Tuesday, April 29, 2008

PowerPoint Tip: Using PDF files during presentations

In my latest article that has been posted to the web site, I talk about how we can increase interaction in our sales presentations. I talk about the difference between a lecture style of presentation (one-way communication only) and a more interactive presentation. I then give four ways to get the audience involved to have more of a conversation. One of the ideas is to hyperlink to a PDF document, and that's what I am going to expand on today. The full article is at: http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/articles/increasinginteraction.htm .

When you display a brochure in the Adobe PDF Reader, it usually opens showing the full page, which is usually far too small to be able to read or explain. So what you will need to do is zoom in on the area that you want the audience to focus on. You can use the percentage zoom drop down list, but the zoom is focused on the center of the page, which may not be where you want to zoom in on. Instead, click on the zoom-in magnifying glass tool and then you can click on the portion of the page you want to expand (you may need to click there more than once to make it readable). It allows you to show what you want quickly during your presentation.

Your PDF document will usually have multiple pages, since it is usually a brochure that you are showing. You will need to jump to the page that you want to show. Instead of scrolling down or using the Page Down key to jump through pages, use the feature to go directly to the page you want. Click in the page number field at the bottom of the screen and simply type in the page number you want to show. The software will jump directly to that page and you save time getting to what you wanted to show the audience.

You also have an option in Acrobat that can help give the audience more context when looking at a multi-page document. In the lower right hand corner of the Acrobat screen, you will see a number of icons that represent the different ways that the display can be shown. If you want to give people a context of where they are in a multi-page document by showing facing pages as if they had opened a brochure on their desk, select the icon that looks like two pages beside each other. Then, when you want to zoom in, select the icon that just shows one page.

With more documents being created in PDF format, use these ideas to bring a PDF document into your presentation for added impact. If you aren't familiar with adding hyperlinks to documents and PDF files, check out the Guide to Advanced PowerPoint Techniques, which has complete instructions to follow. Get more info at: http://www.ThinkOutsideTheSlide.com/guidetoadvppt.htm

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