In the most recent episode of The Presentation Podcast, episode 38 “Alternatives to PowerPoint,” my co-hosts and I talked through presentation software options other than PowerPoint. On a related note, I spent this week at The Presentation Summit conference in Florida. The conference is focused on the presentation industry as a whole, not specific software, and there are some interesting parallels from what I saw at the conference and the podcast discussion.

Throughout the podcast, Nolan Haims, Sandra Johnson and I (Troy Chollar) discuss a lot of apps and when other software can be a good option. PowerPoint is the software we reference as the benchmark. Ironically, at The Presentation Summit this week, Microsoft was the only presentation software represented (they came with a team of 6 Project Managers and Developers – which is a fantastic opportunity for anyone in the presentation industry to have direct access and conversation with the people responsible for PowerPoint!). The product expo had many great companies represented: slide management, hardware, add-in coders, AR and VR (amazing stuff!), and more. But Keynote, Prezi (who have been at the conference in the past), Haiku Deck, Adobe, Google, and other presentation creation apps did not have a presence.

Another interesting parallel that I noted was that for a conference full of professional presentation designers, there was continuous excitement over discovering new features and ways to use PowerPoint. That excitement of discovery ties in directly with a new LinkedIn an article that I posted, “The ‘New’ PowerPoint” about how people do not realize features that have changed and been added, literally making PowerPoint a new software app compared to previous versions.

The key takeaway is: yes, there are other presentation software options available. However, those other options do not have a large user base or large profile at presentation industry events. Microsoft’s PowerPoint continues to be the industry standard for presentation software – and there are plenty of new features to make it better than the “old” PowerPoint.

– Troy @ TLC