Creating Successful Resume: Tips for Beginners

You probably know what it is like to listen to a very boring presentation. Most presenters do not have a single clue that their presentations can kill the audience with boredom. Bad presentation is not just a bad PowerPoint presentation, it is also a fail to deliver the message. The truth is that it can happen even to good presenters. One wrong decision can spoil the whole presentation. Are you sure that you always make good presentations? Is your audience attentive while you are speaking?

Here are simple tips that might help you to make sure that your presentation is good and successful:

- Make a short script. A little planning will not do you any harm. On the contrary, it will help you decide what information must be included in the slides in the first place. Like every story, PowerPoint presentation also has beginning or introduction, middle part and ending. Of course, if you are an expert in improvising, you can skip planning.

- One by one. Do not include as much information as possible in one slide. PowerPoint presentation is a tool that backs up or illustrates what you are saying. And key information that you are presenting should be on the screen at the very moment you are telling about it – not earlier and not later. You, as a presenter, can control the flow of information presented to the audience.

- Avoid cluttered slides. This is exactly where plenty of presenters, especially beginners, fail. They think that they need to include as much as possible. Wrong. Your slides are illustration and it must include a key statement and several bullet points. When you include a lot of information in PowerPoint slides, the audience stops listening to you and begin to read.

- Design is crucial. PowerPoint presentation should not be made in very bright or dark colours. Do not use cheesy effects that will definitely spoil everything.

- Arial, Helvetica and Calibri are the best fonts for presentations.

- Decorative fonts can be used only for heading and only if they are easy to read.

- Dark text is always used on a light background because it is easier to read.

- Text should not have a centred position. Align it right or left.

- Images and sound effects. There are two opinions whether images should be used in presentations at all. Some people say that they only distract audience, other believe that that they help keep attention. Both opinions have grounds and it is important to use visual and sound effects reasonably. If you are downloading images from the Internet, make sure they are of good quality. But even if they are, remember that most images and sound effects can be subject to copyright. To make sure that you are not breaking law, download sound effects and music from melodyloops.com – a web site with royalty free background music that can be used for business and personal needs too. There are plenty of other resources on the Internet that provide images on the same grounds.

• Rehearse. No matter how brilliant you think you are, rehearse your presentation once you have finished it.