Sales Presentations For Dummies

Julie M. Hansen

• Publisher: For Dummies
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781119104155
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Sales
• Index: Business

Are your sales presentations stuck in the 20 th century?

Sales Presentations For Dummies rises to the challenge of guiding you through the process of engaging and persuading busy buyers in a world that's constantly bombarding them with sales pitches. Motivating today's buyers to pull the trigger on a new deal requires a certain set of skills, and this straightforward text guides you through what you need to know to create and deliver compelling presentations. Pulled from examples and experiences of thousands of actual sales presentations, the information in this innovative resource offers the tools and tips you need to keep your leads engaged from hook to call to action.

Today's business landscape is competitive. When your sales presentation is being compared to countless others, it's important to stand out for all the right reasons. Instead of using dated sales approaches, update your understanding of the art of selling—and create compelling, engaging presentations that hook audience members from the beginning.

• Leverage a proven, blockbuster formula that engages audiences in any industry
• Use the power of storytelling to connect with prospective clients and soften their resistance to your sales pitch
• Understand and apply customer insights to ensure that your solution is top-of-mind in purchasing decisions
• Update your professional skill set to encompass today's most motivating sales tactics

Sales Presentations For Dummies brings your sales style into the 21 st century and connects you with the skills you need to excel in today's complicated business landscape.

Part I

Getting Started with Sales Presentations

When creating a sales presentation, you have a lot to keep track of, including what tools to use and when. The Cheat Sheet at www.dummies.com/cheatsheet/salespresentations has some handy checklists that you can print for each presentation that you give to ensure that you don’t forget anything important.

In this part …

Understand what an effective presentation is and what you need to do to make sure your presentation is successful.

Know all that goes into planning a persuasive presentation that makes a compelling case for your product or service.

Identify the challenges of presenting today and turn them into opportunities.

Uncover your prospect’s business challenge and the impact it’s having on his organization.

Discover prospect insights and find out how to apply them for a competitive advantage.

Build your presentation on a solid value proposition to differentiate your solution and build credibility.

Tailor your message to resonate with different decision makers, stakeholders, and influencers.

Chapter 1

Embracing the Future of Sales Presentations

In This Chapter

Comprehending today’s requirements for an effective presentation

Putting together a presentation that persuades

Taking the steps to prepare for your presentation

Handling today’s presentation challenges

Adapting for special types of sales presentations

Way back in the 1980s, salespeople didn’t have to compete with smartphones and tablets for their prospect’s attention. Rarely more than one or two decision makers were involved, and buyers had much less access to information on your product or service. You certainly didn’t do virtual presentations or demonstrations. In the second decade of the 21st century, technology continues to change and so do your prospects. Yet when it comes to sales presentations, too many salespeople are still using tools and techniques from the ’80s. At least they’ve dropped the leg warmers.

Today’s selling environment requires a whole different approach to your presentation. To give a presentation that persuades today’s busy prospects, stands out from your competition, and is remembered when buying decisions are made, you need to start carrying some tools from the present in your presentation kit.

This chapter serves as your jumping-off point into sales presentations of the 21st century. Here you discover the requirements for an effective presentation that resonates with today’s decision makers. I introduce a persuasive structure that makes a compelling case for your product or service. You can see why paying attention to your voice, your body, and how you use your surroundings pays off. You also can discover what tools are winning the war for attention. And finally, I explain what adjustments you need to make in special presentations like team selling and web presentations.

Understanding What an Effective Presentation Can Do

An effective presentation in the past typically meant closing the sale. In today’s more complex market, a successful presentation can be more like a play in football; it advances the sale. No matter how you spell success, all sales presentations today must meet the following requirements in order to be successful.

Tailoring to meet your prospect’s needs

One size doesn’t fit all. Today’s prospects want to do business with salespeople who have a clear understanding of their needs, their challenges, and their goals. Tailoring your presentation to fit your prospect’s unique needs and establishing a customized value proposition is the price of entry in today’s competitive market.

It requires discovering how the problem is impacting your prospect’s business and how he’s currently addressing that problem. Tailoring for today’s well-informed prospect often means delivering insights by recognizing areas of improvement or identifying gaps that can shed new light on your prospect’s business and tie back to your solution. Tailoring forms the basis of a customer-focused presentation that allows you to show your prospect how you can meet his needs better than your competition. With the commoditization of many products and services, this kind of laser-sharp focus is what will separate you from the competition and turn you into a preferred solution.

Today’s presentations must be structured around value, and answer one or both of the following two questions that are in every prospect’s mind:

• Why buy? Many prospects are hesitant or afraid to change. Selling against the status quo is a much different strategy than the next question.
• Why buy from you? Making a case for you over your competition in your presentation requires clear and concise differentiation — not always easy when differences are slight.

In Chapter 2, you discover how to gain insights through a discovery process, and in Chapter 3 you find out how to apply those to tailor your presentation.

Gaining attention

Your prospect invites you to give your hard-fought presentation. You have all the decision makers together in one room at the same time. Quick reality check: Do you have their attention? Don’t bet on it. Like you, prospects have other things on their minds. Perhaps they just got off a call with an unhappy customer or they’re worrying about how to handle an unresolved issue.

Your first goal is to pull your listeners into the present and break through the mental clutter and physical distractions that plague today’s business audiences. Understanding what drives attention and applying that knowledge to your presentation can give you a huge advantage over your competition:

• Attention spans fall: It’s not just your imagination. Studies show that people’s attention spans are falling faster than the Russian ruble — dropping an incredible 50 percent in the last decade — wait, is that a new LinkedIn request?
• Attention bottoms out. Attention isn’t something you get once in a presentation and then you’re done. Attention starts off high at the beginning of your presentation and drops to its lowest point in ten minutes, just when you were getting to your good stuff.
• Multitasking is a myth. Finally the truth is out. People can really only focus on one thing at a time. That has loads of implications for your presentation. For example, talking about one thing while an unrelated text-heavy slide is on the screen? Waste of your breath.

Knowing how to make adjustments in your presentation for these changes in behavior is critical. Read how in Chapter 4.

Planning a Killer Presentation

Hordes of data sandwiched between a company overview and an awkward “any questions?” closing neither engages nor persuades today’s prospects. Although Ted Talks — short innovative speeches available at www.ted.com — have shed insight into what engages audiences today, you want your prospect to do more than feel good when you’re done. You need a persuasive structure that leads to action, which I discuss in the following sections.

Hook them with the opening

Fair or not, during those critical first few seconds during your opening, your prospect is evaluating you, making decisions about how and whether they are going to listen to you. In fact, research has found that the majority of jurors decides on the verdict — and sticks with it — during the opening arguments. Although you’re not on trial, you need to know what you need to accomplish with your opening:

• Capture attention. Use a relevant opening hook — something that makes your prospect put down his smartphone and pay attention, like a story, a quote, or an insight — to get off to a strong start.
• Define the situation. Quickly comparing how your prospect is dealing with the problem to what your prospect’s situation looks like after the problem is resolved gives your prospect a reminder of why you’re there and a vision of where you’re headed.
• Establish value. Busy prospects hate to have their time wasted. Giving them a sense of value initially is critical to gain early buy-in.
• Sell the next minute. Like many movie previews, too many salespeople reveal the whole plot in their opening. Keep interest and attention high by holding something back to keep your prospect tuned.

Seem like a tall order for the top of your presentation? You bet it is. Don’t leave your opening to chance. The sale could be riding on it. Find out more about creating a powerful opening in Chapter 5.

Create tension in the body

The body of most sales presentations is made up almost entirely of a long list of features that leave your prospect longing for a fire drill. In a persuasive presentation, use the body to build tension by exploring the gap between your prospect’s current situation and where they want to be. Here’s why:

• Establish priority: Prospects often have competing p...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• Part I: Getting Started with Sales Presentations
• Part II: Building a Blockbuster Presentation
• Part III: Delivering an Impactful Presentation
• Part IV: The New Rules of Engagement: Interacting with Your Audience
• Part V: Focusing on Special Types of Presentations
• Part VI: The Part of Tens
• About the Author
• Cheat Sheet
• Connect with Dummies
• End User License Agreement