On a recent blog post at Duarte.com (http://tinyurl.com/3bwr4kg) it was stated that “Your slides are a visual representation of your idea and are a reflection of you.” This tweaked my interest because I had just read a similar statement in The Non-Designers Presentation Book by Robin Willliams (http://tinyurl.com/6jflvnm). In the book she said, “You are your slides. If they are sloppy and unclear, it naturally follows (in many minds) that you are sloppy and unclear, or that your information is not sound.”
So at least two experts in presentation design agree – you are your slides. This makes sense to me, and goes back to Marshall McLuhan who, in 1964, coined the phrase “the medium is the message” to illustrate that the delivery medium and the message being delivered have a symbiotic relationship.
Although this concept was conceived long before PowerPoint, I think it is applicable today. I believe it’s particularly applicable in sales presentations in which the presentation is proposing a product or service AND at the same time represents the sales organization. For example, if an organization’s brand promise states that they offer simple solutions to their customers’ problems, then it seems that their sales pitch/presentation should be designed to reflect simplicity (simple clean slides). Wordy complex slides would be “anti-message” and could weaken the overall impact of the presentation.
Is how you design your presentation and slides a big part of your message? Do you think that design is as important as content? Is the medium the message?
Joe Pops
Refuse to be boring