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Every audience expects presentation handouts, and your presentation should include them. But these three common mistakes will make your handouts a liability to your presentation instead of an asset.

1. Handing them out at the wrong time

It’s not always necessary or appropriate to hand out materials at the beginning of your presentation. That’s the usual way it’s done, but it has one major drawback: people will read through the whole set of handouts and you’ll lose their attention as you begin your presentation. It’s very difficult to bring them back, and when they do give you their attention again they probably have some ideas in their heads that you’re not yet ready to present to them. Either way, you’ve lost control.

This is particularly so when the handout is a workbook or even a multi-page document. For example, if you hand out a complete set of financial statements to accountants, they will want to look through them carefully right away. Getting them to focus on what you want to say at any given time is almost impossible.

The solution is to hand out each piece of material at the time you are going to address it in your presentation. Don’t give them the whole financial set; give them the Profit and Loss Statement when you’re going to discuss it, the Balance Sheet when you’re ready for it, and so on with the other pieces. That way, control of the presentation will be in your hands, not those of the audience.

2. Making them simply a copy of your slides

People like to use paper copies of your slides to make their notes, but that carries the same problem as the first mistake. Instead, create your own note pages.

About two-thirds of the page from the left-hand edge of the paper should contain BRIEF statements relating to each topic. They could be extracts from your slides, or summaries of your points. Include as much detail as you think appropriate. Then on the remaining one-third on the right side of the page, leave a column headed “Notes” or “How can I use this?”, depending on the type of presentation.

If you must provide a copy of the slides, do it after your presentation is over.

3. Not having enough information on the handouts

The main purpose of a handout is for future reference, so this is your opportunity to provide as much information as your audience needs or wants, even if you have handed it out one page at a time.

You don’t want them focusing on handouts containing complicated charts, graphs and tables while you are speaking, but such material makes excellent handouts for later study.

Another advantage of detailed handouts is that if someone asks for, say, the complete architectural plans, before you are ready, you can tell them that they will receive the complete set of detailed plans at the end, but for now you’d like to focus on the drawings on the screen. The fact that they know they’ll receive everything at the end gives them the comfort they need to concentrate on your presentation.

Used thoughtlessly or automatically, handouts can kill your presentation; used correctly they can provide another tool to ensure that the audience receives the most value from your presentation.

These days companies are using Internet like never before, it is used for advertising, branding and for providing information to customers. The web is saturated with websites trying to market various products and services and with so much competition around there is always a pressing need to stand out of the crowd by presenting information enticingly.

In order to present data in an enticing manner, it is essential to implement data visualization tools while building websites or internet applications. Data visualization tools help in presenting information in an interactive manner and also facilitate display of data in interesting ways such as charts, maps or gauges.

Interactive maps are an excellent medium for presenting data and they can be used in reports, presentations or in real-time digital dashboards. An interactive map allows you to display information about each individual region. The data pertaining to a particular region becomes visible when the mouse cursor hovers over it. These maps have immense potential and they can be implied in many ways.

Companies from various industry segments have come up with innovative implications of interactive Flash maps. Airlines companies use interactive maps to show seat allocation, thereby allowing customers to book a seat of their choice. Travel portals and hotels sites make extensive use of Flash maps to show hotel locations along with other details such as address, contact details and availability. In some cases prospective customers even get to see the layout of the hotel and then book a room of their choice.

Multi-national organizations such as banks use maps for many purposes such as data analysis, product and market analysis etc. Here is a hypothetical situation in which banks can use Flash maps to aid in decision making. Prior to launching a particular product in the global market, banks can easily undertake an analysis of sales of similar products. Here maps may be employed to denote regions of high and low potential.

Most Flash map tools allow automatic coloring of different segments of the data range, so it is possible to automatically generate a color coded map that helps in identifying regions of high and low potential. Flash maps are also used extensively by consumer electronics companies. These companies put up Flash maps on their websites to help potential customers find authorized dealers and service centers.

Flash maps are rapidly gaining popularity and increasing number of designers are implementing them in their projects. One of the reasons behind the phenomenal success of Flash maps is the fact they can be customized extensively.