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Antony Eikeland discusses don't present your brand and undermine your businessIt's strange how so many organizations produce a corporate PowerPoint presentation template; a "one size fits all", template for all corporate presentations.
Whereas Gandalf and the other characters in the film franchise, "The Lord of the Rings", may have come to terms with the concept of "One ring to rule them all", it's sad to see so many presenters undermine and destroy their organizations credibility, by believing that one template will present for all.
And whilst you, as indeed most every organization, do not have the budget of a Hollywood blockbuster available at your disposal, there are ways to ensure that your brand keeps its integrity, and your audience made to feel as though your efforts were made for them. Not for a previous presentation, or indeed, as the sole template for everything.
But did you know that there are ways to achieve this without it having to cost you the middle earth?
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Don't present your brand and undermine your business |
| Antony Eikeland, Communication Consultant, 123PPT.com |
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Protect the brand...it's holy!
It is almost corporate policy. "We have a brand. We have a profile. We have an advertising agency, and they know what's best for us, and they manage our profile".
Corporate policy indeed. The marketing department of any organization has usually at some point, invested quite heavily in a logo, brand, and profile. And inevitably, after the business cards, letterheads, and stationary, a PowerPoint template is produced for the organization, as a part of the marketing package, that is made for general purposes, with the logo placed in one of the corners, and the color scheme of the profile implemented in the template design.
The PowerPoint template also usually comes with strict guidelines concerning.
- Content here.
- Logo margin widths here.
- Images of this size here.
- Text here.
- Etc. etc.
All very dictatorial, and seemingly practical.
Dictatorial ignorance
I say dictatorial because, an advertising agency attempts to control the use of content and layout of the client to "best communicate and keep aligned their clients brand and profile". But what the advertising agencies don't do, is have an awareness of the different needs of the organizations presenters, the different organizations, audiences, and the different organizations presentation goals.
For example, the CEO of an organization is giving a presentation to his board. He browses his organizations network to find the Marketing\ PowerPoint Template folder and uses the PowerPoint template to produce his presentation towards his board.
In the same organization, a member of the middle management group is giving an internal presentation to his departmental staff about motivation.
At the same time, a member of staff is giving a presentation at a conference about the organizations new product line. Whilst elsewhere a member of the human resources department is giving a presentation at a local university and recruitment fare in a bid to tempt new employees to the organization.
In this example, we have:
- Four very different presentations.
- Four very different presenters.
- Four very different audiences.
And yet, we have one common red thread. The same clean usually white with a border, a logo, and the profile colour scheme, corporate PowerPoint template.
The corporate PowerPoint template designed by the advertising agency to ensure overall consistency in brand, placement and use.
The one corporate PowerPoint template to rule them all.
Generically flawed
However, in its bid and effort to be open, general, and flexible, the template is:
- Not optimized towards any specific audience.
- Not specific to any market or target group.
- Not specific or representative of any service, or product line.
- Not specific or representative of the presenter.
Of course you will hear the arguments.
- "It is a corporate template designed for all corporate communications and has to be general rather than specific to one", from the agency.
- "We have invested a lot of resources in producing our profile and brand, and our agency believes that this PowerPoint template best communicates our goals, visions, and corporate identity", from the organization.
- "It's the template that we must use when referring to our organization, products, or services", from the presenter.
- "We can't afford to invest more resources in developing more PowerPoint templates for varied themes and uses. The template that we have serves us well, and works perfectly fine", from the CEO.
It's strange isn't it, how every argument for why things are as they are, and continue as they do, sound more like excuses than arguments? And every argument for why the corporate template must be used for all presentation communications, and audiences, is based more upon convenience than on audience satisfaction.
Content maybe king, but you'll never see if you're eyes aren't watching
In reality, every audience is different. Every situation is different. As a presenter, you put effort into gathering key data, charts, text, and copy for their presentations. Writing keywords, statements, and value propositions. And yet, after spending all this effort on content and relevant communication information, why would you then put everything inside the corporate PowerPoint template?
Would you go out and buy an expensive engagement ring for your partner and give it to them in a shopping plastic bag? Or would you make the effort of preparing a wonderful three-course meal and serve it to your guests on paper plates with plastic knives and forks?
We often forget the greatest challenge, as a presenter is not to "wow" our audiences with knowledge or try to assert a level of higher intelligence and therefore justify our right to be on the podium. But rather, our greatest challenge is to engage our audience, to make them understand our perspective and viewpoints, and most importantly to motivate them to a point where:
- Our board members say "Yes, we will fund your ambitions".
- Our departmental staff says, "Yes, we want to do better and achieve more".
- Our exposure at conventions and conferences is met with "Yes, we must have this product, or partner with this organization".
- Our recruitment efforts are met with, "Yes, this is the company I want to work for".
With these as communication goals, now ask yourself the last time you or any of your colleagues achieved this effect following your presentation with old reliable corporate PowerPoint template.
Makes you wonder if the investment in old reliable was worth it after all doesn't it?
It's not a question of what you invest but where you invest it
So why do so many organizations follow this advertising agency tradition? This corporate PowerPoint template mentality?
Well firstly, as we have discussed, convenience plays an important role, whilst one could easily argue, so does cost.
And yet, producing multiple templates, with differing designs that follow your corporate guideline and ideal, but provide greater optimization, and with it personality and audience commitment can actually be achieved for far lower costs than the use of an advertising agency.
Interested?...then read on.
Last month, a salesman wrote to me, he said that he was going for an interview at a large company. It meant bigger salary, greater responsibility and fresh challenges. As he wrote, he asked if it was possible to create a PowerPoint template and presentation for the interview so that he could already at the interview stage show his prospective employers that he was willing to walk that extra mile.
Two days later a presentation was complete. Our patron attended his interview, and subsequently was employed before the end of his interview. For the cost of only a hundred dollars the salesman went on to increase his income by over $100,000 a year. A good investment wouldn't you say? Rather than using a clip art PowerPoint template, or a freely downloadable, lower quality template design from one of a number of online presentation sites. The salesman decided to invest a mere $200 in a unique and professional design and presentation that illustrated to his audience the efforts he was making on their behalf. Delivering a presentation that was wholly relevant and motivating, strong, and therefore inspiring.
Now apply this same logic to your organization. What would such an investment be worth to you? In presenting your products? In presenting your services? In presenting to your board? In recruiting? In internal presentations? Etc. etc.,
A memorable presentation is one that is seen
I have often been asked why I joined 123PPT.com. And to this day my answer remains the same. Organizations spend thousands of dollars on advertising agencies to produce a corporate presentation template. For this reason, the vast majority of organizations can only afford to do this process once every few years. Or, as is more often the case, only once during the organizations lifespan.
The effect?
Well, need I say? Whenever you find yourself at a convention, a conference, or seminar composed of several speakers from several organizations, don't you instantly spot the PowerPoint presentations that look, bland, insipid, very corporate and as a result communicably weak, and uninspired?
Now ask yourself, "How did I notice these?"
Because, In between every few presentations, comes one that actually grabs your attention. It is visually appealing. Is relevant to the subject, the content, and to you as an audience member. It gets you attention. It keeps your focus and you follow the presenter through their presentation without those moments of struggle and fighting to keep your eyes open, and head upright. More often than not, when the presentation is over, it's the one that is most memorable.
Finally an alternative
123PPT.com isn't an advertising agency. No more than it is an Internet company. It is a communications group. 123PPT.com, our artists, designers, copywriters, composers, sound engineers, consultants, and advisers, provide professional presentation services for a mere fraction of the cost of an advertising agency.
And whereas an advertising agency is most concerned with its need to maintain a long-term ownership an creative copyright over its clients. 123PPT.com chose a different path. To instead provide every individual, every organization, institute, school, fortune 500 company, and concern, with the world's leading presentation services with a focus to provide clients with motivating designs, relevant content, copy writing, and visually attentive and audience engaging services.
From its outset, the goal of 123PPT has been to provide these services to everyone, from the individual, to the multi-divisional, multi-territorial global organization. And our purpose, to ensure that our clients return on investment is immediate and apparent.
Why action speaks louder than words
After returning from the Christmas holidays, I received a request from an organization that needed to remake their corporate PowerPoint template. At the same time the organization wished to convert all of its existing PowerPoint presentations, and apply the new template design to them.
After talking with the organization, they decided to forward to 123PPT.com it�s profile, brand and design handbook, and asked our artists to create a number of PowerPoint templates that would embody a number of differing themes.
What happened was the birth of over twenty new PowerPoint templates, which in total cost less than 70% of their one original and only corporate advertising agency PowerPoint template.
All the newly designed PowerPoint templates abides by the rules of the corporate profile, of the brands, colors, and font schemes, but in addition, took into consideration various aspects of the organizations needs for presentations. For example, a customer support presentation template, and an affiliate and partner PowerPoint template etc.,
Covering differing themes, all of these templates had a common look and feel, and felt very much as though they belonged to the same organization. Only now when a presenter presented at a convention, for example, their corporate template visually complemented the content of their speech.
Last week the CEO of the organization telephoned me personally to inform me of a presentation the organization held at a recent conference in Indiana.
For the first time in the company's twenty-four year history, and as a direct result of the presentation, they had sold out orders for their product at a single convention. During one day, they had received orders for over $14 million.
The return on investment represents almost 70000%.
In a world where agencies and creative bureaus focus on communicating their uniqueness, their superior quality, and their extensive client list. 123PPT.com has simply got on with the job. And let our clients results speak for themselves.
For the first time there is a real alternative to the agencies and the single corporate presentations template. It's no longer a question of "We have a very important event coming up and set aside a budget for a presentation". Every presentation you deliver can receive and the same attention to detail you provide to your content.
Stop damaging your brand and expose it intelligently
The greatest damage often committed to a brand, is placing it on a sterile white or graduated color background, with a color scheme, or elements extracted from a profile manual. These "corporate use" PowerPoint templates are then used for every type of corporate presentation. And contain all manner of content subject, topics, and themes, for every non-specific audience type and size.
Quite ironic, when one considers that the creators of the corporate presentation templates, the advertising agencies, create them in order to control the brand and create consistency with it, only to hand them over for every content type and presentation theme.
The hardest job for any presenter is to connect their audience with their presentation and self. The goal of every presentation is create audience action. Albeit attention, motivation, or acceptance.
Perhaps 2009 is the year when you will finally delete that corporate PowerPoint template folder on your server, and invest in the development of a range of unique and target specific templates that will enable you to achieve your goals and ambitions for the forth-coming year, and year's hereafter. And perhaps 2009 will be the year where your presentations are those that motivate your audiences, and your organization rises to a new level of corporate communication and dividend.
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