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The typical sales presentation is too long, contains too much text, leaves the key messages too late in the presentation, talks too much about the product and not enough about the benefits, and looks simply amateurish.

Sales presentations are used at the moment of truth right at the end of the sales cycle. An effective sales presentation will deliver higher conversion rates and shorten the sales cycle.

So, what steps should a sales take to go from an average sales presentation to one that is proven to win business?

Cut down on the corporate stuff

Most sales presentations talk in great detail about the company’s history, locations, values, mission and so on. Most of the time, for most of this content, nobody is interested or cares. This information is probably on the website anyway. Say enough to build credibility and establish empathy, but no more. The corporate stuff should be done and dusted in the first five minutes.

Decide which benefits are most powerful, and scrap the rest

Do you have trouble deciding which of the dozen or more benefits you offer is the most important? The common approach is to just list all of them and hope that some of them resonate with your audience. Every audience is different; therefore every presentation must be different.

The problem, of course, is that by saying too much you overload your audience and your key messages or ‘reasons to engage’ are forgotten.

We believe four stakeholder interests are represented in the room. Firstly the ‘Treasurer’ who is motivated by value for money, secondly the ‘Evaluator’ who will compare and contrast your offering to other contenders, then the ‘Coach’ who probably invited you in and lastly the ‘Implementer’ who will work directly with you, should you win the business.  So ensure all interests are represented in the content.

Position the ‘Summary of Benefits’ correctly

There is little more stupid when it comes to sales presentations than only talking in terms of benefits at the end of a presentation when the audience have already disengaged and probably become more concerned about their broken finger nail or golf swing.  Maximum attention levels are often after about five minutes – so start talking about benefits then.

Be sure your benefits are qualified. If a benefit is ‘less cost’ what does this mean for the prospect? Perhaps it means more budgets remaining for other services. So spell out these key reasons to engage, with you and nobody else.  

Sixty slides of text is hell

If your sales presentation usually lasts more than an hour, your prospects might wish they never met you and pray they will never meet you again.

When presenting a particularly complex product, or if you are expected to present for a long time, consider using multimedia, multiple presentations and presenters, or hyperlinks to present in a non-linear way. Remember people buy for rational and emotional reasons. You have got to win the ‘head’ and the ‘heart’ so a break from rationality will ensure your message comes through a second door.

Timing is key

Ever been reading a book and flicked to the back to see how many pages you have left? How would you feel if once you started reading you had no way of finding out how long it was?  

We recommend the duration should not exceed 20 minutes. Recently we met with an advertising agency that was achieving a conversion rate of less than 20pc.  Their presentation lasted almost 90 minutes with no time for questions. Put simply, the mind can only absorb what the seat of the pants can endure! A lost opportunity for audience consideration, participation and contribution. Leave time for questions.

Technical specification slides can lose the audience

Technical details are often important when selling. But don’t fall into the trap of including every technical detail. Eliminate the details that are no different from competitors. Instead, produce a product specification sheet, and perhaps use as a hand out. Then, try to bring the remaining specifications to life in your presentation. If you have an important technical advantage, what does this mean in the world to the prospect?  

Listing products is not the same as selling solutions

Don’t just present a few slides on each product you offer. If you want to sell solutions, understand the problem that you can solve, and then present one integrated view of the solution you offer.

Finding slides from different product presentations and putting them into one jumble of a presentation isn’t the same as presenting a solution. Even worse, this cut and paste approach will lead to inconsistent messaging and visuals.

Remember, slides are used as ‘visual aids’ designed to help your audience understand, engage and recall your message better than your competitors.

Eliminate bullet points

Bullet points and text-heavy slides are the least effective form of visual aids. The audience read the text, and ignore the presenter – they can’t listen and read at the same time. It’s the reason why we stop and look up when somebody disturbs us reading a good book. Even the polite ones will wonder if they should look at the screen or look at you. Eventually, they will end up doing neither.

If you can email your presentation to somebody who missed it and they can read through and understand it on their own, then your visual aids are undermining you rather than supporting you.

More information on Ronan Kinahan and Vibe Marketing can be found here.