Internet marketers and content managers alike are discussing the problem of Information overload these days. They are looking at how to make content more targeted and concise for their audience. Presentations also suffer from this problem. In fact, Information Overload might just be the biggest issue in presentations today. So, lets get started.
Reduce The Number Of Bullet Points
First of all, only use bullet points when you need to. Second of all, use only a few. You need to reduce them to as few as possible. The bullet points should also be as short as possible. Sometimes you’ll see presentations where a single bullet point is two lines long. If your bullet points are that long, your presentation might be privy to Information Overload too.
An Easy Way To Make Shorter Bullets
Read the long bullet points and and try to find main keywords. Now use those keywords to make shorter phrases which go to the point. You want the audience to be able to read it at a glance. They should be listening to your voice, explaining the bullet point instead of using their attention to read your slides. For example:
Long:
Maintain company records and store them in various backup solutions like the cloud to keep them safe offsite.
Short:
Maintain company records.
Backup to the cloud.
You can see how simple and direct this is. If you’re going to explain something in the slides, then there is no need to put it in the bullet points as well. Its much easier to listen to you talk than to read about what you’re saying from the projector screen. As a rule, you should not put long descriptions in the slides either. This will save your presentation from Information Overload, make them look better, and make your audience’s life easier.
Image Courtesy:
Information overload by Jorge Franganillo [CC BY 2.0] via flickr
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