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The Coolest, Little Known New Feature of PowerPoint 2007

The new Microsoft office brought along the addition of new extensions: .pptx, .xlsx, .docx.  However , this new extension is nothing more than a zipped container of all of the elements required to build your specific PowerPoint presentation.  When you change the “.pptx” extension to “.zip” , it will open into a world of new possibilities.  All of the file images are located in teh media folder.  There are too many benefits from both a consumer and a developer to mention them all; however here are three to should benefit everyone.

• Retrieve all artwork easily and in original format (.jpeg, .wmf, .tif, etc.)
• Easily identify large images (file size) and reduce for more manageable PowerPoint files
• Images are linked files and can be dynamically swapped for other images

The only thing I could wish for is that the images maintained their original name, but C'est la vie.  There are so many possibilities here, please share how this will benefit you.

Trends and Microsoft

When you create an item that every consumer uses and you lead the industry, more often than not if you try something new, good or bad the others will follow.  Microsoft is no exception; they released Office 2007 earlier this year with a new font, “Calibri”.  Personally, I love it.  It follows many of the current blog practices or being a hair smaller and offering a lot more white space.  From a design perspective I think it is a beautiful choice, however from a functionality perspective it lacks.

The statistics of the aging population online are overwhelming.  Human Factors International published in March 2007 that internet users include:

• 75% of adults aged 56-65
• 41% of adults over 66

They also reported that vision begins to deteriorate between 40 and 50 years of age. 

As I mentioned I love Calibri and within Microsoft Office uses have the ability to increase font size, however if your company follows the small font trend for your website, then make sure you offer the ability for someone with less than perfect vision to use your site, otherwise you may be missing out on sales from one of the largest populations online.

Add Typos to Your Website

Recently while preliminarily testing various presentation keywords, I stumbled upon something interesting.  The proper spelling of Microsoft’s presentation product is PowerPoint (one word), however many understandably misspell it as two words.   I began by testing the largest probable population, simply powerpoint (one word) vs power point  (two words).  The correct spelling outperformed the incorrect spelling by 40% (~200,000 yearly searches).  Although the correct spelling has the majority, it is not overwhelming and one should keyword their site for both. 

The surprising part cam in when I began testing  key phrases (always recommended above keywords).  This time it was “animated powerpoint” vs “animated power point”.  In this instance the incorrect spelling outperformed the correct spelling by 25% (~ 800 yearly searches). 

I am not endorsing misspelling your products or services throughout your site.  It would probably reduce your credibility, however with meta tags, image tags, and a little creative writing, there is no reason that you would not add both a correct and an incorrect spelling to your website. 

Anyone know of other misspelled words or phrases that outperform the correct spelling?

The PowerPoint Replacement?

It has been rumored for some time now that Google will be adding to its free Google Docs and Google Spreadsheets a presentation package.  Last week Google made it official and announced they will soon be releasing Google Presently.  Presently was acquired when Google purchased Tonic Systems.

Once Presently is released, Google will have completed constructing their own office suite.  It is assumed, similar to Google Documents and Google spreadsheets, that Presently will also be free to use.  Google insists it is not competing with Microsoft office and that Office offers more features, however that is complete spin. 

Microsoft early on dominated the business software industry by giving pieces of office away for free (namely PowerPoint) which ultimately removed any competition.  Today Google is following that model, but one better, they are giving everything away for free.  The greatest challenge for the Google Office Suite in gaining users isn’t Microsoft; it is whether you trust your data online.  Much like paying with credit cards or accessing bank records online, some people are more accepting than others.  It will be interesting to watch the next steps for both products.

Would/Do you use the Google Office Suite? 

The Most Practical Small Business Marketing Guide

Duct Tape Marketing by John Jantsch is by far the most useful small business books I have read to date.  It is written in a format that it can be read through from cover to cover or by chapters of interest.  Many of the ideas are not necessarily novel, however they are all in one place, easy to find, and more importantly easy to implement.  If you are looking for ways to increase your business through subtle, yet effective changes to your marketing then read Duct Tape Marketing. 

Don’t take my word for it, see the reviews of other readers at amazon.com

A Little Border Space Please

In the printing world, if an item or color is printed to the edge, then a little extra should go beyond that boundary (bleed).  This allows the cutter a bit of wiggle room during the trim process.  At the same time, no item of value; text, logo, or page number, should exist within a close proximity of the edge, just in case the trim is a bit inside the margin. 

The same is true of projected presentations for conferences, trade shows, and other large venue uses.  Important content should not go all the way to the edge to allow a little extra overlap off of the screen.  In the early days of PowerPoint, it was customary to require a ½” border where important content was not permitted. With uses of PowerPoint expanding beyond projected presentations; flip books, general thought collection, board meetings, this rule seems to have gone away.  Due to the more sophisticated projectors of today, I would argue that ½” border may be excessive; however ¼” or more still should be followed.  You never know when that little bit of space will prove advantageous. 

Saving PowerPoint 2007 as PDF: Not as Easy as It use to Be

Due to a conflict between Microsoft and Adobe, Microsoft Office 2007 (Vista) does not come with a native way to save as PDF.  However, there are two options.  The first and more costly is to buy a complete copy of Adobe Acrobat.  The other is for customers running a Genuine Microsoft Office product to go to the Microsoft Download Center and download the add-in.   

Is Your Content Still Yours? Have You Been Plagiarized?

Ever wonder if someone has plagiarized your website content.  With over 105 Million websites, how would you know?  Copyscape by Indigo Stream Technologies provides a tool to defend your website.   By simply typing in your url, Copyscape will scour the web for other sites with your content.  Want a little extra defense?  Add their “Protected” banner to your website and/or pay for their premium service.

Design, Tic Tac Toe, and PowerPoint

As part of my “Elements of Design” class, I teach a lesson on Tic Tac Toe.  Each student is asked to bring in an ad that they feel represents a good solid design and then asked to draw an edge-to-edge Tic Tac Toe board on top of it. You should see 9 boxes, 3 over 3.  Upon a quick examination, you will notice that the focal point(s) of each ad will fall on one of three places: a point of intersection, centered within a rectangle, or within the middle of a line segment.  Items that are placed along these positions will create a more balanced design; thus carrying through a visual flow and creating a greater focus and attention to key points. This is known as the “Rule of Thirds”.

Points of Intersection

Centered in Rectangle

Middle of Line Segment

PowerPoint is no different.  It is a design tool.  PowerPoint layouts should follow universal design principles.  When creating layouts, be cognoscente of the Tic Tac Toe board; even going as far as placing guidelines onto the slides to assist with alignment. 

Below is an example of a slide with the Tic Tac Toe board on top.  As you can see below, the title is vertically centered within the first row. The person’s head with the laptop is horizontally centered within the right column with his eyes (the focal point of this image) aligned on the first horizontal plane.  The first bullet is also positioned on the first horizontal plane.

With Tic Tac Toe Guides

Final Slide

These lines of symmetry can direct the viewers’ eyes to focus on each element as a step-by-step visual story, thus reinforcing your message with several elements on every slide. 

Which Keeps More Visitors? Single Long Page or Short Multipage Articles

In the 90’s web pages use to scroll and scroll; but it was soon learned that long articles scared people and that time is money and no one has time to read a long article. Today articles get broken up to span several pages, not only does this make each section more digestible, but also it increases the amount of space to place ads.  However, there has been a long standing theory that each time you make a visitor click, you will lose 50% of your visitors.  So which loses fewer visitors? The long article on a single page or one that spans several pages.

ADDITION -----------------------------------------------------

Since posting, I posed this question on cre8asite forums.  They already had a thread running on this very topic.  Here is a summary…

Long pages:

• Benefit:
  Better Search Engine Categorizing, Some visitors prefer long pages (maybe generational)
• Con:
  Some visitors will only read short articles

Short Multi-pages

• Benefits:
  More ad space, easier to digest
• Cons:
  Loss of visitors on each click, fewer visitors on sub-pages and search engines may not categorize pages properly

In the end,it may be generational, it may be pure preference, or it may be something entirely different.  All anyone could really do is take a guess then test with their own content. But some interesting points none-the-less.

Cre8asite Thread 1
Cre8asite Thread 2
14th Colony test Results

What are your thoughts?  What has your experience been?