How to Reduce Text on Your PowerPoint Slides
The human brain is a beautiful thing. We can recall distant memories, harness deductive reasoning, and empathize with our fellow humans in a matter of seconds. The funny thing is… It’s also an “ooh squirrel” type of thing. If we find ourselves listening to or looking at something less than interesting we can very quickly and easily become distracted.
Unfortunately, this means that we – PowerPoint creators and presenters – are constantly fighting against the “shiny object” that is anything more interesting than our presentations. The good news is that reducing the amount of text on your PowerPoint slides is an easy way to maintain audience interest.
Why You’ll Want to Reduce Text on Your PowerPoint Slides
If you’re like me, it helps to understand the “why” behind this strategy. You’ve probably heard of “death by bullet points” and wondered where this saying came from. Well, it’s a derivative of a scientific phenomenon called the picture superiority effect.
The picture superiority effect is just a fancy way of saying that our brains prefer images over words. In fact, we recall images at a much higher rate. Studies show that your audience is likely to remember information supported by images at a rate of 65% or higher while information presented in text format has a recall rate closer to 10%. That’s a HUGE difference! Add in the fact that images help to keep your audience’s attention and it’s a no-brainer that we need to practice using less text overall.
How to Reduce Text
So, you might be wondering, “Well, if it’s so important, how do I do it effectively?”. I’m so glad you asked! 🙂 There are many ways to reduce the text on your PowerPoint slides but I’ve come to use a few religiously.
- Replace short phrases with easily recognizable symbols or icons. For example, text that says “this is important” can be replaced with a caution symbol, and “key dates” can be replaced by a calendar icon. You can even draw custom icons in PowerPoint!
- Convert a list of bullet points into Smartart. But wait! Before you roll your eyes at my recommendation for SmartArt (people seem to love or hate it for some reason), remember that an infographic is still technically a “graphic” which means – you guessed it – a higher recall rate!
- Can’t think of a good image to support your message? No problem. Simply move some of the text from your slide to your speaker notes. This will allow you to maintain your message while also reducing the amount of text your audience sees which will, in turn, increase their likelihood of remembering your message.
Conclusion
In short, “death by bullet points” isn’t just a quirky saying. Reducing the amount of text on your slides, whether they’re formatted as bullets or not, will dramatically increase the impact of your presentations. I hope you found this post helpful! If you did, I’ve got a few more easy recommendations for reducing text that you can start using TODAY! Enter your info below and I’ll send it right over!
If you’re interested in diving deeper into the science, check out this article on Inc.com.
