Tag Archives: sales pitch

Sales Presentations: How to Own the Room as You Sell Your Stuff!

Our live webinar series is motoring through summer, with the fast-paced and information-packed “How to Give a Great Sales Presentation, Small Business-Style!” This webinar focuses on 4 key areas of giving sales presentations: Audience, Content, “The Nerves”, and Was It Good?

The Audience

Tailor your sales presentation’s message for different groups. You need to know who your audience is and what they care about so that you can present useful information. If you don’t know about your audience and what’s useful for them, find out:

  1. Attend the event yourself (if possible)
  2. Ask the organizers about the people who will be attending and what they’re likely to want to hear about.
  3. Show up early talk to people prior to your presentation about why they’ve come and what they’d like to hear from you.

A sales presentation should signal to your audience that you understand their core values and that your own core values align with theirs. If you can’t connect with your audience on that emotional level, your audience is unlikely to buy from you. Remember – sales are emotional!

Sales Presentations and Content: The Beginning and the End

When you’re planning sales presentation content, pay special attention to the beginning and the end – they serve important functions! The beginning of the presentation should contain the ” hook” that catches peoples’ interest. An effective hook:

  1. Is very clear and simple
  2. Has some sort of number or return on investment (investment being time spent watching the presentation.) 
  3. Draws people in by asking a question or telling a story.

Your hook may be your only chance to get peoples’ attention, so make it a good one!

The end of a sales presentation should invite the audience to take a concrete, reasonable next step. The step should be a gesture their interest in what you have to offer. Don’t ask them for the world! You might invite them to:

  1. Pick up your business card on the way out
  2. Schedule a phone call or coffee date with you to chat about their needs
  3. Stay after for a few moments to see a quick demo of your software or website.

Pro tip: You should never have to say “Thank you” to indicate that a sales presentation is over. It should be clear to the audience!  

Sales Presentations and Content: Benefits versus Features

You’ll feel compelled to tell your audience all about the features that make your product or service is the best on the market. Resist that urge. Instead, tell your audience why it *matters* that your product can do what it does and why it’s important that a job be done just the way that your company can do it. Convince them to hire you by telling them the benefits of doing so!

Consider how you might use the following as you present benefits:

  1. Emotional words to further capitalize on the power of talking about benefit.
  2. Vocal intonation and body movements to break up the conversation
  3. Moments that “pop!” to emphasize points that you want your audience to remember.

You want to make an emotional appeal with your sales presentations because (say it with me!) sales are emotional!

The Nerves: No Big Deal

Everyone gets a little nervous about speaking in front of groups. There are ways to work through it! Use these techniques when your nerves start to get the better of you:

  1. Be sure that you’ve practiced enough before your sales presentations. Most people need to practice a presentation between 7 and 20 times. 
  2. Show up first. Be in the room as everyone arrives and even talk to people a bit if that’s possible. You’ll feel in control of the room and the audience will see you feeling confident and ready. 
  3. Don’t take a deep breath just before you start presenting, as you may start to hyperventilate. Instead, exhale and force all the air out of your diaphragm and allow it to refill. Then go in and own it! You’ve got this!

Was Your Sales Presentation Good? How You Can Tell

You don’t need a lot of training or a fancy post-presentation audience questionnaire to evaluate how your sales presentations go over. You can monitor the standard indicators of audience interest and engagement as you’re presenting:

  1. Are people interrupting you to ask question as you’re presenting ?Questions about implementation and logistics are an especially strong sign of interest. 
  2. What is the body language saying? Engaged people will lean in, maintain eye contact, nod and smile. Bear in mind that body language in a business-to-business sales presentation can be trickier.
  3. Are people taking even small actions after your sales presentations? Even if someone just takes a business card from your display table, congratulate yourself. You caught their interest! Now you need to follow up and move them along your sales funnel!

We have lots of information about presentations on our website, and all our resources are available to small business owners on a pay-what-you-can basis! Sign up for an account and check us out!

You can also see more of our webinars on our YouTube Channel.

The Secret To Getting More Sales

The Secrete to Getting More Sales is all about following these 7 keys steps:
 
1. Do pre-contact research
2. Tell better stories
3. Ask better questions
4. Get commitment
5. Get broader agreement
6. Influence the influencers
7. Justify the cost
 
Great 35-minute video that will make a huge difference in how you look at sales!
 

 
Contact the Expert
 
Adrian Davis
adavis@whetstoneinc.ca
 

Cold Calling Basics (Part 1)

Cold calling is the most cost effective way to develop new leads for a small business owner selling business to business (B2B) or business to government (B2G). Even with all social media options, search engine optimization, and so many other marketing tools available to a small business owner – cold calling and telemarketing still wins out.

 

Unfortunately it is also the most hated way to get business. People are often scared of even picking up the phone for the first call. But if it is the most cost effective way to get new business, it is important to learn how to improve your odds.

 

The top 10 tips that are covered are;
– how to be a human rather than a robot when telemarketing
– when in doubt, put yourself in your customer’s shoes
– why honesty is truly the best policy
– how to keep your energy and optimism up
– when to call your target prospect
– how often to call your target prospect
– what makes a bad lead list and what are the red flags that your lead list stinks
– what information should you be keeping and tracking about your customers?
– should you be scared of gatekeepers and tactics to get to the person you want

 

 

Expert Contact Information

Carla Langhorst
Carla@smallbusinesssolver.com

 

Like the PowerPoint? cold calling basics

 

Sales Storytelling

Think about the excitement you felt when you first thought about running your own business. Did you dream of financial freedom? More time with your family? Travel to exotic places?
 
Where has all the excitement gone? Many small business owners experience incredible stress, time pressures and little personal time with loved ones. They realize that their business will collapse if they are absent from it. What started out as a dream has now become a cage.
 
The transition from a business that is a burden to a business that enables you to have the lifestyle that you dream of is not as difficult as you might think.
 
Learn to avoid:
 
•The stress from being the bottleneck in your business.
•The stress of poor cash flow
•The stress from not feeling in control
 
And how to achieve:
 
•Financial Freedom
•A business that works for you instead of a business you have to work for
•More time with your loved ones
 
If you would like to rekindle the dream, watch this video!
 

 
Contact The Expert
 
Adrian Davis
Adrian@adriandavis.com

Become A Networking Guru

Networking is a super way to get the word out there about your business. Especially if you are anxious about selling, this is a great first way to try your hand at the sales pitch.

 

This webinar covers the basics.  But more importantly, opens your eyes to many different tactics that might work better for you personally.

 

Specific topics include;

– where to network?

– your 30-second super pitch (are they dead?)

– reciprocity and being likeable

– your personal brand and ways to be remembered

– what not to do at a networking event!!

– what to do with those business cards?!

– follow up (the how, the why, the when)

 

Watch the video to find these answers and more!

 

Your Expert

 

Teresa Shaver, Executive Director

Business Advisory Centre Durham

PH:  905.668.4949 x222 . 1.866.632.5151

Email :  tshaver@bacd.ca    www.bacd.ca

 

Essential Reading for Networking Success:

Work the Pond – Darcy Rezak

Love is the Killer App – Tim Sanders

The Go Giver – Bob Burg

Never Eat Alone – Keith Ferrazzi

Enchantment – Guy Kawasaki

The Art of Mingling – Jeanne Martinet https://www.hellomynameisscott.com/

 

Apps/Software for Business Organization

Business Card Apps:

Evernote Hello ≈ Cardmunch ≈ CardCloud  ≈ CardFlick ≈ Bump

CRM Software:

Capsule CRM, Insightly, Batchbook. Highrise, Salesforce, Zoho, Sugar

Email Newsletter / Online Marketing:

Constant Contact, Mail Chimp, Email it!, Campayn, Aweber

 

Weekly To Do’s to build your network:

Send Four Cards a Week:

Handwritten notes every week to those in your network

Make Four Calls a Day:

Even if you leave a voicemail your outreach will be noticed and appreciated

Develop Four new Contacts a Week:

You never know when you’ll make a great new connection for you or for someone in your network.

Play Matchmaker:

The best networkers listen to others, understand their needs and share their resources.

 

Rules to Live By:

 

1. Help Everyone

2. Don’t Wait to Be Asked to Help

3. When You Are Asked, Don’t Miss That Opportunity

4. Compliment and Encourage

5. Introduce People

6. Be Friendly

7. Take a Chance

8. Be Open, Don’t Limit Your Friendships

9. Think the Best of People and Try Not to Judge

10. Be Grateful and Express It Often