Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:  
Summary: simple but useful
Comment: For a book that is about presenting information concisely, there are a lot of unnecessary words and pages, but perhaps that's necessary to make a book out of it. Nonetheless, the information is useful, and my presentations are much better as a result of following his advice. His focus on making your main points fit into a two line title has made my verbiage much more effective, and it's kind of a fun challenge. I've modified his approach significantly to fit my needs, but without having read the book I'd still be back with overly long and kind of boring PP presentations.
If you are only going to buy one book, tho, I'd probably recommend Presenting to Win [ASIN:B000OHZG9Y Presenting to Win: The Art of Telling Your Story]] instead.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great book, buy it now!
Comment: Great book, great concept -- it really helps you turn Powerpoint presentations on their head and turns them into a "supplement" rather than a "crutch" for your presentations. I've found my audiences to be more engaged and retain more information by revamping my presentations using Cliff's suggestions.
My only gripe is that the book seems redundant towards the middle -- almost as if he realized he didn't have enough information to fill a chapter so he had to fluff a bit.
I still would whole-heartedly recommmend this to anyone who finds themselves giving any kind of presentation.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Business People Beware!
Comment: This book fails in a big way - it does not address the real needs of a Powerpoint user within a corporation today, which is the source of the vast majority of Powerpoints created. There is virtually no attention given to how to present analysis, data, and findings and how to report on the details of a critical project that manangers, senior leaders, executives, and board members will use to guide their decision making.
Did it really take two versions of the book to make the point that slides that contain fewer bullets are easier to read? Do we even need a book to tell us that? The countless times we have all sat through truly awful presos suggests that we are already highly adept at making this point ourselves. If you added all the "cute" pictures from the examples in this book, you'd burn out you ink cartridge if you ever had to print one!
Readers, please understand: the author's message about this topic resonates with a certain segment of the user population and he makes part of his living from it in the form of a website, media interviews, books, and consulting gigs where his REAL interest is. You'll notice too that creating an "updated version" is a great way for the author to start boosting the sales price of his book since you could have picked up a new copy of the last version for about $13.00 or less!
This book does well for the Powerpoint user who is creating a presentation that will be talked through and explained to an audience (Eg. teachers in a classroom, salespersons with customers, speakers at a large conference etc.). There are some great tips on how to craft and deliver your message. However, the techniques do little for the slide deck that will be printed and circulated around a table for review or one whose content needs to stand on its own without the verbal narrative it would otherwise need to be meaningful. You'll note that the author's credentials suggest that his strength is in communications rather than business. And this is indeed what he delivers. If your need is not presenting any type of business analysis, then I believe this book will help you very much.
I have spent a great deal of my time coaching analysts and managers on Powerpoint and presentations- both MBA and non MBA - and these are definitely not the techniques that lead to best in class business presos.
Hope that helps.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Indispensible guide for creating PowerPoints
Comment: This book converted me from an anti-PowerPoint extremist to a true believer. Why? Because all my traditional - and well accepted - ideas about putting together PowerPoints were wrong. Atkinson's BBP system is far better. He starts by explaining some basics about how we learn. What he says makes sense and is backed up by research. Traditional PowerPoint presentations violate most or all of these basics by trying to convey too much, too quickly. Atkinson shows how to break up ideas into digestible and memorable pieces with the proper use of templates, text, and images. But before getting into those specifics, he details his system for creating your overall PowerPoint story. Again, his suggestions run counter to conventional practice. For instance, in BBP, everything starts with the Slide Sorter View. Like most people, I guess, I'd start with the Normal View and start pounding out slides. Wrong! With BBP, you craft your story logically and systematically using storytelling methods that are tried and true. The heart of BBP is in storyboarding, which Atkinson likens to the art of storyboarding a film. The result of using BBP is a presentation that is coherent and persuasive.
Atkinson provides the theory and all the "how-to" details for building a presentation using his templates, PowerPoint 2007, and various other Microsoft products. If you don't use the 2007 version of PowerPoint, many of the "how-to" procedures won't apply. The book is still worth reading if only for an understanding of BPP principles and techniques.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Was hoping for more!
Comment: I was quite disappointed in this book. If you are new at giving presentations and need a place to start, this book will be ok. For anyone with minimal experience you will waste your money. The extras on the CD are not worth installing. Very disappointed.
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