I developed Put the Power in Your PowerPoint Presentations for an in-service for my agency. As a member of the Distance Learning team, I accepted the challenge to do this since this is an area in which I’ve done extensive reading and research. However, this is truly my first attempt at putting all of that great information into practice for a live presentation that I’m delivering. I combined information from various sources for the content, including Richard Mayer, Garr Reynolds and Cliff Atkinson.
The presentation is actually tomorrow and I still have quite a bit of practicing to do. I really wanted to be able to deliver this without notes, but I don’t see that happening since I haven’t put in as much time as I’d need to for that to be a reality.
As I’ve studied the great presenters out there, the many on TED, Garr Reynolds and Merlin Mann, I aspire to one day, deliver a talk with the conversational ease that they do. I’ve had lots of training in a more formal style and I looks like I won’t be able to make an overnight transformation, but it is something that I’m practicing.
Here’s the thing…as I say in my presentation, if you design your slides correctly–for a live audience–they shouldn’t be able to stand alone. So, putting a presentation that you give on SlideShare “as is” won’t be helpful for anyone viewing it. What you may, or may not, notice about the best SlideShare presentations (check out the contest winners’ presentations to see what I mean by this), is that they mimic a storybook. They use large fonts and visuals with very few words (part of a sentence) per slide. Each page is part of an ongoing story. Some presentations may have as many as 50 slides. As I mention in my presentation, this is not a problem. When you view a presentation on SlideShare, you are clicking through very rapidly. You can probably read a 50 slide presentation in 2 minutes.
Try it with the winner of the 2009 SlideShare’s World’s Best Presentation Contest…
The next time you deliver a presentation live, try out my suggestions and then give yourself some time and post a different version–more like a storybook–on SlideShare. Don’t forget to include a link back to an article on your website!
As I’ve shared before, getting quality inbound links to your site is pretty important. A book that I am reading talks about this and other great SEO strategies, Search Engine Optimization: An Hour a Day.
Directories are one source of these links, but there are a few tips to keep in mind as you search for directories.
2) Search for Niche directories. These are directories geared toward your industry. Here are a few ways to find them:
Check the incoming links for your competitors and see if any of the urls are directories that you may want to be listed in as well.
Reminder… type: link:www.url.com in Yahoo! (this should
be your competitor’s website address)
Note: You probably shouldn’t pay to be listed anywhere
Think about offline publications in your industry. Is there an online equivalent? See if they have a directory or if your company is listed on their companion website.
Search for your target keywords. Are there any directory pages among the top search results. If so, you can benefit from their rank by getting listed in their directory.
Search the search engines for relevant niche directories by entering “pet store directory” and “Richmond Directory.”
You may also find a directory for a certain part of the city, such as “Shockoe Bottom” a popular area in Richmond, VA.
3) When you submit your website, make sure you can select a category that suits your business.
4) Give submitting your home page a second thought. It may be possible that a different landing page may work better.
These tips, provided by Jennifer Grappone and Gradiva Couzin, authors of Search Engine Optimization: An Hour A Day should be very helpful as you build quality incoming links to your website.
I was recently searching for an alternative to Meeting Wizard to simplify the process of finding dates that work for several people so we could schedule a meeting. I ran across GatherGrid.com and then searched the term “GatherGrid vs. Meeting Wizard.”
My search didn’t show many results, maybe 4 or 5, but the results that did appear were quite interesting:
Yahoo! Answers
One was a response to a Yahoo! Answers question asking for a website to schedule meetings. The person wanted something simpler than Meeting Wizard. I’m assuming that a representative from GatherGrid responded to the question, but that’s just speculation, and touted the benefits of GatherGrid, including a link to the service page.
Action Item: Search Yahoo! Answers for questions about your industry or product and respond. Don’t forget to be helpful and on topic and leave your link behind.
Blog Commenting
The second response was actually an article about the benefits of Meeting Wizard. Frances commented that GatherGrid is much simpler and left a link encouraging readers to check it out. Now, I don’t know if Frances works for GatherGrid, but this is a great way to use your competition to your advantage.
Action Item: Search Google for blogs in your industry, your competitors’ blogs and blogs about industry related products, provide useful information and include a link to your website.
I got this email at work today and had to share it with you. Take a careful look a the instructions they give to placing their link on your website. This is an awesome real life example of how you can request links! The email could probably be personalized a bit more…and it never hurts to share the popularity of your website (page rank or monthly visitor stats).
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I was recently searching for an alternative to Meeting Wizard to simplify the process of finding dates that work for several people so we could schedule a meeting. I ran across GatherGrid.com and then searched the term “GatherGrid vs. Meeting Wizard.”
