Simplicity Sells

A while back Wired wrote an article and had the cover of their magazine of "How Apple Got Everything Right By Doing Everything Wrong".  They elaborate on Jobs’ tyrannical point of  running a company, and  explain that Jobs’ perspective is one that pushes employees to their edge and further making new designs and new programs. Nothing is released until it is completed, and in a proper running stage that people will not find flaws with.

But my perspective with Apple is that their simplicity is what sells! The end user of their applications are drawn in by the simplicity and the ease of use of many Mac products in comparison, especially to Windows. Take a look at the iPod, one wheel, one center button and a Menus that are layed out very easily and are great to navigate.  The ease of use that Mac provides, is one that draws users of all ages.

John Maeda on TED.com has a talk of Simplicity Patterns . The integration of design, technology, and simplicity is one that ultimately leads to more productivity, better usage, and more sales.

Then I came across 23 Kick Ass Portfolios , and thought that these portfolios were yes, kick ass, but at the same time, they don’t have the same type of simplicity that encourages easy navigation, and lets the user have a simple view of where to go and what to do.  In order to encourage the portfolio design and to draw more people, I think they should split up their site, and have their designs under a separate location to ease navigation and have the reviewer be able to look at the designs more objectively. With other designs in the way, the object can get obscured and lead to a misjudgment of the portfolio itself.

Presentations a How To

Photo by bonedad

• Being a college kid, and having a focus on International Business, presentations are a huge part of my college life and my business life. Many times the common presenter overlooks the benefits of simplicity in presentations. I have composed a few presentations for school that grabbed attention and held it throughout the whole time. The key to keeping focus during presentation is to keep the information coming and to make it easy for the audience to pay attention.

• A picture is worth 1000 words
  • Sometimes presenters get a little too picture happy with their presentations. Try your best to use only relevant graphics, whether the graphic is a graph, chart or photograph, make sure it is useful and can assist in describing the overall point of your presentation.
• Hard hitting facts and support
  • Use your facts often and make them support your overall purpose. When you present the fact on your slide, if you put a graphic along with the slide, make sure it is non intrusive. For example:
• Simplicity Sells (To take a TED Title)
  • Simplicity in the presentation will very well be your key to attention. Keep the amount of information on the slide to a minimum, and allow most of the explanation to come from your own words rather than letting people read from the slide. If they wanted to read the slides, you wouldn’t be there.
    Take a look at the TED talks, specifically Stefan Sagmeister, Hans Rosling and Guy Kawasaki’s 10/20/30 Rule for presentations which can be found Here.

Focus carefully on your presentations, Slide Share is basically a YouTube of Presentations and PowerPoints.

Keep in mind also, that with everything else, you’re trying to sell yourself, so think, What point am I trying to get across? How am I getting the audience’s attention? What is my goal with this presentation? How do I present it?

Design Carefully, keep the presentation easy on the eyes, and load it with facts.

You’re on your way to a proper Presentation!