Presentation design is a specialized graphic design niche focusing on visualizing presentation content to enable the audience to comprehend it more quickly and remember it longer. Business and education presentations are the most common use for presentation decks and what most presentation designers work in. Designers specializing in presentations may use the title Presentation Designer or Presentation Specialist.
Presentation Designers or Specialists may take on different responsibilities within different teams or organizations, which may include:
According to a survey of full-time presentation designers by Zip Recruiter, the average presentation designer makes just over $72,000 per year. Presentation designers who can master sales and marketing can far exceed that average by providing their services on a freelance basis. Presentation Designers are among the highest paid graphic design niches.
Aspriring presentation designers should follow these basics steps to become a successful six-figure presentation designer.
Because presentation designers are visualizing content to both tell a story and represent a brand, it is essential to understand the basic principles of design and branding. Traditionally trained graphic designers may have already learned these skills in college. If you do not know the basics of design, you should learn them to ensure that you can effectively deliver effective presentations for your clients.
After learning the basics of branding and design to visualize content, it is essential to have a firm understanding of how to use PowerPoint, Keynote, Prezi, or Google Slides as an effective design tool. These tools are very powerful for creating presentations, but can feel limiting especially to graphic designers who are used to more robust design tools like the Adobe Suite. As a presentation designer, it’s essential to learn how to work around some of PowerPoint’s limitations and embrace the tool so that clients can easily edit natively built PowerPoint designs.
As a presentation designer, your portfolio is your calling card. It is imperative to create a robust and representative portfolio that will resonate with your prospective clients and instill confidence in your ability to elevate their presentation.
Determine how to market yourself competitively so that your clients can find and hire you easily. They may find you via a freelance platform, social media, ads or SEO. Once they find you, you can leverage your killer portfolio and customer reviews to convey your capabilities and make your services irresistible to your clients. For more information on how to get clients as a graphic designer, check out this comprehensive guide.
After you’ve landed clients, you must learn how to create a great, efficient client experience. One that minimizes edits and improves your speed to delivery - ensuring clients are excited to work with you on all future projects. In addition, it makes those clients raving fans who recommend you - and leave fantastic reviews, which help you win even more clients.
Over time, presentation designers should continue to refine their offerings - which clients do you enjoy working on the most? Which are you the best at? Which can you delivery the most quickly? By niching down, your ideal clients can find you even more easily - and knowing their particular needs will enable you to deliver their projects more efficiently, which ultimately improves your revenue.
Presentation design is a unique graphic design niche for several reasons. First, most classically trained graphic designers prefer the Adobe Suite over presentation software like PowerPoint. On the other hand, many clients love PowerPoint because it’s an easy tool for everyone to use and it’s already installed on their devices, ultimately creating a huge opportunity for service providers to provide the desired service - design in PowerPoint. In addition, many presentations are tied to revenue on the client side - either for sales or account support or for fundraising, making them valuable decks that clients are happy to invest in.
Like any other form of designer, it’s essential for presentation designers to have a portfolio that showcases their best work - and the diversity of their skillsets. It is imperative to create a robust and representative portfolio that will resonate with your prospective clients and instill confidence in your ability to elevate their presentation.
Like all jobs, presentation design has it’s challenges. As discussed previously, many classically trained graphic designers find PowerPoint frustrating due to the simplicity of its user interface.
For self-trained designers who know PowerPoint well, developing an understanding of design basics may be a challenge to creating an impressive portfolio.
For freelance professionals who have previously provided execution and client management, but not sales or marketing, learning to market themselves and secure their own clients may pose a challenge.
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Certainly, as AI continues to evolve, particularly in presentation design tools, it will enable presentation designs to operate more efficiently. Thereby, enabling them to bring more creativity to projects or even to deliver more quickly - which clients always seem to need. Read more about why AI won't replace presentation designers here.