Creative Presentation Ideas to Impress Your Audience
Keeping an audience captivated during a presentation. It’s a task many find daunting. Whether you’re delivering a basic PowerPoint to your fellow students in a classroom or sharing a pitch deck with potential investors, you may wonder how you can ensure your presentation will be memorable and exciting.
Keep reading if so. While your main goal should be to deliver a presentation that thoroughly covers your chosen topic, experimenting with different creative presentation ideas can also help you ensure your speech captures an audience’s attention in the first place.
The following are just a few ideas worth considering. They’ll transform a bland speech into one that truly resonates.
Creative Presentation Ideas: How to Make the Right Impression
Tell a Story
Incorporating storytelling into a presentation is often an effective way to engage an audience. Instead of relying solely on dry facts, you can convey your idea through:
- Anecdotes
- Case studies
- Testimonials
Also, consider how different types of visual content might help you tell a story and forge an emotional connection with audience members. For example, a graph or chart may be ideal for a slide whose purpose is to share objective facts and data. On the other hand, if your goal is to tell a story, you might incorporate video.
Keep this in mind when choosing a presentation maker. The tool you work with should allow you to include all types of content that might enhance your speech.
Be aware, research indicates video content is more engaging than other forms of online content. It’s therefore safe to assume that such content would also drive engagement in the context of a presentation.
(Tip: A video presentation doesn’t merely need to consist of live-action footage. You can also include animation to illustrate a unique idea or topic.)
Make it Interactive
One of the key reasons many dread giving presentations is simple: fear of public speaking is among the most common anxieties many people share.
Luckily, when presenting to an audience, you don’t technically need to be the only one doing the talking. You can give yourself breaks by designing and delivering an interactive presentation.
Ways to do so include:
- Polls
- Quizzes
- Games
Again, when coming up with creative presentation ideas, your main goal may be to ensure your audience members don’t lose interest in your speech. One simple way to achieve this goal is to provide those audience members with frequent opportunities to participate directly.
Be Dramatic
No, not in the way you may be thinking! We’re not recommending you get up in front of a group and start crying to get their attention.
(Although, to be fair, that could work.)
Not everyone feels comfortable exercising their acting and improv chops during a presentation. Additionally, not every presentation idea lends itself to this type of creativity.
However, if you believe your audience would be receptive to this approach, and you’re not afraid to get into character, adding an element of drama or role-playing to your presentation can help clarify complex concepts and make your message more engaging.
This is another way in which you might make a presentation more interactive. While you don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable, depending on the circumstances, you could ask for volunteers to join you in acting out certain scenarios. This can lighten the mood and keep everyone engaged.
Use Visual Aids
You likely already appreciate how certain types of visual aids can boost the effectiveness of a presentation. For example, if you’re sharing data, you can help viewers digest it with an infographic.
However, it’s worth considering how less traditional visual aids could also prove useful. Examples to consider include:
- GIFs
- Animations
- Props
- Hand-drawn illustrations
On a related topic, it’s also important to customize your presentation’s visuals so they represent your brand. This may involve:
- Using a branded color scheme
- Choosing the right font for text sections of slides
- Working with a template that allows you to modify all major visual elements
That said, the visual elements of a presentation may not be the only aspects that reflect your brand. Remember, you can include video, which means you can also include audio. Consider how such elements as the right music can potentially strengthen the link between your brand and your presentation.
Make a Mobile-Friendly Version
The day of your presentation doesn’t need to be your one shot to impress your audience! Sometimes, it might be wise to also create a separate mobile-friendly version of a presentation that audience members can view later on their phones and tablets. In some instances, audiences might appreciate the option to see a slide again, watch a video a second time, etc.
Bonus Hint: Use a Template
This may seem counterintuitive. If your goal is to flex your creative muscles, using presentation templates might seem to limit your ability to create something fresh and exciting.
This is a fair assumption to make. However, it’s worth noting that starting with presentation templates can help you save time in the process of designing slides and developing a natural flow for your work. This, in turn, will give you more time and energy to devote to coming up with creative ideas.
Extra Bonus Hint! Stick to Best Practices
Yes, leveraging creative presentation ideas to grab someone’s attention is smart! Just make sure you’re not getting so creative that you end up delivering a presentation that overwhelms your audience or fails to get your message across.
Always keep the basics in mind to ensure your work is organized and clear. For example, you should:
- Use bullet points, headers, and other formatting elements to ensure text sections are clear
- Restate important points
- Stick to a coherent color scheme
- Focus on one idea per slide
- Summarize your topic at the end
- Speak clearly
Powtoon’s Video Presentation Maker Helps You Unleash Your Creativity
Just as using the right template can help you create a presentation more efficiently than you otherwise might, using the right tool can allow you to incorporate creative presentation ideas effectively.
That’s exactly the type of tool you’ll find with Powtoon’s presentation maker. We also offer video-making tools and resources, helping you generate impressive content on a budget. Sign up today to learn more!
Latest posts by Hanna Abitbul (see all)
- How to create an AI avatar - September 25, 2024
- How to Set Realistic Business Goals for 2025 - September 24, 2024
- Best AI script writers in 2024 - June 28, 2024
- How to write a script with AI - June 27, 2024