Letter to a Young Presentationist

Got this the other day:

Good Morning Tony,
I am a recent design graduate with a focus on advertising. I am looking to break into the field of being a presentation specialist for businesses and courtroom presentations. I’m working in advertising but would like to go out on my own as a specialist. My question to you is, what would be the most direct way of me getting into the business and what tools do I need to become proficient in this career? I currently use the Adobe Creative Suite for my work. Besides sharpening up my powerpoint skills, what else do I need to do to get into this exciting field?

My reply, in part:

Hi,

Nice to receive an email such as yours every once in a while. If anything, it confirms to me that graduates like you continue to see potential in the field of visual communication. I’m in agreement with you in that there is plenty of potential here and there’s nowhere to go but up.

While the specialty of designing for business presentations has gotten a bit more crowded since 1993, the year I started, it has become so only because the demand is there. And while over half a billion computers have PPT installed (as of two years ago, anyway), the vast majority of slides suck. So companies that realize this are willing to pay leaders like Cliff Atkinson and Nancy Duarte to help them make their slides not suck. Follow their writing and advice to continue learning about this field. Ditto Scott Schwertly, SOAP (in Brazil), Garr Reynolds, and several of the folks in my blogroll. (I am guessing that since you’ve found me, you’ve likely found these people already anyway.) See, for instance, the LA Times article about the court case which put Cliff Atkinson on the map: http://www.sociablemedia.com/thebio_press.php4 (first listed article)

Mastering Microsoft PowerPoint and Apple Keynote are essential, and mastering Adobe’s Creative Suite is an excellent way to differentiate yourself. I’m a mid-level user of Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. While I learned Flash a while ago, I have had little call for it.

As far as courtroom graphics and animation goes, there’s not much I know about that, other than it is fairly lucrative once you can get in. I am familiar with some of those providers here in Cleveland, and have never done 3D animation myself, but I would heartily encourage your doing so.

The main way to become good at this is to do lots of it. And to get PPT projects, one way is to hit the freelance job boards. The downside here is that competition is racing to the bottom in terms of pricing.

Another way to get jobs is to get networked, in the business/social sense. Answer questions in forums and in LinkedIn. Listen and contribute to the tweetstream. Join local business clubs. There’s a lot of PowerPoint pain out there, both on the speaker’s side as well as the audience. I truly believe there’s enough pie for all of us out here. The challenge is that your customers don’t know what is possible, or, if they do, they don’t know where to start looking for it.

Those are my thoughts for now. Much more information is scattered throughout both my old blog and my new one.

Best of luck!

Anything to add?