Stop Making Bad Presentations | 5 Tips
Your slides are drowning in text, and your audience is drowning with them. When you pack slides with bullet points and dense paragraphs, you're forcing people to choose: read ahead or listen to you. They'll choose to read, which means they stop paying attention. The fix isn't complicated—it's about applying five simple rules that put visuals and clarity first. These principles force you to think harder about what you're actually saying, which makes your message stick with audiences far longer than any bullet point ever could.
1 Limit Your Pitch to 10 Slides
Constraints force clarity. When you know you have exactly 10 slides to make your case, you stop including the "nice to have" details and focus on what truly matters. This rule comes from decades of successful pitch decks—the limitation isn't a bug, it's a feature that makes you ruthless about your message. Count your current slides now; if you have more than 10, go through and ask: "Does this slide move the core idea forward?" If it doesn't, delete it.
2 One Idea Per Slide, Full Stop
When you try to cover three different points on one slide, each one gets diluted. Your audience's attention splits three ways, and by the time you finish explaining the first idea, they've forgotten where you're going. Dedicate an entire slide to a single main idea so it has room to breathe and anchor itself in memory. Test this rule by reading your slide aloud in five seconds—if you're still talking by second six, you've crowded it.
3 Use Visuals, Not Bullet Points
A slide with six bullet points creates a reading race: your audience's eyes dart ahead to consume the text instead of staying with your voice. One strong image, a bold chart, or a large number creates a focal point and forces people to listen to you for the context. This isn't about making pretty slides—it's about controlling the rhythm of information. Start by removing 80% of the text from your current deck and replacing it with a single visual that illustrates the point.
4 Show Data Charts, Not Raw Tables
A table full of raw numbers makes your audience do math in their heads while you're talking—they're calculating instead of listening. A simple bar chart or one large callout number (like "40% increase") tells the story instantly and lets them focus on your explanation. Charts also guide the eye to what matters: the biggest bars, the trend, the outlier. Label your chart clearly so the visual stands alone, and use your voice to explain the why behind the numbers.
5 End with One Clear Action
A final slide that says "Thank You" or "Questions?" is a missed opportunity. Your audience will remember the last thing they see, so make it count by restating one single action you want them to take—sign up, call you, visit a link, share the idea. Vague endings lose momentum; specific calls to action stick in memory because they're concrete. Spend as much time designing your final slide as your first, because that's where the action lives.
These five rules work together to transform your slides from text-heavy walls into clear, visual stories that grip an audience. You're not fighting for attention anymore—you're guiding it. Start with one rule today: count your slides or remove a bullet point. Once you see how much sharper your message becomes, the rest will follow naturally.