HOW TO REFRESH YOUR SALES PRESENTATION

Time to press the pause button

Recollect the day you joined your sales team. 

You not only were eager to prove yourselves, but also were quite curious to find out as many selling points about your product or service as possible, to bag deals. You memorized all that was taught by your sales training team. You applied some of those ideas and got some success. 

Later, with experience on the field, you developed thumb rules of your own and discovered some ‘selling points that work’ that were not taught in your training. Eventually those selling points became part of your standard sales presentation. 

Now, it is time to press the pause button and take a day to ‘Hunt for fresh selling points’.

Why should you do this?

As sales people, over time we get complacent with our working ways, and stop looking for new ideas. We may take the time to refresh our selling points based on the product changes, market changes or changes in customer preferences. The one day you spend to step back and objectively look at your selling points can make a world of difference to the commissions you earn.

Planning the ‘selling points’ day

1.  Talk to colleagues: Start by spending 15 minutes with each of your sales colleagues in an informal setting (like - over a cup of coffee), to ask about the specific selling points they use to close deals. You might be surprised to discover some nuggets that you never thought of. Realize that like you worked out your own set of ‘selling points that work’, your colleagues too have discovered their own set too. There is very little opportunity for them to share it with you, if not for this day.
2.  Talk to customers: Next, pick up the phone and call up your existing customers. Ask them about their experience of your product. Ask them about the specific features of your product that benefit them the most.
3.   Create Value Statement: Once you finish compiling all the learning for the day, start creating a ‘value statement’ for each of those points. Now, take a print out of the value statements, and put it in your folder.
   This is fresh arsenal that will work wonders to your conviction about the product.  This reflects in your confidence and words when you make the next sales presentation.
   
   Whenever you feel a little down, go through the list – and you will get a fresh sense of energy to meet your next customer. 
   
   
   Remember, to conduct this exercise at least once in 4 months to recharge yourself and your pitch. Happy selling!

How to create a pitch table - BuyAPresentation

How to create a pitch table - BuyAPresentation

Influencing customers is tough

If you have been in sales for a while, you would realize that, it is one thing to know a lot of information about your product, and completely another thing to know how to use that information to influence your customers.

What is a pitch table?

A pitch table enables you to see your information as an answer to the 4 critical questions in the minds of your customers. The 4 questions that a pitch table addresses are:

1. What concerns of your customers are solved by your product?
2. What features of your product solve those concerns?
3. What is unique about the features of your product compared to the alternatives available?
4. What is the proof for your claims?

Since these are the questions that a customer considers intuitively before making a purchasing decision, having the information available in one readily accessible table is extremely useful.

An Example

I have tried to construct a ‘Pitch table’, for our product - ‘Premium Animated Powerpoint templates for Sales and Marketing professionals’ as an example.

To give you a quick background about the product:

Our customers are sales and marketing professionals. They have excellent products and ideas that make a difference to their customers’ lives. But, they don’t have the time, or the design expertise to create professional looking POWERPOINT™ slides to convey those ideas powerfully, and make a lasting impression in their customers’ minds. With our premium, animated POWERPOINT™ templates, we help them win business. Now, they can spend their time to think and add value to their customers, instead of spending time on designing their slides, to get a professional look.

This is how the table looks:

What the various benefits of a ‘Pitch table’?

This table gives you all the information you need to convince your customers at a single glance, so it serves as your ready reference to address any type of customer objections. 

You can even arrange the points in the table to appeal to specific segments of your customers. That way, the information can be helpful to start a conversation with your customers.

You can use the information to write an email to your customers, like – ‘The 5 reasons why our service is different and better than any other alternative.

So, start making your pitch table. It is the starting point for all your sales presentations. Happy selling!

5 tips on handshake for sales professionals

5 tips on handshake for sales professionals - BuyAPresentation

The first impact we make

We interact with people at different levels. Starting from an email – where the connection between individuals is no more than a few electronic pixels, to a warm hug – where the connection is friendly and personal.

You would notice that the closer we get to an individual; the better is the level of engagement (of course, getting too close before knowing the person sufficiently well, invades the personal space of the other individual).

If we represent the distance between people, based on our different methods of engagement, this is how the continuum looks:

As you can see, a handshake is the closest you get in a business relationship. In trying to remember the tips on handshake etiquette, it is important not to forget this basic purpose. 

A good handshake sets the expectation for a presentation. So, how to shake hands to achieve the best level of engagement with your customers? Here are the 5 tips:

1. 1. Look into the eyes and smile before you shake hands:

Nothing builds a better engagement than a genuine smile and sincere eye contact. A handshake merely adds to the connection.

2. 2. Say your name and a greeting while you shake hands:

A good handshake lasts not more than 4 seconds. The time is just enough to say your name and convey your happiness in meeting your prospect. It is not the time to recite your bio data or your company’s history.

3. 3. Volunteer your hands by getting up and walking towards your prospect:

When your effort to engage with the prospect is genuine, the prospect always responds warmly. Do not wait for the prospect to extend hands. If in a rare case, the prospect doesn’t extend hands – lower your hands while keeping the smile and eye contact. The warmth is still conveyed.

4. 4. Use only one hand if it is your first meeting:

Adding your free hand to the shake conveys intimacy. If you use both your hands, you may look artificial and over eager.

5. 5. Let your handshake be a handshake:

Whether you are a woman or a man, the handshake should be firm, with your full hand (not just your fingers) and pumped 3 or 4 times. Be warm and be genuine. Everything else is just details.

I hope these tips help you make a better connection with your prospects, the next time you make your sales presentation. Happy selling!

Childhood habits that can kill presentations

Take a moment to travel back to your schooldays. What were some of the thumb rules you followed to score more marks in your school examinations?
Let me make a guess…

Rule 1: Write more
The more pages you filled the more marks you got in your exams. It made the evaluator feel that you knew a lot. So, you learn the habit of fluffing up your content in presentations as well.

Rule 2: Make it look beautiful
Decorating your answers with highlighters and sketch pens got you more marks. So, you learnt the habit of decorating your presentations.

Rule 3: Sound knowledgeable
Using jargon and acronyms made you look intelligent. By littering your answers with some technical words, you could impress your evaluators into give you more marks. So, you learnt the habit of using technical mumbo-jumbo as your weapon against objections.

Unfortunately, those very habits that got you more marks in your school might be killing your sales presentations.

The rules that your customers follow to evaluate your presentations are very different. Here are some of their rules:

Rule 1: More is bore
Your audience is allergic to long winding presentations. The moment you put up that bullet point slide with 6 points and 4 sub-points your audience take a walk mentally. You need to say it in a crisp and clear manner to score more with your audience.

Rule 2: Bling is cheap
Your audience won’t fall for that cool animation or a ‘Zen’ picture. Your slide should make your message memorable by explaining your ideas in a visual way. Concept diagrams are a very useful tool.

Rule 3: Jargon is rude
It is not about what you know; it is about what they learn. Jargon puts a distance between you and your audience. Always talk at their level to win them over.

So, play by the new rules and unlearn your old habits. You will score more in your sales presentations. Happy selling!

10 minutes to sales sucess

They say, “Experience is the best teacher”. 

Well, it most certainly is not! If only experience were to teach people, there would have been no repeat offenders of any kind.  The reality is – it is not the experience itself, but the time you take to reflect on the experience that teaches you valuable lessons.

This is one area where most sales and marketing professionals miss the boat. Most of them operate like talking bill boards, programmed to follow a certain routine like:

Present to prospect 1 – Fail – Present to prospect 2 – Fail – Present to prospect 3 and so on.

If they took just 10 minutes to analyze their calls, they would move up the learning curve much faster.

Let me show you a simple way to analyze your calls.

Step 1: Recall successful calls

Pick up a case where you have succeeded in getting business.

This might sound counter intuitive. Most people advise you to see ‘what went wrong’ in the cases where you failed. The danger is – you might find too many answers to that question. After all, there are a million ways to fail in a sales presentation. But, there are only a few predictable ways in which you can achieve consistent success. So, it makes sense to learn what worked and repeat it.

Step 2: Analyze the call in detail

The second step is to answer these questions, keeping the successful sale in mind:

Analyze product benefit: How has your product made the life better for the customer?

Was he able to minimize his errors? Was he able to save on his costs? Was he able to feel more confident about himself? The answers will tell you the key benefits to focus on – in your next presentation.

Analyze objections: What were the objections raised by him, before he said ‘Yes’ to your offer?

Did he compare your product with his existing option? Was he even aware of the impact of his problems? How did you overcome his objections? The answers will equip you for your next presentation.

Analyze the source: How did you find him in the first place?

Was he referred to you by your existing customer? Did you fix the appointment by cold calling? What was the database used to find the prospect? What was the script used to fix the appointment? This will help you find more prospects with higher chances of conversion.

This simple analysis takes no more than 10 minutes. But it will help you repeat your success consistently. Happy selling!