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I gave a talk at TechBA (a program that’s part of the University of Texas–basically they nurture and grow tech companies from Mexico) a few weeks ago. Each slide in my Keynote presentation consisted of 1-2 words. I had two slides in there that featured diagrams that I built up with transitional effects, but that was it for complexity.

Each word was in like 96 point font on a plain black background. The topic of the talk was “Marketing 2.0″ and the focus was on the fact that Marketing 2.0 is really about getting back to the basics of Marketing, where marketing was before Advertising (and Advertising Agencies) turned marketing into an exercise in shouting at the top of your lungs over and over and over again until somebody purchased your stuff.

In any case, after reading Presentation Zen and Guy Kawasaki’s 10/20/30 Powerpoint rule I’m happy to say that I’m finally on the cutting edge of something or other.

Listen, all of you who think that each slide should contain 6-7 bullet points (and each bullet point should feature 6-7 words)…there’s this thing called “cognitive overload.” If you present us with a ton of words on the screen and start talking about those words, we will only be able to focus on one or the other. When we figure out that you are simply reading from the slides, then we’ll just read the slides.

Guess what? We can read faster than you can talk. So there’s no point in your being up there, right? Just email us your word-packed presentation (or what some call “slide-umentation”) and be off with you.

My personal goal? That you can’t understand my slide presentation without my presence (or at least, my voice). I use 1-2 words per slide, or an arresting image, and use those words and images to bolster what it is I’m talking about. And I get a lot more engagement out of the audience. I used the word WTF on a slide behind me as I talk about “what your target market shouldn’t be thinking when they encounter your marketing.” Even a bunch of software guys from another culture got what I was saying–the titters and laughter said it all.

Am I saying that I’m the next Tony Robbins. Hell no. But at the very least I can make a presentation enjoyable and dynamic and try to erase some of the collective pain being inflicted on business audiences every day.

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