Skip The Thank You Slide - How to End Your Presentation on a High
For the amount of effort that goes into making PowerPoint presentations, they deserve to be called an art form. Every employee knows that PowerPoint presentations are a great avenue for business communication. To communicate something important well, you have to master the art of the business presentation.
Many professionals consider the thank you slide to be an important part of any presentation, signalling the end of your talk while also expressing gratitude.
But is a thank you slide really necessary? We at JobStreet have encountered our fair share of thank you slides, so here are our best tips on how, when, and when to not do it.
How do you make a thank you slide?
Here's the tricky part—most of the time, you don't actually need a thank you slide.
Thank you slides are most appropriate for celebratory events or in instances where your audience members have to make an extra effort to attend your presentation. In these cases, expressing gratitude is imperative. You can go the extra mile by including their names in your slide instead of settling for a measly "thank you." Make your participants feel valued by highlighting individually instead of as part of a collective.
How do you say thank you after a presentation?
Thank you slides are best when they come from actual gratitude instead of just to end a presentation. Apart from pointing out the individuals who were essential for your PowerPoint presentation, you can also be specific about contributions to the presentation, project, event, and the like.
Do you even need a thank you slide?
You only need a thank you slide if it's acelebratory event or your audience members made sacrifices to be here. If you're just delivering news, pitching an idea, or updating your colleagues, you don't actually need a thank you slide.
Instead of a thank you slide, one of the following could be even more effective.
Alternatives to the thank you slide
- "Any more questions?" You can end your presentation with a slide that starts a conversation instead of ending it. Open the floor to discussions, questions, and concerns.
- "One more thing..." This was a popular method by Steve Jobs in which you save the best for last. This could be updates about work, an upcoming holiday, or basically anything to end the meeting on a high note.
- "To summarise..." If you had a particularly long presentation, you can end it with a concise slide showing the key takeaways.
- "Now it's time to..." A call-to-action slide is also a great way to end a presentation. Show an image or even a link that will prompt your audience to do something afterwards.
- "Here's a quote from..." Another creative way to end your slides is with a quote card. End your presentation with a powerful quote that is in line with your slides and sums up the intentions of your presentation.
What do you call the last slide in a presentation?
The last slide is called the closing slide, and thiscanbe your thank you slide.
But if you feel an alternative slide is more appropriate, then you can close your presentation with many other options.
As you can see, good PowerPoint presentations are more complicated than they seem. Putting together a solid presentation takes a variety of skills, which can only get better through practice. And after mastering this essential ability, you can now update your JobStreet profile and proudly add to your resume.
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SEEK Asia , a combination of two leading brands JobStreet and jobsDB, is the leading job portal and Asia's preferred destination for candidates and hirers. SEEK Asia's presence span 7 countries namely Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Philippines and Vietnam. SEEK Asia is part of the Australian Securities Exchange-listed SEEK Limited Company, the world's largest job portal by market capitalisation. SEEK Asia attracts over 400 million visits a year.
About SEEK Limited
SEEK is a diverse group of companies, comprising a strong portfolio of online employment, educational, commercial and volunteer businesses. SEEK has a global presence (including Australia, New Zealand, China, Hong Kong, South-East Asia, Brazil and Mexico), with exposure to over 2.9 billion people and approximately 27 per cent of global GDP. SEEK makes a positive contribution to people's lives on a global scale. SEEK is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, where it is a top 100 company and has been listed in the Top 20 Most Innovative Companies by Forbes.
