Becoming a pitch content master is a lot easier than it seems.

Although many people often point to the very first wildly successful funding rounds of companies like Air BNB, Sequoia Capital, and Crowd Funder, what they typically do is try to teach you how to replicate the content of those winning pitches in terms of the slide topics, but they leave out the fact that many of those pitches achieved success simply because those companies had fantastic ideas.

No matter how nice an executive summary is written and no matter how many times you practice an elevator speech, if the premise of your product, service, or offer is not something that resonates with your potential investor, making sure you tick all the boxes off on the which slides to include checklist is going to be less than relevant.

Of course, it is an important aspect to cover all the information that a potential investor will want to know before considering taking the next step in your opportunity, but that is not what will keep them excited about your venture or motivate them to invest their time, money, and resources into getting on-board with you.

The decision to partner with you is based on how well your content matches up with their ideal investment opportunity of the moment. You can use those standard slide section categories like market size, competitive advantage, marketing plan, etc. to communicate this idea, but it is going to be crucial that your content within those outlines convey the most valuable asset that you have to offer: you and your great idea!

How to Grab and Hold the Attention of Your Prospect

Here are some tips for building momentum during your presentation and organizing your content in a way that holds attention and could have a major impact on the response you receive as well as your final outcome.

1. Make sure the sound of your message is as good as the look of your design
2. Don’t say anything that you do not passionately believe in
3. Have an action goal that you are constantly yet slowly bringing your viewers toward
4. Always keep at the forefront of your mind, “what’s in it for them?”
5. Be sure to include as many facts as possible and include confirmation from reputable sources that are related to your presentation
6. Don’t leave design for the last minute.
7. Be sure that your presentation’s design supports your message and the brand image you want to present
8. Make sure the visual elements in your slides portray the image of yourself and your topic that the audience to receive, perceive, and partner with.

The most important of these is making sure the sound of your message is as good as the look of your design

As overused as the phrase, “Content is King” is, it is still the only tech marketing ‘fad’ in recent years to live past five minutes of fame.

That is, of course, because it’s true. When people are online they are usually searching for an answer. If it is not an answer that they are seeking then it is either entertainment or education.

Technically, every one of these requires words in order to communicate. Especially for those who are using search and those seeking educational materials or resources.
If you are reading this blog, chances are that your idea, your product or service falls under one of these two categories as well. This means that, when they come to you, they are looking for solutions or an opportunity and this is what your message has to provide.

How to Write Content for a Winning Presentation

Here are the most important things to keep in mind when crafting that message:

1. Have one, solitary clear thought or intention communicated in your message.
2. Early on in your presentation, you need to make sure the audience knows why they are there and why they should give you their full attention.
3. Do not make your communications complicated. The straightforward and start with the most compelling aspects of what you have to communicate.
4. The organization of your content is key and very important.

How to Organize Written Content for the Maximum Impact

a. Like back in school, start with your thesis. In this case, start with the why you are in front of what you have brought to offer the viewer today. Make it short, make it clear, and make it worth the investment of time so it feels more worth the investment of money.
b. Create your outline by creating a short summary of everything you want to say in your presentation. After you have everything written down, go through and double-check that you have covered everything you wanted to say. Add any missing elements. Next, go back through again and remove anything that is not pertinent.
c. Now take your outline and make each item a title on a separate page.
d. On each one of your individual title pages, now follow with the things you want to say on that particular topic. Keep it brief. This is just an outline of what you will be covering so you do not forget anything in-the-moment and to help make sure you say everything you need to say in a way that has a natural flow and is understood by your audience. make a list of each strong point you plan to communicate.

Be sure to include any necessary research and/or sources that you would like to reference.

Once you finish your final title page your presentation content is pretty much done. Now all you have to do is go through it making any necessary changes or additions and decide which parts will go into the content of your PowerPoint/Keynote/Google slide as support visual, images, graphs, and text and which parts of your content will be spoken verbally in front of your audience.

With your messaging in place, now all you need is a good proofreader to run through your content and guide you regarding places where clarity can be improved.

Now that you’re ready to “wow” them with and then you should be all set for putting together your Keynote, Google Slides, or PowerPoint slide deck.

Why The Graphic Design of Your Pitch Deck Matters

The purpose of having slides as a support system for your presentation is threefold:

First, having professional and attractive slides offers you something that takes some of the pressure off of you and every single word you say. No matter how much we practice or how many times we have given great speeches or presentations, for some reason, every time we step up on that stage or stand in front of that projector, nerves run high.

Having visual support in the form of digital or print materials that support your message as you are delivering it can help calm those internal waves which will naturally make you feel more confident while you’re speaking. Any time a person is trying to share or sell a message, confidence in yourself and belief in your message are the best ways to resonate with your audience.

Additionally, having a high-quality presentation is good to have with you when you are delivering your message because it brings a sense of legitimacy and consistency to what you have to say. It also shows that you take your idea or work seriously enough to put in the time required to give them the information they need to believe in your offering as much as you do.

Why The Graphic Design of Your Pitch Deck Matters

The purpose of having slides as a support system for your presentation is threefold:

First, having professional and attractive slides offers you something that takes some of the pressure off of you and every single word you say. No matter how much we practice or how many times we have given great speeches or presentations, for some reason, every time we step up on that stage or stand in front of that projector, nerves run high.

Having visual support in the form of digital or print materials that support your message as you are delivering it can help calm those internal waves which will naturally make you feel more confident while you’re speaking. Any time a person is trying to share or sell a message, confidence in yourself and belief in your message are the best ways to resonate with your audience.

Additionally, having a high-quality presentation is good to have with you when you are delivering your message because it brings a sense of legitimacy and consistency to what you have to say. It also shows that you take your idea or work seriously enough to put in the time required to give them the information they need to believe in your offering as much as you do.

How to Make a PowerPoint that Looks Good Visually

As important as it is to have great support material and content that is important to your audience, it is equally important that the visual surface of your presentation be as attractive and professional as possible.

The look of your presentation slides is going to be automatically associated with the value of the words you are speaking. The visual aspects of your presentation also have an impact on the perception of your image and, potentially, your level of trustworthiness.

There are many ways to make your presentation look as good as possible.

Unless presentation or proposal design is a talent you possess, it will be best to either purchase the services of an expert presentation designer (such as myself) or if you have a strict budget to maintain, you can also purchase a PowerPoint, Keynote, or Google Slides template from one of these high-quality presentation template sales shops online as well as some of the most beautiful and modern presentation templates for Keynote and PowerPoint that I have ever seen.

The link includes places where you can purchase professional PowerPoint templates including a link to my own presentation template store where you may be able to find the perfect PowerPoint template for your next great venture. I have used each of the suggested sites myself in the past and found some pretty good options that are great starting points. Just add your own photos and content, change the branding elements such as colors and logos, and you’ve got a great presentation that is ready-to-go.

How to Start a PowerPoint, Keynote, or Google Slides Design

In the meantime, if you follow the simple guidelines above, you will produce a final product that you can deliver with confidence and that your audience will appreciate and hopefully respond to.

You can use PowerPoint by saving to a laptop or computer and present live using your device. Or you can upload your PowerPoint to Office 365 where you can access it from the cloud anywhere you go (always take a backup on a zip drive and send a second backup to yourself via email, though, just in case). Keynote also has both a desktop and iCloud version you can use. I am not as familiar with that one but I am sure it works in the same way.

Then, of course, there is Google Slides. Superior in terms of the ability to easily share with a wide range of teams, stakeholders, and reviewers, but not so popular in the design department because some of its features are complex and some of the basics of developing a master template are not featured at all. But I am sure that is something they are working on so I stay close to Google Slides on a pretty regular basis so that, as the features improve, I can enhance the templates I design for you.

Click here to find my top 10 suggestions for finding OUTSTANDING stock photography for your presentation and projects. If you need help getting started on your the design aspects of your presentation, go to my PowerPoint and Keynote Presentation Shop to see some beautiful starting points that will help you communicate your message. Here are a few of my favorite template designs that you can use to save yourself some time on making your pitch deck look good so you can, instead, focus on getting your message clear, convincing, and concise.

Good luck and happy growing!

The post How to Make a PowerPoint Presentation Attractive with Content Writing appeared first on Bridgette Bryant | Designer, Poet, Friend.

Express Your “Why” in a Beautiful Way

Have you been trying to figure out how to make a PowerPoint presentation attractive? Or considering hiring a presentation designer because it just seems too complicated or even impossible to make your pitch deck or presentation look modern and professional?

This beautiful branded template is the perfect fit for any subject and is built on master slides, making it perfect for corporate use and professional teams. Master slides make it easy for you to extend the number of slides in a presentation while keeping the genius visual design aspects intact.

If you’re like most people, creating a powerpoint presentation is a real pain, and sometimes irritating and, in the end, you end up with something you’re not super ecstatic about. This template takes all the pain away. All the designs are done. You literally just drag and drop images you want into the placeholders, and either type or copy/paste in your text.

WHAT’S INCLUDED:
– 50 Outside-the-Box Slides
– Still Business-Driven and Professional
– Master Slide Base Structure
– PLENTY of Device Screen Slides – just drag and drop your mobile app or webpage design screen in and you have a ready-to-go mockup!
– Links to Download Fonts Used in Presentation (free)
– Animations (non-animated file included)
– Quick color change by editing template colors
– Icon Library that you can color and scale
– Single-Use Personal License

WATCH DEMO VIDEO: https://youtu.be/4nhWs9VpAmY

MAKE IT YOURS HERE
Download UX Product Design and Research Report for PowerPoint
 

The post UX Product Design and Research Report Template for PowerPoint appeared first on Bridgette Bryant | Designer, Poet, Friend.

Let’s be real here – in the digital content game, visuals are a big deal. No sugarcoating it: if you want your website, blog post, or presentation to actually grab people’s attention, you need some killer images. Plain and simple, good visuals can take your message from meh to memorable. It’s not rocket science – people are drawn to eye-catching stuff, so why not use that to your advantage?

Stock photography used to be a way of getting images that you wouldn’t dare even consider if you wanted to look professional and be taken seriously for your work.

Finding the perfect photos without breaking the bank can be challenging. Fortunately, numerous free stock photo sites offer a treasure trove of beautiful, high-resolution images at no cost. This article explores some of the best free stock photo sites that will help you elevate your projects with eye-catching visuals while keeping your budget intact.

Get ready to discover the best resources for finding stunning, royalty-free images that will bring your creative visions to life!

Today the tide as dramatically turned with such an outrageous amount of talented photographers who are generous with their works and are sharing modern and stunning shots all over the public domain.

As a graphic designer, I use photography almost every single day. As a social media user, you probably do, too. It is social media that has encouraged a shift to natural and real pictures and finding stock photos to proudly use even as an obscure blog post featured image would be impossible without the following Free Photo Heroes.

This is my list the top 10 Amazing Places to Grab FREE Photos for your presentations, projects, and marketing designs. I have compiled these based on my personal opinion, ranking them in order from “Outerspace Awesomeness” to “Thanks for the Stellar Resource” and I am including a brief summary of the types of photos you can find it each resource. Happy building!

1. Reshot – Powerful, emotionally engaging, and realistic free stock images

Reshot is a new one to the scene for me. Gorgeous, innovative, non-stocky stock that you won’t believe is free, but it is!

When I first found this beautiful collection of curated free photos, I almost abandoned this blog article altogether just to sit and sunk in the lovely that emanates from this glorious resource.

What catches my attention the most is the beauty inside the beauty of the shots. On the surface, they are unique and outside the realm of normal stock photo quality. In about 70% of the images, as you look closer, you can see the object of the image staring back at you and, in most cases, making a very clear statement that you can’t ignore and don’t really want to anyway.

The images are fun-loving, many of them are elegant and perfect for a high-end blog because of their clean poshness there’s balance out by real human emotion. Other images are incredibly sexy, without being vulgar. Some of the images like the one above, you just can’t believe you got so lucky to find. If you don’t take out anything on this list, don’t do yourself a disservice of missing out on this one.

Free photography in the site leaves me asking just one question, where the heck are talented photographers hiding and why.

2. Rawpixel – Super Cool Nature Free Pics that Shine with Realism and Clarity

This is another one that almost had me scrapping this article and jumping into creating something using their images.

They are not outrageous, they are not outlandish. They are simple, clean, original, and quietly creative. A lot of realism and even some beautiful backgrounds can be found in this freemium stock photo resources. There are also a lot of graphics like logo ideas and mockups for Instagram ad posts that may be just right for your brand.

There is an impressive quantity of pastel images, photos, and backgrounds as well. If you’re looking for something with a soft edge and a bold center, Rawpixel is just the place.

Although the images are free, they do have a daily limit of five free downloads with a free membership. So as long as you’re not looking for a ton of once, the standard free membership should work fine for you.

3. Gratisography – Outrageous, amazing, and often goofy free images for the free-spirit in you

Gratisography is hands-down the most hilarious stock photography site I’ve ever seen. It deems itself the source of creative and quirky, high-resolution free pictures and is definitely the best resource of creative out-of-the-box images that I have ever seen.

Filled with shocking facial images and a guy in a bunny suit way more often than one would expect to see on any website, the site is definitely the place to find and expressive images that are great for blog posts and e-learning courses that want to take up their students with a little bit of relevant imagery.

4. Jay Mantri – Incredible stock photo images, lots of amazing aerial and inspiration

I have been following Jay’s beautiful, soulful shots for years. Lately I’ve noticed he’s been incorporating video so I guess he’s expanding his horizons and using his wonderful talents in other ways.

The site has a lot of eccentrically creative perspectives that we really get to see in real life and are simply a delight to see in his curation of free stock photography.

Aerial shots and images of nature as being pieces at everything. His work makes me want to go places and I hope it inspires you to do the same.

Photos are full-on CCO licensed and free of copyright restrictions. He does not even ask for an attribution nor does he uses photos to link-build by putting them on separate click-to-download pages. He just has a gallery of scrollable beauty for you to soak in and create with as you will.

5. StockSnap – Bright and Exciting Free Photos For Upbeat Vibes

The headline for this resource is “Free Stock Photos For Commercial Use”. Music to your ears, right?. They allow you to do anything you like with their stock except redistribute the images.

Their curation is a high-vibration gallery which I found to have the theme of excitement, flair, and millennial-level youth. The theme feels like a ‘go, seek, find, and rock out’ type of atmosphere which kind of makes you want to hang around even if you’re not trying to find free image downloads.

The site is full of high-resolution photos that do not require attribution, although of course it is appreciated.

6. Pikwizard – beautiful, natural realistic free stock photos

When double checking my stock photo resource fact, I came across another article sharing some of the best photo sites on the web. It included sites I’ve known for years except for this one in particular which acidly caught my attention.

Although you do have to pay attention to the licensing rights, this site has truly amazing images that are not only realistic and cover a wide range of topics, but many of them are also emotionally engaging and are so well taken that they inspire my thoughts making me want to create something new just so I can use the photo.

The user interface design of the site is also wonderful. Just being on the homepage is an experience in of itself. And to top it off, they have an excellent filter for the most popular categories that will help you get the pictures you are looking for as fast as possible.

7. Pixabay – Great for outdoor, architectural, and public building free photos

Pixabay may be an oldie, but it’s also an ever-growing goodie. It was another one of the first sites to raise the bar on stock photo quality and it has branched out lately to include more office and startup industry types of photography.

The site touts “stunning free images” of over one million in quantity! Thankfully, there is a pretty good search engine to help you navigate to what you’re looking for more quickly.

Of all the sites I have ever used for free photo downloading, this one could be the most frequently updated curation. Both the videos and photos are generously free for commercial use WITHOUT an attribution required. Pretty nice, right?

They recently even added videos to their offerings, great for website backgrounds or B-roll clips. They also have links to vectors and illustrations which I have not yet taken advantage of, but if you give them a try, let me know what you think!

8. Pexels – Surprisingly detailed, high-resolution free stock images

The great value offered by Pexels is in the crisp high-resolution value of the photos.

Similar to Pixabay in terms of having a good search tool for fast filtering, Pexels offers some real slice-of-life photos with a hint of “stock image” flair that does not necessarily diminish the value of its images.

A closer look at their inventory can produce some ‘is this a stock image or a real image’ emotions and the usability of their stock video selection as good backgrounds can’t be beat since they are free video downloads.

One interesting thing that is unique about Pexels in terms of the producers of this content is the support they offer to their content creators.

Whenever you download an item you get this neat popup that allows you to show your appreciation to the creator by donating, sharing, or following them.The download window includes a visible photo of the creator and their name, making the interaction a more personal experience and allowing these wonderful artists the opportunity to get some of the credit they deserve.

9. Free Pik – A surprisingly good source for free photos plus free vector images and free PSDs

I first found Freepik when searching for icons to add to my presentation design website. I was looking for something clean and professional looking that wasn’t thick and bulky. They had lots of icons to view and, after spending some time on the site I noticed that they also have free PSD files that you can download as well as free stock photos!

At first, I didn’t think anything of it. I thought they would be the standard old quality. But as I started browsing and as I would see photos pop up in the search when I put in where I was looking for something else, I began to notice that there stock photo quality was nothing to blink at.

If you find yourself in need of a stock photo, be sure to give their collection of look. The majority of their offerings are 100% free. Some of them are what they could call their new premium line. I had access to the premium line quite a few times and the main benefit is that you do not have to attribute any images that you download. It’s all about $10 a month so if you’re working on a client project, it can be pretty useful.

Freepik also allows you to to create collections where you can curate your own favorite free stock images by category for future use or to simply organize their thousands of great and impressive quality stock photography. They also have a like feature in case you’re in a hurry and just want to grow through the images and assigning things you like and go back later when you need them to actually download.

10. IM Creator – A great stock photo option for images of men and women

This website was one of the first I found that had excellent beautiful images of people, particularly in their women category. At the time, I was looking for pictures to put into my WordPress website templates. I needed user profile pics that looked like real photos of people that would actually become a part of, say, a social media community.

Since finding their people collection, I have returned to IM Creator many times for great photos of people. They have other categories to explore as well. As an added bonus, I believe almost all of the images are full Creative Commons license which means they are free for commercial use as well as personal use. They do require attribution to the creator in commercial use cases. For personal use, I’m not sure. You can always message and asked if he planned to use the photos for commercial projects.

I hope you enjoyed this crucial list of the best free stock photography sites available online. Finding the right image for every one of your projects, books, articles, or social media post can have a phenomenal effect on the readership and share-ability of whatever you produce.

If you’re creating a website or designing a brochure or taking a dip into the digital publishing realm, each brilliant thing you do can benefit from the attention-grabbing work provided by these outstanding resources.

I hope you find them just as valuable as I have and that they bring you tremendous luck every time you feature an image from a free stock photo provider on this list. Happy building!

Honorable Mentions for Great Free Stock Photography

Graphic Burger

No photos here but GREAT photorealistic mockups, particularly for computer and device screens and realistic images to put your t-shirt designs on to showcase your products. I think they have a few paid products but it’s primarily free and very good!

Split Shire

An oldie but a good for classic-feeling overlayed images. They make a great effort to make their photography feel timeless and emotional, so they definitely earned a mention.

Unsplash

One of the very first good free stock photo site I ever found. I think they also may have been one of the first to focus on providing quality images that could compete with paid options. Looking at the site now, I can see that availability has grown considerably and they’ve made additions with some creatively exciting options that I have not found any other stock photo platforms. If there was a spot number 11, this site would’ve taken it.

ISO Republic

Has some very good basic creative images that would be great fillers for the content and they have some truly excellent background images. The work is very colorful and bright which really makes them stand out in the free stock photography crowd.

So what great free stock resources did I miss?!

The post 10 Sites for Free Stock Photos for Presentation Content [Not the usual suspects] appeared first on Bridgette Bryant | Designer, Poet, Friend.