This post is second in the series of “Icons are the new bullet points”. Part 1 covered first 20 industries in alphabetical order A to E and their corresponding icons. Part 2 covers the remaining industries and their slides designed using icons.

 

All those who read our Icons are the new bullet points Part 1 post must agree with us by now that icons can transform any boring slide into an aesthetic and impactful one.

 

It’s not just us folks at SlideTeam who believe in the power of icons. Have a look at any online visual design around you- the apps in your mobile phones, the web pages, online ads while surfing the internet- you’ll notice these small visual representations of a concept called icons in almost every design. Icons are a designer’s safest, quickest and easiest design hack to pull out an elegant and catchy design. No complicated tools, no brain wracking, no spending of hours. Just a few minutes and a professional design is ready!

 

Being tiny visual illustrations of a concept, they hardly take up any space thus allowing you to add your content without making it look too text-heavy. Did we forget to tell you last time that there are broadly two types of icons that you can use for your presentation? Yes, we did.

 

Types of Icons for PowerPoint Presentations

 

They are: Image Icons (Non-editable) and Vector Icons (Editable). See the image below showing you examples of both.

 

Image Icons are same as visuals, only small in size with focus on just one concept (growth sign, dollar symbol, direction signboard, etc.). They illustrate your point well and are more meaningful than large resolution photos that convey the same point. If the image used in the icon is not a high resolution one, then the image might pixelate on expanding.

 

Vector Icons are also called Scalable Vector Graphics (SVGs) since they can be expanded or minimized to any size without loss of resolution. They are fully editable icons- you can change the color, size and orientation of the icon to your liking. You can have a colored background behind the icon or go without it. You can even use vector icons that have drop shadows (In the image below, three out of the four editable icons have drop shadows). This is the in-thing in the presentation world.

 

Types of Icons- Image Icons and Vector Icons

 

What’s Your Industry? There’s an Icon For That!

 

If we missed out your industry in Part 1, you’ll probably find it in this post (If not, tell us and we’ll add it to the list). These are samples of slides from each industry that have been re-designed with the use of icons to create impactful slides. As you’ll notice in the designs below, we have used Vector Icons to stress our point. Why? Like we said before, they are trending right now and you can edit them as per your brand colors and liking. So, here we go starting with alphabet F:
21. Food and Beverage Industry

Burgers, french fries, drinks...yumm, we are hungry and so will your audience be. A food and beverage presentation slide stuffed with bullet points is an unforgivable sin. Include visuals yes, but that could make the slide a bit too heavy (to the eyes). Icons are the perfect visuals to set the mouths watering and capture audience eyeballs. Remember to mix colors (not too many) when you are using a combination of icons; that’ll give a rich, warm effect gelling perfectly with the personality of food industry.

 

Food and Beverage Industry Presentation Slide

 

22. Health Industry

This is a million dollar industry with hundreds of how-to-stay-healthy presentations being delivered every day. New health services are being launched as modern, lifestyle diseases like diabetes and high BP skyrocket. Then there is the beauty and fitness industry with umpteen presentations revealing the secret to a flat tummy and glowing, healthy skin! Make your presentation more credible and impactful with the right use of icons.


P.S. You’ll love the tipsy icon used below to represent the limit-alcohol-intake advice. 😀

 

Health Industry Presentation Slide

 

 

23. Hospital Services

Although most chances are that the audience of your hospital services presentation will comprise members of your industry, there can be a slight chance that laymen are listening too. They would obviously be oblivious to the heavy jargons that you keep injecting in your slides. Make your slides more understandable with simple language and abundant use of icons. That ways, the audience will instantly know what you are talking about and benefit from your information.

 

Hospital Services Presentation Slide

 

24. Information Industry

The information industry is information-intensive and research-intensive industry. Presenters belonging to this industry also tend to create slides overloaded with information. That’s not a good practice for presentation slides. Remove the long winding sentences, retain the pointers and add relevant icons to make the information interesting and easily comprehensible.

 

Information Industry Presentation Slide

 

25. Information & Communications Technology (ICT)  Industry

ICT encompasses all technological tools that can access, store, transmit and manipulate information. So, computer hardware and software, Internet, broadcasting technologies like radio and television, mobiles phones and satellite systems etc. come under the ICT umbrella. Each technological resource can be depicted with its corresponding icon. If you are speaking about the impact of ICT on different sectors of the economy like in the slide below, you can again use icons to create impactful slides.

 

Impact of ICT on Society Slide

 

26. Insurance Industry

Presentations belonging to the insurance industry are unfortunately the most yawn-inducing and incomprehensible ones. Blame the insurance policies explained in bullet point fashion. Every insurance clause can be depicted with an icon to break the text clutter and aid in understanding. Trust us, it will radically transform your slides and your audience will be thankful to you for this!

 

Insurance Industry Presentation Slide

 

27. Legal Services Industry

These presentations suffer the jargon sickness too. Slides look less like slides, more like documents. If you are from this industry and want your presentations to convince the audience to hire your legal services, you’ll have to step up your game. That means create professional and easy-to-understand slides. Less text and more visual elements will do the trick.

 

P.S. Check out the icon used for family law. It can be funny to some but for those couples wishing to separate, it is a reminder that children suffer the most because of parental conflicts. As a presenter, you can then stress that you have a proven track record of successfully and amicably settling disputes involving children.

 

Legal Services Presentation Slide

 

 

28. Manufacturing Industry

Manufacturing industries like iron and steel industry, electronics, clothing and textile industry, shipbuilding and many more are daily bringing out new commodities in the market or are indulging in value addition. High resolution images pertaining to each industry and its operations can easily be used to create high-impact slides. Many presentations belonging to this industry are thankfully a visual delight. Many are not. There are tons of manufacturing industry PowerPoint icons on the web. Use them to create enriching slides.

 

Manufacturing Industry Presentation Slide

 

29. Music Industry

A lot of music lessons are shared via presentations. If you are using visuals of the musical notes to explain those, then you are doing good. If you have a slide full of text and bullet points,use icons to represent those points. Look for a word in the sentence that lends itself to a visual- playlist, headset, favorites, DJ, beat, dance, etc. You’ll easily find their icons on the web- make use of them to spice up your slides!

 

Music Industry Presentation Slide

 

30. Non-profits, Foundations & Philanthropists

If you have a slide full of bullet points and further dot points under each bullet point, we recommend you retain just the headings (like we did in the charity slide below). The sub points can be included in your talk. If you need to keep those part of your deck, dedicate a complete slide to each category. That ways, your slide won’t be overloaded with content and you can use visuals and icons to create clean and appealing slides.

 

NGO Industry Presentation Slide

 

31. Petroleum Industry

Whether you are presenting on an overview of the petroleum industry, or specific aspects like import and export, production and petroleum prices, uses or environmental effects of the industry, you can create high quality slides by employing icons, readily available on the Internet. In fact, you won’t find high quality visuals for these concepts as easily as finding icons. Look at the slide below: The fundamentals of petroleum industry right from production to refining and transportation are so easy to understand thanks to the use of colorful icons. Compare that with a bullet-ridden slide (yuck, right?)

 

Petroleum Industry Presentation Slide

 

 

32. Pharmaceuticals Industry

Pharmaceuticals industry is another example where icons are more visually appealing than images. While an image of an injection or tablets spread on a table can make audience feel uncomfortable (or even sick), icons are harmless and convey the same point in much lesser space!

 

Pharmaceutical Industry Presentation Slide  

 

33. Public Administration

Public administrators implement government initiatives and operations that directly affect the people. Each operation is best represented by an icon. So, if you are a public health administrator, you can employ healthcare icons to create informative and professional presentations. All public concerns like crime, sanitation, infrastructure, education, transport, etc. lend themselves to icons. So, there should be no excuse for dumping words, words and words (you are not Shakespeare) on your audience!

 

Public Industry Presentation Slide

 

34. Public Relations

Public Relations industry is growing exponentially with plethora of private PR firms offering their services. If you are representing your PR agency, your presentations will mirror your reputation. How will you build others’ reputation if your presentations are boring, unappealing and unprofessional!  If your organization is launching a PR campaign by sponsoring local events, indulging in corporate social responsibility, or other forms of publicity, create attractive designs (presentation, brochure, etc.). Don’t just tell the public, show them by using visuals and icons.

 

Public Relations Presentation Slide

 

 

35. Publishing Industry

Can there be an icon for fiction and nonfiction? Yes, there is. Different genres of books, production and distribution process, facts and figures of publishing industry...all can be depicted with icons.

 

Publishing Industry Presentation Slide

 

 

36. Real Estate

You must have gone through many a real estate services’ presentation. While the opening slide is a happy family picture holding keys of a new house, the rest of the slides paint a sad picture. Blame the bullet points! There’s no dearth of real estate icons on web, whether it is house on sale, house sold, security, home loan, etc. You just need to download it once and keep using them for all your presentations. What say?

 

Real Estate Industry Presentation Slide

 

37. Retail Industry

Name any consumer good or service that the retail industry is selling and you will be able to depict it through an icon. Besides, you can also leverage icons in slides explaining operations, supply chain, types of retail outlets, etc. to aid in better understanding. Images can be used but only when the content is negligible. Where you need to give some details, go for icons.

 

Retail Services Slide

 

38. Service Industry

Many of the industries that we have covered till now fall under this category. Any industry offering intangible product or service is a service industry. Accounting, engineering, tradesmanship, social services, etc. are some such examples. When talking about revenue, expansion or any other aspect of the industry, employ icons to create visual interest.

 

Service Industry Slide

 

39. Sports Industry

Thankfully, many sports presentations are action packed with visuals of players in action. However, some presentations become chaotic when too much content and images are used, killing the legibility of both. Icons can help you create cleaner slides. As in the slide below, image of one sport would not have done justice to other sports. Icons, however, can help you visually illustrate each point.

 

 

Sports Presentation Slide

 

40. Telecommunications Industry

It might sound repetitive but please do not add detailed explanations in the slide. Keep that for your talk. Otherwise, you tend to start reading slides and we don’t need to tell you that this is audience’s worst pet peeve. If you need to put details as you are not presenting the topic in person, dedicate a complete slide to each point. In the slide below, we removed all the details and gave an overview of the telecommunications industry using icons and headings. The difference in the look and feel of the slide is there for you to see.

 

Telecommunications Industry Presentation Slide

 

 

41. Travel and Tourism Industry

Although stunning images and minimal content should be the rule of any travel and tourism presentation, it eludes some presenters. Tragedy is when beauty of a tourist spot is explained in bullet points! A bigger tragedy is when a picture-perfect image is littered with text.

 

Contrarily, check out any infographic on travel and tourism industry. They are sprinkled generously with icons. Why? They take lesser space, true. But it takes split second for readers to know about the package offerings, precautions, tips for travellers, etc. It’s time that tourism PowerPoint presentations step up to that level. Do you agree?

 

Tourism Industry Presentation Slide

 

SlideTeam offers both Image Icons and Vector Icons. We even have some free PowerPoint icons for you to get started.

 

Check Out Our Free Icons Collection

 

Check Out Our Complete PowerPoint Icons Library

 

Moral of the Story: Use Icons in Your Presentation Slides. Icons make it easy for your audience to visualize your point. And it can be inserted into ANY slide design to enhance it. Ya right, ANY!

 

Not able to find the right icons for your slides? In a fix how some concept can be illustrated via an icon? Send us your content at [email protected] and we’ll fix it for you! Our Presentation Design Services team can also help you create icon-ic slides.

 

All the best!