Improve PowerPoint Presentations with Presenter View

Whether you are hosting a PowerPoint presentation in person face to face, or for an online audience using Teams or Zoom, nerves can get the better of you and cause you to forget important points or even to seem unprepared. In this article, you will learn how to improve PowerPoint presentations with Presenter View.

In PowerPoint, the Presenter View setting sits in the Slide Show ribbon.

It is usually enabled by default, but it is worth checking this setting before you start your presentation. Presenter View only works when you connect your computer to a second monitor, a projector, or a television set.

Improve PowerPoint Presentations with Presenter View
Presenter View
How does Presenter View work?

Presenter View splits the display of the presentation in two. The presenter, or speaker, sees the Presenter View on their screen (the PC or laptop screen) while the audience sees only the current slide (the big slide in Presenter View).

Benefits of using Presenter View
  • The presenter can see the current duration of the presentation, which shows as a clock at the top of the current slide. You can pause this clock if something interrupts the presentation, e.g., a break. The clock helps the presenter deliver more concise, and therefore more efficient presentations.
  • Initially, the Presenter View fills the entire screen. However, the presenter can open the taskbar by selecting “Show Taskbar” at the top of the window. This enabled the presenter to open other files during the presentation without the audience being aware of this.
  • The presenter also sees a preview of the next slide, which prepares them for what is coming. This ensures the continuity and fluidity of the presentation. The presenter can hint at the content of the next slide, then bring it in at the right time.
  • Below the preview of the next slide, there is a box which shows the notes which the presentation creator typed below each slide. The notes help the presenter to remember the key points related to each slide. The presenter is then more relaxed and delivers a better presentation each time.
  • Presenter View has a pen tool which contains useful features. This tool is located below the big slide in Presenter View. There is a laser pointer, so there is no need to go out and buy a separate one. The presenter can control the laser pointer using the mouse or trackpad.
  • The pen tool also contains a pen and a highlighter which the presenter can use to write or annotate live on the slide. This makes for a more interactive experience and makes audience participation feel more engaging. If the presenter laptop has a touch screen, it is even easier to write on the slide. Meetings can be much more productive when you use the pen or highlighter.
  • Another useful tool in Presenter View, next to the pen tool is the “See all slides” button. When the presenter realises that they need to use a different slide to the one showing as the next slide, they simply need to select “See all slides.” This opens a view showing all slides from which the presenter can pick a different slide. The audience does not see this view.
Settings to check before starting the presentation

The presenter or setup assistant needs to make sure that they connect the computer properly to the second screen. They also need to check that the audience screen shows only the current slide and not the Presenter View.

If you wish to deliver amazing presentations, this article shows how to improve PowerPoint Presentations with Presenter View.

Essential Time Saving PowerPoint Tips

Working days are usually very full and busy. Most of us do not always complete all the tasks we set for ourselves every day, so we end up with a backlog while feeling bad about it.

Many people use PowerPoint to create presentations for business purposes, but wish they knew quicker ways. In fact, some use PowerPoint daily. If this describes you, please keep reading to learn about some useful time saving tips to boost your productivity when using PowerPoint.

The Slide Master

“Work smarter, not harder” is a phrase often heard. Many PowerPoint users copy slides from existing presentations, then take ages to reformat and adapt the slides to the desired look. Life is too short to be doing this every day. To be much quicker with formatting and standardising, a very useful tool in PowerPoint is the Slide Master. Click View, Slide Master to see these tools.

In Slide Master view, you can build in any content or design features that should always appear in your slides. For instance, whey you insert lines, shapes or pictures into slide layouts, they will always appear on these slides in the normal presentation view and cannot be accidentally changed or deleted.

What a time saver this can be! When you save the presentation as a template, it guarantees a quick fresh start every time.

Duplication

We very often create more than one copy of a slide or an object on a slide. Most users would use Copy and Paste (Ctrl + C, Ctrl + V) to create a second or third copy of an object. A faster way to create copies is to duplicate object using the shortcut Ctrl + D (duplicate). When you know that you will be creating more than one of any design feature, complete the first copy, then duplicate it. This will save much time going forward.

Not only is Ctrl + D a very quick shortcut, but PowerPoint also helps us to lay the duplicates out on a slide in an intuitive pattern. When you duplicate an object, drag the duplicate to where it should go. When you immediately duplicate the duplicate object, PowerPoint will place the second duplicate in a similar spot to where you placed the first one.

 

 

 

Entire slides can also be duplicated using Ctrl + D.

Design Ideas

Nowadays, PowerPoint presentations for business are sleek and professional by design. However, not all PowerPoint users are necessarily creative by nature. Most of us need some help and inspiration to make our slides look great. Fortunately, PowerPoint 365 has a feature which can help even the least creative user to design impactful slides.

In PowerPoint 365, the Design Ideas button is found in the Home ribbon. You can use this tool manually, however, by default, PowerPoint suggests design ideas when we insert text or photos into a slide. A side panel opens, suggesting various slide layouts based on the content. If you wish to turn off automatic suggestions, click File – Options, then untick “Automatically show me suggestions”.

An example of the Design Ideas tool in action is using it to convert a simple bullet point list to an interesting infographic. Simply type up a list of single key words, highlight these, then click Design Ideas.

From this:

To this:

Each time you click Design Ideas, PowerPoint produces a number of suggestions. Most of these can be modified afterwards. This is a very quick and easy way to turn boring slides into slides with impact.

These are just a few useful time saving tips using PowerPoint.

Some additional PowerPoint resources: