they should match – or at least complement – your brand guidelines.
How to Create a Brand Style Guide that Supercharges Your Marketing Strategy
But don’t feel stuck with your brand parameters. Ultimately, you want the colors, fonts, and other elements to reflect the nature of your presentation’s content more than anything else. Then your brand guidelines can take a back seat through subtle details and the logo.
For example, if you’re presenting serious information and lots of data visuals – but your brand is bright and bubbly – you will probably want to tone down your presentation aesthetics.
You don’t want rainbows of colors and heavy fonts overwhelming the information you’re presenting. 🥴
Ready to create a presentation outline that puts your talk in the Presentation Hall of Fame? 😉 You handle the planning, we’ll do the design.
Hard facts will help to build trust. To beef up your presentation, be sure to weave these nuggets into your outline. Use statistics to back up your main points. Testimonials for validation. And quotes are perfect for slowing things down – they create space for pause and reflection.
Or as Turkish novelist and playwright Mehmet Murat Ildan says, “A very wise quote is a spectacular waterfall! When you see it, you feel its power!”
Even if you don’t have a time limit, your audience does have limited patience.
Decide how long your presentation will be – research says the perfect length is 20 minutes . Then, use your presentation outline to divvy up your main points so each one gets enough love.
If you find that you’re spending too much time on one point or another, lean more into your visual elements to tell your story. Design can get across more information in less time and with fewer words.
And what about the end?
Your closing slides are not just a place to wrap things up and summarize your points. This is where you have your chance to lay out the next steps you want your audience to take.
Your call to action should clearly state what they can do next to get their hands on your product, benefit from your solution, join your cause, support your idea, or do whatever else you want them to do.
You also want to use emotion here. Whether you motivate with a sense of inspiration and excitement or compel with a sense of urgency, your audience should feel like they have to take your next step.
But they’re not going to feel motivated if you didn’t keep them interested along the way. This is why a well-organized, well-designed outline can make or break your presentation.
To pre-plan, prepare your outline. Then, perfect it, practice, and perfect some more. Let’s dive into the details:
There are three ways to build your outline format:
1. Text-only . Write out all your information and indicate where each slide starts and where you want your visuals to go. If your talk is short and doesn’t require a lot of supporting info, this can work.
The major downside with this presentation outline example is a lack of clarity. You can’t look at text notes and get a feel for how all your components flow or where you might have holes in your story arc.
2. Chart it . Put all your ideas, points, and visuals in bubbles, boxes, or other shapes. Give each content category – topic, key point, supporting info – a unique shape or color. That way, when you map out your presentation, you’ll see the structure clearly.
3. Storyboard . We recommend using a storyboard. You’ll be able to quickly see how your presentation unfolds. And, if you’re creating slides to show your audience, a storyboard lets you see how all your charts, visual design choices, and other elements will look together. Basically, a storyboard gives you the big picture.
Once you have everything laid out, you can decide if you want to reorder your slides or refine any of your content.
Before designing the actual presentation, practice your talk. Find someone to present to and ask for their feedback. As you test-run your presentation while it’s in outline format, you might find that switching the sequence of a couple of slides, adding more supporting visuals, or even eliminating some content will elevate your presentation to super-star level.
And finally, pat yourself on the back. 😉 You’ve done an amazing job prepping. You’re ready to design an amazing presentation!
If you’re struggling to bring your ideas to life, we can help. So go ahead, crumple up your stick figure storyboard sketches and toss them in the bin. Say goodbye to stressful presentation planning, and get ready to deliver a talk that you feel 100% proud of!
With unlimited designs, you can get all the design work your heart desires – storyboarding, data visuals, presentation slides, and more. But your costs never change.
Sign up for a plan today and find out how much easier (and prettier!) your life can be with an epiic designer in your corner.
Apr 21, 2022
A content writer and editor for over 12 years, Brenna spends her days (and nights!) creating content to help brands better connect with their audience.
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August 3, 2018 - Dom Barnard
For many people the thought of delivering a presentation is a daunting task and brings about a great deal of nerves . However, if you take some time to understand how effective presentations are structured and then apply this structure to your own presentation, you’ll appear much more confident and relaxed.
Here is our complete guide for structuring your presentation, with examples at the end of the article to demonstrate these points.
If you’ve ever sat through a great presentation, you’ll have left feeling either inspired or informed on a given topic. This isn’t because the speaker was the most knowledgeable or motivating person in the world. Instead, it’s because they know how to structure presentations – they have crafted their message in a logical and simple way that has allowed the audience can keep up with them and take away key messages.
Research has supported this, with studies showing that audiences retain structured information 40% more accurately than unstructured information.
In fact, not only is structuring a presentation important for the benefit of the audience’s understanding, it’s also important for you as the speaker. A good structure helps you remain calm, stay on topic, and avoid any awkward silences.
Generally speaking, there is a natural flow that any decent presentation will follow which we will go into shortly. However, you should be aware that all presentation structures will be different in their own unique way and this will be due to a number of factors, including:
Before choosing the presentation’s structure answer these questions first:
When reading the points below, think critically about what things may cause your presentation structure to be slightly different. You can add in certain elements and add more focus to certain moments if that works better for your speech.
This is the usual flow of a presentation, which covers all the vital sections and is a good starting point for yours. It allows your audience to easily follow along and sets out a solid structure you can add your content to.
Before you start delivering your talk, introduce yourself to the audience and clarify who you are and your relevant expertise. This does not need to be long or incredibly detailed, but will help build an immediate relationship between you and the audience. It gives you the chance to briefly clarify your expertise and why you are worth listening to. This will help establish your ethos so the audience will trust you more and think you’re credible.
Read our tips on How to Start a Presentation Effectively
In the introduction you need to explain the subject and purpose of your presentation whilst gaining the audience’s interest and confidence. It’s sometimes helpful to think of your introduction as funnel-shaped to help filter down your topic:
In this section also explain:
The way you structure your introduction can depend on the amount of time you have been given to present: a sales pitch may consist of a quick presentation so you may begin with your conclusion and then provide the evidence. Conversely, a speaker presenting their idea for change in the world would be better suited to start with the evidence and then conclude what this means for the audience.
Keep in mind that the main aim of the introduction is to grab the audience’s attention and connect with them.
The main body of your talk needs to meet the promises you made in the introduction. Depending on the nature of your presentation, clearly segment the different topics you will be discussing, and then work your way through them one at a time – it’s important for everything to be organised logically for the audience to fully understand. There are many different ways to organise your main points, such as, by priority, theme, chronologically etc.
When planning your presentation write a list of main points you want to make and ask yourself “What I am telling the audience? What should they understand from this?” refining your answers this way will help you produce clear messages.
In presentations the conclusion is frequently underdeveloped and lacks purpose which is a shame as it’s the best place to reinforce your messages. Typically, your presentation has a specific goal – that could be to convert a number of the audience members into customers, lead to a certain number of enquiries to make people knowledgeable on specific key points, or to motivate them towards a shared goal.
Regardless of what that goal is, be sure to summarise your main points and their implications. This clarifies the overall purpose of your talk and reinforces your reason for being there.
Follow these steps:
Conclude your talk by thanking the audience for their time and invite them to ask any questions they may have. As mentioned earlier, personal circumstances will affect the structure of your presentation.
Many presenters prefer to make the Q&A session the key part of their talk and try to speed through the main body of the presentation. This is totally fine, but it is still best to focus on delivering some sort of initial presentation to set the tone and topics for discussion in the Q&A.
The above was a description of a basic presentation, here are some more specific presentation layouts:
Use the demonstration structure when you have something useful to show. This is usually used when you want to show how a product works. Steve Jobs frequently used this technique in his presentations.
This structure is particularly useful in persuading the audience.
As well as incorporating stories in your presentation , you can organise your whole presentation as a story. There are lots of different type of story structures you can use – a popular choice is the monomyth – the hero’s journey. In a monomyth, a hero goes on a difficult journey or takes on a challenge – they move from the familiar into the unknown. After facing obstacles and ultimately succeeding the hero returns home, transformed and with newfound wisdom.
Storytelling for Business Success webinar , where well-know storyteller Javier Bernad shares strategies for crafting compelling narratives.
Another popular choice for using a story to structure your presentation is in media ras (in the middle of thing). In this type of story you launch right into the action by providing a snippet/teaser of what’s happening and then you start explaining the events that led to that event. This is engaging because you’re starting your story at the most exciting part which will make the audience curious – they’ll want to know how you got there.
The remaining method structure is good for situations where you’re presenting your perspective on a controversial topic which has split people’s opinions.
When delivering presentations it’s important for your words and ideas to flow so your audience can understand how everything links together and why it’s all relevant. This can be done using speech transitions which are words and phrases that allow you to smoothly move from one point to another so that your speech flows and your presentation is unified.
Transitions can be one word, a phrase or a full sentence – there are many different forms, here are some examples:
Signify to the audience that you will now begin discussing the first main point:
Move from one point to a similar one:
Internal summarising consists of summarising before moving on to the next point. You must inform the audience:
You can move your body and your standing location when you transition to another point. The audience find it easier to follow your presentation and movement will increase their interest.
A common technique for incorporating movement into your presentation is to:
Slides are a useful tool for most presentations: they can greatly assist in the delivery of your message and help the audience follow along with what you are saying. Key slides include:
There are some presenters who choose not to use slides at all, though this is more of a rarity. Slides can be a powerful tool if used properly, but the problem is that many fail to do just that. Here are some golden rules to follow when using slides in a presentation:
Guy Kawasaki, an entrepreneur and author, suggests that slideshows should follow a 10-20-30 rule :
Here are some additional resources for slide design:
Group presentations are structured in the same way as presentations with one speaker but usually require more rehearsal and practices. Clean transitioning between speakers is very important in producing a presentation that flows well. One way of doing this consists of:
From this example you can see how the different sections of the presentations link which makes it easier for the audience to follow and remain engaged.
Having examples of great presentations will help inspire your own structures, here are a few such examples, each unique and inspiring in their own way.
This presentation by ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt demonstrates some of the most important lessons he and his team have learnt with regards to working with some of the most talented individuals they hired. The simplistic yet cohesive style of all of the slides is something to be appreciated. They are relatively straightforward, yet add power and clarity to the narrative of the presentation.
Since being released in 2009, this presentation has been viewed almost four million times all around the world. The message itself is very powerful, however, it’s not an idea that hasn’t been heard before. What makes this presentation so powerful is the simple message he is getting across, and the straightforward and understandable manner in which he delivers it. Also note that he doesn’t use any slides, just a whiteboard where he creates a simple diagram of his opinion.
Here’s an example of a presentation given by a relatively unknown individual looking to inspire the next generation of graduates. Rick’s presentation is unique in many ways compared to the two above. Notably, he uses no visual prompts and includes a great deal of humour.
However, what is similar is the structure he uses. He first introduces his message that the wisest man he knew was a third-grade dropout. He then proceeds to deliver his main body of argument, and in the end, concludes with his message. This powerful speech keeps the viewer engaged throughout, through a mixture of heart-warming sentiment, powerful life advice and engaging humour.
As you can see from the examples above, and as it has been expressed throughout, a great presentation structure means analysing the core message of your presentation. Decide on a key message you want to impart the audience with, and then craft an engaging way of delivering it.
By preparing a solid structure, and practising your talk beforehand, you can walk into the presentation with confidence and deliver a meaningful message to an interested audience.
It’s important for a presentation to be well-structured so it can have the most impact on your audience. An unstructured presentation can be difficult to follow and even frustrating to listen to. The heart of your speech are your main points supported by evidence and your transitions should assist the movement between points and clarify how everything is linked.
Research suggests that the audience remember the first and last things you say so your introduction and conclusion are vital for reinforcing your points. Essentially, ensure you spend the time structuring your presentation and addressing all of the sections.
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Blog Data Visualization 18 Presentation Design Tips For Success
Written by: Midori Nediger May 15, 2023
Bad presentations. We’ve all had to sit through them. Heck, we’ve probably all given one or two. I know I have.
You know the type: twice as long as they need to be, slides chock-full of text, no visuals in sight.
How can you ensure you don’t fall victim to these presentation faux-pas when designing your next presentation for your team, class, or clients?
In this blog, I’ll walk you through tips on how to design an impactful presentation along with presentation templates that can help you deliver it with style to leave a lasting impression.
What makes a presentation memorable?
It usually comes down to three things:
All three elements work together to create a successful presentation. Just like how different presentation styles serve different purposes, having a good presentation idea will give the audience a purpose for listening.
Here are some top tips to consider to help you design and deliver an impactful presentation:
According to David Paradi’s annual presentation survey , the 3 things that annoy audiences most about presentations are:
The common thread that ties all of these presentation annoyances is text. Audiences are very picky about the text found in presentation slide decks .
In my experiences speaking at conferences and in webinars over the past few years, audiences respond much more positively to presentations that use visuals in place of text.
Audiences are more engaged, ask more questions, and find my talks more memorable when I include lots of visual examples in my slide decks.
I’m not the only one who has found this. We recently surveyed nearly 400 conference speakers about their presentation designs and found that 84.3% create presentations that are highly visual.
A great example of a high visual presentation is the iconic AirBnB pitch deck design , which includes no more than 40 words per slide. Instead of repeating the speaker’s script on the slides, it makes an impact with keywords, large numbers, and icons:
Learn how to customize this presentation template:
To help you take your presentations to the next level, I’d like to share my process for creating a visually-focused presentation like the one above. I’ll give you my top presentation design tips that I’ve learned over years of presenting:
You can then apply this process to our professional presentation templates or pitch decks , creating unique presentation decks with ease! Our user-friendly editor tools make customizing these templates a breeze.
To leave a lasting impression on your audience, consider transforming your slides into an interactive presentation. Here are 15 interactive presentation ideas to enhance interactivity and engagement.
We’ll cover the most important steps for summarizing lengthy text into a presentation-friendly format. Then we’ll touch on some presentation design tips to help you get visual with your slide decks. Read on for the best creative presentation ideas .
We know from David Paradi’s survey that audiences are easily overwhelmed with lots of text and data, especially when presentations are long.
(You when you see a presentation with lots of text and data and it’s long)
So unlike in a white paper , report , or essay , you can’t expect to tackle many complex ideas within a single presentation.
That would be a recipe for disaster.
Instead, identify a single central message that you would like to communicate to your audience. Then build your presentation around that core message.
By identifying that core message, you can ensure that everything you include in your presentation supports the goal of the presentation .
As seen below, a great presentation tells you exactly what you’re going to learn (the core message), then gets right to the facts (the supporting information).
To ensure you create an asset that’s clear, concise, impactful, and easy to follow, design your presentation around a single core message.
Think of your outline as a roadmap for your presentation. The outline will shape the presentation structure and guide you through your content. Creating a strong presentation outline straight away helps make sure that you’re hitting all of the key points you need to cover to convey a persuasive presentation .
Take this presentation outline example:
These are all things that we know we need to talk about within the presentation.
Creating a presentation outline makes it much easier to know what to say when it comes to creating the actual presentation slides.
You could even include your presentation outline as a separate slide so that your audience knows what to expect:
The opening moments of your presentation hold immense power – check out these 15 ways to start a presentation to set the stage and captivate your audience.
Next, use that core message to identify everything that doesn’t belong in the presentation.
Aim to eliminate everything that isn’t immediately relevant to the topic at hand, and anything remotely redundant. Cut any information that isn’t absolutely essential to understanding the core message.
By cutting these extra details, you can transform forgettable text-heavy slides:
Into memorable slides with minimal text:
Here’s a quick checklist to help you cut out any extra detail:
Get rid of:
This step may seem obvious, but when you’re presenting on a topic that you’re passionate about, it’s easy to get carried away with extraneous detail. Use the recommendations above to keep your text in check.
Clarity is key, especially if you’re presenting virtually rather than in-person. However, Lisa Schneider (Chief Growth Officer at Merriam-Webster) has had plenty of experience making that adjustment. She recently shared her tips for adapting in-person presentations into virtual presentations on Venngage that you can check out.
Watch: How to design a presentation [10 ESSENTIAL TIPS]
According to presentation guru Nancy Duarte , your audience should be able to discern the meaning of your slides in 6 seconds or less.
Since your audience will tend to read every word you place on each slide, you must keep your text to an absolute minimum. The text on your slides should provide support for what you’re saying without being distracting.
Never write out, word for word, what you’re going to be saying out loud. If you’re relying on text to remember certain points, resist the urge to cram them into your slides. Instead, use a tool like Venngage’s speaker notes to highlight particular talking points. These can be imported into PowerPoint — along with the rest of your presentation — and will only be viewable to you, not your audience.
For the actual slides, text should only be used to reinforce what you’re saying. Like in the presentation design below, paraphrase long paragraphs into short bulleted lists or statements by eliminating adjectives and articles (like “the” and “a”).
Pull out quotes and important numbers, and make them a focus of each slide.
As I mentioned above, audiences struggle when too much information is presented on a single slide.
To make sure you don’t overwhelm your audiences with too much information, spread out your content to cover one major takeaway per slide.
By limiting each slide to a single simple statement, you focus your audience’s attention on the topic at hand.
My favorite way to do this is to pick out the core message of whatever I’m talking about and express it in a few keywords, as seen in this presentation slide below.
This helps ensure that the visuals remain the focus of the slide.
Using the text in this way, to simply state a single fact per slide, is a sure-fire way to make an impact in your presentation.
Alternatively, pull out a significant statistic that you want to stick in your audience’s minds and make it a visual focus of the slide, as seen in this popular presentation by Officevibe .
This might mean you end up with a slide deck with a ton of slides. But that’s totally ok!
I’ve talked to many professionals who are pressured by their management teams to create presentations with a specific number of slides (usually as few as 10 or 15 slides for a 30-minute presentation).
If you ask me, this approach is completely flawed. In my mind, the longer I spend sitting on a single slide, the more likely I am to lose the interest of my audience.
A good rule of thumb is to have at least as many slides as minutes in your presentation. So for a 10 minute presentation you should have at least 10 slides .
Use as many slides as you need, as long as you are presenting a single message on each slide, (as seen in the lengthy presentation template below). This is especially important if you’re presenting your business, or delivering a product presentation. You want to wow your audience, not bore them.
As important as having one major takeaway per slide is having visuals that highlight the major takeaway on each slide.
Unique visuals will help make your message memorable.
Visuals are a great way to eliminate extra text, too.
You can add visuals by creating a timeline infographic to group and integrate information into visual frameworks like this:
Or create a flowchart and funnels:
Or by representing simple concepts with icons, as seen in the modern presentation design below. Using the same color for every icon helps create a polished look.
Using visuals in this way is perfect for when you have to convey messages quickly to audiences that you aren’t familiar with – such as at conferences. This would also make the ideal interview presentation template.
You can alternatively use icons in different colors, like in the presentation templates below. Just make sure the colors are complimentary, and style is consistent throughout the presentation (i.e. don’t use sleek, modern icons on one slide and whimsically illustrated icons on another). In this example, presentation clipart style icons have been used.
Any time you have important stats or trends you want your audience to remember, consider using a chart or data visualization to drive your point home. Confident public speaking combined with strong visualizations can really make an impact, encouraging your audience to act upon your message.
One of my personal favorite presentations (created by a professional designer) takes this “key message plus a visual” concept to the extreme, resulting in a slide deck that’s downright irresistible.
When applying this concept, don’t fall into the trap of using bad stock photos . Irrelevant or poorly chosen visuals can hurt you as much as they help you.
Below is an example of how to use stock photos effectively. They are more thematic than literal and are customized with fun, bright icons that set a playful tone.
The content and visual design of a presentation should be seamless.
It should never seem like your text and visuals are plopped onto a template. The format and design of the slides should contribute to and support the audience’s understanding of the content.
It’s easy for audiences to get lost during long presentations, especially if you have lots of slides. And audiences zone out when they get lost.
To help reorient your audience every once in a while, you can use something I like to call scaffolding slides. Scaffolding slides appear throughout a presentation to denote the start and end of major sections.
The core scaffolding slide is the agenda slide, which should appear right after the introduction or title slide. It outlines the major sections of the presentation.
At the beginning of each section, you should show that agenda again but highlight the relevant section title, as seen below.
This gives audiences the sense that you’re making progress through the presentation and helps keep them anchored and engaged.
Alternatively, you can achieve a similar effect by numbering your sections and showing that number on every slide. Or use a progress bar at the bottom of each slide to indicate how far along you are in your presentation. Just make sure it doesn’t distract from the main content of the slides.
You can imagine using this “progress bar” idea for a research presentation, or any presentation where you have a lot of information to get through.
Leila Janah, founder of Sama Group, is great at this. Her Innovation and Inspire talk about Sama Group is an example of a presentation that is well organized and very easy to follow.
Her presentation follows a logical, steady stream of ideas. She seems comfortable talking in front of a crowd but doesn’t make any attempts to engage directly with them.
Every slide should have a visual focal point. Something that immediately draws the eye at first glance.
That focal point should be whatever is most important on that slide, be it an important number, a keyword, or simply the slide title.
We can create visual focal points by varying the size, weight, and color of each element on the slide. Larger, brighter, bolder elements will command our audience’s attention, while smaller, lighter elements will tend to fade into the background.
As seen in the presentation template above, this technique can be especially useful for drawing attention to important words within a long passage of text. Consider using this technique whenever you have more than 5 words on a slide.
And if you really want your audience to pay attention, pick a high-contrast color scheme like the one below.
When picking fonts for your presentation, keep this technique in mind. Pick a font that has a noticeable difference between the “bold” font face and the “regular” font face. Source Sans Pro, Times New Roman, Montserrat, Arvo, Roboto, and Open Sans are all good options.
The last thing to remember when using size, weight, and color to create emphasis on a slide: don’t try to emphasize too many things on one slide.
If everything is highlighted, nothing is highlighted.
Audiences are quick to pick out, and focus on, any inconsistencies in your presentation design. As a result, messy, inconsistent slide decks lead to distracted, disengaged audiences.
Design choices (fonts and colors, especially), must be applied consistently across a slide deck. The last thing you want is for your audience to pay attention to your design choices before your content.
To keep your design in check, it can be helpful to create a color palette and type hierarchy before you start creating your deck, and outline it in a basic style guide like this one:
I know it can sometimes be tempting to fiddle around with text sizes to fit longer bits of text on a slide, but don’t do it! If the text is too long to fit on a slide, it should be split up onto multiple slides anyway.
And remember, a consistent design isn’t necessarily a boring one. This social media marketing presentation applies a bright color scheme to a variety of 3-column and 2-column layouts, remaining consistent but still using creative presentation ideas.
When giving a group presentation it’s always difficult to find the right balance of who should present which part.
Splitting a group presentation by topic is the most natural way to give everybody the chance to attempt without it seeming disjointed.
When presenting this slide deck to investors or potential clients, the team can easily take one topic each. One person can discuss the business model slide, and somebody else can talk about the marketing strategy.
Top tips for group presentations:
Page after page of the same layout can become repetitive and boring. Mix up the layout of your slides to keep your audience interested.
In this example, the designer has used a variety of combinations of images, text, and icons to create an interesting and varied style.
There are hundreds of different combinations of presentation layers and presentation styles that you can use to help create an engaging presentation . This style is great for when you need to present a variety of information and statistics, like if you were presenting to financial investors, or you were giving a research presentation.
Using a variety of layouts to keep an audience engaged is something that Elon Musk is an expert in. An engaged audience is a hyped audience. Check out this Elon Musk presentation revealing a new model Tesla for a masterclass on how to vary your slides in an interesting way:
It can be overwhelming to build your own presentation from scratch. Fortunately, my team at Venngage has created hundreds of professional presentation templates , which make it easy to implement these design principles and ensure your audience isn’t deterred by text-heavy slides.
Using a presentation template is a quick and easy way to create professional-looking presentation skills, without any design experience. You can edit all of the text easily, as well as change the colors, fonts, or photos. Plus you can download your work in a PowerPoint or PDF Presentation format.
After your presentation, consider summarizing your presentation in an engaging manner to r each a wider audience through a LinkedIn presentation .
People like having role models to look up to. If you want to motivate your audience, include examples of people who demonstrate the traits or achievements, or who have found success through the topic you are presenting.
While you might be tempted to fill your slides with decorative visuals and splashes of color, consider that sometimes simplicity is more effective than complexity. The simpler your slide is, the more you can focus on one thought-provoking idea.
A really good quote can stick in a person’s mind for weeks after your presentation. Ending your presentation with a quote can be a nice way to either begin or finish your presentation.
A great example of this is Tim Ferriss’ TED talk:
Check out the full talk below.
When you pair concise text with an image, you’re presenting the information to your audience in two simultaneous ways. This can make the information easier to remember, and more memorable.
Use your images and text on slides to reinforce what you’re saying out loud.
Doing this achieves two things:
Don’t believe us? See this tip in action with a presentation our Chief Marketing Officer Nadya gave recently at Unbounce’s CTA Conference . The combination of text and images on screen leads to a memorable presentation.
Often, presenters will write out an entire script for their presentation and read it off a teleprompter. The problem is, that can often make your presentation seem too rehearsed and wooden.
But even if you don’t write a complete script, you can still put key phrases on your slides to prompt jog your memory. The one thing you have to be wary of is looking back at your slides too much.
A good presentation gets things moving! Check out the top qualities of awesome presentations and learn all about how to make a good presentation to help you nail that captivating delivery.
Audiences don’t want to watch presentations with slide decks jam-packed with text. Too much text only hurts audience engagement and understanding. Your presentation design is as important as your presentation style.
By summarizing our text and creating slides with a visual focus, we can give more exciting, memorable and impactful presentations.
Give it a try with one of our popular presentation templates:
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Five tips to set yourself apart.
Never underestimate the power of great communication. It can help you land the job of your dreams, attract investors to back your idea, or elevate your stature within your organization. But while there are plenty of good speakers in the world, you can set yourself apart out by being the person who can deliver something great over and over. Here are a few tips for business professionals who want to move from being good speakers to great ones: be concise (the fewer words, the better); never use bullet points (photos and images paired together are more memorable); don’t underestimate the power of your voice (raise and lower it for emphasis); give your audience something extra (unexpected moments will grab their attention); rehearse (the best speakers are the best because they practice — a lot).
I was sitting across the table from a Silicon Valley CEO who had pioneered a technology that touches many of our lives — the flash memory that stores data on smartphones, digital cameras, and computers. He was a frequent guest on CNBC and had been delivering business presentations for at least 20 years before we met. And yet, the CEO wanted to sharpen his public speaking skills.
Undergraduate Research
Delivering an effective oral presentation is an essential skill for sharing your research findings with an audience. Tailoring your presentation to your audience, preparing for technical issues, and engaging your listeners with clear, concise content are crucial for the success of your research project. This guide provides comprehensive advice on how to prepare, what to include, and common pitfalls to avoid, ensuring your presentation is impactful and memorable.
For further assistance, contact the Office of Undergraduate Research for individual consultations.
Purpose
The purpose of an oral presentation is to share your research with an audience, typically through PowerPoint or Prezi. It is typically a synopsis of your research. If you've conducted a study, you will probably address the following topics:
If your scholarship is in a different form (e.g., a film analysis, a presentation of a creative work), the structure will likely be a little different, but in all cases, it should be clear to the audience what the main goals of your research are, why it's important to do this work, and what you found in your research.
Preparation
Plan for the Unexpected
What to Avoid
It is usually not required that you use visuals for your presentation, but a PowerPoint or Prezi can often help the audience follow along with your research.
If you use PowerPoint or Prezi:
Also, consider your verbal and physical presentation:
Ways to Stand Out
Handling Audience Questions
Conclusions
If you have been accepted to present your research at a conference, congratulations! This is a great honor, and you should be proud of this accomplishment. If you would like an individual consultation with someone from the Office of Undergraduate Research about your presentation, please do not hesitate to contact us at [email protected] .
Other online resources to check out include:
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Every significant project begins with a proposal. But before you learn how to write a project proposal , you must master how to build an effective outline.
To create a project proposal outline, start by understanding the project goal and scope , its key stakeholders, their concerns, and the project's anticipated benefits. This will help provide a framework for the outline.
This article explores the importance and key components of a project proposal outline, highlights best practices for creating a solid outline, and explains how to write one. Write your project proposal outline in Confluence for free.
A project proposal outline aims to clearly explain a project in a way that convinces readers to support it. An effective project proposal outline is essential to strategic planning and influences your company’s decision-making process .
To create an effective project proposal outline, you must understand the stakeholders' primary goals and concerns. Draft your proposal outline to align with and address what those stakeholders care about and can expect from your project.
That effort begins with the outline’s title, which should persuade your audience to continue reading the outline. This approach will result in a project proposal outline that engages and persuades participants, stakeholders, and influencers to support your project.
There are multiple types of project proposals, including academic proposals, business proposals, project proposals, and research proposals.
The structure and components of each project proposal outline may vary depending on the type of proposal involved. Most of your proposals will likely be project management proposals, which aim to address a specific operational business need or pursue a specific business opportunity.
Every project proposal outline should include several key components. Use this project proposal format to write an effective outline:
Now that you have a usable structure, you can start creating your outline. Here’s a summary of the critical steps.
Start by researching your audience, their primary goals and concerns, and how your proposed project can align most closely with these. Gather information through surveys, interviews, and informal conversations to shape the structure and content of your proposal outline.
Take good notes and record conversations where possible, which will help ensure you capture all the valuable information your research unearths.
Structure your outline by using your primary research and the list of components above. Organize information logically and create headings and subheadings for each section to help enhance readability. Focus on presenting your project proposal outline clearly and concisely.
Once you have a structure in place, start writing. Draft each section in clear and professional language while incorporating terms familiar to or essential to your primary audience wherever appropriate.
Review and revise each outline section to achieve maximum accuracy and completeness. If time and circumstances permit, try to get at least one or two members of your primary audience to review and comment on your outline before developing and sharing your final version.
When creating a project proposal outline, it’s crucial to keep your work concise, focused, and aligned with your goals and objectives (and those of your primary audience). Use familiar, comfortable language and include credible supporting data within the body of your outline or as appendices. Use consistent formatting and fonts to prevent visual disruption and focus your readers’ experience on the content of your outline.
The right software can ease and speed up your entire project proposal creation process, including collaborative review and editing. This is where Confluence shines.
Confluence brings everyone together in a connected workspace to move projects forward. Teams can create, edit, and share project plans so everyone is on the same page. Every project, proposal, and outline can include multiple types of information, including action items, assignees, dates, tables, and more. Confluence offers a range of available templates, including a project proposal template , to help you start quickly and efficiently. Explore the project poster template in Confluence, and use Confluence to write your project proposal outline for free .
Why is a proposal outline important.
A project proposal outline helps you organize your thoughts and ensure that you cover all critical points. It also makes the writing process more efficient and enables you to clearly communicate the proposal's objectives and methodology to reviewers and stakeholders. A solid project proposal outline can benefit all of your project management phases , including project planning .
You can use the same basic proposal outline structure for different types of proposals. Tailor each outline to fit the specific context and goals of each proposal and the needs and expectations of your primary audience and stakeholders. Primary research can help you select the best proposal type and structure for your specific outline.
Some common mistakes to avoid when creating a proposal outline include overloading the outline with information, unclear directions, or a lack of precision. Others include ignoring your primary audience's needs and expectations, lack of cohesion, and poor information flow.
Sticking closely to a well-crafted structure such as the one outlined in this article can help you avoid these and other pitfalls. Soliciting reviews and comments from select audience members and stakeholders while crafting your outline can help ensure that your final version resonates with and positively persuades your audience.
Project poster template.
A collaborative one-pager that keeps your project team and stakeholders aligned
Use this collection of Confluence templates to create and execute a project
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1. Decide the Purpose of the Presentation. Decide on the goal of your presentation before you start writing any notes. It serves as a base for the remainder of your outline. Your presentation may have one of the following six objectives: to inform, convince, motivate, inspire action or entertain.
Here are the steps to follow: Provide a Prompt: Enter a brief description of your presentation topic into the AI tool. Customize the Output: Examine the generated outline. You may need to modify the titles of the slides and their order to better suit your needs.
Follow these steps when creating an outline for your presentation: 1. Consider the purpose of your presentation. When creating a presentation outline, determine your goal. To find this, think about what you want your audience to obtain or support after your discussion. For example, a nonprofit that builds wells for impoverished communities may ...
Finally, the outline should include a conclusion that summarizes the key points and reinforces the main message. 4. What are the 5 pieces of presentation Outline? The 5 key pieces of an outline include the introduction, main points, supporting information, visuals, and conclusion.
The very first step in creating an outline is to ask yourself what the purpose of your presentation is. Write your main message or a one-sentence summary of your thesis at the top of your outline when you get started. This may help you stay on task, and it will keep the purpose of your speech right in your eye's sight.
Presentation outline examples Basic presentation outline example. Let's take a look at a presentation outline and accompanying notes for a persuasive presentation on encouraging people to meditate every day: I. Introduction. Hook - find a striking image and tell a story; Thesis statement - everyone should meditate for 10 min per day; II.
This helps you manage your time effectively during the actual presentation. Notes or Reminders: Add any reminders, cues, or notes to yourself that will help you deliver your presentation effectively. These can include tips on delivery, body language, or specific points to emphasize. Presentation Outline Examples. Image: freepik.
Organize your slides. Include a title slide with the presentation topic, your name, and date. Add a relevant image or graphic to set the tone. Provide an agenda or outline slide to give the audience an overview of what to expect. Use section divider slides to clearly separate different parts of your presentation.
The goal for the presentation should be very concise and measurable so you can have a particular point of focus for your presentation. The most common goals for presentations include: · Motivating. · Educating. · Inciting an action. · Informing. · Entertaining. · Persuading users to do something specific. 2.
Enhance with Quotes, Testimonials, or Data. Make your presentation more interesting by adding extra info like quotes, testimonials, or data. It can make your audience more engaged and reinforce your message. 3. Visualize Your Concepts. How you show your ideas matters a lot.
Here's a guide on how to create a presentation outline, along with tips for each section and examples for different presentation scenarios. 1. Start with a Strong Opening: Grab Attention and Set the Tone ... Activities or Demos: If relevant, include a quick demo or hands-on activity to illustrate your point. Check-ins: Periodically ask for ...
A good outline should include headings and subheadings that outline the main topics and supporting details, ensuring a clear and logical arrangement of information. Creating a presentation outline helps the presenter stay organized and focused, and makes it easier for the audience to follow the content and understand the main concepts of the ...
Presentation Outline. Introduction. Keep it under 5 minutes. Introduce yourself, your company, and the topic of discussion. Explain the significance and topic relevance. Specify your approach to the topic. Preview the main points or key idea. Make a transition to the main points. Main Body.
Here are some extra tips for creating an effective presentation outline: Keep it short and sweet. Outlines should be brief and to the point. Include only the most important points. Don't try to cram too much information into your presentation. Be clear and concise. Outlines should be easy to understand and follow. Use keywords and key phrases.
Step 4: Use visuals. Text accompanied by visuals is usually easier to understand at a quick glance and is generally retained in memory for a longer time. You probably won't be adding visuals to your presentation outline, but you might want to indicate in the outline where it would make sense to include visuals.
Using Outline view in PowerPoint or another tool, gradually pull your outline apart into unique sections. Instead of typing them one-by-one, just paste the sections onto new slides. You don't have to stick with the exact text you wrote. Instead, paste the sections out and use them as the inspiration for content.
When writing your outline follow the suggested simple formula for any presentation: (1) Tell them what you are going to tell them (2) Tell them (3) Then, tell them what you told them. In your presentation's outline, this is your introduction, body, and conclusion.
Mind the structure. Creating a structure is essential for an informative outline in a presentation. Usually, presentation services provide the foundation of your presentation the three main parts: introduction, main part, and conclusion. Your goal is to hook the audience in your introduction and make sure you have caught their attention.
Once you answer these questions (the ones that are relevant to your presentation), distill your purpose into a one or two-sentence summary that you can fit on a single slide. This summary is the first part of your outline design. 2. Set up the structure. Okay, enough philosophizing about your purpose and goals.
This clarifies the overall purpose of your talk and reinforces your reason for being there. Follow these steps: Signal that it's nearly the end of your presentation, for example, "As we wrap up/as we wind down the talk…". Restate the topic and purpose of your presentation - "In this speech I wanted to compare…". 5.
Emphasize key points with text and images. Label your slides to prompt your memory. 1. Include less text and more visuals in your presentation design. According to David Paradi's annual presentation survey, the 3 things that annoy audiences most about presentations are: Speakers reading their slides.
The body of your presentation needs to contain your key points. You should present these in a logical order, so that your audience can follow them easily. Keep in mind that the body should comprise a limited number of ideas: the more you try to include, the fewer people will remember. A good guide is to cover three to five main points, but no more.
Here are a few tips for business professionals who want to move from being good speakers to great ones: be concise (the fewer words, the better); never use bullet points (photos and images paired ...
Embrace a "Presentation Zen" style: simple (not simplistic), clean, and powerful.; Have interesting, high-resolution images on your slides. Consider ways to involve your audience and make the presentation a little bit interactive so it's not just you talking the whole time.
Introduction: This section should cover the same grounds as the executive summary and provide more details centered on the content of the proposal outline. It should be brief and encourage further reading. Problem statement: Include a brief, clear statement of the business problem or opportunity the proposed project intends to address.