Text, Typography, and Content Layout
Domain focus: whether text is readable at projection distance and whether the wording supports speaking rather than replacing it.
Typography rules
Use one heading and one body face, or a single family in two weights; sans-serif reads better on projectors and screens. Working minimums: 40 pt titles, 28 pt body, nothing below 18 pt. Keep line spacing near 1.0–1.2 and avoid long all-caps runs, which slow reading. Left-align body text; centre only short standalone statements. Use real bullet formatting and indent levels, never typed spaces or repeated Enters, so text reflows when the placeholder resizes.
Content rules
The 6×6 guideline is a starting heuristic, not a law: what matters is that a bullet stays on one line where possible and carries a phrase, not a paragraph. Keep bullets grammatically parallel, lead with the verb, and put numbers in a consistent format. When a slide needs more than about 40 words, that content usually belongs in a handout or the speaker notes.
Worked example
A slide carries three 35-word bullets. Rewrite as three six- to eight-word phrases ("Month-one churn: 34%") plus the supporting sentence spoken aloud and duplicated in Notes. Reasoning: the audience reads faster than you speak, so full sentences on screen create a competing script; a short phrase anchors the point while your voice supplies the detail.
Traps that cost marks
Leaving Autofit on "Shrink text on overflow" so text silently drops to 12 pt; titles that wrap to three lines; mixing sentence case and title case; using spaces or tabs to fake alignment; text over photography with no contrast layer; unformatted numbers and units.