Amy Balliett is the CEO and founder of the creative content agency, Killer Visual Strategies (formerly Killer Infographics). She owned her first company, a candy store and ice cream parlor, at the age of 17 before heading off for college. She subsequently built a successful career in SEO and marketing, and headed up SEO at several companies before launching Killer in 2010. In the years since, she has grown Killer Visual Strategies to become the industry leader in visual communication, driving visual strategy and creative content campaigns for global brands including Microsoft, Boeing, Adobe, Nikon, Starbucks, the National Endowment for the Arts, the United Nations, and more.
Considered an expert in her field, Amy speaks at dozens of conferences each year including SXSW, Adobe MAX, SMX, and more. She is also a regular teacher at The School of Visual Concepts, a guest lecturer at several colleges and universities, a LinkedIn Learning instructor, and the author of the award-winning book Killer Visual Strategies: Engage Any Audience, Improve Comprehension, and Get Amazing Results Using Visual Communication.
In this conversation, Amy talks about her session(s) at the PowerPoint Presentation Design Deep Dive 2021 being held online on February 18–19 this year.
Indezine is a media partner for this event.
Geetesh: Amy, please tell us more about your two sessions, Visual Design of Information and Infographics: The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly at the upcoming PowerPoint Presentation Design Deep Dive 2021 event. What can the audience expect to learn from this session?
Amy: Thanks for asking! I designed both sessions so that they can stand apart from one another while also providing further benefit from attending both sessions for those who are able. That said, there are a few redundancies between the two sessions just in case someone can only attend one.
The first session, The Visual Design of Information, focuses first on the “why” behind the demand for visual content and information design. I’ve found that truly understanding this “why” makes it easier for content creators to better understand their end audience and produce higher quality content as a result. Following a deep dive into the brain science that fuels our interpretation of visual content, I then spend the bulk of the presentation getting into the “how” of it all. This includes an exercise to create the best narrative for visual storytelling along with a breakdown of some key rules to follow when creating content rooted in visual storytelling, inclusive of real-life examples.
The second session, Infographic Design: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly touches on the “why” as well, but at a higher level and faster pace to ensure we can spend the bulk of the session in the tactical execution of great infographics. To do this right, I show real-world examples of bad and sometimes ugly content as well as examples of high quality and successful content. I pick apart the content to show what works, what doesn’t work, and why. I also share some of my favorite rules of infographic design that, when followed, help to ensure success.
Geetesh: I looked at some of your work on your website and found that you use movement within slides as an integral way to capture attention. Can you share your thoughts about this use of movement?
Amy: This is a very intentional choice. Multiple studies show that audiences respond more positively to moving images over static images. This type of imagery increases engagement, but of equal if not more importance it increases understanding and retention.
My agency, Killer Visual Strategies, is a full-service creative content firm. We produce a wide array of content types, but they boil down to 3 key categories: static, motion, and interactive. To help delineate between these 3 categories on our portfolio, we deliver up 3 different types of portfolio thumbnails. Any work we have done that is entirely static in nature appears as an entirely static thumbnail. Any motion graphic work shows a sampling of the animation itself as the thumbnail (the thumbnails are animated GIFs versus static JPGs). Any interactive project we have done has an animated thumbnail showing the interactive experience on a device like a laptop, tablet, or phone.
In addition to using moving imagery throughout our site, we also take advantage of subtle parallax scroll animations. These are used sparingly throughout the site, and meant to draw attention to key information.
There is a clear purpose behind every animation within our site, with nothing created for the sake of filling space or fluff. Instead, every decision has been made to keep our audience engaged while showing off our capabilities throughout.
PowerPoint Presentation Design Deep Dive 2021 is a conference about presentation design.
Date: February 18–19, 2021
Location: Online Event
Register now! Indezine readers can save $100 with promo code: GEETESH
The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.
Filed Under: Events Tagged as: Amy Balliett, Events, Interviews, PPDDD
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