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Research conference presentation slide template + 3 design tips

Imagine this: research conference organizers send the participants a PowerPoint presentation slide template along with instructions that sound something like this:

Your presentation should be 20 minutes long; please keep the number of presentation slides to a maximum of 20.

A scientist who has 35 PowerPoint slides from the previous conference and might think:

OK, no problem! I will simply squeeze the information from the remaining fifteen slides into the first twenty to fit the provided presentation template.

The resulting presentation slides probably look similar to the figure below.

academic conference presentation slides example

The scientist arrives at the conference, delivers the presentation, and receives applause at the end. He puts a picture from the conference on a social network and receives a comment: Sorry, I missed your presentation. Please email me the slides.

Ahh, he thinks , it’s a good thing I jammed that extra information into the presentation slides. Otherwise, it would be difficult for the person asking to get the full overview of my work!

It seems everyone is happy. The conference organizers got their 20 slides, the presenter successfully delivered his speech, and even the person on social media got the information she requested. But one thing is missing from the story – what about the people who actually showed up for the presentation?

The listeners were probably bewildered by the PowerPoint slides resembling an explosion of a hard drive disc over the screen. Their eyes were darting to follow the laser pointer from a figure in one corner of the slide to bullet points in the other. At around the third slide, many probably started daydreaming about the appetizers they can expect during the coffee break. They energetically clapped their hands at the end of the presentation because it was finally over. They forgot the performance as soon as the next speaker took the stage.

OK, but what about the person that asked you to send her the slides? Surely she would be disappointed when receiving a presentation which she cannot understand without you being there to present it. Well, send her the research paper (see my book to learn writing an impactful research paper). This is the piece of work that is meant for sharing and has to be self-explanatory. You are on the stage for a reason! Research conference presentation slides do not have to be self-explanatory.

In this post, you will learn three crucial tips for preparing scientific conference presentation slides to efficiently explain your research.

Tip No.1: One thought per slide

Presenters often use slides to keep the talk on track. Frequently this takes the form of the dreaded bullet-point list. Such an approach is a bad idea. Despite what some people claim, humans can not multitask at things that require deliberate thinking. Too much text will draw the listener’s attention away from what you are saying and toward reading the text on the slide. Since we read faster than we can speak, your listeners will already know what you are going to say, thus losing their attention.

The best approach for keeping the presentation slides light is to limit yourself to one single thought per slide. This could be, for example, a figure and several supporting bullet points taking up not more than one row each. But do not be afraid only to have one item, like a diagram, on the slide which takes only ten seconds to explain. There is no invisible jar that will start to spill over if you pour too many slides inside. A single thought per slide will allow the audience to better follow the presentation. This will also allow you to increase the size of text and images, thus ensuring that people in the back row can follow the talk.

Instead of using presentation slides as a teleprompter, use this valuable real estate for information that adds to your presentation, not duplicates it.

The “before” figure below presents a typical academic conference PowerPint presentation slide with three bullet points. I transformed it into three separate slides, each introducing one single thought. When displaying the “after” slides, the presenter would simply say out loud the information that was previously written.

academic conference presentation slides example

You will notice that each of the converted slides uses visual information instead of text. Visuals draw human attention and can do a great job explaining things that would be difficult to put into words. Data charts, scientific illustrations, diagrams, or videos can all add another dimension to complement your presentation.

I am not claiming that you should strip your presentation slides of useful information or dumb them down. My reasoning stems from the vast majority of presentation slides that I have seen in research conferences. The slides are often overwhelmed with details that do more to confuse the listener than help. Focusing the slide content on visual information will help to support instead of distracting from your message. This brings us to the next topic.

Tip No.2: Presentation slides are for visual information

Even though I urge you to simplify the slides, it is clear that as a researcher, you will need to present complex information. This will most often take the form of different charts and illustrations (let’s call them graphics).

There is a lot to learn about the creation of graphics, but one element from the toolkit of designing graphics is particularly important for creating great scientific conference presentation slides. That is knowing how to guide the listeners’ attention. To do it, we must tap into a basic human instinct – people are drawn to outliers. Back at the dawn of homo-sapiens, this helped us spot danger or notice prey: think of a lion moving in a steppe – it is easy to imagine why our vision has evolved to pay attention to it.

Today we can take advantage of the 300 thousand-year-old instincts of our species to explain the all-important differences between two lines in a graph. Color, size, motion, white space, enclosure, and shape are some graphical features that can attract attention to particular elements in a chart.

academic conference presentation slides example

Learn creating charts that tell a story

Knowing how to prepare efficient data charts and graphics will not only help you to create better slides; you will be able to use these skills to write clearer research papers and certainly it will increase your chances of obtaining research grants. My book Research Data Visualization and Scientific Graphics is a short guide that will help you to learn create charts that tell a story.

The example below directs the attention of the viewers within a single chart to the different topics that are being discussed (data from Evans et al. ). These could be presented in sequential slides.

academic conference presentation slides example

The “Only 60 harvests ” left claims are exaggerated. Research by Evans et al. shows that depending on the soil management, only 7-34% of soils have less than 100 year lifespan.

academic conference presentation slides example

Even most bare soils survive upwards of 300 years.

academic conference presentation slides example

A good management practice can extend the soil’s life by several orders of magnitude.

A word of caution for those who might become too trigger-happy when discovering how easy it is to add animations to PowerPoint presentation slides: use these effects only when they add information to the story that you are telling. It quickly becomes irritating to see flying text, rotating slide transitions, expanding bullet points, and dissolving pictures. Revealing only one item at a time can be similarly annoying when done without a purpose.

academic conference presentation slides example

Hint: Avoid using PowerPoint templates with busy backgrounds or colorful university logos on each slide. This limits your ability to draw the listeners’ attention to a particular item on the slide. On a busy background, the highlighted parts will not pop out quite as much as they would from a simple background.

Tip No.3: Use action titles

Instinctively we can probably agree that the most important information, regardless of the type of medium, should be the largest. For example, it would be weird if the largest letters on a milk bottle would rea “Recyclable”. Interestingly, almost none of us actually follow this logic when designing scientific conference presentation slides.

If you open PowerPoint, by default the largest text is the slide title. Since it is also located at the top of the slide, the title is going to be the first thing that draws the listener’s attention. But what do we put up there? Redundant, meaningless phrases like Methodology or Results of XYZ test . The figure below provides one such example.

academic conference presentation slides example

The traditional PowerPoint title attracts all the attention while providing very little information.

You will probably agree that the tile Global temperature prediction does little to reveal what’s important about the information in the presentation slide. That is unless the listener has suddenly awoken from a nap and wants to understand what is the topic you are currently discussing. If this is the case, slide titles are the least of your problems.

Instead of wasting the title for redundant information, a much better idea is to follow the advice from the C.N.Knaflic’s book Storytelling with Data in using an action title . An action title should provide information about the results, highlight an important observation or a conclusion for the particular slide. For example, instead of a whole block of slides having the title Results , the individual slide titles would say Observations have high variability or Simulation supports the test results .

In other words, a conference slide title should present something important about the research that the audience should not miss. It sets the expectations for what to expect from the information on the slide.

See below the different ways in which an action title can be displayed in the presentation slides. Doesn’t this approach offer more information than the traditional PowerPoint slide title that we saw earlier?

academic conference presentation slides example

An action title highlights the key information that the listeners should not miss

academic conference presentation slides example

Placing the action title at the bottom (and graying it out) is another option, giving more emphasis to the slide content.    

academic conference presentation slides example

The widescreen (16:9) slide size can be put to good use by dividing it into two columns: one for visual information, the other for key text.

academic conference presentation slides example

Removing the title altogether allows increasing the size of the graphics. The presenter tells all the information that was previously written in the slide title.

academic conference presentation slides example

Font size rule of thumb : Make sure that the listeners in the back rows can read your slides comfortably. Since you will rarely have the chance to test this, apply the rule of thumb by using 14 to 28 pt. font size for the main text and in charts. References and other background information could be smaller and grayed out to avoid distracting from the main content.  

A free scientific conference presentation slide template

Now that we have reviewed three key principles of academic conference presentation slide design, use them to prepare your own slides. An even better way is to prepare a PowerPoint slide template that automatically incorporates many of these tips.

Below you will find a free PowerPoint template that I designed specifically for scientific conference presentations. It holds six preformatted slide layouts which by default follow many of the academic conference slide design tips that we just went through, including the use of action titles, focus on visual information, and large enough font size. The presentation template also holds the three design tips to serve as a reminder from this post.

MS PowerPoint logo

You will access these free Powerpoint scientific presentation slide templates in the download

Great slides will not mask poor presentation skills

Creating great presentation slides is certainly important in order to make a memorable academic presentation. But no amount of slide polishing will mask other potential problems, including lack of substance, unclear presentation structure, and a presenter who is so stressed their mouth feels like a desert.

What you need is to add presentation skills to your scientific skill tool belt. My name is Martins Zaumanis and with my online course “Scientific Presentations Masterclass” I will show you how to become a masterful presenter using a system that I developed, called the “ Five S presenting pyramid ”. 

Learn to give powerful academic presentations and overcome stage fright using the Five-S pyramid.

Scientific Presentations Masterclass banner

The Five-S pyramid starts from the basics of putting together the presentation  Substance  (first S), advances to devising a presentation  Structure  (second S), shows how to put up a  Show  (third S), tell memorable  Stories  (fourth S), and finally, it will offer advice for how the  Speaker  (fifth S) can work on improving presentation skills, including dealing with stage fright.

academic conference presentation slides example

The Five-S pyramid starts from the basics of putting together the presentation  Substance  (first S), advances to devising a presentation  Structure  (second S), shows how to put up a  Show  (third S), tell memorable  Stories  (fourth S), and finally, it will offer advice for how the  Speaker  (fifth S) can work on improving presentation skills, including dealing with stage fright.

Related articles:

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Research Conference Presentations: Some Tips and Examples

Useful Tips

Research talk 101 (by Lucia Dettori)

How not to give a presentation (from ScienceRoll)

Examples of Short Talks (PowerPoint files):

Mark's example of a bad research presentation

Mark's example of a somewhat better research presentation

Examples of Posters (PowerPoint files):

Poster example 1

Poster example 2

Poster example 3

Academic presentations: Conferences

  • Presentation Design
  • Slide design
  • Conferences
  • Group presentations

Jump to content on this page:

“... if you cannot stand up and present your findings, in one form or another, you will struggle to achieve the intellectual and professional success which will allow you to move on to even more interesting projects.” Lucinda Becker, Presenting Your Research: Conferences, Symposiums, Poster Presentations and Beyond

Research students are often asked to give presentations at academic conferences. This can be both terrifying and exciting in equal measures. This page gives some top tips on how to make sure your presentation stands out from the crowd and that you get the most from the experience.

Why give a conference presentation?

There are many, here are just a few:

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To get feedback on your research that you can act upon to improve your final thesis or a future published paper. This can be absolutely invaluable in stopping you going off-track or forgetting to include important material.

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To make other academics want to read your finished thesis or a future published paper. Think of it as the trailer to the upcoming movie – it needs to be full of your most interesting material but leave them wanting to know more.

Handshake icon

To make contacts that are relevant to your research area . Never underestimate the importance of networking at any academic conference. You can even ask people working in related research to find you after your presentation.

Clapping hands icon

To get your name known in relevant academic circles . This is a real chance to showcase your work and gain a reputation within your field. With a good presentation you could get a reputation as a real expert in your field.

Basic structure of a conference presentation

In a conference presentation you need to choose an aspect of your research that can comfortably be conveyed to an audience in an interesting way within the timescale you are given. This is usually only about 20 minutes (with 10 minutes for questions) so resist the temptation to cover your entire PhD thesis. A useful simple structure is shown here.

As you can see, this still follows a simple story structure, with a  beginning , a  middle  and an  end  as covered on our  Structuring Presentations page ; it is, however, a little more research focused.  Depending on the conference type, you may choose to use one of the structures on the other page. What is most important is that the structure of your presentation is clear to the audience . You will only be one of many presentations and they can all start to blur in the audience's mind if you are not careful and clear.

1 Issue; 2 Approach; 3 Findings 4 Conclusions

Make your presentations visual

It is a temptation in a conference presentation, where you have a lot of information you want to get across, to fill the slides with text. Again, remember your presentation needs to stand out to be remembered so resist this temptation and make sure you use good visual slide design as covered on our Slide Design page . Using full sentences for your titles and visual content is vital for the quick levels of understanding that a conference environment requires.

Image with bullets points giving statistics of endangered mammals alongside image of the same figures shown as a pie chart with an iberian lynx sitting next to it

Finish with a flourish

Presenter with their most important point on the screen behind them, asking "Are there any questions or feedback".

The questions and feedback that you get at the end of a conference presentation is one of the most important reasons for attending. Make the most of this time. End with a slide that contains the most important point that you want the audience to take away and then specifically say "Thank you for your time, are there any questions or feedback?". Do not put another slide up at this point. That way your most important point stays on screen for longer than any other slide. By including a call for feedback at the end, rather than just asking for questions, you are more likely to get useful responses that can move you forward in your work.

Never EVER go over time

Presenter watching a very large clock

This is the cardinal sin of conferences. Some conferences will not let you go over time, and will cut you short (after a few warnings). This is also a problem as you lose your time for questions and feedback which is one of the main reasons for doing the presentation in the first place! Avoid going over time by making sure you practice it often and trim the slides if necessary. If you are using PowerPoint there is a tool called Rehearse Timings in the Slide Show menu which times you as you move through the presentation and tells you your overall duration. Just remember NOT to save the timings within the presentation or it will start automatically advancing your slides as you give the presentation which can have disastrous results.

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Ten simple rules for effective presentation slides

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliation Biomedical Engineering and the Center for Public Health Genomics, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, United States of America

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  • Kristen M. Naegle

PLOS

Published: December 2, 2021

  • https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1009554
  • Reader Comments

Fig 1

Citation: Naegle KM (2021) Ten simple rules for effective presentation slides. PLoS Comput Biol 17(12): e1009554. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1009554

Copyright: © 2021 Kristen M. Naegle. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Funding: The author received no specific funding for this work.

Competing interests: The author has declared no competing interests exist.

Introduction

The “presentation slide” is the building block of all academic presentations, whether they are journal clubs, thesis committee meetings, short conference talks, or hour-long seminars. A slide is a single page projected on a screen, usually built on the premise of a title, body, and figures or tables and includes both what is shown and what is spoken about that slide. Multiple slides are strung together to tell the larger story of the presentation. While there have been excellent 10 simple rules on giving entire presentations [ 1 , 2 ], there was an absence in the fine details of how to design a slide for optimal effect—such as the design elements that allow slides to convey meaningful information, to keep the audience engaged and informed, and to deliver the information intended and in the time frame allowed. As all research presentations seek to teach, effective slide design borrows from the same principles as effective teaching, including the consideration of cognitive processing your audience is relying on to organize, process, and retain information. This is written for anyone who needs to prepare slides from any length scale and for most purposes of conveying research to broad audiences. The rules are broken into 3 primary areas. Rules 1 to 5 are about optimizing the scope of each slide. Rules 6 to 8 are about principles around designing elements of the slide. Rules 9 to 10 are about preparing for your presentation, with the slides as the central focus of that preparation.

Rule 1: Include only one idea per slide

Each slide should have one central objective to deliver—the main idea or question [ 3 – 5 ]. Often, this means breaking complex ideas down into manageable pieces (see Fig 1 , where “background” information has been split into 2 key concepts). In another example, if you are presenting a complex computational approach in a large flow diagram, introduce it in smaller units, building it up until you finish with the entire diagram. The progressive buildup of complex information means that audiences are prepared to understand the whole picture, once you have dedicated time to each of the parts. You can accomplish the buildup of components in several ways—for example, using presentation software to cover/uncover information. Personally, I choose to create separate slides for each piece of information content I introduce—where the final slide has the entire diagram, and I use cropping or a cover on duplicated slides that come before to hide what I’m not yet ready to include. I use this method in order to ensure that each slide in my deck truly presents one specific idea (the new content) and the amount of the new information on that slide can be described in 1 minute (Rule 2), but it comes with the trade-off—a change to the format of one of the slides in the series often means changes to all slides.

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  • PPT PowerPoint slide
  • PNG larger image
  • TIFF original image

Top left: A background slide that describes the background material on a project from my lab. The slide was created using a PowerPoint Design Template, which had to be modified to increase default text sizes for this figure (i.e., the default text sizes are even worse than shown here). Bottom row: The 2 new slides that break up the content into 2 explicit ideas about the background, using a central graphic. In the first slide, the graphic is an explicit example of the SH2 domain of PI3-kinase interacting with a phosphorylation site (Y754) on the PDGFR to describe the important details of what an SH2 domain and phosphotyrosine ligand are and how they interact. I use that same graphic in the second slide to generalize all binding events and include redundant text to drive home the central message (a lot of possible interactions might occur in the human proteome, more than we can currently measure). Top right highlights which rules were used to move from the original slide to the new slide. Specific changes as highlighted by Rule 7 include increasing contrast by changing the background color, increasing font size, changing to sans serif fonts, and removing all capital text and underlining (using bold to draw attention). PDGFR, platelet-derived growth factor receptor.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1009554.g001

Rule 2: Spend only 1 minute per slide

When you present your slide in the talk, it should take 1 minute or less to discuss. This rule is really helpful for planning purposes—a 20-minute presentation should have somewhere around 20 slides. Also, frequently giving your audience new information to feast on helps keep them engaged. During practice, if you find yourself spending more than a minute on a slide, there’s too much for that one slide—it’s time to break up the content into multiple slides or even remove information that is not wholly central to the story you are trying to tell. Reduce, reduce, reduce, until you get to a single message, clearly described, which takes less than 1 minute to present.

Rule 3: Make use of your heading

When each slide conveys only one message, use the heading of that slide to write exactly the message you are trying to deliver. Instead of titling the slide “Results,” try “CTNND1 is central to metastasis” or “False-positive rates are highly sample specific.” Use this landmark signpost to ensure that all the content on that slide is related exactly to the heading and only the heading. Think of the slide heading as the introductory or concluding sentence of a paragraph and the slide content the rest of the paragraph that supports the main point of the paragraph. An audience member should be able to follow along with you in the “paragraph” and come to the same conclusion sentence as your header at the end of the slide.

Rule 4: Include only essential points

While you are speaking, audience members’ eyes and minds will be wandering over your slide. If you have a comment, detail, or figure on a slide, have a plan to explicitly identify and talk about it. If you don’t think it’s important enough to spend time on, then don’t have it on your slide. This is especially important when faculty are present. I often tell students that thesis committee members are like cats: If you put a shiny bauble in front of them, they’ll go after it. Be sure to only put the shiny baubles on slides that you want them to focus on. Putting together a thesis meeting for only faculty is really an exercise in herding cats (if you have cats, you know this is no easy feat). Clear and concise slide design will go a long way in helping you corral those easily distracted faculty members.

Rule 5: Give credit, where credit is due

An exception to Rule 4 is to include proper citations or references to work on your slide. When adding citations, names of other researchers, or other types of credit, use a consistent style and method for adding this information to your slides. Your audience will then be able to easily partition this information from the other content. A common mistake people make is to think “I’ll add that reference later,” but I highly recommend you put the proper reference on the slide at the time you make it, before you forget where it came from. Finally, in certain kinds of presentations, credits can make it clear who did the work. For the faculty members heading labs, it is an effective way to connect your audience with the personnel in the lab who did the work, which is a great career booster for that person. For graduate students, it is an effective way to delineate your contribution to the work, especially in meetings where the goal is to establish your credentials for meeting the rigors of a PhD checkpoint.

Rule 6: Use graphics effectively

As a rule, you should almost never have slides that only contain text. Build your slides around good visualizations. It is a visual presentation after all, and as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. However, on the flip side, don’t muddy the point of the slide by putting too many complex graphics on a single slide. A multipanel figure that you might include in a manuscript should often be broken into 1 panel per slide (see Rule 1 ). One way to ensure that you use the graphics effectively is to make a point to introduce the figure and its elements to the audience verbally, especially for data figures. For example, you might say the following: “This graph here shows the measured false-positive rate for an experiment and each point is a replicate of the experiment, the graph demonstrates …” If you have put too much on one slide to present in 1 minute (see Rule 2 ), then the complexity or number of the visualizations is too much for just one slide.

Rule 7: Design to avoid cognitive overload

The type of slide elements, the number of them, and how you present them all impact the ability for the audience to intake, organize, and remember the content. For example, a frequent mistake in slide design is to include full sentences, but reading and verbal processing use the same cognitive channels—therefore, an audience member can either read the slide, listen to you, or do some part of both (each poorly), as a result of cognitive overload [ 4 ]. The visual channel is separate, allowing images/videos to be processed with auditory information without cognitive overload [ 6 ] (Rule 6). As presentations are an exercise in listening, and not reading, do what you can to optimize the ability of the audience to listen. Use words sparingly as “guide posts” to you and the audience about major points of the slide. In fact, you can add short text fragments, redundant with the verbal component of the presentation, which has been shown to improve retention [ 7 ] (see Fig 1 for an example of redundant text that avoids cognitive overload). Be careful in the selection of a slide template to minimize accidentally adding elements that the audience must process, but are unimportant. David JP Phillips argues (and effectively demonstrates in his TEDx talk [ 5 ]) that the human brain can easily interpret 6 elements and more than that requires a 500% increase in human cognition load—so keep the total number of elements on the slide to 6 or less. Finally, in addition to the use of short text, white space, and the effective use of graphics/images, you can improve ease of cognitive processing further by considering color choices and font type and size. Here are a few suggestions for improving the experience for your audience, highlighting the importance of these elements for some specific groups:

  • Use high contrast colors and simple backgrounds with low to no color—for persons with dyslexia or visual impairment.
  • Use sans serif fonts and large font sizes (including figure legends), avoid italics, underlining (use bold font instead for emphasis), and all capital letters—for persons with dyslexia or visual impairment [ 8 ].
  • Use color combinations and palettes that can be understood by those with different forms of color blindness [ 9 ]. There are excellent tools available to identify colors to use and ways to simulate your presentation or figures as they might be seen by a person with color blindness (easily found by a web search).
  • In this increasing world of virtual presentation tools, consider practicing your talk with a closed captioning system capture your words. Use this to identify how to improve your speaking pace, volume, and annunciation to improve understanding by all members of your audience, but especially those with a hearing impairment.

Rule 8: Design the slide so that a distracted person gets the main takeaway

It is very difficult to stay focused on a presentation, especially if it is long or if it is part of a longer series of talks at a conference. Audience members may get distracted by an important email, or they may start dreaming of lunch. So, it’s important to look at your slide and ask “If they heard nothing I said, will they understand the key concept of this slide?” The other rules are set up to help with this, including clarity of the single point of the slide (Rule 1), titling it with a major conclusion (Rule 3), and the use of figures (Rule 6) and short text redundant to your verbal description (Rule 7). However, with each slide, step back and ask whether its main conclusion is conveyed, even if someone didn’t hear your accompanying dialog. Importantly, ask if the information on the slide is at the right level of abstraction. For example, do you have too many details about the experiment, which hides the conclusion of the experiment (i.e., breaking Rule 1)? If you are worried about not having enough details, keep a slide at the end of your slide deck (after your conclusions and acknowledgments) with the more detailed information that you can refer to during a question and answer period.

Rule 9: Iteratively improve slide design through practice

Well-designed slides that follow the first 8 rules are intended to help you deliver the message you intend and in the amount of time you intend to deliver it in. The best way to ensure that you nailed slide design for your presentation is to practice, typically a lot. The most important aspects of practicing a new presentation, with an eye toward slide design, are the following 2 key points: (1) practice to ensure that you hit, each time through, the most important points (for example, the text guide posts you left yourself and the title of the slide); and (2) practice to ensure that as you conclude the end of one slide, it leads directly to the next slide. Slide transitions, what you say as you end one slide and begin the next, are important to keeping the flow of the “story.” Practice is when I discover that the order of my presentation is poor or that I left myself too few guideposts to remember what was coming next. Additionally, during practice, the most frequent things I have to improve relate to Rule 2 (the slide takes too long to present, usually because I broke Rule 1, and I’m delivering too much information for one slide), Rule 4 (I have a nonessential detail on the slide), and Rule 5 (I forgot to give a key reference). The very best type of practice is in front of an audience (for example, your lab or peers), where, with fresh perspectives, they can help you identify places for improving slide content, design, and connections across the entirety of your talk.

Rule 10: Design to mitigate the impact of technical disasters

The real presentation almost never goes as we planned in our heads or during our practice. Maybe the speaker before you went over time and now you need to adjust. Maybe the computer the organizer is having you use won’t show your video. Maybe your internet is poor on the day you are giving a virtual presentation at a conference. Technical problems are routinely part of the practice of sharing your work through presentations. Hence, you can design your slides to limit the impact certain kinds of technical disasters create and also prepare alternate approaches. Here are just a few examples of the preparation you can do that will take you a long way toward avoiding a complete fiasco:

  • Save your presentation as a PDF—if the version of Keynote or PowerPoint on a host computer cause issues, you still have a functional copy that has a higher guarantee of compatibility.
  • In using videos, create a backup slide with screen shots of key results. For example, if I have a video of cell migration, I’ll be sure to have a copy of the start and end of the video, in case the video doesn’t play. Even if the video worked, you can pause on this backup slide and take the time to highlight the key results in words if someone could not see or understand the video.
  • Avoid animations, such as figures or text that flash/fly-in/etc. Surveys suggest that no one likes movement in presentations [ 3 , 4 ]. There is likely a cognitive underpinning to the almost universal distaste of pointless animations that relates to the idea proposed by Kosslyn and colleagues that animations are salient perceptual units that captures direct attention [ 4 ]. Although perceptual salience can be used to draw attention to and improve retention of specific points, if you use this approach for unnecessary/unimportant things (like animation of your bullet point text, fly-ins of figures, etc.), then you will distract your audience from the important content. Finally, animations cause additional processing burdens for people with visual impairments [ 10 ] and create opportunities for technical disasters if the software on the host system is not compatible with your planned animation.

Conclusions

These rules are just a start in creating more engaging presentations that increase audience retention of your material. However, there are wonderful resources on continuing on the journey of becoming an amazing public speaker, which includes understanding the psychology and neuroscience behind human perception and learning. For example, as highlighted in Rule 7, David JP Phillips has a wonderful TEDx talk on the subject [ 5 ], and “PowerPoint presentation flaws and failures: A psychological analysis,” by Kosslyn and colleagues is deeply detailed about a number of aspects of human cognition and presentation style [ 4 ]. There are many books on the topic, including the popular “Presentation Zen” by Garr Reynolds [ 11 ]. Finally, although briefly touched on here, the visualization of data is an entire topic of its own that is worth perfecting for both written and oral presentations of work, with fantastic resources like Edward Tufte’s “The Visual Display of Quantitative Information” [ 12 ] or the article “Visualization of Biomedical Data” by O’Donoghue and colleagues [ 13 ].

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the countless presenters, colleagues, students, and mentors from which I have learned a great deal from on effective presentations. Also, a thank you to the wonderful resources published by organizations on how to increase inclusivity. A special thanks to Dr. Jason Papin and Dr. Michael Guertin on early feedback of this editorial.

  • View Article
  • PubMed/NCBI
  • Google Scholar
  • 3. Teaching VUC for Making Better PowerPoint Presentations. n.d. Available from: https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/making-better-powerpoint-presentations/#baddeley .
  • 8. Creating a dyslexia friendly workplace. Dyslexia friendly style guide. nd. Available from: https://www.bdadyslexia.org.uk/advice/employers/creating-a-dyslexia-friendly-workplace/dyslexia-friendly-style-guide .
  • 9. Cravit R. How to Use Color Blind Friendly Palettes to Make Your Charts Accessible. 2019. Available from: https://venngage.com/blog/color-blind-friendly-palette/ .
  • 10. Making your conference presentation more accessible to blind and partially sighted people. n.d. Available from: https://vocaleyes.co.uk/services/resources/guidelines-for-making-your-conference-presentation-more-accessible-to-blind-and-partially-sighted-people/ .
  • 11. Reynolds G. Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery. 2nd ed. New Riders Pub; 2011.
  • 12. Tufte ER. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. 2nd ed. Graphics Press; 2001.

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How to make a scientific presentation

How to make a scientific presentation

Scientific presentation outlines

Questions to ask yourself before you write your talk, 1. how much time do you have, 2. who will you speak to, 3. what do you want the audience to learn from your talk, step 1: outline your presentation, step 2: plan your presentation slides, step 3: make the presentation slides, slide design, text elements, animations and transitions, step 4: practice your presentation, final thoughts, frequently asked questions about preparing scientific presentations, related articles.

A good scientific presentation achieves three things: you communicate the science clearly, your research leaves a lasting impression on your audience, and you enhance your reputation as a scientist.

But, what is the best way to prepare for a scientific presentation? How do you start writing a talk? What details do you include, and what do you leave out?

It’s tempting to launch into making lots of slides. But, starting with the slides can mean you neglect the narrative of your presentation, resulting in an overly detailed, boring talk.

The key to making an engaging scientific presentation is to prepare the narrative of your talk before beginning to construct your presentation slides. Planning your talk will ensure that you tell a clear, compelling scientific story that will engage the audience.

In this guide, you’ll find everything you need to know to make a good oral scientific presentation, including:

  • The different types of oral scientific presentations and how they are delivered;
  • How to outline a scientific presentation;
  • How to make slides for a scientific presentation.

Our advice results from delving into the literature on writing scientific talks and from our own experiences as scientists in giving and listening to presentations. We provide tips and best practices for giving scientific talks in a separate post.

There are two main types of scientific talks:

  • Your talk focuses on a single study . Typically, you tell the story of a single scientific paper. This format is common for short talks at contributed sessions in conferences.
  • Your talk describes multiple studies. You tell the story of multiple scientific papers. It is crucial to have a theme that unites the studies, for example, an overarching question or problem statement, with each study representing specific but different variations of the same theme. Typically, PhD defenses, invited seminars, lectures, or talks for a prospective employer (i.e., “job talks”) fall into this category.

➡️ Learn how to prepare an excellent thesis defense

The length of time you are allotted for your talk will determine whether you will discuss a single study or multiple studies, and which details to include in your story.

The background and interests of your audience will determine the narrative direction of your talk, and what devices you will use to get their attention. Will you be speaking to people specializing in your field, or will the audience also contain people from disciplines other than your own? To reach non-specialists, you will need to discuss the broader implications of your study outside your field.

The needs of the audience will also determine what technical details you will include, and the language you will use. For example, an undergraduate audience will have different needs than an audience of seasoned academics. Students will require a more comprehensive overview of background information and explanations of jargon but will need less technical methodological details.

Your goal is to speak to the majority. But, make your talk accessible to the least knowledgeable person in the room.

This is called the thesis statement, or simply the “take-home message”. Having listened to your talk, what message do you want the audience to take away from your presentation? Describe the main idea in one or two sentences. You want this theme to be present throughout your presentation. Again, the thesis statement will depend on the audience and the type of talk you are giving.

Your thesis statement will drive the narrative for your talk. By deciding the take-home message you want to convince the audience of as a result of listening to your talk, you decide how the story of your talk will flow and how you will navigate its twists and turns. The thesis statement tells you the results you need to show, which subsequently tells you the methods or studies you need to describe, which decides the angle you take in your introduction.

➡️ Learn how to write a thesis statement

The goal of your talk is that the audience leaves afterward with a clear understanding of the key take-away message of your research. To achieve that goal, you need to tell a coherent, logical story that conveys your thesis statement throughout the presentation. You can tell your story through careful preparation of your talk.

Preparation of a scientific presentation involves three separate stages: outlining the scientific narrative, preparing slides, and practicing your delivery. Making the slides of your talk without first planning what you are going to say is inefficient.

Here, we provide a 4 step guide to writing your scientific presentation:

  • Outline your presentation
  • Plan your presentation slides
  • Make the presentation slides
  • Practice your presentation

4 steps for making a scientific presentation.

Writing an outline helps you consider the key pieces of your talk and how they fit together from the beginning, preventing you from forgetting any important details. It also means you avoid changing the order of your slides multiple times, saving you time.

Plan your talk as discrete sections. In the table below, we describe the sections for a single study talk vs. a talk discussing multiple studies:

Introduction

Introduction - main idea behind all studies

Methods

Methods of study 1

Results

Results of study 1

Summary (take-home message ) of study 1

Transition to study 2 (can be a visual of your main idea that return to)

Brief introduction for study 2

Methods of study 2

Results of study 2

Summary of study 2

Transition to study 3

Repeat format until done

Summary

Summary of all studies (return to your main idea)

Conclusion

Conclusion

The following tips apply when writing the outline of a single study talk. You can easily adapt this framework if you are writing a talk discussing multiple studies.

Introduction: Writing the introduction can be the hardest part of writing a talk. And when giving it, it’s the point where you might be at your most nervous. But preparing a good, concise introduction will settle your nerves.

The introduction tells the audience the story of why you studied your topic. A good introduction succinctly achieves four things, in the following order.

  • It gives a broad perspective on the problem or topic for people in the audience who may be outside your discipline (i.e., it explains the big-picture problem motivating your study).
  • It describes why you did the study, and why the audience should care.
  • It gives a brief indication of how your study addressed the problem and provides the necessary background information that the audience needs to understand your work.
  • It indicates what the audience will learn from the talk, and prepares them for what will come next.

A good introduction not only gives the big picture and motivations behind your study but also concisely sets the stage for what the audience will learn from the talk (e.g., the questions your work answers, and/or the hypotheses that your work tests). The end of the introduction will lead to a natural transition to the methods.

Give a broad perspective on the problem. The easiest way to start with the big picture is to think of a hook for the first slide of your presentation. A hook is an opening that gets the audience’s attention and gets them interested in your story. In science, this might take the form of a why, or a how question, or it could be a statement about a major problem or open question in your field. Other examples of hooks include quotes, short anecdotes, or interesting statistics.

Why should the audience care? Next, decide on the angle you are going to take on your hook that links to the thesis of your talk. In other words, you need to set the context, i.e., explain why the audience should care. For example, you may introduce an observation from nature, a pattern in experimental data, or a theory that you want to test. The audience must understand your motivations for the study.

Supplementary details. Once you have established the hook and angle, you need to include supplementary details to support them. For example, you might state your hypothesis. Then go into previous work and the current state of knowledge. Include citations of these studies. If you need to introduce some technical methodological details, theory, or jargon, do it here.

Conclude your introduction. The motivation for the work and background information should set the stage for the conclusion of the introduction, where you describe the goals of your study, and any hypotheses or predictions. Let the audience know what they are going to learn.

Methods: The audience will use your description of the methods to assess the approach you took in your study and to decide whether your findings are credible. Tell the story of your methods in chronological order. Use visuals to describe your methods as much as possible. If you have equations, make sure to take the time to explain them. Decide what methods to include and how you will show them. You need enough detail so that your audience will understand what you did and therefore can evaluate your approach, but avoid including superfluous details that do not support your main idea. You want to avoid the common mistake of including too much data, as the audience can read the paper(s) later.

Results: This is the evidence you present for your thesis. The audience will use the results to evaluate the support for your main idea. Choose the most important and interesting results—those that support your thesis. You don’t need to present all the results from your study (indeed, you most likely won’t have time to present them all). Break down complex results into digestible pieces, e.g., comparisons over multiple slides (more tips in the next section).

Summary: Summarize your main findings. Displaying your main findings through visuals can be effective. Emphasize the new contributions to scientific knowledge that your work makes.

Conclusion: Complete the circle by relating your conclusions to the big picture topic in your introduction—and your hook, if possible. It’s important to describe any alternative explanations for your findings. You might also speculate on future directions arising from your research. The slides that comprise your conclusion do not need to state “conclusion”. Rather, the concluding slide title should be a declarative sentence linking back to the big picture problem and your main idea.

It’s important to end well by planning a strong closure to your talk, after which you will thank the audience. Your closing statement should relate to your thesis, perhaps by stating it differently or memorably. Avoid ending awkwardly by memorizing your closing sentence.

By now, you have an outline of the story of your talk, which you can use to plan your slides. Your slides should complement and enhance what you will say. Use the following steps to prepare your slides.

  • Write the slide titles to match your talk outline. These should be clear and informative declarative sentences that succinctly give the main idea of the slide (e.g., don’t use “Methods” as a slide title). Have one major idea per slide. In a YouTube talk on designing effective slides , researcher Michael Alley shows examples of instructive slide titles.
  • Decide how you will convey the main idea of the slide (e.g., what figures, photographs, equations, statistics, references, or other elements you will need). The body of the slide should support the slide’s main idea.
  • Under each slide title, outline what you want to say, in bullet points.

In sum, for each slide, prepare a title that summarizes its major idea, a list of visual elements, and a summary of the points you will make. Ensure each slide connects to your thesis. If it doesn’t, then you don’t need the slide.

Slides for scientific presentations have three major components: text (including labels and legends), graphics, and equations. Here, we give tips on how to present each of these components.

  • Have an informative title slide. Include the names of all coauthors and their affiliations. Include an attractive image relating to your study.
  • Make the foreground content of your slides “pop” by using an appropriate background. Slides that have white backgrounds with black text work well for small rooms, whereas slides with black backgrounds and white text are suitable for large rooms.
  • The layout of your slides should be simple. Pay attention to how and where you lay the visual and text elements on each slide. It’s tempting to cram information, but you need lots of empty space. Retain space at the sides and bottom of your slides.
  • Use sans serif fonts with a font size of at least 20 for text, and up to 40 for slide titles. Citations can be in 14 font and should be included at the bottom of the slide.
  • Use bold or italics to emphasize words, not underlines or caps. Keep these effects to a minimum.
  • Use concise text . You don’t need full sentences. Convey the essence of your message in as few words as possible. Write down what you’d like to say, and then shorten it for the slide. Remove unnecessary filler words.
  • Text blocks should be limited to two lines. This will prevent you from crowding too much information on the slide.
  • Include names of technical terms in your talk slides, especially if they are not familiar to everyone in the audience.
  • Proofread your slides. Typos and grammatical errors are distracting for your audience.
  • Include citations for the hypotheses or observations of other scientists.
  • Good figures and graphics are essential to sustain audience interest. Use graphics and photographs to show the experiment or study system in action and to explain abstract concepts.
  • Don’t use figures straight from your paper as they may be too detailed for your talk, and details like axes may be too small. Make new versions if necessary. Make them large enough to be visible from the back of the room.
  • Use graphs to show your results, not tables. Tables are difficult for your audience to digest! If you must present a table, keep it simple.
  • Label the axes of graphs and indicate the units. Label important components of graphics and photographs and include captions. Include sources for graphics that are not your own.
  • Explain all the elements of a graph. This includes the axes, what the colors and markers mean, and patterns in the data.
  • Use colors in figures and text in a meaningful, not random, way. For example, contrasting colors can be effective for pointing out comparisons and/or differences. Don’t use neon colors or pastels.
  • Use thick lines in figures, and use color to create contrasts in the figures you present. Don’t use red/green or red/blue combinations, as color-blind audience members can’t distinguish between them.
  • Arrows or circles can be effective for drawing attention to key details in graphs and equations. Add some text annotations along with them.
  • Write your summary and conclusion slides using graphics, rather than showing a slide with a list of bullet points. Showing some of your results again can be helpful to remind the audience of your message.
  • If your talk has equations, take time to explain them. Include text boxes to explain variables and mathematical terms, and put them under each term in the equation.
  • Combine equations with a graphic that shows the scientific principle, or include a diagram of the mathematical model.
  • Use animations judiciously. They are helpful to reveal complex ideas gradually, for example, if you need to make a comparison or contrast or to build a complicated argument or figure. For lists, reveal one bullet point at a time. New ideas appearing sequentially will help your audience follow your logic.
  • Slide transitions should be simple. Silly ones distract from your message.
  • Decide how you will make the transition as you move from one section of your talk to the next. For example, if you spend time talking through details, provide a summary afterward, especially in a long talk. Another common tactic is to have a “home slide” that you return to multiple times during the talk that reinforces your main idea or message. In her YouTube talk on designing effective scientific presentations , Stanford biologist Susan McConnell suggests using the approach of home slides to build a cohesive narrative.

To deliver a polished presentation, it is essential to practice it. Here are some tips.

  • For your first run-through, practice alone. Pay attention to your narrative. Does your story flow naturally? Do you know how you will start and end? Are there any awkward transitions? Do animations help you tell your story? Do your slides help to convey what you are saying or are they missing components?
  • Next, practice in front of your advisor, and/or your peers (e.g., your lab group). Ask someone to time your talk. Take note of their feedback and the questions that they ask you (you might be asked similar questions during your real talk).
  • Edit your talk, taking into account the feedback you’ve received. Eliminate superfluous slides that don’t contribute to your takeaway message.
  • Practice as many times as needed to memorize the order of your slides and the key transition points of your talk. However, don’t try to learn your talk word for word. Instead, memorize opening and closing statements, and sentences at key junctures in the presentation. Your presentation should resemble a serious but spontaneous conversation with the audience.
  • Practicing multiple times also helps you hone the delivery of your talk. While rehearsing, pay attention to your vocal intonations and speed. Make sure to take pauses while you speak, and make eye contact with your imaginary audience.
  • Make sure your talk finishes within the allotted time, and remember to leave time for questions. Conferences are particularly strict on run time.
  • Anticipate questions and challenges from the audience, and clarify ambiguities within your slides and/or speech in response.
  • If you anticipate that you could be asked questions about details but you don’t have time to include them, or they detract from the main message of your talk, you can prepare slides that address these questions and place them after the final slide of your talk.

➡️ More tips for giving scientific presentations

An organized presentation with a clear narrative will help you communicate your ideas effectively, which is essential for engaging your audience and conveying the importance of your work. Taking time to plan and outline your scientific presentation before writing the slides will help you manage your nerves and feel more confident during the presentation, which will improve your overall performance.

A good scientific presentation has an engaging scientific narrative with a memorable take-home message. It has clear, informative slides that enhance what the speaker says. You need to practice your talk many times to ensure you deliver a polished presentation.

First, consider who will attend your presentation, and what you want the audience to learn about your research. Tailor your content to their level of knowledge and interests. Second, create an outline for your presentation, including the key points you want to make and the evidence you will use to support those points. Finally, practice your presentation several times to ensure that it flows smoothly and that you are comfortable with the material.

Prepare an opening that immediately gets the audience’s attention. A common device is a why or a how question, or a statement of a major open problem in your field, but you could also start with a quote, interesting statistic, or case study from your field.

Scientific presentations typically either focus on a single study (e.g., a 15-minute conference presentation) or tell the story of multiple studies (e.g., a PhD defense or 50-minute conference keynote talk). For a single study talk, the structure follows the scientific paper format: Introduction, Methods, Results, Summary, and Conclusion, whereas the format of a talk discussing multiple studies is more complex, but a theme unifies the studies.

Ensure you have one major idea per slide, and convey that idea clearly (through images, equations, statistics, citations, video, etc.). The slide should include a title that summarizes the major point of the slide, should not contain too much text or too many graphics, and color should be used meaningfully.

academic conference presentation slides example

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Scientific Presentation Guide: How to Create an Engaging Research Talk

Creating an effective scientific presentation requires developing clear talking points and slide designs that highlight your most important research results..

Scientific presentations are detailed talks that showcase a research project or analysis results. This comprehensive guide reviews everything you need to know to give an engaging presentation for scientific conferences, lab meetings, and PhD thesis talks. From creating your presentation outline to designing effective slides, the tips in this article will give you the tools you need to impress your scientific peers and superiors.

Free online course software examples

Step 1. Create a Presentation Outline

The first step to giving a good scientific talk is to create a presentation outline that engages the audience at the start of the talk, highlights only 3-5 main points of your research, and then ends with a clear take-home message. Creating an outline ensures that the overall talk storyline is clear and will save you time when you start to design your slides.

Engage Your Audience

The first part of your presentation outline should contain slide ideas that will gain your audience's attention. Below are a few recommendations for slides that engage your audience at the start of the talk:

  • Create a slide that makes connects your data or presentation information to a shared purpose, such as relevance to solving a medical problem or fundamental question in your field of research
  • Create slides that ask and invite questions
  • Use humor or entertainment

Summary of scientific presentation outline tips

Identify Clear Main Points

After writing down your engagement ideas, the next step is to list the main points that will become the outline slide for your presentation. A great way to accomplish this is to set a timer for five minutes and write down all of the main points and results or your research that you want to discuss in the talk. When the time is up, review the points and select no more than three to five main points that create your talk outline. Limiting the amount of information you share goes a long way in maintaining audience engagement and understanding. 

Main point outline slide example for PhD thesis

Create a Take-Home Message

And finally, you should brainstorm a single take-home message that makes the most important main point stand out. This is the one idea that you want people to remember or to take action on after your talk. This can be your core research discovery or the next steps that will move the project forward.

Step 2. Choose a Professional Slide Theme

After you have a good presentation outline, the next step is to choose your slide colors and create a theme. Good slide themes use between two to four main colors that are accessible to people with color vision deficiencies. Read this article to learn more about choosing the best scientific color palettes .

You can also choose templates that already have an accessible color scheme. However, be aware that many PowerPoint templates that are available online are too cheesy for a scientific audience. Below options to download professional scientific slide templates that are designed specifically for academic conferences, research talks, and graduate thesis defenses.

Free Scientific Presentation Templates for Download

Step 3. Design Your Slides

Designing good slides is essential to maintaining audience interest during your scientific talk. Follow these four best practices for designing your slides:

  • Keep it simple: limit the amount of information you show on each slide
  • Use images and illustrations that clearly show the main points with very little text. 
  • Read this article to see research slide example designs for inspiration
  • When you are using text, try to reduce the scientific jargon that is unnecessary. Text on research talk slides needs to be much more simple than the text used in scientific publications (see example below).
  • Use appear/disappear animations to break up the details into smaller digestible bites
  • Sign up for the free presentation design course to learn PowerPoint animation tricks

Scientific presentation text design tips

Scientific Presentation Design Summary

All of the examples and tips described in this article will help you create impressive scientific presentations. Below is the summary of how to give an engaging talk that will earn respect from your scientific community. 

Step 1. Draft Presentation Outline. Create a presentation outline that clearly highlights the main point of your research. Make sure to start your talk outline with ideas to engage your audience and end your talk with a clear take-home message.

Step 2. Choose Slide Theme. Use a slide template or theme that looks professional, best represents your data, and matches your audience's expectations. Do not use slides that are too plain or too cheesy.

Step 3. Design Engaging Slides. Effective presentation slide designs use clear data visualizations and limits the amount of information that is added to each slide. 

And a final tip is to practice your presentation so that you can refine your talking points. This way you will also know how long it will take you to cover the most essential information on your slides. Thank you for choosing Simplified Science Publishing as your science communication resource and good luck with your presentations!

Interested in free design templates and training?

Explore scientific illustration templates and courses by creating a Simplified Science Publishing Log In. Whether you are new to data visualization design or have some experience, these resources will improve your ability to use both basic and advanced design tools.

Interested in reading more articles on scientific design? Learn more below:

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Data Storytelling Techniques: How to Tell a Great Data Story in 4 Steps

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Best Science PowerPoint Templates and Slide Design Examples

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Free Research Poster Templates and Tutorials

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academic conference presentation slides example

Academic Conference Presentations

A Step-by-Step Guide

  • © 2022
  • Mark R. Freiermuth 0

Gunma Prefectural Women’s University, Tamamura-machi, Japan

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  • Takes the presenter on a journey from initial idea to conference presentation
  • Addresses topics such as abstract writing, choosing a conference, posters and online versus face-to-face presentations
  • Based on the author's own experiences

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About this book

This book provides a step-by-step journey to giving a successful academic conference presentation, taking readers through all of the potential steps along the way—from the initial idea and the abstract submission all the way up to the presentation itself. Drawing on the author's own experiences, the book highlights good and bad practices while explaining each introduced feature in a very accessible style. It provides tips on a wide range of issues such as writing up an abstract, choosing the right conference, negotiating group presentations, giving a poster presentation, what to include in a good presentation, conference proceedings and presenting at virtual or hybrid events. This book will be of particular interest to graduate students, early-career researchers and non-native speakers of English, as well as students and scholars who are interested in English for Academic Purposes, Applied Linguistics, Communication Studies and generally speaking, most of the Social Sciences. With that said, because of the book’s theme, many of the principles included within will appeal to broad spectrum of academic disciplines.

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academic conference presentation slides example

Presenting Thesis in Conferences: Oral and Poster Presentation

academic conference presentation slides example

Introduction

academic conference presentation slides example

  • English for Academic Purposes
  • public speaking
  • research presentation
  • academic skills
  • conferences
  • poster presentations

Table of contents (9 chapters)

Front matter, next up on stage….

Mark R. Freiermuth

Conferences: Choose Wisely Grasshopper

Getting started: the precise abstract, after the excitement fades: preparing for the presentation, tea for two or more: the group presentation, conferences: live and in-person, ghosts in the machine: the virtual presentation, the seven deadly sins: what not to do, the top five, back matter.

-Sarah Mercer , Professor for Foreign Language Teaching and the Head of the ELT Research and Methodology Department, University of Graz, Austria

Authors and Affiliations

About the author.

Mark R. Freiermuth  is Professor of Applied Linguistics at Gunma Prefectural Women's University, Japan. 

Bibliographic Information

Book Title : Academic Conference Presentations

Book Subtitle : A Step-by-Step Guide

Authors : Mark R. Freiermuth

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21124-9

Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan Cham

eBook Packages : Social Sciences , Social Sciences (R0)

Copyright Information : The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022

Hardcover ISBN : 978-3-031-21123-2 Published: 05 January 2023

eBook ISBN : 978-3-031-21124-9 Published: 04 January 2023

Edition Number : 1

Number of Pages : VII, 159

Number of Illustrations : 45 b/w illustrations

Topics : Applied Linguistics , Research Skills , Career Skills , Sociology of Education

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academic conference presentation slides example

6 Tips For Giving a Fabulous Academic Presentation

6-tips-for-giving-a-fabulous-academic-presentation.

Tanya Golash-Boza, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of California

January 11, 2022

One of the easiest ways to stand out at an academic conference is to give a fantastic presentation.

In this post, I will discuss a few simple techniques that can make your presentation stand out. Although, it does take time to make a good presentation, it is well worth the investment.

Tip #1: Use PowerPoint Judiciously

Images are powerful. Research shows that images help with memory and learning. Use this to your advantage by finding and using images that help you make your point. One trick I have learned is that you can use images that have blank space in them and you can put words in those images.

Here is one such example from a presentation I gave about immigration law enforcement.

PowerPoint is a great tool, so long as you use it effectively. Generally, this means using lots of visuals and relatively few words. Never use less than 24-point font. And, please, never put your presentation on the slides and read from the slides.

Tip #2: There is a formula to academic presentations. Use it.

Once you have become an expert at giving fabulous presentations, you can deviate from the formula. However, if you are new to presenting, you might want to follow it. This will vary slightly by field, however, I will give an example from my field – sociology – to give you an idea as to what the format should look like:

  • Introduction/Overview/Hook
  • Theoretical Framework/Research Question
  • Methodology/Case Selection
  • Background/Literature Review
  • Discussion of Data/Results

Tip #3: The audience wants to hear about your research. Tell them.

One of the most common mistakes I see in people giving presentations is that they present only information I already know. This usually happens when they spend nearly all of the presentation going over the existing literature and giving background information on their particular case. You need only to discuss the literature with which you are directly engaging and contributing. Your background information should only include what is absolutely necessary. If you are giving a 15-minute presentation, by the 6 th minute, you need to be discussing your data or case study. At conferences, people are there to learn about your new and exciting research, not to hear a summary of old work.

Tip #4: Practice. Practice. Practice.

You should always practice your presentation in full before you deliver it. You might feel silly delivering your presentation to your cat or your toddler, but you need to do it and do it again. You need to practice to ensure that your presentation fits within the time parameters. Practicing also makes it flow better. You can’t practice too many times.

Tip #5: Keep To Your Time Limit

If you have ten minutes to present, prepare ten minutes of material. No more. Even if you only have seven minutes, you need to finish within the allotted time. If you write your presentation out, a general rule of thumb is two minutes per typed, double-spaced page. For a fifteen-minute talk, you should have no more than 7 double-spaced pages of material.

Tip #6: Don’t Read Your Presentation

Yes, I know that in some fields reading is the norm. But, can you honestly say that you find yourself engaged when listening to someone read their conference presentation? If you absolutely must read, I suggest you read in such a way that no one in the audience can tell you are reading. I have seen people do this successfully, and you can do it too if you write in a conversational tone, practice several times, and read your paper with emotion, conviction, and variation in tone.

What tips do you have for presenters? What is one of the best presentations you have seen? What made it so fantastic? Let us know in the comments below.

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Princeton Correspondents on Undergraduate Research

How to Make a Successful Research Presentation

Turning a research paper into a visual presentation is difficult; there are pitfalls, and navigating the path to a brief, informative presentation takes time and practice. As a TA for  GEO/WRI 201: Methods in Data Analysis & Scientific Writing this past fall, I saw how this process works from an instructor’s standpoint. I’ve presented my own research before, but helping others present theirs taught me a bit more about the process. Here are some tips I learned that may help you with your next research presentation:

More is more

In general, your presentation will always benefit from more practice, more feedback, and more revision. By practicing in front of friends, you can get comfortable with presenting your work while receiving feedback. It is hard to know how to revise your presentation if you never practice. If you are presenting to a general audience, getting feedback from someone outside of your discipline is crucial. Terms and ideas that seem intuitive to you may be completely foreign to someone else, and your well-crafted presentation could fall flat.

Less is more

Limit the scope of your presentation, the number of slides, and the text on each slide. In my experience, text works well for organizing slides, orienting the audience to key terms, and annotating important figures–not for explaining complex ideas. Having fewer slides is usually better as well. In general, about one slide per minute of presentation is an appropriate budget. Too many slides is usually a sign that your topic is too broad.

academic conference presentation slides example

Limit the scope of your presentation

Don’t present your paper. Presentations are usually around 10 min long. You will not have time to explain all of the research you did in a semester (or a year!) in such a short span of time. Instead, focus on the highlight(s). Identify a single compelling research question which your work addressed, and craft a succinct but complete narrative around it.

You will not have time to explain all of the research you did. Instead, focus on the highlights. Identify a single compelling research question which your work addressed, and craft a succinct but complete narrative around it.

Craft a compelling research narrative

After identifying the focused research question, walk your audience through your research as if it were a story. Presentations with strong narrative arcs are clear, captivating, and compelling.

  • Introduction (exposition — rising action)

Orient the audience and draw them in by demonstrating the relevance and importance of your research story with strong global motive. Provide them with the necessary vocabulary and background knowledge to understand the plot of your story. Introduce the key studies (characters) relevant in your story and build tension and conflict with scholarly and data motive. By the end of your introduction, your audience should clearly understand your research question and be dying to know how you resolve the tension built through motive.

academic conference presentation slides example

  • Methods (rising action)

The methods section should transition smoothly and logically from the introduction. Beware of presenting your methods in a boring, arc-killing, ‘this is what I did.’ Focus on the details that set your story apart from the stories other people have already told. Keep the audience interested by clearly motivating your decisions based on your original research question or the tension built in your introduction.

  • Results (climax)

Less is usually more here. Only present results which are clearly related to the focused research question you are presenting. Make sure you explain the results clearly so that your audience understands what your research found. This is the peak of tension in your narrative arc, so don’t undercut it by quickly clicking through to your discussion.

  • Discussion (falling action)

By now your audience should be dying for a satisfying resolution. Here is where you contextualize your results and begin resolving the tension between past research. Be thorough. If you have too many conflicts left unresolved, or you don’t have enough time to present all of the resolutions, you probably need to further narrow the scope of your presentation.

  • Conclusion (denouement)

Return back to your initial research question and motive, resolving any final conflicts and tying up loose ends. Leave the audience with a clear resolution of your focus research question, and use unresolved tension to set up potential sequels (i.e. further research).

Use your medium to enhance the narrative

Visual presentations should be dominated by clear, intentional graphics. Subtle animation in key moments (usually during the results or discussion) can add drama to the narrative arc and make conflict resolutions more satisfying. You are narrating a story written in images, videos, cartoons, and graphs. While your paper is mostly text, with graphics to highlight crucial points, your slides should be the opposite. Adapting to the new medium may require you to create or acquire far more graphics than you included in your paper, but it is necessary to create an engaging presentation.

The most important thing you can do for your presentation is to practice and revise. Bother your friends, your roommates, TAs–anybody who will sit down and listen to your work. Beyond that, think about presentations you have found compelling and try to incorporate some of those elements into your own. Remember you want your work to be comprehensible; you aren’t creating experts in 10 minutes. Above all, try to stay passionate about what you did and why. You put the time in, so show your audience that it’s worth it.

For more insight into research presentations, check out these past PCUR posts written by Emma and Ellie .

— Alec Getraer, Natural Sciences Correspondent

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Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

Conference Presentations

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This resource provides a detailed overview of the common types of conference papers and sessions graduate students can expect, followed by pointers on presenting conference papers for an audience. 

Types of conference papers and sessions

Panel presentations are the most common form of presentation you will encounter in your graduate career. You will be one of three to four participants in a panel or session (the terminology varies depending on the organizers) and be given fifteen to twenty minutes to present your paper. This is often followed by a ten-minute question-and-answer session either immediately after your presentation or after all of the speakers are finished. It is up to the panel organizer to decide upon this framework. In the course of the question-and-answer session, you may also address and query the other panelists if you have questions yourself. Note that you can often propose a conference presentation by yourself and be sorted onto a panel by conference organizers, or you can propose a panel with a group of colleagues. Self-proposed panels typically have more closely related topics than conference-organized panels.

Roundtables feature an average of five to six speakers, each of whom gets the floor for approximately five to ten minutes to speak on their respective topics and/or subtopics. At times, papers from the speakers might be circulated in advance among the roundtable members or even prospective attendees.

Workshops feature one or a few organizers, who usually give a brief presentation but spend the majority of the time for the session facilitating an activity that attendees will do. Some common topics for these sessions typically include learning a technology or generating some content, such as teaching materials.

Lightning talks (or Ignite talks, or Pecha Kucha talks) are very short presentations where presenters' slide decks automatically advance after a few seconds; most individual talks are no longer than 5 minutes, and a lightning talk session typically invites 10 or more presenters to participate over the course of an hour or two rather than limiting the presenters like a panel presentation. A lightning talk session will sometimes be held as a sort of competition where attendees can vote for the best talk. 

SIGs (Special Interest Groups) are groups of scholars focused on a particular smaller topic within the purview of the larger conference. The structure of these sessions varies by conference and even by group, but in general they tend to be structured either more like a panel presentation, with presenters and leaders, or more like a roundtable, with several speakers and a particular meeting agenda. These styles resemble, respectively, a miniconference focusing on a particular topic and a committee meeting. 

Papers with respondents are structured around a speaker who gives an approximately thirty-minute paper and a respondent who contributes their own thoughts, objections, and further questions in the following fifteen minutes. Finally, the speaker gets that same amount of time to formulate their reply to the respondent.

Poster presentations ask participants to visually display their ideas on a research poster, which is typically displayed with other research posters in a specific area at a conference. The poster needs to be understandable on its own (without the author) as viewers sometimes look through the posters outside the bounds of the poster session, which is a scheduled period of time where poster authors stand with their posters and engage viewers in conversation about the work. Research posters have long tended to follow common templates for design, but in recent years some scholars have begun challenging these templates for improved usability (for example, the Better Poster campaign as described here  or the APA template based on the original, here.

You can read more about research posters on our resource here .

Presenting the conference paper

Aim to take less time than you are given! If your presentation slot is 15 minutes, aim for 13 or 14 when you practice. A little leeway and a slightly shorter presentation is a courtesy to your audience and to your fellow presenters, and will not at all imply that you are unprepared or unprofessional — in fact, being able to keep well within your allotted time is the mark of a good presenter.

Make sure you speak slowly and clearly, using accessibility aids if available such as a microphone or closed captioning on a slide deck. Many presenters have begun bringing accessibility copies of their talks, which are printed transcripts of the talk using a larger font for audience members who need them. It is also becoming increasingly common for presenters at conferences to share their slides and copies of their talk via a shortened link or QR code found on the bottom of the slides so that audiences may access them later or even while they are in your session.

The conventions for presentation differ based on field. Some fields tend toward reading papers aloud with very little audiovisual accompaniment; others use slide decks; others speak extemporaneously. You can find out more about typical practices in your field by attending conferences yourself and by asking mentors. Generally, you will be able to improve the accessibility of your presentation if you have a visual accompaniment and prepared remarks.

Even in fields where presenters tend to read papers verbatim, it is rarely a good idea to bring a paper from a class or another research paper you have written without editing it for an oral presentation. Seminar papers tend to be too long to read in 15 minutes, and often lead to graduate students surpassing their time limits. Moreover, research papers are meant to be read — they lack the kinds of repetition and simple sentence structure that are more beneficial to listeners. Finally, conference presentations do not serve the same purposes as most class papers — typically in a class, you're expected to show that you have understood the material, but at a conference, listeners are more interested in hearing what contributions you have that might help them in their own research. It's typical to move the bulk of your literature review to an appendix or another document so that you can discuss other scholarship in the area if it comes up in the Q&A, but during your presentation you're left free to focus on your own methods and findings. (Many presenters will even say: "I'm skipping a lot of [X material] for the sake of time, but I'm happy to discuss it later with anyone who's interested.")

Since you will present your paper orally, you may repeat important points and say more about the structure of the essay than a written submission to a journal (or a paper for your undergraduate or graduate courses) would require. This often means signposting orally when you are moving to a new section of the paper or when you are shifting to a new idea. The thesis of your paper should come early in your presentation to give listeners a clear understanding of what is to follow. At this point, you may also overview or forecast your paper and tell listeners how you will move from one argument to the next. It is generally advised to quickly summarize your important points in a bulleted list at the end of your presentation to remind everyone of the two or three most essential arguments or findings.

If you use a slide presentation, you may want to follow the guidelines presented in the OWL resource, Designing an Effective PowerPoint Presentation .

Presentation

Different Types of Slides for Your Presentations

Different Types of Slides for Your Presentations

Table of Contents

Presentations are a great way to share information and ideas. Whether you’re selling a product, teaching a class, or showing off your work, the slides you use can make a big difference.

There are many different kinds of slides you can add to your presentations, each with its own purpose and advantages. By knowing the different types of slides and how to use them well, you can create interesting and informative presentations that will stick with your audience.

Different Types of Slides

There are many different types of slides that you can use in your presentations. Some of the most common types include:

Opening Slides

1. title slide.

title slide

The title slide is your chance to make a strong first impression and set the tone for your presentation. It should clearly convey the topic, your identity, and relevant details. A good title is both practical and creative.

The main title is the focal point and should be concise yet descriptive. Use a large font size that’s easy to read from a distance. If needed, add a subtitle for more context. Clearly state your name, job title, and affiliation. Include the date and venue for reference.

Design your slide to reflect your brand or personal style using logos, colors, and fonts. Keep it clean and uncluttered for a professional look. Remember, less is more. Use high contrast for readability and avoid distracting background images. Consider adding subtle effects like fade-in or morph for visual interest.

2. Agenda Slide

agenda slide

Agenda slides serve as a valuable tool for guiding your audience through the structure of your presentation. By outlining the main topics and their expected duration, you can help them anticipate the flow of information and manage their expectations.

This is especially beneficial for lengthy presentations or academic talks where a clear roadmap can enhance understanding and engagement.

When creating an agenda slide, consider including the following elements:

  • Clear Topic List: Present a concise and well-organized list of the main topics to be covered.
  • Optional Timings: Indicate the estimated duration of each section to provide a sense of pacing.
  • Visual Progress Indicator: Use checkmarks, arrows, or other visual cues to highlight the current topic and show what’s ahead.
  • Distinctive Headings: Use clear and concise headings to visually separate different sections.
  • Hyperlink Integration: If using PowerPoint, consider adding hyperlinks to specific slides to ensure smooth navigation and avoid abrupt jumps.

Learn more on How to Create Agenda Slides in Powerpoint .

Transitional Slides

Transitional slides act like bridges that connect different parts of your presentation. They help your audience smoothly move from one topic to the next. These slides are important because they:

  • Clearly Signal a Change: Let your audience know that you’re moving on to something new.
  • Keep the Audience Engaged: Prevent sudden jumps between topics, helping them stay focused.
  • Make Your Presentation More Visually Interesting: Add variety and visual appeal.

Here are some examples of transitional slides:

3. Quote Slide

quote slide

Quote slides incorporate wisdom, authority, or inspiration from renowned sources into your presentations. They can provide strong support for your arguments or motivate your audience.

These slides are perfect for emphasizing a point, sparking thought, or introducing a new direction in your presentation. Use them to highlight the importance of an idea.

Here are the elements of a quote slide:

  • The Quote: Clearly presented and attributed to the speaker or writer. The text should be easy to read and emphasized to stand out.
  • Author’s Name and Credentials: Provide context by including the author’s name and, if relevant, their qualifications or why they are an expert on the topic.
  • Related Imagery or Background: An image or design that matches the theme of the quote can make it more impactful.

Consider using a quote presentation template with a professional layout. You can find something directly on SlidesAI . For readability, ensure there is a good contrast between the text and the background. Text boxes with backgrounds are often used. If you use an image, choose one that enhances the text, not competes with it.

4. Image Slides

image slide

Image slides can significantly make your presentations better by gaining attention with their visual appeal and transitions. For a smooth flow, use a full-screen image with a fade effect. To create a more dynamic experience, experiment with the Morph transition between slides featuring overlapping images.

You can also build anticipation with a thematic image series that subtly connects your topics. Remember to keep these transitions concise and impactful to maintain your audience’s attention.

Closing Slides

5. q&a slide.

q and a slide

Q&A slides are often used in presentations for various reasons. For instance, some presenters like to ask questions to the audience after their presentation and answer any questions they may have.

Other presentations might encourage the audience or panel members to ask questions throughout the presentation. If you’re planning to incorporate Q&A into your presentation, consider using some well-designed templates to make a positive impression.

6. CTA Slides

CTA slide

A call-to-action slide, or CTA slide for short, serves to encourage viewers to take a specific step after your presentation. This could range from initiating a conversation to purchasing a product or service, or even engaging in a project.

Typically placed at the end, following the concluding remarks and thank you slide, the CTA aims to spark immediate action. Here’s what makes a strong CTA slide:

  •  A Clear Direction: The heart of the CTA itself should be direct and persuasive. Think of something like “Register Now,” “Join Our Team,” or “Visit Us Online.”
  • Reasons to Act: Briefly remind viewers of the benefits they reap by taking action. This strengthens the appeal and motivates them to follow through.
  • Contact Information or Links: Make it easy for them to act! Include all necessary links or contact details so viewers know exactly where to go next.
  • Visually Appealing Design: Grab their attention! Use a design that pops and features large, easy-to-read text. Opt for strong, action-oriented language to drive the message home.

7. Summary Slide

summary slide

A summary slide is a great way to give your viewers an overview of the presentation once it ends. By recapping everything that was presented, summary slides make it easier to remember the most important takeaways.

A summary slide should include:

  • Important Points: Clearly summarize the main points covered in your presentation.
  • Visual Recap: Use simple visuals like graphics, charts, or callouts to visually represent significant data or conclusions.
  • Concluding Remark: End with a sentence or two that encapsulates the overall message or conclusion of your presentation
  • Maintain consistency in styling throughout your presentation for a cohesive look.
  • Use color or size variations to emphasize the hierarchy of concepts summarized.

Closing Thoughts

Understanding the different types of slides and how to use them can significantly enhance your presentations. Feel free to mix and match slides based on your needs and presentation style. By choosing the right slides, you can create a more engaging presentation that leaves a lasting impression on your audience.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Which are the important slides for any presentation.

The core slides include:

  • Title Slide: Captures attention with your presentation title, your name, and affiliation (if applicable).
  • Agenda Slide: Briefly outline the key points you’ll cover, setting expectations for your audience.
  • Closing Slide: Summarize your main takeaways and leave a lasting impression.

I have a ton of data. Should I use a text-heavy slide or a chart?

Charts win every time! Bullet points and dense text overload audiences. Visualize your data with clear charts (bar graphs, pie charts) to make it easily digestible.

Can I use images and videos in my slides?

Absolutely! High-quality visuals like pictures, infographics, and short videos can boost engagement and illustrate complex concepts. Just ensure they’re relevant and add value.

How can I make my slides more visually appealing?

Maintain a consistent color scheme, use high-resolution images, and avoid clutter. Explore presentation software features like animations and transitions, but use them sparingly to avoid distraction.

How can I find high-quality visual templates for my slides? 

There are many resources available! Many presentation software programs like SlidesAI offer built-in image libraries. You can also find free stock photo websites or purchase royalty-free images from online marketplaces. Remember to check licensing requirements before using any visuals.

Are there any slide types I should avoid?

Slides overloaded with text are a major turn-off for audiences. Aim for visuals and concise points. Similarly, avoid excessive animations and transitions, which can be distracting.

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8 Types of Presentation with Examples and Tips

8 Types of Presentation with Examples and Tips

Every presentation is different, reflecting your unique business and the information you share. But, some common presentation types are used across various fields and teams. Before diving into specific slides or organization, consider the type that best suits your audience.

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How to introduce yourself in a conference presentation (in six simple steps)

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Academic conferences are great occasions for networking. Particularly the start of a conference presentation offers a unique opportunity to introduce yourself to the audience, concisely and effectively.

Why effective introductions during academic conference presentations matter

Thus, while the content of your presentation is certainly important, the networking aspect of academic conferences should not be underestimated.

A good introduction includes information on who you are, what your research is about, and how people can learn more about you. And of course how they can connect with you.

An effective introduction at the start of your conference presentation will help people remember you. Even more importantly, they should feel invited to get in touch with you. In-person, via email, or on social media. This is how networks are formed, which can have a lasting effect on your career.

Step 1: State your full name, position and your university affiliation

Don’t jump straight into the topic of your presentation! Instead, start with the basics. State your name, your position and the university affiliation you have.

Step 2: Explain your research area and focus in 2-3 sentences

Explaining your research area in a few sentences is challenging. However, it is essential to keep it short. Think of 2-3 sentences. You do not want to take away precious time from your actual presentation.

Step 3: Tell people where they can find out more about you online

Your online presence can consist, for instance, of your academic website , or your online university profile. Maybe you also work on a research project that has its own website with information. Whatever you decide to share with your conference audience, make sure that everything is up to date!

Step 4: Provide your professional social media handles

However, if you do, make sure to also point people to – for instance – your Twitter or LinkedIn account.

Step 5: Provide your email address and invite people to reach out

Step 6: emphasize that you are happy to connect and chat after your presentation.

Finally, point out that you are happy to connect and chat with people after your presentation. Then, transition to your presentation.

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Free Conference Presentation Template

Download free conference presentation template & google slides.

academic conference presentation slides example

Our Free Conference Presentation Template features a slide deck for preparing conference presentations . Professionals from every field of science or business showcase their research and findings at conferences. However, preparing a comprehensive yet-to-the-point conference presentation is always tricky. For this, we have designed a 100% editable slide template for our users that is free to download and convenient for editing with all PowerPoint versions, Google Slides, and Keynote presentation software. It includes customizable graphs, background features, and tables for an interactive presentation. 

This Free Conference Presentation Template has a black background theme with simple graphics. The first slide carries a title segment for displaying the presentation’s topic or project’s title. An instructor human illustration is added to this slide with a paper diagram representing the research paper discussion. The following slides of this free slide template have:

  • Vertical process diagram for showing the objectives
  • Four numbering circles to mention the methodologies used for the research
  • 4-segment horizontal figure to showcase the findings and results
  • A data-driven bar graph for presenting the statistical findings & results
  • Vertical 3-segment process chart for adding conclusion points

In addition, users can edit the acknowledgments slide to display the names of the authors, supervisors, or reviewers. This free conference PowerPoint template can be helpful for business and scientific research presentations. Professionals can also re-purpose the slides for their specific use cases. For instance, the conclusion slide can show the options for future research. Likewise, users can include some process steps instead of the methodologies used. So, download and try this free conference template for Google Slides. You can also check our featured Conference PowerPoint template for your presentations. Download and try it now for free!

  • 100% Editable PowerPoint Templates & Google Slides.
  • Compatible with all major Microsoft PowerPoint versions, Keynote and Google Slides.
  • Modern 16:9 Aspect Ratio.
  • Scalable Vectorial PowerPoint Shapes and PowerPoint Icons.
  • Instant Access and Download.
  • New Templates every week.

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Presentation Examples: Inspiring Ideas for Different Types of Presentations

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When preparing for a presentation, it can be immensely helpful to look at examples for inspiration. Different situations require different approaches—whether you’re pitching a new idea to investors, presenting a strategy to your team, or educating an audience at a conference. In this blog post, we’ll explore presentation examples across various categories, breaking down how each can be structured for maximum impact.

By examining these examples, you’ll gain insights on how to tailor your own presentation based on your objectives and audience.

1. Business Pitch Presentation Example: The Investor Pitch

An investor pitch aims to secure funding by convincing potential investors that your business is a solid opportunity. It needs to be concise, compelling, and data-driven.

Key Components:

  • Problem Statement: Start by highlighting a clear problem in the market that your product or service solves.
  • Solution and Value Proposition: Clearly explain how your offering addresses the problem and what sets it apart from competitors.
  • Market Opportunity: Provide data on the market size, growth potential, and target audience.
  • Business Model: Outline how your business makes money and its scalability.
  • Traction and Milestones: Showcase your progress so far, such as revenue growth, customer acquisition, or partnerships.
  • Funding Ask and Use of Proceeds: Specify how much funding you’re seeking and how you plan to use it.

Example Structure:

  • Slide 1: Introduction with a compelling statistic or quote about the industry.
  • Slide 2: Problem statement illustrated by customer pain points.
  • Slide 3: Solution overview with visuals of your product or service.
  • Slide 4: Market opportunity with key figures and growth trends.
  • Slide 5: Business model explanation with revenue streams and pricing strategy.
  • Slide 6: Traction, including growth charts, testimonials, or case studies.
  • Slide 7: Funding request and breakdown of how funds will be allocated.

2. Sales Presentation Example: Closing a Deal with a Client

A sales presentation should focus on understanding your client’s needs and presenting your product or service as the ideal solution. It needs to be persuasive, highlighting the benefits and outcomes your offering provides.

  • Understanding the Client’s Pain Points: Begin by discussing the challenges your client faces and what they’re hoping to achieve.
  • Tailored Solution: Customize your pitch to show how your offering directly solves their specific problems.
  • Benefits and ROI: Highlight the key benefits and the return on investment your client can expect.
  • Case Studies and Testimonials: Provide examples of similar clients who’ve seen success with your solution.
  • Next Steps and Call to Action: Clearly outline the next steps, whether it’s scheduling a demo, signing a contract, or a follow-up meeting.
  • Slide 1: Client-specific introduction with their pain points and goals.
  • Slide 2: Overview of your product or service, focusing on features that matter most to the client.
  • Slide 3: Detailed benefit breakdown with visuals showing outcomes and results.
  • Slide 4: Case study of a similar client, highlighting the problem, solution, and positive results.
  • Slide 5: ROI analysis with projections tailored to the client’s business.
  • Slide 6: Call to action, clearly stating the next steps or decision points.

3. Strategy Presentation Example: Presenting a New Business Strategy to Executives

A strategy presentation is about communicating a clear vision and plan for achieving specific goals. When presenting to executives, it’s crucial to be concise, data-driven, and aligned with business objectives.

  • Executive Summary: Begin with a high-level overview of the strategy and its importance.
  • Current Situation Analysis: Analyze the current landscape, including strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT).
  • Strategic Objectives: Clearly define the goals and objectives of the strategy.
  • Action Plan: Break down the steps, initiatives, and timelines needed to achieve the objectives.
  • Resource Allocation: Highlight the resources (people, budget, technology) required for implementation.
  • Risk and Mitigation: Address potential risks and how they’ll be managed.
  • KPIs and Metrics: Define how success will be measured and monitored.
  • Slide 1: Executive summary with a bold statement about the strategy’s potential impact.
  • Slide 2: SWOT analysis or current situation overview.
  • Slide 3: Strategic objectives, laid out as clear, measurable goals.
  • Slide 4: Action plan timeline, including major milestones and deliverables.
  • Slide 5: Resource allocation, specifying budget and team responsibilities.
  • Slide 6: Risk assessment and contingency plans.
  • Slide 7: Key performance indicators and how progress will be tracked.

4. Educational Presentation Example: Teaching a Concept to Students

An educational presentation is about breaking down complex information into digestible parts. The goal is to inform and engage, making sure your audience walks away with a solid understanding of the subject.

  • Introduction to the Topic: Provide a clear overview of what the audience will learn and why it’s important.
  • Key Concepts Explained: Break the content into bite-sized sections, with each section covering a key concept.
  • Visual Aids and Examples: Use diagrams, charts, and examples to clarify and reinforce key points.
  • Interactive Elements: Incorporate quizzes, polls, or discussions to check for understanding and maintain engagement.
  • Summary and Review: Recap the key concepts and answer any questions the audience might have.
  • Slide 1: Topic introduction with a statement of objectives (e.g., “Today, we’ll explore the fundamentals of digital marketing”).
  • Slide 2: Breakdown of the first key concept with visuals and a real-world example.
  • Slide 3: Explanation of the second concept, including a brief interactive activity (e.g., a poll or quiz).
  • Slide 4: Visual demonstration or case study related to the topic.
  • Slide 5: Summary slide recapping the main points and next steps for further learning.
  • Slide 6: Open the floor for questions and discussion.

5. Motivational Presentation Example: Inspiring an Audience to Take Action

A motivational presentation aims to inspire and energize the audience. Whether you’re speaking at a conference or leading a team meeting, the goal is to evoke emotion and drive people to take action.

  • Personal Story or Anecdote: Start with a relatable story that sets the tone and connects with the audience.
  • Core Message or Theme: Define the central message that you want the audience to take away.
  • Powerful Examples or Quotes: Use impactful quotes or stories to reinforce your message and add emotional weight.
  • Call to Action: Clearly communicate what you want the audience to do next, and why it matters.
  • Closing with a Memorable Statement: End with a statement that lingers in the minds of your audience.
  • Slide 1: Opening with a powerful quote or a story that resonates with the audience.
  • Slide 2: Introduce the core message or theme (e.g., “The Power of Resilience in Overcoming Adversity”).
  • Slide 3: Share a personal experience or example that illustrates your message.
  • Slide 4: Reinforce the theme with a memorable quote or an inspiring example from history.
  • Slide 5: Call to action, urging the audience to apply what they’ve learned or commit to change.
  • Slide 6: Closing with a motivational statement or vision for the future.

Great presentations are built on a foundation of clear structure, relevant content, and a deep understanding of your audience’s needs. By examining these examples and tailoring your approach to fit your specific context, you can create presentations that are impactful, persuasive, and memorable. Whether you’re pitching, educating, or inspiring, having a well-organized presentation outline will give you the confidence and clarity needed to deliver your message effectively.

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Speaker 1: So the next thing you might be wondering is, okay, what do the talks look like? So there's actually lots of different types of presentations. And when you submit to present at a conference, you usually are submitting a particular type of presentation or submission. So you're submitting specific type of proposal for example you may be submitting a poster submission which i've talked about on my social media in the past a poster presentation really looks like a big science fair for adults so it's a bunch of boards lined up you put your poster up there and then people kind of walk around and ask you questions and you talk about it other types of presentations include workshops so there were some like how to publish in an academic journal um i went to a writing workshop how to build your writing village to promote your productivity they're also continuing education workshops so those tended to be a little bit longer and those who are licensed professionals who need to have continuing ed on a regular basis get continuing ed credits for that but you could attend even if you don't need ce credits so that was cool those tended to be more like symposia so that means there's one overarching topic and then there's a lot of smaller maybe 15 to 20 minute presentations within that general theme and the idea is that you're learning about that overarching topic and getting continuing ed credit in that topic their other type of talks were roundtable discussions i think they call them critical conversations this year but those tend to be more discussion based so those look like yes you have a presentation you may have slides i did a critical conversation with my best friend and colleague and a faculty member who's a great mentor of mine so we did a critical conversation and it is much more discussion based so you have have lots of questions, you're presenting some general themes, maybe some theory, maybe some cases, and then you're asking the attendees to really engage in a conversation. So I attended a talk like this that was about the role of spirituality and help seeking for intimate partner violence, which is a research interest of mine, and that presentation was really cool. There were slides and they did share about their research and the work that they're doing, but then they had these really great questions and they asked us to get into groups and discuss them. that's that's one type of presentation that you might find at an academic conference especially APA so a question that I'm sure is on your mind is did I present at the conference what was my presentation like so as I mentioned briefly yes I did present at the conference I did a roundtable slash critical conversation I was the first author of this presentation but I developed it pretty equally with my co-author who's a best friend of mine and other student in my program Chika and one of our faculty members at our institution who is a great mentor of mine. So it was three of us women of color psychologists and we presented on how to navigate multiple systems within couples therapy during COVID-19. During the 2020 to 2021 academic year all of us were doing telehealth couples therapy because there was a global pandemic and we couldn't do in-person therapy, but we were also seeing that as individuals and as clinicians working with clients, all of us were navigating a lot of different things happening. So it was not just COVID, it was also a ton of highly publicized racist events in this country. So the murder of Black people, Asian Americans being targeted because of their identity, the 2020 election, immigration you know rights and and anti-immigration policies so we talked about how to do couples therapy and navigate all of the systemic forces that are impacting our clients and us how to use anti-oppressive practices and create an anti-racist space in a therapy room in a virtual therapy room and it was meant to be a discussion-based presentation which it was we had a pretty small turnout, I think probably less than 10 attendees, but the division that we were presenting in, which was the couples and family therapy division of APA, is relatively small in and of itself. The community of folks who do couples and family therapy compared to all of the other people who are attending APA is relatively small, so for us it was actually a really good turnout. There was also other talks scheduled at the same time with really interesting topics, and that's one of the things one of the challenges I don't know if it's really a pro or a con but one of the things as a presenter is you may be up against really interesting really meaningful presentations in similar areas that are happening at the same exact time and honestly as a speaker I was like I wish I could attend this talk but I'm actually speaking at that time so that happens I think that's okay the people who want to be there who are able to be there are there and I really enjoyed presenting with my best friend with a mentor who I really look up to who has guided me through my program and our presentation was great I think we got lots of great questions and engagement and at the end of the day there's no right or wrong way to do these presentations right as long as we're presenting the topic that we plan to and people that are attending receive it well I think everything is great the interesting thing about presentations overall that you may not know if you've never attended is that you submit your proposal you just submit an abstract here's what we want to talk about and here's the format that we want to do it in and you might give some brief overview of what you're gonna cover in your presentation and you get accepted or you get rejected and after that what you include is really up to you there's nobody you know checking and monitoring and making sure that you cover the things that you said you were going to cover there's no one making sure that you don't go over time there's this overall trust right that is as a professional you're submitting on a certain topic that you have expertise in that topic obviously you include a bio and stuff and that the rest is up to you which is really great so we did have slides we also had discussion questions and what was really great to see in our presentation and in others is that there's a huge variety in the type of event that you're going to attend so there were some speakers who had um songs who had to stand up and do like movement there were talks that had small groups there were some rooms where you're sitting in round tables and you're actually engaging with people i had other talks where they asked us to sit in a circle and talk with each other and connect. There were some talks where you're just listening and others where they're passing the mic around and they want you to engage in discussion. So a huge variety in your experience, even going from talk to talk. So that's the general overview of how it went for us. I was really pleased and just glad that we were able to present something. I think it's a huge honor to be able to present at APA because it is such a big conference and I imagine that there's a ton of people, like so many people submitting proposals and to get something accepted, especially as a first author. It feels amazing, so I'm really proud that we were able to do that. There are also big like keynote addresses, right, that are done by maybe the president of a division or somebody who has spent a lot of time doing work, really meaningful work in the field. There's also awards. There's another type of event, which is not really a presentation. It's like social hours, so there might be each division might have like a social hour and you go and network with the leadership in the division or just other professionals in that division that's a great opportunity to meet other people who have a shared interest as you aside from attending talks so you might attend a talk within your research interest and you can at the end go and ask questions and connect and exchange emails with the speakers or other attendees or you can attend a division event where you're meeting people who are also members of that division for example the trauma division and this is a cool way to connect with people and eventually collaborate right i ended up meeting some people who i wanted to maybe publish with and what i was pleased to see is that people are really open to that people are really excited to talk about their work and we're excited to talk about our own work and it's a space that for me as a graduate student really cultivated a lot of inspiration so especially seeing lots of women of color presenting and going to talks within my interests so things about intimate partner violence trauma collective healing and seeing a lot of women of color who have contributed significantly to the field really presenting their work and looking confident and making these amazing contributions that i'm like i can't wait to be in this role and now i'm like my mind is buzzing with all these ideas and papers i want to write and studies i want to do so for graduate students especially maybe even for undergraduate students it's a place to spark your creativity and your curiosity and give you an eye and give you a window into what a career in psychology especially in psychological research could look like which is really cool so I pretty much covered what it looks like to go to a conference what types of events are there who is there what my presentation was like another great thing about attending conferences is that you get to pick and choose right I mentioned the app earlier and how you can kind of make your schedule you get to go to as much or as little conference stuff as you want to because again it's very independent you're paying to register you're paying to travel there and then it's really up to you what you want to get out of it different professionals take different approaches some people go only for the day that they're presenting and then they're out of there because they're really busy or maybe they've attended tons of conferences and they don't need a network with any more people which is understandable and some people want to go for the entire conference and they want to attend as many things as possible and i find that at every conference that i attend i have a different approach it depends on the location it depends on what's going on in my life at the time and I actually attended a lot of APA things so I was not there for all of the days it was Thursday Friday Saturday and I only attended Friday and Saturday I think that was perfect my flight was the morning of my presentation I arrived around 6 a.m. which meant that I did an overnight flight and then my presentation was about 4 p.m. so I had lots of time during the day to not only rest but also attend different conference presentations meet some people that I had wanted to meet and then have some time to like sit back, review my presentation, and then go for it. Usually in the evening is when there are lots of different social events. They may be APA events where there's like social hours and like cocktail hour type of things where you can meet people or what happened for us is that my school was hosting an alumni event at a restaurant nearby the conference hotel so things like that you can kind of go and meet people even outside of the conference, but the entire city, wherever you are, is usually flooded with psychologists or professionals in the area of the conference. Aside from actually attending things during the day, at night you can, you know, do social things, explore the city during the day, you can do really whatever you want. So when I went to another conference in Chicago, I spent a lot of time doing sightseeing and exploring and enjoying the city and less time doing conference stuff. This time around, because it's APA and it's such, there were so many talks that I wanted to attend I actually did a lot of conference stuff and I found that everyone that I met had a different approach some people were like oh wow you attended a lot of stuff and other people were like back to back going to different sessions and what's cool is it's really up to you you have the app you can see where you want to be and you just pop in wherever you want you can take notes on the app which is really cool or you can obviously take your own notes there are I think the primary benefit is that you get to be re-energized about the work that you're doing and also if especially for me as a woman of color, like first generation Latinas, seeing other people who look like me there, that inspiration, that connection. There were a lot of great talks. I think this year's theme, I can't remember it, but it seemed to be that there were a lot of presenters of color and a lot of topics related to race and ethnicity and diversity. And that felt good because I felt like there was a lot of presentations that were interesting to me, a lot of people who look like me and a lot of people who didn't look like me, but haven't been well represented in psychology or in academia in general and just seeing that APA was giving them all the opportunity to showcase their work, which they should have been doing a long time ago. By the way, this video is not sponsored by APA. I am an APA student member. It's really important to be part of a professional organization so that you can attend events like this, network with people, and find opportunities. But overall, I think that one of the great things about attending conferences is that it's so independent. You make what you want of it. So I did do a little bit of exploring Minneapolis with Chika, my friend who attended with me, and we were able to balance, right? Like what are the conference things we want to do? What is the amount of rest that we need? Like time at the hotel that we need to just spend relaxing because there's so much happening. And what are the things outside of the conference that we want to do? Are there particular touristy things that we want to do? Are there particular people that we want to meet up with outside of the conference? And in some cases, I mean, you may be attending a conference that is in a city where you have friends or family and so you might want to balance spending time at the conference and seeing them so traveling for conferences has been something that is both really fun really exhausting and slightly different each and every time so whether you attended APA before or not I hope that this recap was somewhat helpful to you and you were able to get an inside look at what it's like to attend these types of conferences and if you are ever at a conference and you happen to see me I hope that you will say hello. One of the greatest pleasures, blessings, gifts of attending conferences this past year has been meeting some of you, meeting people at the conferences or at different talks, having some of you come to my talks. I love finding out that there are GradLife Grind community members at an event that I'm at. I love hearing from you. I love meeting you. I love finding out what your work is in and I love hearing how GradLife Grind has helped you. So it would be the biggest gift and the biggest thank you to like this video, to subscribe to this channel, and to say hello if you ever see me in person. Thank you so much for watching this video and I hope that you will tune in to some others.

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Conference Style Presentation templates

Welcome to your go-to hub for conference style presentation templates our diverse collection is designed to add a touch of sleek elegance to your google slides and powerpoint projects. perfect for any professional meeting or event, these templates combine style with ease, helping you deliver your message with confidence and flair. explore and find the perfect fit to make your next presentation shine.

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Simple Conference Style Presentation presentation template

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Simple conference style presentation.

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Abstract Conference Style Presentation presentation template

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Abstract Conference Style Presentation

Download the Abstract Conference Style Presentation presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic...

Formal Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Formal Conference Style Presentation

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Creative Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Creative Conference Style Presentation

Download the "Creative Conference Style Presentation" for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic resources....

Minimalist Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Minimalist Conference Style Presentation

Download the "Minimalist Conference Style Presentation" for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic resources....

Formal Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the Formal Conference Style Presentation presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic...

Watercolor Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Watercolor Conference Style Presentation

Download the "Watercolor Conference Style Presentation" for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic resources....

Simple Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the Simple Conference Style Presentation presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic...

Simple Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Medical Conference Style Presentation

Download the "Medical Conference Style" presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides. Healthcare goes beyond curing patients and combating illnesses. Raising awareness about diseases, informing people about prevention methods, discussing some good practices, or even talking about a balanced diet—there are many topics related to medicine that you could be sharing...

Formal Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the "Formal Conference Style Presentation" for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic resources....

Watercolor Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the Watercolor Conference Style Presentation presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic...

Medical Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the Medical Conference Style Presentation presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic...

Medical Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the "Medical Conference Style Presentation" presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides. Healthcare goes beyond curing patients and combating illnesses. Raising awareness about diseases, informing people about prevention methods, discussing some good practices, or even talking about a balanced diet—there are many topics related to medicine that you could be...

Simple Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Elegant Conference Style Presentation

Download the "Elegant Conference Style Presentation" for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic resources....

Minimalist Conference Style Presentation presentation template

Download the Minimalist Conference Style Presentation presentation for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using different graphic...

Elegant Conference Style Presentation presentation template

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COMMENTS

  1. Research conference presentation slide template + 3 design tips

    Now that we have reviewed three key principles of academic conference presentation slide design, use them to prepare your own slides. An even better way is to prepare a PowerPoint slide template that automatically incorporates many of these tips.

  2. Conference Presentation Slides: A Guide for Success

    Take a look at our detailed guide on how to build conference presentation slides that shall guarantee a successful event. Click here for more info.

  3. Preparing a Conference Paper: PowerPoint Presentations in Education

    In order of importance, write down all the points you want your viewer to understand. Focus your presentation on the first three points. Include sections similar to a typical journal article. SUMMARIZE! Aim for approximately 1 minute per slide. Usually 10-15 slides total.

  4. Examples of Research Conference Presentations

    Examples of Research Conference Presentations. Research Conference Presentations: Some Tips and Examples. Useful Tips. Research talk 101 (by Lucia Dettori) How not to give a presentation (from ScienceRoll) Examples of Short Talks (PowerPoint files): Mark's example of a bad research presentation.

  5. Academic presentations: Conferences

    In a conference presentation you need to choose an aspect of your research that can comfortably be conveyed to an audience in an interesting way within the timescale you are given. This is usually only about 20 minutes (with 10 minutes for questions) so resist the temptation to cover your entire PhD thesis. A useful simple structure is shown ...

  6. PDF Microsoft PowerPoint

    Outline of Conference Presentation Results (3-4 slides). Present key results of study or data analysis. Don't superficially cover all results; cover key results well. Summary (1 slide). Future work (0-1 slides). Optionally give problems this research opens up. Total of 10-15 slides depending on time.

  7. Ten simple rules for effective presentation slides

    The "presentation slide" is the building block of all academic presentations, whether they are journal clubs, thesis committee meetings, short conference talks, or hour-long seminars.

  8. How to make a scientific presentation

    This guide provides a 4-step process for making a good scientific presentation: outlining the scientific narrative, preparing slide outlines, constructing slides, and practicing the talk. We give advice on how to make effective slides, including tips for text, graphics, and equations, and how to use rehearsals of your talk to refine your presentation.

  9. Scientific Presentation Guide: How to Create an Engaging Research Talk

    Scientific presentations are detailed talks that showcase a research project or analysis results. This comprehensive guide reviews everything you need to know to give an engaging presentation for scientific conferences, lab meetings, and PhD thesis talks.

  10. Academic Conference Presentations: A Step-by-Step Guide

    This book provides a step-by-step journey to giving a successful academic conference presentation, taking readers through all of the potential steps along the way—from the initial idea and the abstract submission all the way up to the presentation itself. Drawing on the author's own experiences, the book highlights good and bad practices ...

  11. 6 Tips For Giving a Fabulous Academic Presentation

    Here is one such example from a presentation I gave about immigration law enforcement. PowerPoint is a great tool, so long as you use it effectively. Generally, this means using lots of visuals and relatively few words. Never use less than 24-point font. And, please, never put your presentation on the slides and read from the slides.

  12. How to Make a Successful Research Presentation

    Turning a research paper into a visual presentation is difficult; there are pitfalls, and navigating the path to a brief, informative presentation takes time and practice. As a TA for GEO/WRI 201: Methods in Data Analysis & Scientific Writing this past fall, I saw how this process works from an instructor's standpoint. I've presented my own research before, but helping others present ...

  13. Presenting at an Academic Conference: Example Presentation

    Presenting at an Academic Conference: Example Presentation Video Type: Tutorial Transcript Auto scroll Get link Cite Presenting at an academic conference: example presentation

  14. Free Research PPT Templates & Google Slides Themes

    These research presentation templates are suitable for academic presentations, scientific conferences, and research symposiums. They can be used by researchers, scientists, scholars, and students to showcase their findings, methodologies, and data analysis in a visually appealing and professional manner.

  15. Conference Presentations

    Conference Presentations This resource provides a detailed overview of the common types of conference papers and sessions graduate students can expect, followed by pointers on presenting conference papers for an audience.

  16. Ten tips for delivering excellent scientific presentations

    For example, if you are asked to present a 30-minute presentation, you need to determine if this is the allocated time slot, or the length of time you should be speaking. ... important to understand the difference between conveying scientific information via a published paper versus a conference presentation. This may seem obvious, but it is ...

  17. Free Google Slides & PowerPoint templates about conferences

    Minimalist Conference Style Presentation. Download the "Minimalist Conference Style Presentation" for PowerPoint or Google Slides and start impressing your audience with a creative and original design. Slidesgo templates like this one here offer the possibility to convey a concept, idea or topic in a clear, concise and visual way, by using ...

  18. Conference Powerpoint Templates and Google Slides Themes

    The conference PowerPoint template can enhance your presentations by providing a professional and organized layout, allowing you to showcase key information, agenda, and speaker details effectively. Its sleek design and cohesive color scheme will captivate your audience, ensuring a memorable and impactful conference experience.

  19. 7 Different Types of Slides for Your Presentations

    Make Your Presentation More Visually Interesting: Add variety and visual appeal. Here are some examples of transitional slides: 3. Quote Slide. Quote slides incorporate wisdom, authority, or inspiration from renowned sources into your presentations. They can provide strong support for your arguments or motivate your audience.

  20. How to introduce yourself in a conference presentation (in six simple

    Academic conferences are great occasions for networking. Particularly the start of a conference presentation offers a unique opportunity to introduce yourself to the audience, concisely and effectively. Contents Why effective introductions during academic conference presentations matterStep 1: State your full name, position and your university affiliationExampleStep 2: Explain your research ...

  21. Free Conference Presentation Template & Google Slides

    Our Free Conference Presentation Template features a slide deck for preparing conference presentations. Professionals from every field of science or business showcase their research and findings at conferences.

  22. 20+ Stunning Presentation Examples to Inspire Your Audience

    Slide 2: Breakdown of the first key concept with visuals and a real-world example. Slide 3: Explanation of the second concept, including a brief interactive activity (e.g., a poll or quiz). Slide 4: Visual demonstration or case study related to the topic. Slide 5: Summary slide recapping the main points and next steps for further learning.

  23. Exploring Diverse Presentation Formats and Experiences at Academic

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