Slide titles matter
While every situation is different, you can follow a few general rules when it comes to titling your medical presentation slides. You are not titling a book, essay, short story, or newspaper article, so do not look to those mediums for guidance. Instead, read below for the top five guidelines you can follow during your preparation stages.
Be as artistic as you want with your use of photos, images, borders, and effects, as long as your title is readable.
Slide titles matter
While every situation is different, you can follow a few general rules when it comes to titling your medical presentation slides. You are not titling a book, essay, short story, or newspaper article, so do not look to those mediums for guidance. Instead, read below for the top five guidelines you can follow during your preparation stages.
Be as artistic as you want with your use of photos, images, borders, and effects, as long as your title is readable.
1. Consolidate by focusing on the important
A title that is a sentence is no title at all. Your slide title should be an eye-catching group of words that labels the slide and gives some specific information about it. Your title should be crisp and concise rather than wordy. Instead of writing ‘Heart Valve Device Market Shows Promise and Will Continue to Grow at 20% Per Year,’ try ‘ 20% Annual Growth Expected for Heart Valves.’ When a title is as short as possible, you are narrowing the attention of the audience so that they immediately know what to look forward to in the slide. If they have to decipher a long and complicated title, then you have failed in your title writing.
2. Use the right font
When presenting to investors and medical staff, use fonts that are standard and arrive with any version of PowerPoint. Ariel and Calibri are both great choices. But if you are sick and tired of these two fonts, why don’t you try a few others that are professional and clean. These would include:
- Gil Sans
- Corbel
- Helvetica (most used font — has many variations).
Just make sure you stay away from overly artistic fonts such as those in Word Art as these create titles that are warped and heavily stylized.
3. Use a large font
Your slide title should ALWAYS be larger and more noticeable than the body text of the slide. This delineates its status as ‘title’ and sets it apart from the rest of the text. It is not advisable to keep the title and body text the same size, but give them different font sizes. The increased size makes the title easy to read so that it is the very first thing the audience sees on your slide.
Click here to learn more about the best font size for a PowerPoint presentation
4. Use appropriate contrast
No matter what range of colors you use, you should always make sure your slide title color is readable. It should not matter how far a doctor is from the screen, at what angle the screen is tilted, or how strong the sun light from the windows appears. Prepare for all situations by using a color that contrasts solidly against the background color. You can use the color wheel to see what colors contrast well with one another. Normally, colors on the opposite side of the wheel contrast the best. Also remember that you do not have to write your title in a different color that the rest of your text. The title should be obvious thanks to increased font size, top or left location, and its early introduction on the page.
5. Use a line underneath the title
This is optional of course and only if you are using a set template to prepare your medical PowerPoint presentation. A thin line underneath the title will help separate the heading from the text or images underneath it and give it more emphasis and importance.
In Cliff Atkinson’s words
Cliff Atkinson, a writer on the topic of effective PowerPoint slides, spells it out for the speaker. “The point of the headline is to help your audience understand your point as effectively as possible.” This means that among other points, you should publish titles that are easy to read, not ones that require squinting.
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