PowerPoint Tips & Tutorials

Using hyperlinks

Hyperlinks are a great way to connect your presentation to other slides, presentations, documents, and the Web. You can use hyperlinks for the following:

• To enable you to jump to other slides quickly
• To switch to another presentation
• To open another file, such as a Word document or Excel spreadsheet
• To display a Web page
• To open an e-mail to someone

To create a hyperlink, select an object. It can be an AutoShape (shape), placeholder, or the text itself. If you select text, the text will have an underline and become the hyperlink color in the color scheme (theme colors). Then choose Insert> Hyperlink. (In 2007, Insert tab> Links group> Hyperlink.)

In the Insert Hyperlink dialog box, choose the type of link on the left:

• Existing File or Web Page
• Place in This Document
• Create New Document
• E-mail Address

Then locate the slide or file, enter the Web URL, or enter an e-mail address. Click OK.

Hyperlinks work only in Slide Show view. Always test your hyperlinks.

When you add a hyperlink to a presentation, you must be careful that the target of the hyperlink is available. If you are giving the presentation offsite using a laptop, all the targets need to be on the laptop as well, unless your laptop is actively connected to the Internet. An alternative is to copy Web site documents you think you will need to your laptop and hyperlink to those documents. The advantage is that you don't have to depend on getting a good connection to the Internet at your offsite location.

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