PowerPoint Tips & Tutorials

Create section markers

A complex presentation may be divided into several sections. In order to help your audience understand where the current slide sits in the whole structure, you can create section markers that appear throughout the presentation. Each slid displays all of the section names, but the current section is bold, or a different color, so that the audience always knows which section you're currently discussing.

In this slide, you can see at the bottom that the current slide is in the section on Images.

Cecile McKee asked me how she could create such a presentation, and here is the technique I used:

1. Add separate text boxes at the bottom, one for each topic. Use a color that's readable but not too obvious. Gray works well on a white background. Make sure they'll fit well on every slide and adjust as necessary.
2. Copy the text boxes to all of the section slides, that is, the 1st slide of each section.
3. For the 1st section, add animation to the first section name, choosing Emphasis>Change Font Color, and change it to black or another color that will stand out without being distracting. Use the With Previous start, so that the animation occurs when the slide is displayed. Set the speed to Very Fast. Another animation you could use is Bold Reveal.

Note: An alternative is to just bold the word for each section.

4. Copy the text boxes to the other slides in that section -- the animation will come along.
5. Go to the second section, and add the same animation to that section's name, with the same settings. Copy that to the other slides in the second section.
6. Continue until you've finished the entire presentation.

Below are slides in the Tables, Charts, and Diagrams sections.

back to main tips menu for more tips