Anyone can throw together a PowerPoint presentation, but not everyone has the ability to tell a compelling story through a couple of slides. Evolving technology, hybrid workforces and changes in buyer behavior have fundamentally changed how companies capture the attention of prospects, engage with them and inspire them to act.

One of the most critical marketing assets is the company pitch deck, which typically takes the form of a presentation deck. Bringing a company’s story to life requires plenty of careful thought and consideration on your team’s part. Not only should you consider what topics you’ll be presenting, but also what you can do to visually engage your viewers throughout the entire presentation. 

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Storytelling Do’s and Don’ts

Creating modern company presentations no longer has to be a painstaking, inefficient process. In fact, companies with the right technology can actually remove the design burden from their teams.

Here are the most important do’s and don’ts for marketers tasked with company presentations:

• • Do: As technology has evolved over the decades, so has the company presentation. The first and most important thing companies need to understand about storytelling today is presentation software isn’t all the same. Different tools offer different capabilities. For example, your company might consider using a tool that provides different pre-built templates to tell a story that is sure to wow the crowd. This means organizations don’t have to settle or make storytelling harder than it has to be. Businesses should consider the options available to them and which will best suit their goals and mission.
    

• Don’t: Companies that want to tell their stories in engaging ways need to stop using stale, traditional tools like PowerPoint. These outdated tools have one major flaw for marketers: a blank slate. Marketers should consider using marketing and design resources to avoid the burden of staring at empty slides. Rather than focusing on the company story they want to tell, marketers are tasked with figuring out how to visualize that story and then format it. Blank slates are also frequent brand killers because without any design parameters, inconsistencies in content creation are almost guaranteed.  
• Do: Modern storytelling is just as much about creating content as it is understanding how it works. For marketing teams to win today, they need the ability to gauge the efficacy of their company presentations. Premiere software vendors will offer organizations presentation analytics, which include the number of presentation views, who viewed the presentation, the average and total time those people viewed the slides or deck, and how many viewers made it through to the end of the presentation. When marketers have this detailed insight, they better understand buyer engagement and can tweak or tailor their content accordingly. 
• Don’t: Marketers don’t have to start each company presentation from scratch. In fact, companies equipped with design AI tools benefit from software which makes decisions on their behalf, upholds design-forward standards, adheres to company-established brand guidelines and saves valuable time.
• Do: As marketers create company presentations, they need to keep buyer expectations in mind. Visual communications are ubiquitous today, which means creating experiences for buyers is all the more important – particularly in this current remote-selling environment. Don’t forget to bring company stories and data to life through imagery, video and animations. 
• Don’t: Marketers should strive for simple company presentations and, at all costs, avoid Frankendecks. Jammed with information that overwhelms and confuses the audience, Frankendecks are known as “the junk drawer of content” because they’re branding and design messes.
• Do: Finally, marketers shouldn’t work in a vacuum when they create company presentations. Teams need the ability to collaborate, edit, update and share presentation decks, even on-the-fly. Organizations shouldn’t forget about the cloud when evaluating presentation software and all the advantages cloud-based tools can offer.Modern storytelling should be quick and easy for both marketers and their peers. 

Marketers should take heart to start or create a company presentation. It’s actually easier than ever to create effective, engaging and memorable presentation decks. Organizations just need to upgrade their presentation tools and embrace modern storytelling. The right presentation software should serve as the designer, so marketers don’t have to be. 

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