How to Make a PowerPoint Presentation

Want to make a PowerPoint presentation but don’t know where to start? In this post, we’ll cover the basics so that you can get started. Learn to change the slide size, use slide masters, how to add new slides and how to add content to your slides. If you have questions about the process, comment below and we’ll try to answer your question.

1. Open PowerPoint

On the start window of PowerPoint 2013 select ‘Blank Presentation’. You can create your own color scheme and graphics or you can select a ready-made theme by going to ‘Design’ tab. We are going to create our very own template but whichever option you choose you can follow along with the rest of the steps.

2. Slide Size

When you make a PowerPoint presentation you should start from setting the size for your presentation by going to the Design tab -> Slide Size. The PowerPoint 2013 is preset on Widescreen 16:9. You can customize the size by selecting ‘Custom Slide Size’.

3. Slide Master

Next, go the View tab -> Slide Master. Whatever you apply to the slides here will affect the representative slide on the so-called “Normal view”. For example, when you edit or add a footer on the very first slide it will apply that change to every single slide. The other slides under that one will affect the representative layout that you select from the ‘normal view’.

From inset tab, you’ll be able to add pictures (e.g. logo), shapes, text boxes, tables etc.

Whatever you add to these slide master slides will be uneditable in the front end unless if you use the Placeholders. So if you add a footer with your company logo, that will be uneditable in the front end but if you add an image placeholder you will be able to change and edit the image in the normal view.

Use placeholders to create editable content.

How do I use Slide Master? I generally just add the design elements there that will appear in every slide such as title placeholder, header design, footer design and a possible background and do the rest on the Normal view. If I make a PowerPoint presentation for others to use I will add image placeholders but I never use the text placeholders, they just make the user experience way too stiff. You can delete the slides that you won’t be using. If you want to see exactly how I use slide master for a PowerPoint template, you can download this free PowerPoint template.

When you are done with the master view, select ‘close master view’ or select the ‘normal view’ from the View tab.

4. Adding New Slides

You can add new slides by going to the Home tab -> New Slide and selecting the layout that suits your needs. You can duplicate any slide that you have added to the timeline by right-clicking the slide and select ‘Duplicate Slide’. You can also drag or re-order the slides. If you have a lot of slides the Slide Sorter view is best for this. You’ll find that under the View tab.

5. Adding Content to Your Slides

Now it’s time to add content to your slides. While on the Normal view go to the Insert tab -> Shapes. From this menu, you can select shapes or text boxes to add to your slide. You would simply select an element, come over to the slide and drag the element to the size you want.

You can organize your slides as you go by dragging them to the location you want in the timeline.

Want to save time and not do all that work yourself? Take advantage of our easy to use PowerPoint templates and just fill in your information into the slides. Here is our list of the best PowerPoint templates.

Still not sure how to make a PowerPoint presentation? Do you have questions about PowerPoint? Leave a comment below.

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