2. Master slides

A 'master slide' is a common feature found in professional presention software applications.

The main purpose of a master slide is to ensure a consistent look and feel to a set of slides that are based upon it. So a master slide is a kind of template.

What the master slide can control

This means every slide uses the same range of colours, font style, font size and bullet point style. These features included on the master slide are called the  'master text'.

It can also contain fixed images such as logos that will then appear on every slide.

A header and footer can also be added that includes the date or time, the author, the file name and or saved file location.

Slide numbers can also be included, which makes it easy to automatically number slides even if some are deleted or moved around as the presentation is developed.

These features are called 'placeholders' because the actual data / information is only loaded into each slide upon opening.

Advantages of using master slides

The master slide ensures that all presentations based on it will follow the corporate house style.

People don't have to remember to include important information such as the logo or date.

If a change is made on the master slide, any existing slides will be automatically updated to reflect that change. Any new slides will also include the change

Another important advantage of using a master slide is that a number of people can work on the same presentation and yet they know that their slides will follow the house style. This saves a lot of time and effort.