It can be used in PowerPoint slides, in web pages and blogs, or anywhere else where it might be helpful. At the moment we have maps of UK & Europe, also we have free editable PowerPoint maps of North America and now editable world maps

To enter, you have to create an involving presentation of 15+ slides, taking full advantage of PowerPoint animations and effects.

Contest entries are judged by a panel of industry professionals including Simon Morton of Eyeful Presentations, Geetesh Bajaj of Indezine and Shawn Toh of PowerPoint Heaven.

Presentation Requirements:
• Created in PowerPoint, OpenOffice, NeoOffice, StarOffice, Lotus Symphony
• Presentations on business, education or career are preferable
• Animations and transition effects, audio and video elements are warmly welcomed
• Specially designed for the contest
• In English language only
• Contains 15 slides or more
• Does not infringe the copyright Note: If you use licensed content, please mention its authors
• Is comprehensible and complete
• Animations, images, graphics and texts of fine quality
• Is not unethical, antisocial, immoral, ugly and does not contain spam or open advertisement
• Presentation size is limited to 100 Mb

Learn more at the official contest page www.slideboom.com/contest2009/

It could be used to demonstrate a point in a sales, business or educational presentation.

Maybe not. The truth is that technology is great – but it shouldn’t leave us incapable when it fails.

I’ve been in offices where there’s a power failure and the computers all go dead. Everyone immediately stops working. But there are ways to work without computers. By all accounts, people managed pretty well for the last couple of thousand years without them. It’s even possible to write words without typing them on a keyboard.

Let’s get back to the PowerPoint failure. Okay, you won’t be able to run your presentation: but assuming you have your notes, you can still give your talk.

Here are five things to do that could help.

1. The first thing to do is to be more passionate. Project your enthusiasm for the subject – and for the audience. Let them know they’re important to you and that you care about them. This should actually be easier to do, since their attention won’t be divided between you and the screen. Your passion will energise the audience and get their attention.

2. Change pace frequently. Pause, ask questions, alter your posture. Remember that you don’t have to stand in one place like a mannequin in a shop window. Walk around the room. Smile, laugh, tell a joke. All these things help to break up your talk and make it more engaging.

3. Another thing to try is to get more of your audience’s senses working. The typical PowerPoint presentation uses only two: looking and listening. But that’s very inactive and relatively uninteresting. Ask them to take notes, for instance. They will be more likely to do that as your presentation isn’t running. And don’t give passive handouts: leave spaces for them to complete. Get them thinking, not just absorbing.

4. Help the audience connect with your material. You could even – shock, horror – stop talking occasionally and ask them questions. Get them to share experiences. Get them to participate. They’ll remember your talk for a lot longer if they’re part of it.

5. Experiment with different seating arrangements. The vast majority of talks have the speaker at the front and all the seats arranged in rows with the audience facing him or her. This gives a subtle hint that the speaker is the only person who’s important in that room. (And it gives another hint that it’s time to sit down and tune out.) What about a semi-circle, or even a circle that you stand in the middle of? This will surprise the audience and suggest that this talk will be both different and special.

If you put all these tips into practice, your talk can still be a success – even without the technical magic that PowerPoint offers.

And you know what? You can do all of these things when PowerPoint is working. They’ll make your presentation even more successful.

By David Vickery

It can be used in PowerPoint slides, in web pages and blogs, or anywhere else where it might be helpful. At the moment we have maps of UK & Europe, also we have free editable PowerPoint maps of North America and now editable world maps

We thought that you might like this blank weekly diary that you can customise and print off.

If you would prefer a landscape version, then check out the weekly calendar templates on the site.

Not very engaging, right? In fact, you’d probably leave pretty early into the “performance” – either physically or in spirit. You might still be sitting in your seat but the chances are you’d be thinking about something else.

Now imagine the same play but the actors are in costume, in make-up and in character. They move around on stage. When the murder happens, the first actor pulls out a gun. He fires it and it makes a loud bang. The second actor claps his hand to his chest: “blood” spills over his shirt, he falls to the ground, writhes in agony and then lies still.

If this was well done, it could have you on the edge of your seat. Yet the words spoken might be virtually the same.

This is exactly the situation we’re in when we sit down for a PowerPoint presentation. Many of these are very word heavy – sometimes almost intolerably so. We take in far more information through our eyes than through our ears. The old saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words” is true.

Of course, PowerPoint can use pictures. But if these are done without much thought, these too can easily start eyes glazing over: yet another bar chart, yet another staid visual. What you can end up with is a presenter, standing still, droning on. There’s no variety, no interaction – and no fun.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Introducing a prop can liven up the whole presentation. Suddenly the audience isn’t staring at a screen: they’re looking at something unexpected. It could be an everyday object like a ten-pound note, or something bizarre like a rubber chicken. The point is, you’ve reawakened the audience’s interest.

Props can make your point far more quickly and effectively than words. They’re also much more memorable. If a chemistry teacher told you that putting potassium in water makes the metal burn explosively, you might be mildly interested. But once you’ve seen a demonstration, you might remember it for the rest of your life.

So, props can wake up a group. They can also make the presentation more interactive. They’re memorable. They can be fun and get a laugh, which always helps the audience to warm to you. They shift focus from the presenter, and from the presentation itself, to the prop. And they introduce variety, which can be a very welcome spice to an overly bland presentation.

A few words of caution. Props must be relevant, and not a gimmick. Indeed, the bigger the prop, the more relevant it should be. As the presenter, you must be comfortable with whatever you use: it should suit your personality. If it doesn’t, it just won’t work. One way to discover this – and to make the use of the prop smoother and more effective – is to practise beforehand. This of course is good advice with any kind of presentation, but it’s even more essential when props are involved.

Finally, use props sparingly. One or two props could make a presentation; seven or eight could break it.

But as long as you bear these points in mind, why not introduce a prop to your next presentation? You might even have your audience on the edge of their seats.

By David Vickery

It can be used in PowerPoint slides, in web pages and blogs, or anywhere else where it might be helpful. At the moment we have maps of UK & Europe, also we have free editable PowerPoint maps of North America and now editable world maps.

You may find this image useful for a presentation about lighthouses, life boats, marine activity, sailing, the beach or the sea.  An ideal template for a geography project or even as a background for your holiday photos.

But there is another way. Why not make a presentation and show it to whoever can help?

Our local fishing club is trying to improve the riverbank. This is obviously a good cause: not only would it benefit the fishermen, it would also create a more pleasing environment for the locals and the wider community who might experience it.

Having thought about how to proceed, the club members made a pack that includes maps, photos and other useful collateral, and passed it out to a number of agencies that might be persuaded to put their corporate hands in their pockets. The pack also includes a presentation. All of which has proved useful in generating group and one-to-one discussions.

The British adventurer Sir Ranulph Fiennes is also well known for using presentations to help him raise sponsorship money for his expeditions.  And that’s not surprising.

After all, PowerPoint is adept at presenting complex stories in a simple, engaging and easy-to-understand way. Being multimedia in nature, it’s easy to include, say, pictures of a riverbank as it currently is, then contrast those with artists’ impressions of how it might look if the money rolls in. Much more persuasive and emotionally engaging than colourless facts and figures.

If you can get in front of people – or even one person – who could help your good cause with money, time or anything else that’s valuable, PowerPoint is a great way to get your points across succinctly and effectively.

You might also impress those potential helpers with your ability to present your case professionally. The fact that you’ve taken the time and trouble to order your points in a logical manner, using accompanying visual and audio material to back them up, is likely to make a good impression too.

So don’t leave PowerPoint in the office – take it out in the world with you!

By David Vickery