Welcome to our series on presentation advice from an AV production perspective. At BVC we have produced 100’s of meetings, giving us loads of experience on the best techniques and advice for ensuring a high quality meeting. Attention should be your number one priority for your attendees. Many planning teams value this goal but are not sure how to guarantee this success through audio visual production. Whether you are hosting a $100 meeting or a $100,000 meeting, you need each and every attendee to be fully attentive.

In this series, we will provide advice on key aspects of AV, giving you valuable ideas on how to coordinate with your AV team. We will focus on video displays (large screens, PowerPoint), sound design (microphones, Q&A sessions), proper lighting techniques, and displays. We hope you find this information valuable and for more detailed advice feel free to reach us on our website or our Facebook.

While nearly every single business meeting relies on PowerPoint, many presenters still do not know the how their PowerPoint will look on a big screen. All the basic rules still apply when using large venue screens, but we would add some additional pointers to make your presentation the best it can be.

1. Bigger is Better
   • Bigger screens mean better visibility for all your attendees. For every person who cannot read the content on your slide, you are wasting valuable resources. Everyone needs to see or they will miss out on all your hard work.
2. Text Size
   • We have all heard the “less is more” mantra for PowerPoint, but with large screens this becomes even more important. Despite the big screen size, attendees will struggle to read small text which will distract them from your valuable content. **Great tip: after creating your slides, step to the back of your room and see if you can still read your slides, if not, then you have to make the text bigger
3. Filling your Screen
   • A great presentation should ALWAYS fill the screen. Have you ever seen a power point with black bars around it? This means your slides are not sized right for the screen. Always coordinate with your AV team to figure out the aspect ratio of your screen. Empty space will distract your listeners and cuts out valuable space for your slides.
4. High Quality Pictures
   • The bigger your screen, the more important high resolution pictures become. If your picture looks grainy, then people will be distracted. Have you ever tried to watch a Netflix video with a grainy picture? It is hard to pay attention. Don’t do this to your attendees!
5. Presenter Tools
   • Everyone should use a slide advancer. These are remote controls that advance the slide for you. This ensures a seamless presentation and gives you control over when to switch slides.
   • Confidence monitors can really help you focus on the audience, and not your slides. Typically we set TV monitors to show you your current and upcoming slides. Some people even display notes or a timer clock to help them along.

We hope you found these tips helpful! Stay tuned for more blogs from the BVC team.