Most people tend to think that the concept of virtual reality has a place with The Jetsons family, but not so much at the office — think again. Recently, more and more businesses are exploring ways they can mesh virtual reality with daily business operations to possibly help benefit customer service and even employee satisfaction. Take your business to the next level by embracing three dimensions instead of two. Here’s why:

Create your own virtual product prototypes

With the help of virtual reality, you’ll no longer have to rely on manufacturing when you want to see what your product physically looks like and how it might work. These virtual products allow you to make any changes before going through with production. According to Abi Mandelbaum, CEO and co-founder of YouVisit, “Model creation in VR, for example, can save companies time and money, as these types of models or prototypes allow viewers to examine a product and make changes without the time or expense of building a physical model.”

Virtual designs for engineers

Especially beneficial for engineers, architects and other professionals that work with building or engineering large structures, virtual reality helps save both time and money. As an alternative to small models or 2D renderings, VR offers a more immersive experience that helps design and replicate structures.

Virtual tours

Let’s say that you’re a real estate agent showing houses to potential buyers. Your buyers might be in a different state or simply don’t want to spend time going from house-to-house. Virtual reality allows customers to see what the home looks likes in a three-dimensional setting without them having to actually be there.

Showing all the angles of a product

In order to entice buyers into making a purchase, they must first get an idea as to what it’s actually like, and they need to see as many angles as possible — especially for products that customers don’t get to physically touch. With virtual reality, customers are given a better idea of what your product is like. Abi Mandelbaum says that “Virtual reality can allow current and potential customers to explore a product before they commit to making a purchase. Furthermore, VR completely immerses customers, helping place a product directly into their (virtual) hands or empowering viewers to see a product in action.”

Take customers on an adventure

If you are in any tourism or adventure-based business, you can use virtual reality to give customers a taste of what to expect from the attractions. Imagine that you have an amusement park and want to attract customers’ attention. You can opt to offer a short VR replication of one of your rides so people can see whether or not they’d like it. Or if you own a resort or campground, you’ll also be able to create reality versions of whatever activities you offer.

VR has the potential to take your small- and medium-sized business to the next level if done properly of course. If you have any questions about how you can mesh virtual reality with your company, don’t hesitate to send us an email or give us a call. We’ll be more than happy to assist with your queries.

The post How VR helps with business growth appeared first on TechSolutions, Inc..

Many suffer from glossophobia, the fear of public speaking. Reasons vary, from traumatic childhood experiences to the inability to imagine your co-workers in their underwear. Enter Microsoft PowerPoint. This program helps visually depict a presentation, whether it be for a class project or a boardroom meeting, or to convince parents to buy your first car. With the nine following tips, you can maximize the efficiency of your next PowerPoint presentation.

Start slideshows instantly

The audience doesn’t want to see the speaker’s cluttered desktop or unread emails as the PowerPoint presentation is being set up. Simply name the file with a .PPS or .PPSX file extension and voilà! Bypass the editing mode and start the show with a double click and end it with the Esc key.

Pull back the focus with Blackouts and Whiteouts

Audience members have the tendency to lose focus or drift away when presentations are longer than usual. If you suspect audience members are starting to lose focus, hit the B key for a complete blackout or the W key for a total whiteout. Then hit any key or click the mouse to return to the slides – this technique helps get the eyes back on you, where they belong.

Say no to bullet points

Both Steve Jobs and Tim Cook agree that bulleted lists aren’t the ticket. A better way to create lists is to drop each item in one at a time, if possible, next to a big image that is the main focus of your presentation. Don’t forget to talk about each individual list item, but not with bullets.

Insert pictures from Flickr and OneNote

Jazz up presentations by including images or memes that’ll make the audience laugh instead of doze off. Head to the Insert tab and select Online Pictures; you’ll see Office.com Clip Art, Bing Image Search, Flickr, OneNote and even Facebook. The vast pool of online imagery is now at your disposal.

Chart animation

The challenge doesn’t lie in inserting the chart into the presentation, but in making it interesting. Enter chart animation. After inserting the chart, click the Animations tab and activate the Animations pane. From there, click Add Animation. Pick an animated effect. Then, in the Animation Pane where you see the entry for the chart’s animation, right click and select Effect Options.

This lets you customize sound and animation timing. But on the final tab—Chart Animation—be sure to change Group Chart from “As One Object” to “By Category.” This makes charts display on screen one element at a time as you click, with bars or pieces of pie arriving one after the other, as if each was its own slide.

Kiosk presentations

Kiosk mode simply plays your presentation on a loop without allowing any human intervention or desktop access. This is ideal for trade shows and kiosks that you’d find in malls. Simply click the Slideshow tab > setup Slideshow > and in the dialog box, click next to Browsed at kiosk. Duration, audio, animation and transitions are fully customizable.

Extend music over multiple slides

Why confine your favorite tunes to just one slide? Expand it over the duration of your presentation by clicking on the speaker icon that indicates the embedded audio. Look for the Audio Tools above the tabs on top. Now select the new Playback tab, and in the Start section make sure to check the box for “Play Across Slides.” And presto, the audio is played across the next few slides or until the music runs out.

Duplication

If you are constantly reusing the same element throughout your presentation, the good old Ctrl-C+Ctrl-V is fine, but Duplication is better. Hold Ctrl while you click and drag on the object to create an exact dupe, keep selecting and making dupes and they’ll all space themselves out evenly. You can even dupe entire sets of slides; simply select one or more slides on the left navigation pane, select Insert, click New Slide menu and select Duplicate Selected Slides.

Animate, animate, animate

Any element of a PPT slide is animatable. Choose the element, go to the Animations tab, and at the right end of the Animations Gallery, click the down arrow to get “More.” You can choose from many options about how an element appears, gets emphasis, or disappears—but for animated motion, go to the fourth section. If you pick Custom Path, you can get the object to do just about any wild motions you want on the screen before it settles down. Keep in mind that you don’t want an audience with motion sickness.
PowerPoint presentations are complicated — that’s a fact. So is how effective it becomes once utilized properly. If you have any further questions regarding our tips or how to execute them, please feel free to give us a call or send us an email. We’re more than happy to answer all of your questions.

The post Enhance your next PowerPoint presentation appeared first on TechSolutions, Inc..