Best Plugins to Boost Your Productivity and PowerPoint Add-ins

Best Plugins to Boost Your Productivity and PowerPoint Add-ins

Lucidchart

Lucidchart is an excellent tool to boost productivity, offering powerful features to accelerate business progress and drive innovation. With over 15 million users worldwide, it combines diagramming, data visualization, and collaboration features.

Key Features:

• Enable linking data to diagrams or visuals
• Transform diagrams or visuals into seamless slide deck presentations
• Create Account Maps or Org Maps for sales
• Connect with Salesforce and LinkedIn Sales Navigator
• Integrate with multiple Apps like Zapier
• Reusable custom shape feature for efficient diagram creation

Power-user

Power-user is an intelligent tool for PowerPoint, Excel, and Word, designed to help you quickly create business presentations and spreadsheet reports.

Key Features:

• Customize or convert PowerPoint templates and themes
• Unpivot table feature for quick database transformation
• Set up corporate style for charts, tables, and cells
• Offer training and adoption support based on team experience
• Provide technical support
• Various templates and visual elements like maps, pictures, charts, icons, and diagrams

ToDo List Pro

ToDo List Pro is an Office tool for maintaining To-Do lists in your presentation or Excel.

Key Features:

• Read and make changes to content
• Automatically save To-Do lists with the document
• Excellent application for increased productivity
• Free to download and use

QR4Office

QR4Office is a tool to generate custom QR codes and insert them into your PowerPoint presentation with just a few clicks.

Key Features:

• Embed QR codes for additional information
• Clean and easy-to-use application
• Improve accessibility of PowerPoint presentations

Pickit

Pickit makes it effortless to add spectacular visuals to your PowerPoint presentations, offering free high-quality images and icons.

Key Features:

• Vast image collection
• Multiple image categories for various presentations
• Abracadabra tool for easy text look-up
• Ask for custom pictures from the user community

Pro Word Cloud

Pro Word Cloud helps users create a word cloud from the text and add it to their presentation.

Key Features:

• Create beautiful word clouds
• Read text from the document
• End data over the internet
• Customize word clouds with different sizes, fonts, layouts, and color schemes

Emoji Keyboard

Emoji Keyboard allows styling your complex presentation, making it more lively and appealing, especially for a younger audience.

Key Features:

• Library of over 1,300 variants of emoji
• Saves time searching for relevant emojis
• Adds excellent visual appeal to grab the audience's attention
• Requires minimal permission to use emojis

Pexels

Pexels is an excellent tool for adding relevant images to your PowerPoint presentations, offering a collection of 100% copyright-free images.

Key Features:

• Seamless and convenient image search
• Easy-to-navigate image search engine
• Access to free stock images
• Search-by-color option to match presentation themes

Symbols and Characters

Symbols and Characters allow searching and using special symbols and characters in your presentations.

Key Features:

• Auto-lookup feature to suggest relevant symbols
• Search by single letters or in specific language tables
• Easy insertion of symbols into presentations

Scan&Paste for Office 365

Scan&Paste for Office 365 saves time in adding images to presentations, documents, or OneNote, enhancing PowerPoint presentations.

Key Features:

• Quickly add images
• Portable photo scanner
• No account creation required to download images
• Easy-to-use application

PowerPointLabs

PowerPointLabs increases productivity by saving time in creating complex animated presentations.

Key Features:

• Highlight bullets and light up slides
• In-slide animations
• Add audio narration from your speaker
• Quick building or updating of roadmaps
• Single-click addition of subtitles or captions

PhET Sims

PhET Sims, created by PhET Interactive Simulations at the University of Colorado, is a collection of interactive simulations for science.

Key Features:

• Models and representations for science education
• Supports instructional uses like labs, lectures, academic tasks
• Ideal for Grades K-12 and university classes
• Library of instructional slides on Science and Maths

Office Timeline

Office Timeline is a timeline maker and Gantt chart PowerPoint-based tool, allowing users to produce visually appealing timelines, Swimlanes, and Gantt charts.

Key Features:

• Create professional timelines, roadmaps, Gantt Charts, etc.
• Project management tool
• Customize charts and timelines
• Import data from Excel and Project
• Drag and Drop tasks and milestones

Mentimeter

Mentimeter is a fantastic PowerPoint tool to provide an interactive experience to audiences.

Key Features:

• Turn workshops, meetings, training, and conferences into interactive sessions
• Ask multiple choice questions or conduct voting through smartphones
• Add images, gifs, word clouds, etc., to presentations
• Basic features are free, advanced features available with a premium plan

Benefits of Using PowerPoint Plugins and Add-ins

1. Create engaging and highly visual presentations easily.
2. Access professional images, graphics, and symbols.
3. Utilize advanced data presentation features with easy-to-use controls.
4. Increase productivity by saving time in making complex presentations.
5. Create charts, diagrams, and graphs for business and academic purposes.

How to Install Add-ins Using Office Store or a Third-Party Website

Office Store (AppSource)

1. Go to AppSource.
2. Sign in using your Microsoft account.
3. Search and find the add-ins you want to download.
4. Click the Get It Now button.
5. Give Microsoft permission to install the add-in.
6. Select the application for which you want the add-in.

Third-Party Websites

1. Explore third-party websites for business-centric add-ins.
2. Find the right plugin for your needs.
3. Download and start using the add-in for your PowerPoint presentations.

Final Words

PowerPoint add-ins and plugins provide access to features that elevate your presentations. Explore the mentioned add-ins to find the best fit for your next presentation. Ensure responsible and efficient use of these tools for optimal results.

Q&A Section

Q1: Are these PowerPoint plugins free to use?

A1: Some plugins mentioned, like ToDo List Pro and Pexels, are free, while others may have associated costs. Always check the terms before downloading.

Q2: Can I use these plugins on Mac or only on Windows?

A2: Most plugins are compatible with both Windows and Mac versions of Microsoft PowerPoint. Verify compatibility on the respective websites.

Q3: How do I ensure responsible use of PowerPoint plugins?

A3: Use plugins judiciously, ensuring they enhance your presentation without overwhelming it. Regularly update plugins and be cautious when downloading from third-party sites.