How to Effortlessly Brand Your PowerPoint Presentations with Your Company Colors

You‘ve worked hard to cultivate a strong brand identity for your business. But is that branding reflected in your PowerPoint presentations? Consistent use of your brand‘s signature colors across all your assets, from your website to your pitch decks, can increase brand recognition by up to 80%.[^1]

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In just a handful of simple steps, this post will teach you exactly how to integrate your brand colors seamlessly into your PowerPoint slides. Say goodbye to generic presentations and hello to slideshows that exude professionalism and build brand equity.

Why Branding Your PowerPoints Matters

Before we dive into the how-to, let‘s talk about why branded presentations are so important:

  1. Brand consistency builds trust. Consistently branding your assets, including presentations, boosts your credibility and makes you appear more reliable to customers.[^2]

  2. Branded presentations look more professional. A cohesive, polished slide deck will impress your audience more than a generic one.

  3. Color influences perception. The colors you use impact how your brand is perceived. For example, blue tends to evoke feelings of trustworthiness while red is associated with excitement.[^3]

  4. Branding sets you apart from competitors. In a crowded market, a strong visual brand identity differentiates you from the pack.

Now that you‘re convinced, let‘s learn how to actually customize your PowerPoint‘s colors.

How to Change Shape and Text Colors

The first step is updating the colors of core slide elements like shapes, icons, and text to your brand colors. Here‘s how:

  1. Select the shape or text box you want to recolor.
  2. Navigate to the "Format Shape" menu.
  3. Open the "Shape Fill" dropdown and select "More Fill Colors."
  4. Choose the "Custom" tab in the Colors window.
  5. Click the eyedropper tool, then click the color you want to use from your brand palette.
  6. Click "OK" to apply the color.

Repeat these steps for each element you want to customize. To save even more time, save your custom brand colors so you can easily access them whenever you‘re building a deck:

  1. After selecting your custom color, click the "Add to Custom Colors" button before exiting the Colors window.
  2. Give the color an identifiable name, like "Brand Blue 1".
  3. Click "OK".

Now your custom colors will always appear under "Custom" in the color picker.

Extracting Colors from Images

What if you need to grab an exact hue from an existing image, like your logo, to use in your presentation? PowerPoint makes it easy with the built-in eyedropper tool:

  1. Insert the image you want to pull colors from into your deck.
  2. Navigate to the "Shape Format" menu.
  3. Open the "Shape Fill" dropdown and select the eyedropper icon.
  4. Click the point in the image containing the color you want to extract.
  5. The color will automatically apply to the selected shape or text box.
  6. Don‘t forget to save the color for future use!

This technique is useful for ensuring your presentation is consistent with other branded assets.

Recoloring Images and Graphics

Sometimes you‘ll need to use an image in your presentation that doesn‘t quite match your brand‘s aesthetic. While you can‘t completely change the colors in a photo, you can use PowerPoint‘s recolor tools to apply a custom color filter:

  1. Select your image and navigate to the "Format Picture" menu.
  2. Select "Color" and choose a preset from the "Color Saturation" dropdown. Use the sliders to customize the effect.
  3. For more control, click "Picture Color Options" and use the "Picture Color" menu to apply a tint or change the color tone.

Keep in mind recoloring works best for simple graphics and icons. Avoid recoloring complex photos as the effect can look unnatural.

Choosing Complementary Brand Colors

Of course, to create beautifully branded presentations, you first need a cohesive brand color palette. Here are some tips for choosing colors that mesh well together and convey the right brand personality:

  • Use the 60-30-10 rule. Choose three colors in these proportions – 60% for your main color, 30% for your secondary color, and 10% for an accent.

  • Consider color psychology. Different colors elicit different emotions. Blue conveys security and intelligence, green evokes growth and health, purple seems luxurious and creative.[^3] Choose colors that match your brand‘s traits.

  • Prioritize contrast. High color contrast is essential for readability, especially when text is involved. Use a light background with dark text or vice versa. Avoid pairing colors of similar boldness.

  • Create a mood board. Compile images, ads, and other branded materials with a color scheme you like. Use them as inspiration for your own palette.

  • Use a color calculator. Tools like Adobe Color or Coolors can help you generate a harmonious color scheme and provide the exact hex codes to use.

Remember, your brand colors should be unique to your company but also versatile enough to use across many mediums.

Creatively Incorporate Your Brand Colors

Now that you‘ve customized your slides‘ core elements, here are some unexpected ways to creatively infuse even more brand personality into your presentation:

  1. Tint photos. Apply a transparent color overlay to images in your brand‘s hue to subtly tie them into your theme.

  2. Create branded graphs and charts. Don‘t settle for default graph colors – customize them to your brand palette.

  3. Add a color footer. Include a stripe of your main brand color in the footer of each slide for a cohesive look. Place your logo there while you‘re at it.

  4. Use color to emphasize key points. Highlight important text or shapes in a contrasting color to make them stand out.

  5. Design a stunning cover slide. Set the tone for your presentation with an eye-catching, on-brand cover slide. Incorporate colors, images, and your logo.

Remember, a little color goes a long way. Avoid over-designing your slides or using too many colors at once. Aim for a clean, consistent aesthetic that keeps the focus on your message.

Examples of Effectively Branded Decks

Need some inspiration? Check out these examples of PowerPoint presentations with excellent brand consistency:

  • Uber‘s investor deck: Uber‘s signature black and white color scheme features prominently throughout their sleek pitch deck. Pops of teal and purple accent colors add visual interest.

  • charity: water‘s impact report: This non-profit‘s light blue brand color is used liberally in their image-heavy impact report, giving it a cohesive, calming feel.

  • Airbnb‘s listing presentation: Airbnb‘s playful coral pink and teal brand colors infuse personality into their simple, text-centric property listing slides.

In each of these examples, the brand colors play a central role in the presentation‘s design but are balanced by plenty of white space, limited accent hues, and clean, readable fonts.

Go Forth and Brand Your Presentations

You now have all the tools you need to rebrand your tired old PowerPoints into captivating, visually engaging presentations. To recap:

  1. Identify or create your signature brand color palette
  2. Customize your slide elements‘ colors using PowerPoint‘s built-in tools
  3. Incorporate your brand colors creatively throughout your presentation
  4. Use your colors consistently across all your slides

Implementing a cohesive color scheme is a small change that can make a big impact on your presentation‘s memorability and professionalism. So open up your slideshow, crack open your brand style guide, and get to customizing.

By putting these tips into practice, you‘ll be well on your way to building more brand recognition and leaving your audience with a lasting impression of your company‘s personality and values. No more cringing at off-brand presentations – you‘ve got the power to create on-brand slide decks right at your fingertips.

[^1]: Venture Harbor, 2020
[^2]: Lucidpress, 2019
[^3]: The Logo Company, 2018
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