PowerPoint Templates for Memorial Day

1. American Flag Design


2. War Memorial Template


3. Military Camouflage Template


4. Army Soldier in his Cammies


5. Tanks, Helicopters, Missiles, Oh My

1. Flag Waving


2. Excellence Award with U.S. Flag and Sky


3. Excellence Award with Flag

And for Memorial Day content for your PowerPoint presentation, you may wish to keep an eye on the number of soldiers and civilians who gave their lives for the current war.

• Thousands of soldiers have died.
• Tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians have perished.
• There is no end in site.

Flags fly at half mast this Memorial Day.

Labels: PowerPoint Templates

¶ 5/21/2007 03:04:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

  Email Signatures Your Clients Hate

Today, the Wall Street Journal weighs in on evil email signatures -- and why evil email sign-offs are poised to get worse.

For the record -- I like to see a simple, consistent approach to email signatures.

But I actually like some of the add-ons that the WSJ hates. Logos, graphics, banners, and other promotional sign-offs do not necessarily have to be overbearing or tacky bandwidth hogs. Used with discretion, some of the fancier email signature techniques can be quite useful...and have a positive promotional impact, as well.

Of course, you can always vote or comment your opinion on email sigs...and see what others think immediately.

So tell me...what do you think about promotional email sign-offs? Or in other words, what do you think about "Email Bling"??

Labels: Poll, Presentation

¶ 5/18/2007 01:00:00 PM

  Email Signatures Your Clients Love

This year, I find myself receiving emails from people in the HR, Finance, Marketing, and Sales departments of a huge corporation. But by the look of their emails, I would never guess that they all work for the same company.

• The fonts and sizes are different.
• The background colors vary.
• Even the signature formats are woefully inconsistent.

Consistency is Key! As part of my internet marketing consulting practice, I often recommend that corporate clients "get it together" with regard to presenting a consistent email image. And oddly, the humble but powerful email signature is frequently overlooked in corporate brand guides.

But what medium do organizations use more abundantly than email? And what medium is more ripe for a marketing message to "go viral"? A company with only 10 employees can easily send out over 100 emails every day -- and each email can get forwarded to dozens if not hundreds or thousands of other people.

Humble But Powerful! Even though an email sig is humble bit of corporate communication, do not dismiss its potential to make a powerful impact.

I recommend that corporations adopt at least a simple, consistent sig format...

However, some of the stuff you see in email signatures can be a bit much...

• Email address: When you send an email, your recipient already has your email address, right? So why be redundant and include it in the sig?
• A confidentiality notice: I doubt this lengthy bit of copy really has any legal teeth. But I am not a legal expert, so I could be wrong. However, it IS ugly and takes up bandwidth. And just about everyone I know ignores it entirely. If you really MUST have one, why not just link to it in your sig?
• Logo and Picture. I am on the fence about using a logo and/or picture in the signature. A Realtor I know includes his head shot in his sig, and I think it's nice to see his grinning mug from time to time. But others have told me that it creeps them out to have a face embedded in their emails. And while your logo belongs on real world letterhead, do you really need it in your email signature?

But that's just me. I like to see simplicity, consistency, and useful information in corporate email signatures.

What about you? What do you like to see in a signature file? And what items need to be tossed in the trash?

And what about your organization? Does your organization's corporate brand guide provide a standard for the email look and feel and the signature? Why or why not?

Labels: Presentation

¶ 5/18/2007 10:53:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

  PowerPoint Logos: From Pac Man to Canada

Friday thought: last year, I noted that the PowerPoint logo looked like Pac Man going after goblins. However, I think the icon really depicts a pie chart trying to gobble up bullet points.


This year, as I work on PowerPoint presentations, I glance at the new PowerPoint 2007 logo in my taskbar and think, "Is that the flag of Canada? Wait, no. It's the new PowerPoint icon."



However, one might also think that in this new Power Point logo, the bullet points are trying to eat that pie chart!

(Although the flag of Canada is red, when the logo is scrunched down to taskbar size, the new PowerPoint logo looks like a waving flag to me.)


I guess we see what we want to see.

Labels: fun

¶ 5/18/2007 09:54:00 AM

  Best Graduation Speech Template Ever - 2007 Edition

Quite a few people are online searching for "graduation speech templates" this month. Honestly, what sort of valedictorian or salutatorian would want to merely "fill-in-the-blanks" for a commencement speech that should be an honor to prepare and deliver?

Creativity and originality is important to the overachievers who give graduation speeches. I kind of doubt they are looking for a fill-in-the-blanks, boilerplate approach.

So, just who are the people who are looking for graduation speech templates online? Are you the same folks who use the old Microsoft PowerPoint AutoContent Wizard to develop presentations like "Communicating Bad News" or "Motivating a Team"?

Or are you just looking for a little fun -- a little humor to relieve the last stressful month of Senior-itis?

Well, here it is, for Seniors only: a free, 2-page pdf download created just for the Class of 2007, which I immodestly call "Best Graduation Speech Template Ever: 2007 Edition". Seniors, you can download it, print her out, fill in the blanks, and easily get that pesky writing assignment out of the way -- a month early!

Don't forget to horrify your parents and teachers by asking them to listen to your templated speech before you threaten to give it to a commencement audience!

Labels: fun, images, PowerPoint Templates

¶ 5/10/2007 11:08:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

  Top Nine Visual Cliches

Every year or so, I get so sick of a visual image, I cannot even see it anymore.

Recognizing Visual Clichés. I think it started the year a company I worked with "went global". Leadership insisted on sticking a globe on everything -- brochures, annual reports, PowerPoint slides, employee orientation videos, coffee cups -- everything.

For about 2 years, I could not face a map. I would not look at a magazine with a globe on it -- and there seemed to be dozens. Web sites? It was the late 90's, and the term "World Wide Web" became all the rage, so -- globes became visually omnipresent.

I had to avert my eyes to prevent myself from rolling them.

Today, I can look at representations of planet Earth. I remembered that I like globes, maps, and geography -- long before I was visually assaulted with them.

But I frequently develop and dismiss new visual peeves. Here is a current list of my top 9 visual clichés:

Light Bulb = Bright Idea
Handshakes = Partnerships
Chess Pieces = Strategy
Gears = Thinking
Handprint = Handmade
Fingerprint = Unique
Jigsaw Puzzles = Completion
iPod Silhouette = Trendy
Wooden Blocks = Simplicity

What are your pet visual peeves in 2007?

And which image metaphors are you banishing from your PowerPoint slides this year?

And which should go away permanently?

Labels: images

¶ 5/02/2007 03:15:00 PM 3 Comments Links to this post

  PowerPoint Death Watch

Labels: fun, PowerPoint

¶ 5/02/2007 01:40:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post