Here at PresentationPoint, we LOVE PowerPoint. Its ease of use and the fact that most people in organizations already have access to PowerPoint as part of the Microsoft Office Suite make it the perfect companion platform for DataPoint. Another amazing feature of PowerPoint is that there are so many different templates available. In this article, we are going to explore how I incorporate the thousands of presentation templates in Canva into my Canva to PowerPoint to DataPoint workflow.
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What is Canva?
Canva is an easy-to-use online graphic design tool that lets people create a variety of visual content such as social media graphics, posters, videos, websites, and of course, presentations. Canva offers both free and paid versions, and I have found the paid version to be great value as it gives me access to a lot more stock photos, videos, and illustrations and can produce higher-resolution output.
Why Use Canva Instead of PowerPoint?
Quite simply – templates. Canva has over 26,000 presentation templates, all in one place. Presentation templates and designs created in Canva can easily be exported to editable PowerPoint presentations, so you get the best of both worlds.
My Canva to PowerPoint to DataPoint Workflow
Here is an overview of my Canva to PowerPoint to DataPoint workflow. Details for each step are broken down below:
- Step 1: Assemble My Data
- Step 2: Find a Great Canva Template
- Step 3: Export to PowerPoint
- Step 4: Connect PowerPoint to Data
- Step 5: Share my Data Visualization Presentation
Step 1: Assemble My Data
I always start my data visualization workflow by making sure I have the data collected that I want to show. For this example, I am using an Excel spreadsheet, but you can use DataPoint to connect to thousands of additional data sources using our data PowerPoint integrations.
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For this example, I created a spreadsheet to match a Canva template I wanted to use, but usually, you would start with the data and choose a Canva template based on this.
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Step 2: Find a Great Canva Template
Log into your Canva account (you can create a free account if you are not already a Canva member). Then click on [Create a Design] and choose [Presentation].
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Then search within the templates until you find a design template you like. When you click on the template you can choose either to apply the entire multiple-page template to your presentation or just a single slide template.
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Step 3: Export to PowerPoint
Once you have chosen either a single slide or an entire presentation template, I adjust the presentation’s graphic using the stock photos, videos, and other elements within Canva. Once I am happy with the design, I then export the presentation to PowerPoint so I can connect it to my live data using DataPoint.
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To export, click on the [Share] then [Download] option.
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Then click on the > on the [Download] menu item to access the pull-down menu to choose what format to download the template in. Choose PPTX in this case as we want the presentation to be in an editable PowerPoint format. Save the template to your computer hard drive.
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Step 4: Connect PowerPoint to Data
If you haven’t already installed our DataPoint add-on for PowerPoint, install it now. Now we open the exported PowerPoint and click on the [DataPoint] option in the menu options at the top. After you click on [DataPoint], then click on the [List] options in the [Connections] group.
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Once you’ve clicked on the [List] command, you choose the connection type. In this case, we are connecting to an Excel file, but you can see all the other options here as well that you could use. Click on [Microsoft Excel], then [Add Connection] and then browse your hard drive for where you saved your Excel file.
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Once you find your file by using the [Browse], click on the file, then choose [Open], then [OK].
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Now we have a New Microsoft Excel connection. We recommend as a best practice that you immediately rename the connection in case you create presentations with input from multiple sources. If you had 4 different Excel connections, it would be time-consuming to go through them all to find the one you need. In this case, I click on the [Rename] button and name the connection.
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Then I click on the newly named connection and click on [Add Query] to choose which data I want to connect. In this case, I tick the box [The first row contains field names] so it doesn’t pull over the labels from the first row. I can also set the [Data refresh rate] to be only once at the opening of the presentation or continuously updating for whatever frequency I want.
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If your numbers aren’t going to change often, use the [Only once] option. If you are creating live dashboards, scoreboards, KPI screens, etc., set the refresh rate to every hour or every few seconds depending on how often your data changes.
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Then click on [OK]. Once again, we recommend you rename the new query. You will see that you can [Preview data] in the window below your [Available Connections]. Click on [OK].
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Now we go back to our presentation and find the first text box we want to change, in this case the 12,7% box for sales revenue. Â If you were doing this with a new design, we would first insert a text box from the normal PowerPoint menu, but in this case, we already have text boxes with numbers we can change. Click on the numbers for sales revenue until the text box comes up, then choose [Text box] from the DataPoint menu.
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Once you click on the DataPoint [Text box] option, the Text box window pops up. You can use the pull down menu in the [Data connection] to choose your data source and the [Column] you want to use. In this case, the correct one is showing.
At this point, I could just click [OK] and the data would be updated in the text box, but the original data format is 12,7% a common way of showing numbers in Europe. If my audience was from North America, I would prefer to have the data shown as 12.7% with a decimal point instead of a comma. Fortunately, DataPoint allows me to change this with the [Format] tab. I choose [Format], then [Percentage] and set the decimal places to 1 to get the format I desire. Notice the sample updates as I make the change. Then I click [OK]
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Now the 28.0% shows in the box, but the % symbol has dropped a line. This is easy to fix by either dropping the font size using PowerPoint’s normal font formatting or by adjusting the text box a bit.
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In this case, I just stretched the text box a bit horizontally and the % symbol jumped to where it should be.
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At this point, I would repeat the text box steps with each of the options. This is quick to do now that all the connections are already made. I can use the formatting for each text box to add the suffix “k’ to the 28k section for example
Step 5: Share my Data Visualization Presentation
Now that I have my automatically updating PowerPoint presentation connected to live data, I can share it with others. Here are some ways to share:
- Live presenting – You can present it live on a screen in your boardroom, or at a conference of thousands. Your data will always be up to date.
- Share as a report. You can share your latest presentation using the normal export formats for PowerPoint. You can export as .pdf, PowerPoint show (.ppsx), video (MP4), images (.jpg or .png), or print the presentation. In these formats, the data won’t update automatically, but you can use the DataPoint [Snapshot] command to regularly create a newly updated report and share it.
- Live Dashboards – you can create live dashboards to show data in real time. This could be used to show KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) live sales numbers, profits, # of clients, logistics, event information, and even scoreboards.
Contact us if you have questions about how this Canva to PowerPoint to DataPoint workflow can be used for live data visualization, reporting, or dashboarding for your organization.
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