Boost Your Sales With These Presentation Tips
Years ago, presentations were typically only delivered in boardrooms and at conferences. There were very few other options for delivering a presentation to an audience. These days, presentations have been given a new lease on life. Presentations can now be delivered in a variety of new ways, which is great news for salespeople who want to pitch to prospects outside of conferences and boardrooms.
To help you use presentations creatively to boost your sales, try some of these methods for pitching to prospects.
1. Put Your Pitch In Your Pocket
You never know when you will meet a new prospect for your business. You might strike up a conversation with a prospect in line at the coffee shop or while waiting for your child’s dance recital to start. The possibilities are endless for places you can meet a prospect.
Don’t let a hot lead go cold; skip the business card exchange, email correspondence, appointment scheduling steps and instead deliver a short pitch to the prospect right then and there. To do so, carry your presentation in your pocket by storing your slides on your mobile devices.
You can carry your pitch in your pocket by uploading it to SlideShare or using a platform such as Flowvella to store your slides online or in the cloud. In addition, you can use PowerPoint mobile or the Keynote app to deliver your presentation on a mobile device.
To ensure you hook the prospect’s attention without taking up too much of their time during a spontaneous pitch, create a deck especially for pitching prospects while on-the-go. At most, your prospect will be willing to listen to your pitch for a few minutes – which should be plenty of time for you to effectively intrigue the prospect. You probably won’t close a deal during one of these pitches however you will likely be able to secure a follow-up meeting more easily after giving the prospect more information.
2. Give Prospects The Power
If you can’t pitch a prospect in person, sending the pitch via email is another great option. These days, the customer likes to be in total control of the sales process. They want to learn about products and companies on their own time and their own terms. They don’t want to listen to a salesperson’s pitch; they want to get the information they need, and then either move forward with the purchase, or move on.
While it is ideal to arrange some face-to-face time or a phone call in addition to corresponding via email, you might not be able to schedule that type of interaction until the prospect has looked through your sales materials first and determined that your company is worth their time. Because your presentations and other sales materials might be your only opportunity to convert prospects, you need to create high-quality, compelling materials.
To track the effectiveness of the presentations you send via email, use a service such as Attach or PointDrive to view actionable data. If you notice that one presentation is outperforming other presentations, adjust your presentation strategy accordingly. Don’t continue to use ineffective presentations; deliver presentations that are helpful and interesting for your prospects to view.
In addition to sending presentations via email, you can also embed presentations on your website so prospects who view your site can also access your sales materials. While it will be more difficult to track who views your sales materials and how they interact with the content, providing your presentations on your website is better than losing a prospect simply because they couldn’t access the information they needed. With SlideShare’s easy-to-use embed code, embedding a presentation is as simple as copy and pasting a code into a blog post or website page.
3. Pitch Prospects Virtually
If a prospect agrees to schedule time with you, but they are not local, don’t miss the opportunity to pitch that prospect simply because their location is not convenient. Deliver your pitch via a platform such as GoToMeeting, JoinMe, or WebEx.
Since virtual presentations are not as captivating as presentations delivered in real life, and they are also not as convenient as presentations sent via email, your virtual presentation needs to be customized for each prospect, or else you might quickly lose the prospect’s interest. To customize the presentation, remove any slides that do not relate to the prospect’s needs or interests, and add slides that will answer questions the prospect has already mentioned.
In addition, have extra slides easily accessible in case the prospect wants to discuss topics you didn’t anticipate. It is important that you make the best use of your time with the prospect. If you cannot locate a slide that will answer one of their questions, and instead you must schedule a follow-up conversation with them, your chances of closing the deal decrease dramatically. Consumers want to make buying decisions quickly; when they are ready to purchase, they don’t want to wait around for salespeople to get back to them. Communication must be quick and convenient so build your presentations accordingly.
Conclusion
Get the best possible ROI for your presentations by carrying your presentations in your pocket, sending presentations via email, embedding presentations on your website, and also presenting your slides virtually.
How do you use presentations to drive sales? We would love to hear your ideas. Tweet us at @Ethos3.
