How Presentations Can Increase Sales
I am in awe of my friends who work in high pressure sales roles. It seems that every time they achieve a goal and hit their sales numbers, the bar is raised and they are asked to generate more sales than ever before.
I am constantly researching best business practices and uncovering new research that relates to business, therefore I have a collection of tips I share with my friends in sales. I would like to also share some of these suggestions with you today to help you close more deals – no matter how high the bar is raised. To avoid overwhelming you with too many tips, the tips below will specifically help you leverage presentations to increase your sales numbers.
1. Educate
Before making a purchase, most customers want to thoroughly research the product or service on their own – without the assistance of a salesperson. In fact, a whopping 94 percent of buyers do some form of online research before making a purchase, according to the 2014 State of B2B Procurement study from the Acquity Group. Gone are the days when salespeople held customers’ hands throughout the entire buying process, answering questions and providing solutions along the way. Now, customers want to do a deep dive into research on their own terms. This means most customers interact with salespeople only when they’re ready to make a purchase.
Thus, if you want to increase your sales, you need to think outside the traditional box of sales tools, and become a fusion between a content marketer and a salesperson. You will need to put on the content marketing hat to keep your pipeline full, and put on your salesperson hat when you’re ready to close the deal. Both components are necessary to get a customer ready to sign on the dotted line.
To hook new prospects and also educate potential clients, create one or a few presentations about your company and your products/services. Next, post your presentations in as many places as possible. Upload your decks to SlideShare, your LinkedIn profile, LinkedIn blog posts, the company FAQ, the company blog , and any other places you think are relevant.
Additional Resource: How To Embed Presentations – On LinkedIn and Your Website
If you want to extend the reach of your presentations, turn your decks into videos and then upload the videos to Facebook, YouTube, and also embed the videos in the places listed above. Some prospects will prefer to read the information on slides, while others will appreciate the video option. Presenting content in a variety of formats will help you educate more people; that is one reason presentations are so valuable. Presentations can easily be transformed into videos, individual slides can be used in social media posts or blog posts, and the presentation can also be used to pitch prospects during face-to-face meetings.
Additional Resources: How To Turn A PowerPoint Presentation Into A Video
How To Use Presentations For Social Media Marketing
2. Show
Presentations are inherently visual; thus, you easily can and should amp up the visual elements of your slides to keep viewers clicking through your presentation happily.
If you need some extra motivation to take your presentation visuals to the next level, check out some of the stats recently published by HubSpot:
– Researchers found that colored visuals increase people’s willingness to read a piece of content by 80%.
– Content with relevant images gets 94% more views than content without relevant images.
– Shoppers who view video are 1.81X more likely to purchase than non-viewers.
– Visual content is more than 40X more likely to get shared on social media than other types of content.
As you can tell by the stats listed above, the more visual your content, the more successful your educational content will be. Therefore, don’t create slides that are just words on a colored background. While this minimalist approach to design might work in some select situations, most people who will be researching your services/products online will prefer a presentation or presentation video that is colorful and thoughtfully loaded with graphics, photographs, illustrations, and any other elements that will help you deliver your message visually.
Additional Resources: Where To Find Free Icons For Your Presentation Designs
Free Stock Photos To Beautify Your Professional Presentations
3. Connect
So far, these tips have been aimed at helping you catch more prospects while they are in the online research stage. Your presentations however will be valuable to you in other ways as well – such as helping you fill your pipeline with new contacts you meet in person while building your personal platform as a thought leader.
One of the best ways to build your personal platform and be seen as a go-to expert in your areas of interest is to speak at conferences and events. When you deliver a presentation on stage in front of an audience, your credibility skyrockets. Everyone in the audience, as well as anyone who views a video of your presentation online, will likely see you as a thought leader in your area of expertise. Thus, when they need a product/service that you sell, you will be at the top of the list of people they think to contact. In addition, should you choose to reach out to audience members before they contact you, the chances that your message will be opened and responded to increase dramatically. No longer will you be just a salesperson pushing a product; instead you will be seen as an industry leader with valuable insights.
To ensure your presentation helps elevate your credibility, design a highly-visual, creative presentation that will impress the audience. Don’t use a template that will restrict your creativity. Instead, create a custom presentation from scratch and carefully consider every element you include. Create the slides that will resonate with the audience that you will be addressing. The more custom your presentation, the more likely you are to connect with the audience in a memorable way.
Additional Resources: The Complete Guide to Knowing Your Audience
The Complete Guide To Creating A Captivating Professional Presentation
Conclusion
To stay ahead of your sales goals, create presentations that will help you help prospects in the way the desire. Inform your prospects by creating and sharing educational presentations and videos. In addition, apply to speak at prominent conferences that attract your target audience. Don’t sit around and wait for your customers to come to you; be proactive and reach your customers by providing the information they need. If you don’t empower prospects with information, they will likely overlook your offerings and instead purchase from a company that was highly-visible during the research process.
