I am proud to announce that my latest DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007,” is now available for purchase.

This is a set of two DVD s containing over seven hours of training! Each lesson averages about 10 minutes. So, when you want to work on one specific part of your presentation you can just put the DVD in your computer, locate the lesson and get a focused coaching session – all within the space of less than 15 minutes.

When you want quick answers and a visual guide for the steps involved, this is the DVD for you.

When you want to learn how to use PowerPoint from a professional speaker & trainer and not from a “techie”, this is the DVD for you.

I am also proud to announce that my online bookstore opened this morning. I invite you to visit the bookstore for The Company Rocks. You can also learn about my other DVDs including, “The 50 Best Tips for Excel 2007.”

Thank you for all of your kind words of support as I have built this website over the past year. I wish you a very happy new year in 2010!

Sincerely,

Danny Rocks

danny@thecompanyrocks.com

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People do business with people that they like – or would like to be like.

Take advantage of this. Shine the (video) spotlight on your employees. Let your customers get to know them better. Let your employees “showcase” their special talents and expertise.

People want to do business with people that they know and trust. Your website gives you a great opportunity to:

• Include a short video of your employees sharing a tip, a hobby, a piece of trivia
• Invite your customers to get to know something that they did not know yet …
  • About your business
  • About your product
  • About your employees

Try it!

Here’s an example - I filmed a series of training videos for NAMM – The International Music Products Association.

In this video, you can see – and hear – me playing a little piano music. Now, perhaps, you did not know that I played the piano. Perhaps that makes me more interesting. Perhaps you – the customer – would like to know a little bit about me.

This is an opportunity to start a conversation. Which may lead to a sale. Which will help to establish a connection between your employees, your customer and your business.

Try it – you may like it. And… you may find more customers – who like to business with people that they like – or people that they would like to be like!

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I want you to reduce the “Visual Clutter” on your PowerPoint Slides. You are not trying to write a “ransom note,” you are attempting to create a professional image.

PowerPoint has a great set of tools that you can use to enforce the Visual Style options that you set. In this video lesson, I demonstrate how to set up the style guides and then how to use PowerPoint’s tools to make the changes that conform to your rules.

Here are the steps to follow for this lesson:

1. Go to the Tools Men and choose Options and then click the Spelling & Style Tab.
2. On the Spelling & Style Tab choose Style Options.
3. You can make your stylistic choices on the “Case & End Punctuation” tab and on the “Visual Clarity” tab. When you have made your choices, click OK.
4. Back in Normal View, when you click in a Text Place holder, look for the Yellow Light Bulb. Click on it to see your options to conform to the style settings that you set.
5. Also, look for the AutoFit Options Smart Tag. Choose the best option to change your style.

Search my Index of PowerPoint Video Lessons for the topic of your choice.

News! My DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is availabe for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

Related Videos

• How Many Slides Should I Use?

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MS Excel is the best application for organizing & calculating data. It is also the best choice for creating graphs of your data.

MS PowerPoint is the best application for communicating “the story” that you want your data to communicate.

Use  each application to do what it does best. And don’t waste time re-typing your Excel data into PowerPoint.

In this video lesson, I demonstrate 5 ways to import your Excel data into a PowerPoint presentation. 1) Paste it as Text only. 2) Paste it as a Picture. 3) Paste it as a Table. 4) Embed the entire Excel Workbook (OLE). 5) Paste Special to establish a “Link” to the Excel Source Data.

Here are the steps to follow in this video lesson:

1. Select and copy the Excel Data to the clipboard.
2. In PowerPoint select the slide for the data and choose “Paste.”
3. Look at the bottom right corner of the “pasted data” and locate the “Paste Options” tag.
4. Option #1 – Paste as Text Only. The data is pasted into a Text box that can me sized and moved.
5. Option #2 – Paste a Picture of the Table – Can be sized and moved. The Picture Toolbar makes it easy to modify the background and borders of the table.
6. Option #3 – Paste the data as a Table (Default option) – each entry fits into its own “cell” in the table. Easy to format the table to fit your needs.
7. Option #4 – Paste the Entire Excel Workbook. This option actually “embeds” the Excel application – and increased the size of you file. You can double-click on the table and the MS Excel application is activated (OLE) so that you can e.g. modify functions and add fields. etc.
8. Option #5 – This time you choose Edit – Paste Special – Link. Now, whenever you change the “source data” in Excel your PowerPoint slide will update to reflect the current information. Be careful to keep the Excel file in the same directory as your PowerPoint presentation file so that the “link” does not get lost when you move files to a USB drive or other location.

Find the PowerPoint Video Lesson that you want – Index to all PowerPoint Topics

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

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I have uploaded many of my PowerPoint Training Videos to YouTube. Here is the link to my YouTube Channel:

http://www.youtube.com/user/DannyRocksPowerPoint

YouTube reaches a very broad audience. It offers a very different experience. YouTube makes it very easy to share the videos that you like with your friends and colleagues. Check it out for yourself!

I must admit that I was wary about uploading my training videos to YouTube. However, I have had a very positive response to my MS Excel Videos on YouTube. So I have created a separate PowerPoint Channel and have begun to upload content from this website to YouTube.

If you want to share any of my Excel or PowerPoint Videos, YouTube make it easy to do so. You can even choose to embed the videos on your own website – go right ahead! I have included my business card at the beginning and the end of each video so that viewers know how to reach me.

Let me know what you think about YouTube. How is it different from this blog? Have you ever shared a video that you found on YouTube with your friends. Have you ever embedded a YouTube video on your own website?

I invite you to add your comments below.

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

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MS PowerPoint’s Normal View has two Tabs – Slide View and Outline View.  In this video lesson, I will share tips for getting the most out of Outline View.

For example:

• Collapse or Expand the text for individual Slides or for all Slides in the presentation.
• Create a “Summary Slide” containing the titles for each slide in your presentation.
• Insert Hyperlinks to text on your “Summary Slide” to make it easy to navigate to an individual slide.

Here are the steps to follow in this video lesson:

• In Normal View, choose the Outline Tab.
• Be sure that the Outlining Toolbar is active. (View – Toolbars – Outlining) You can either “dock it” or make it a “floating toolbar.”
• Experiment with Expand and Collapse – Individual slides (Double-click or Expand on the toolbar) or All slides in the presentation.
• Create a Duplicate Slide – The keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+D or choose Insert-Duplicate Slide.
• To create a “Summary Slide” first select the slide icons for the slides you want. Then click the Summary Slide Icon on the Outlining Toolbar.
• Create a “Hyperlink” to quickly navigate to individual slides. First select the text on the “Summary Slide” and then use the keyboard shortcut – Ctrl+K and choose “Place in this Document” and choose the slide.
• You must be in Slide Show View in order to test your Hyperlink.

Find the PowerPoint Video Lesson that you want – Index to all PowerPoint Topics

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

Related Videos

• Import Outlines from MS Word
  

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Today’s video tutorial is in response to a viewer’s request. She has been a series of MS Word documents created as Outlines. Her new boss wants her to transfer the Outlines into MS PowerPoint. She really does not want to learn PowerPoint. And she definitely does not want to re-type her outlines.

Watch as I demonstrate three ways to import MS Word Outlines into MS PowerPoint.

Here are the steps to follow in this video tutorial:

Find the PowerPoint Video Lesson that you want – Index to all PowerPoint Topics

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

Related Videos

• Work in Outline View in PowerPoint

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For my video blog entry yesterday – “Which Presentation Will You Deliver?” – I used a script. I am actually enjoying the discipline of writing and reading the script for these blog entries. My preferred style is to use an outline to guide me as I deliver my presentations. However, I find the “permanence” of an Internet blog demands a more disciplined approach.

I am not a perfectionist. When recording my video blogs, I do a “straight take” – no pauses and no editing.  Of course, I abandon a recording that contains obvious “flubs” or false starts. But, I am content to publish a video blog entry that is less than perfect. I really don’t have the time to go back an re-record the occasional “vocal blemish.”

How long?

My biggest concern is the length of a video blog post. I do not want to condense my posts to fit some arbitrary time limit. My feeling is that if I have something to say, I should post what I want to say – adapting my delivery to fit the chosen media. If my message is compelling, a viewer will stay engaged. And, hopefully, return for more. If not … well, that is my problem. Only time, tracking and feedback from my viewers will help me to find the correct balance between content and time limit.

Since I have been using a script for my recent videos, I have been able to track my Words-per-minute (WPM) count. For my “Which Presentation Will You Give” entry, the script contains 1,130 words. The video is 7 minutes and 17 seconds. This gives me a wpm count of @ 160. This is my normal speaking rate. This feels like a comfortable rate – to me. How does it feel it you?

“Eye-Opening” Experience

Recording my presentations has been “eye-opening” for me. Yes, I deliberately used the description “eye-opening.” I am paying more attention to the graphics and text that I choose for each slide in the PowerPoint presentation. I want to ensure that each slide serves a specific purpose.  Reinforcing my speech and not replacing it. Guiding my audience and not distracting them from my content.

When I do a “live” presentation I never get to see how my slides interact with my speech. Recording  these short video blog posts allows me to see and analyze the presentation. Of course, there is a missing ingredient – the audience. You.

So please give me your feedback. What do you think? Do I speak too fast or too slow for you to understand? Do I talk too much or for too long? Is the video blog format useful – for you? What topics would you like to see?

You can email me – danny@thecompanyrocks.com – or add your comments below. I welcome your thoughts.

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

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Dale Carnegie once wrote, “There are three speeches for the one you actually give. The one you practiced … The one you actually gave … and the one you wish you gave?”

In this video lesson, Danny brings this principle to life. Follow these tips and you will consistently deliver “the presentation that you wish you gave!”

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As a follow-up to yesterday’s article, I produced a PowerPoint Presentation on the topic of “words-per-minute( WPM) when speaking. Watch – and Listen – this video recording. Am I speaking “too fast”- for you? “Too slow” – for you? Or, is my WPM count “Just right” – for you?

Yesterday’s written article is 515 words in length. At a normal WPM count of 150, that would make it @ 3 minutes and 45 seconds long. That is a good length for broadcast via the Internet in my experience.

As I was creating the PowerPoint slide presentation, I realized that I would have to add a few words to the narration. I wanted to ensure that it would make sense to viewers watching the presentation- even with the added visual aids and the graphics on the slides. And, of course, I did deviate from the script occasionally. As best I can determine, this presentation contains 600 words and the video lasts 5 minutes. So my WPM is 120.

This is much slower than my normal speaking rate (close to 160 WPM.) I wasn’t trying to purposely slow down. After three practice runs, this is the pace that felt natural to me.

What do you think? Is my WPM “Just right” – for you?

Please share your comments with our readers and viewers below.

News! My new DVD, “The 50 Best Tips for PowerPoint 2007″ is available for purchase. Visit my online store for details.

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