3 Best Ways to Present Data in PowerPoint Effectively

What are the best ways to present data in PowerPoint?

Have you been struggling with data presentation? You have so many great insights from your analysis exercise and can’t seem to find a great way to present them. I’m with you.

As a data analytics consultant, dealing with a large number of datasets and communicating insights to my clients is a daily part of my job.

Today, I will share the 3 rules I always follow when presenting data effectively in PowerPoint slides including the types of data presentation, data presentation PPT format, data presentation best practices, and more.

This post is all about the best ways to present data in PowerPoint.

Know the purpose

The first rule to presenting data effectively is to know the purpose. What do I mean by that?

In a presentation slide deck, you are bound to have many slides. For each slide, you will have a main point you want to bring across, right?

When it comes to presenting data, the same rule applies. Do not overcomplicate things. Think about what is the main point of the specific slide.

After, everything you place in the slide has you to convey that point and only that one point. Do not add irrelevant things that do not help you achieve this.

Choose the Right Presentation Format

The second rule to present data in a nice way is that you need to follow a clean and neat format. There are 2 types of formats we are looking at here:

Data Presentation format – This is the representation of your data.
PPT format – The format of the specific PPT slide.

Type of Data Presentation

#1 Textual or Descriptive presentation

The first type of data presentation is the most simple one. As the name suggests, you present your data in-text and describe it verbally.

For instance, “Out of all the social media platforms, Instagram experienced the highest growth in May. Instagram’s account growth rate has increased by 5x in May (0.5% in Apr vs 2.5% in May).”

Think of it like listening to a podcast or reading a news article, how do they describe a particular trend or data statistics? Use that as a starting point.

Textual presentations are more suitable when the quantity of data is not too large and they are often found in PPT slides as the description. This can help you to bring across your main points more effectively.

#2 Tabular presentation

The second type of data presentation is tabular presentation. The dictionary definition of tabular means ‘data presented in columns or tables’.

For instance,

TABLE 1 | Engagement Rate of Brand A’s Social Media Platforms (per cent)

	Post Type
	Carousell	Videos
Facebook	5.5%	0.1%
Instagram	5.8%	5.2%
Tiktok	–	0.5%

Source: Brand A’s Meta and Tiktok Analytics 2024

As you can see, it’s basically Excel but in a nicer format. Think of it like reading a Profit & Loss Statement of a company.

I usually use the tabular presentation method when it comes to presenting statistical data like max, min, and average, or when I want to show the results of a deep dive.

For example, in the same context as Table 1, I will present in a table format if I want to show the performance of each post from a specific platform.

When it comes to using the tabular presentation method, make sure that you have included all these elements:

Table Number
Title
Column and Row Headings
Unit of Measurement
Source of Data
Note (for specific features on the table that are not self-explanatory)

#3 Diagrammatic presentation

The third type of data presentation is diagrammatic presentation. This is essentially your graphs and charts.

For instance,

This is my go-to data presentation type as I will have the flexibility to bring the audience’s attention to a specific portion of the graphs through colour coding, highlighting the specific area, or even boxing up the area I want to zoom into.

One thing you want to note here is to not overcomplicate the graphs in the sense that your audience doesn’t know how to read the graph and you have to spend a significant amount of time explaining how to read it.

This will defeat the whole point of presenting the visual which is supposed to help you in your data storytelling.

Here are some examples of graphs that you can consider:

Bar graph
Column graph
Donut/ Pie chart
Line graph
Stacked graph
Histogram
Candlestick/ Boxplot
Word Cloud
Bubble Graph

Resource for you: Presentation of Data

PPT Format

Based on different scenarios, I have outlined my 3 go-to PPT formats below.

PPT Format Example 1:

This format is the simplest of them all and I used it for every single analysis report. This format is not only clean but it is straight to the point and helps the audience understand better.

Regardless of whether you are using the tabular or diagrammatic data presentation, this format will allow you to convey your main point effectively.

PPT Format Example 2:

For the second format, this is more suitable when you want to present data trends over a long period. For example, sales trends, and year-on-year growth.

PPT Format Example 3:

In the last format, this is when just presenting one visual is not sufficient to help you bring across your point and you will need the help of 2.

I personally highly recommend avoiding this format unless necessary because it will take away the attention of the audience since there are too many things to look at. In this scenario, you will have to use presentation techniques like animations, and highlighting certain areas so they can be with you every step of the way.

Follow the Data Presentation Best Practices

The last rule to present data efficiently is to follow these best practices.

Basics

There are only 4 basic rules you need to follow when formatting your ppt slide.

#1 Slide Title

Your slide title should convey the main point of the slides. Unlike what you are taught in university/ school, when it comes to data presentation, it is not “as little word as possible”, but it is more of “can your audience understand without you having to explain”.

So, don’t worry about getting too wordy.

#2 Have 1 Visual

For every slide, make sure that you have 1 visual to represent your data, regardless of whether it is tabular or diagrammatic.

A slide full of words is similar to a book. The audience can read it themselves, without you presenting to them.

#3 Have 1 Description Box

For every slide, make sure that you have a description box where you can describe the data via the textual presentation method.

This will help to emphasize the main point of the slide.

#4 Highlight AHA zone

Last but not least, bring your audience’s attention to the AHA zone. AHA zone means the specific area in your slide (usually in your visual) that aids your audience’s understanding.

Think of it like the blurring effect of your camera settings. You need to zoom in on a specific area and the rest will be a blur.

This is usually done through:

Bolding
Boxing the area
Colour coding
Bigger font size

These may be complicated to follow but here’s one thing you can ask yourself every time you are formatting a PPT slide: “Will the audience be able to understand without you explaining?”

This post is all about the best ways to present data in PowerPoint.

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3 Best Ways to Present Data in PowerPoint Effectively

Know the purpose