Nat Robinson

In 1997 IBM coined the term e-Business which helped define a decade of change in the way we use technology to conduct business. This concept caught on like wildfire and soon everything became prefaced with an “e” e-New York, e-fiction, e-ciao (see below), e-thwack etc. but over time e-Business just became business, or rather that which was new and different became the norm. Now it’s just business as usual.

e-ciao. Vespa is an IBM e-business.

Today SlideRocket is helping define a new category of communication technology known commonly as online presentations. Just like e-Business we believe that over the next few years online presentations will become the new norm and what was once typified as an online presentation will be just a presentation. The reason this will happen is that online presentations represent significant advantages in the way that you experience presentations and deliver stories (story = strategy + value).

To understand those advantages we first have to understand what an online presentation is. Enter the 8 Principles Of Online Presentations, a list we’ve devised to serve as a guideline for our category. It’s a work in progress so feel free to comment and add your own thoughts below.

8 PRINCIPLES OF ONLINE PRESENTATIONS

#1 Available – Access anywhere you have an Internet connection and a browser, nothing to install, upgrade or (more…)

Last December Google launched an applications web store for it’s Chrome browser and announced that usage of Chrome had grown from 40 million to 120 million. SlideRocket was fortunate to be one of 10 launch partners that participated in the event and was live on the Chrome Web Store from day one. It’s great having Google pave the way for web apps and like some other Chrome web store participants we wanted to share what this has meant to our business.

#1 Results - The SlideRocket app on the Chrome Web Store received over 50,000 installs in the first 10 days of availability and the volume hasn’t yet dropped off. As much as 60% of SlideRocket’s daily lead flow now comes from the Chrome Web Store. (more…)

Last November, Rachel Arndt from Fast Company ran a slideshow titled, The Coolest Products From the 2010 Chicago Innovation Awards (you can watch it here). 2 slides in, I came across crowdSPRING and after reading the brief description I just knew I wanted SlideRocket to partner with them. Here’s how Rachel describes them.

SlideRocket partners with crowdSPRING

crowdSPRING connects companies looking for creative work with web designers, artists, marketers, and writers who can fill their needs. The company, which launched in 2007, now touts 75,000 members, and bills itself as the “world’s largest marketplace for creative services.”

What a great resource that would be for SlideRocket I thought to myself. We so often get SlideRocket users asking us for referrals to affordable designers who know how to make a presentation stand out from the crowd and likewise from designers and agencies looking for projects to work on. Wouldn’t it be amazing to let them find each other online? (more…)

Today Google announced their Chrome Web Store and we announced that SlideRocket is one of the first apps to join and the first to bring stunning presentation software to over 70 million Google Chrome users. Here’s what you need to know:

Welcome To Your New Office, The Browser
Today much of our personal lives are enhanced with interactions via online services. We send and receive emails and may visit and use upwards of 10 or more different web based applications a day. Increasingly business interactions are moving to the web and Google has created the Chrome Web Store to let you find and manage all you web apps in one one logical place.

One-Click Access / Single Sign-On
With Google’s Chrome Web Store you can install SlideRocket into your app tab in one click. Once installed SlideRocket is available to you at the top of every new browser tab you open in the new app section. One more click will launch SlideRocket and log you using the credentials you choose. After entering the your credentials the first time you won’t need to log in again and single sign-on will be enabled.

Log-in to SlideRocket with your Google Apps or Google ID
As part of our Chrome Web Store integration we’ve employed Open ID to let you use single click log-in with your existing SlideRocket credentials as well as your Google email id or your Google Apps id. This makes the jump from your Chrome browser to SlideRocket almost instantaneous.

Google is in the process of doing some account consolidation around their ID’s so if you encounter any problems please contact our support team via support at sliderocket dot com and we’ll help you figure it out. If you’re a Google Apps user you may also wan to consult with your Google Apps account admin.

Fast Account Provisioning
If you don’t have an account already, SlideRocket will provision a new Lite account for you on the fly. You may want to update your password and account details once your account is created but getting a new account started in SlideRocket will be very quick and easy.

Communicate and Connect
SlideRocket’s is bringing our award winning, web based presentation software to Google Chrome to help you create stunning presentations that engage your audience and deliver convincing communications. We show you how your presentations can engage your audience to produce successful outcomes and quantifiable results while streamlining your business and addressing workflow and redundancy problems that exist in today’s desktop solutions. We connect you to your customers, your co-workers and a wide world of online resources to help you present your best.

Take Action
Watch the presentation news release (PNR)
Read the SlideRocket press release
Download Google’s Chrome browser
Go to the Chrome Web Store
Find out more…

Do you use Google Chrome? Leave a comment below and tell us what you think about the new web store.

No matter how hard you try, the content of your presentation will sometimes be dry and boring.  And, it can be quite a challenge to keep your audience interested and engaged while you’re flipping through one slide, chart, or graph after another.  Sometimes, even pictures and videos aren’t enough to spice things up.

Everyone loves to laugh.

That’s why more and more presenters are seeking ways to add humor to their presentations.  Everyone loves to laugh, and nothing will grab the undivided attention of your audience more than something that makes them smile or chuckle.

What can you to do make your slide deck or speech more amusing?

1.  Set the Tone
Start your presentation off on a light-hearted note.  Give your audience a big smile, and let them know that you want them to not only learn, but to enjoy themselves as well.  They’ll immediately relax and take notice.  But be careful, experts warn that it may not be wise to open with a joke.  If it bombs, the rest of your session will suffer.

2. 101funjokes (www.101funjokes.com)
If you need a good joke, this is the place to go.  Dozens of categories – from jokes about celebrities, the Internet, kids, and the medical profession, to funny bumper stickers, limericks, quotes, and witticisms – make it easy to find whatever you need to incorporate some fun into your slide deck and give your audience a good giggle.

3.  Humor Writers
Let’s face it, some people lack a “funny bone”.  If you are one of those unfortunate souls, you may want to hire a professional writer to help incorporate humor into your slide deck.  They’ll be able to take your existing content, and make it more chuckle-worthy.  Check out the Comedy Writers Guild (http://www.comedywritersguild.com), or conduct a search on Google, Yahoo, or other popular search engine to find one in your area.

4.  Comedy Coaches
Comedy is about more than just “scripting” jokes and quips.  Delivery is also very important when you want to get the laughs.  Check out your local comedy clubs or theater groups.  Most of them will offer classes to help improve your comedic timing and execution.   Or, you can check your Yellow Pages for private comedy coaches who will work with you one-on-one.

5. Learn from Professional Comedians
Many professional comedians measure their success by evaluating one important metric – laughs per minute (LPM).  As you gain more experience adding humor to your sessions, you may want to use this indicator to gauge how effective you are.  How many LPMs should you strive for?  That depends on your content.  Some presentations may warrant several LPMs, while others that are more serious in nature may require just a handful of giggles throughout the entire slide deck to lighten the mood.

This is the continuation in a series of Incredible resources for presentations. If you have an idea for incredible resources or want to add one of your own just add a comment below this post. See the whole incredible presentations series here.

Find more great tips and resources at the Presentation Skills Launch Pad.

I find inspiration in the strangest places and last night I as I watched Grey’s Anatomy on ABC I was surprised to find myself thinking about presentations. Here’s the setup. The Chief of medicine Dr. Webber tells his heads of department that he has a spare $1M and invites them to pitch him on why their department should get the money. The jockeying and competitive head games ensue as each doctor tries to win the money and we get to watch a fantastic cross section of personalities giving presentations to the chief.

Statistics, Relevancy, Emotion, Passion and Delivery could win you $1M

(Spoiler Alert: Don’t read beyond this point if you don’t want to know how this episode turns out)

Now to take this post beyond the water cooler I’m going to ask you to visit ABC’s site and fast forward to 14m 40s to see the winning pitch by Dr. Hunt. By all means watch the whole episode but the 1m 14s of this pitch convinced me that THIS is the way to win $1M in less than 90 seconds and here’s why.

Statistics: Dr. Hunt uses statistics to highlight salient parts of his argument. He doesn’t overwhelm us with them but uses them in support of his main point, lives could have been saved.

Story: Dr. Hunt relates the specific case of a doctor who’s death could have been prevented. This makes his pitch more personal and makes us empathize with his plight. Again this story is relevant to his main argument. Doctors with disaster training could have prevented these deaths.

Relevancy: Dr. Hunt makes his story relevant to the people involved. Himself, his colleagues and the person he’s pitching too. Nothing can sway an audience more than, here’s what this means to you.

Emotion: If you’re talking about something that stirs up emotion for you then it’s ok to impart that to your audience if done in an appropriate way. We’re all human and this is the kind of thing that can make an audience go quiet and really listen to what you’re going to say next.

Passion: Although Dr. Hunt is not loud or vociferous. You can feel that this is something he’s passionate about. Honestly if you’re not passionate about what you’re presenting, you may want to ask yourself, why you’re doing it. Passion is key to creating an engaging presentation.

Delivery: This is a TV drama so the caveat is that this is a dramatic performance. Dr. Hunt pauses to make his point, sighs, reflects and then delivers the crushing question. Can you live with this? Don’t underestimate dramatic effect, it’s a powerful tool in your presentation arsenal. The challenge is not to overdo it, you need to remain authentic in your delivery.

Dr. Hunt won the $1M for delivering an impassioned and convincing pitch in 74 seconds. Why aren’t all presentations like this?

Nothing will help your audience relate to you (and the content you are presenting) more than stories and anecdotes. Whether they’re about people you know or places you’ve seen, or even if you’re re-telling a story you’ve heard elsewhere, they’ll add a personal touch to information that will help draw your audience in, and make what you’re saying more purposeful, understandable, and believable.

Nothing will help your audience relate to you more than stories and anecdotes.

But, even some of the best speakers lack solid storytelling skills. Luckily, there are a ton of great resources that can help you enhance your presentation with terrific stories and anecdotes.

1. Draw from Your Own Experiences
You’re life is more interesting than you think it is, and your past experiences may be quite entertaining to your audience. Perhaps a few stories about your feisty toddler can add a dose of humor to your presentation about dealing with difficult employees. Or, telling them about that time you hiked a challenging five mile trail in a hail storm may enhance your speech about getting and staying motivated. Feel free to embellish for dramatic effect.

2. Books
Hit up a nearby bookstore or your local library. Literary references make ideal stories for presentations and speeches. And, choosing popular books, or beloved classics that people remember fondly, are likely to strike a chord with your audience.

3. Awesome Stories (awesomestories.com)
This self-proclaimed “story place of the Web” provides countless fictional and non-fictional stories in a variety of categories such as famous trials, biographies, movies, history, religion, and sports. Here, educators and other presenters can quickly and easily find stories and their original sources, instead of spending hours upon hours searching national archives, libraries, universities, museums, and historical societies.

4. Anecdotage (anecdotage.com)
This site is home to the largest collection of celebrity anecdotes on the Internet. There are several thousand quotes and stories to choose from, covering a wide range of topics. An intuitive search facility allows you to search by keyword, or by your favorite politician, actor, musician, or other personality.

5. Story Arts Online (storyarts.org)
This educational Web site, created by author and storyteller Heather Forest, was initially designed for teachers, librarians, and students. However, much of its content is focused on the use of stories to enhance speaking and facilitate improved listening, and can provide much value to presenters and speakers of all types. Be sure to check out its comprehensive story library.

This is the continuation in a series of Incredible resources for presentations. If you have an idea for incredible resources or want to add one of your own just add a comment below this post. See the whole incredible presentations series here.

Find more great tips and resources at the Presentation Skills Launch Pad.

Many presenters, particularly novices, struggle to find a presentation style that works best for them.  Luckily, throughout the years, after much trial and error, many successful techniques and methodologies for presentation creation and delivery have emerged, giving speakers a variety of existing approaches to “borrow” from.

From top left: Lawrence Lessig, Masayoshi Takahashi, Seth Godin, Mino Monta

Here, we’ll describe and evaluate some of the most famous – and popular – presentation methods.

1. The Takahashi Method
This extremely unique method calls for the use of very, very large text.  The goal is to use no more than a handful (preferably, less than three) of easy-to-understand words, or a single image or photo with no accompanying words, on each slide, to deliver a very clear, very high-impact message in a very short period of time.  Many believe that this approach forces the audience to listen to the speaker, since the slides alone do not demonstrate all the content to be delivered.

2. The Lessig Method
Based on the style of Stanford Law professor Lawrence Lessig, this method is quite similar to Takahashi’s approach in its simplicity.  Presenters who use this technique incorporate only a brief quote, a short sentence, or a photo with a caption onto their slides, and spend only a few seconds on each.  But, while Takahashi-style presentations are often rather short – usually ten slides or less – Lessig presentations are often quite long, sometimes hundreds of slides that are passed through very quickly.  The idea behind this method is that the rapid-fire pace of delivery prevents the audience from growing bored or getting distracted.

3.  The Godin Method
Although not yet formally recognized by presentation pundits, this method, made popular by best-selling author and marketing guru Seth Godin, focuses mostly on the element of presentation slide design – particularly, how to select accompanying visuals to enhance messages appropriately.  Godin promotes the use of bold fonts, contrasting colors, striking images, and other clear, compelling visuals to better convey thoughts and ideas.

4. The Monta Method
Like the Takahashi approach, this technique originated in Japan.  Introduced by a knowledge worker in the tech field, it emulates the personality and charisma of a popular game show host.  Presenters are encouraged to use questions and answers on all their visuals.  When the question is posed to the audience, the answer is kept covered or hidden, only to be revealed once attendees have tried to “guess”.  The advantage of this approach is that it is highly effective at keeping the audience interested and engaged, and thus, their attention is less likely to wander.

This is the continuation in a series of Incredible resources for presentations. If you have an idea for incredible resources or want to add one of your own just add a comment below this post or see the whole incredible presentations series.

Find more great tips and resources at the Presentation Skills Launch Pad.

Tired of arial, times new roman, and other boring, over-used type styles? Looking to jazz up your slide deck by displaying your text using fonts that are cooler, sleeker, or more stylish?

There are a variety of Web sites and other resources devoted to the creation, sharing, distribution, and use of unique, visually appealing fonts.

Well, you’re in luck. There are a variety of Web sites and other resources devoted to the creation, sharing, distribution, and use of unique, visually appealing fonts that convey your personality and your presenting style.

Here are some of the best places to get new fonts for your presentation, or to learn how to make your own:

1. Dafont.com (http://www.dafont.com)
You’ll find it all here – gothic fonts, international-themed fonts, even fonts that celebrate popular holidays like Valentine’s Day, Easter, or Halloween. And, they’re all free. With more than 10 thousands fonts to choose from, plus over 2 thousand accents, there’s something for everyone, no matter what your need or preference.

2. 1001 Free Fonts (http://www.1001freefonts.com)
Since it launched in 1998, this site has served as a primary source of new fonts for more than 150,000 visitors. Its font search engine provides access to one of the Web’s largest font database, containing more than 30,000 commercial fonts.

3. Fee-Based Font Sites
While many of the font sites on the Web are free, there are several sites that offer higher-quality, professionally-designed fonts, for a price. These include

• Adobe Type Library, Providing stunning, elegant, and beautiful typography since 1985, Adobe Type offers more than 2,500 typefaces.
• Bitstream, and – what many consider to be the best font site out there today – MyFonts. If you want to stay in the know on the latest fonts then the MyFonts newsletters are a great resource.
• Ascender Corporation is a leading provider of advanced font products specializing in type design, font development and licensing. They also own the FontMarketplace which features the downloadable FontSelector a tool that makes it easy to pick fonts by Occasion, Personality and Type Style on Windows operating systems.

4. FontLab (http://www.fontlab.com)
If you don’t find what you need on the Web, and you’ve got some above-average design skills, FontLab makes a great font software package. Create fonts from scratch, convert fonts from various formats and enhance them to meet your requirements, add logos, signatures, or images, and more.

5. Font Tutorials
Looking to create new fonts, without purchasing or learning a new software application? Learn how, using tools you’re already familiar with. For example, Chank can help you learn to make fonts using Fontographer. Divide by Zero has tutorials on designing fonts with Photoshop and Typophile is also an excellent resource.

6. Installation Instructions
Found the perfect font for your presentation, but not sure how to download and install it? If you’re a Windows user, you can access Microsoft’s instructions. If you’re on a Mac, you can learn how to set up and use new fonts on Apple’s support site.

This is the continuation in a series of Incredible resources for presentations. If you have an idea for incredible resources or want to add one of your own just add a comment below this post or see the whole incredible presentation resource series.

A couple of weeks ago I got involved in a debate with Nathan Cashion of Brain Slides about a really impressive presentation created by one of SlideRocket’s customers, Kashi Foods. You can watch Kashi’s presentation and read Nathan’s post and related comments here.

Nathan’s perspective is that presentations shouldn’t be encumbered with a lot of text or used as documents. I argued that our definitions of what constitutes a presentation are too narrow and we should applaud Kashi for innovating the presentation medium and exploring new ways to engage their audience.

You can draw you own conclusions but a great parallel for technology adapting is the printed page. Look at how that has evolved, from the first printing press to today’s electronic magazines and e-books. Why would we expect anything less than evolution from presentation technology?

This discussion led me to look for other ways in which presentation technology has been used and resulted in the following – 7 Unusual Uses for Presentations. I hope you enjoy it and please add your own opinion in the comments below. My conclusion: As unusual as these presentations may be, their goal is common, finding the best, most engaging way to tell a story.

If you’ve observed or implemented a new way to use presentation technology please let me know and we’ll collaborate to add a slide to this deck. Let’s see how many unusual uses we can find.

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