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One of my favorite websites for article marketing (and for finding content for my blogs and newsletters) is WAHM Articles.
You can see my articles here: http://www.wahm-articles.com/profile/Michelle-Shaeffer/1960
It’s free to join, free to post your articles, and free to find articles you can use on your website, in your blog, or in your newsletter.
5 Tips For Giving Presentations That Consistently Sell
©Tessa Stowe, Sales Conversation, 2008
Have you ever given a sales presentation and your prospect said thanks but no thanks? They didn’t seem all that interested or even if they were interested, they didn’t want to buy from you?
Think of all the time, money and resources (TMR) you have wasted on these sales presentations that go nowhere.
Here are five tips that will help you avoid this ever happening to you again. These tips will also help you give sales presentations that consistently sell.
Tip #1: Only give a sales presentation after you understand your prospect’s specific problem and motivation.
Before you can give a presentation and say you can solve your prospect’s problem, you need to understand their specific problem. Yes? Seems obvious and logical I know but ‘prescribing before diagnosing’ is one of the top 10 common sales mistakes. Therefore before you present your solution, ask lots of questions and dive deep into the answers so you can understand their problem. Find out what their problem is costing them. Also find out what specific benefits they would get if they solved their problem.
Tip # 2: Only give a sales presentation after you have asked the “magic question”.
The “magic question” will make the need for many presentations and proposals disappear. That’s why it’s magic. With this question you simply ask “Just suppose, that I give you a presentation on our products and services, and you see they’re a perfect fit for you, what would happen next?” The answer to this question will often indicate you need to do a lot more work before a presentation or proposal is the next best step.
Tip # 3: Give highly relevant sales presentations.
The more relevant your presentation is to your prospect, the greater will be their interest. Conversely the less relevant it is to them, the less will be their interest. There is a direct correlation.
If you give a standard - one size fits all presentation - on the faint hope that something you say will be relevant and hit a hot button, chances are your prospect won’t be listening - or they’ll be asleep by the time you do get to that hot button. If you are giving a standard presentation, you are leaving it up to your prospect to work out what is relevant and most prospects simply can’t be bothered. If you give a standard presentation, the relevance will be low and their interest will be low.
To give highly relevant presentations, only present those aspects of your products and services that are relevant to their specific problem. Ditch the rest. Your prospect doesn’t care about the rest.
You also want your presentation to be highly relevant in language. Speak to your prospect in the language of their role - not in your language. I call this “Speaking to their ears.”
Tip # 4: Give sales presentations that motivate prospects to buy.
With tip #1, I said to only give presentation once you understand your prospect’s motivation for solving their problem. During your presentation, you then simply reflect back all the motivation your prospect has told you during the questioning process. You reflect back what they’ve told you about what the problem is costing them. You reflect back what they told you would be the benefits if they solved their problem. Your prospect will agree with everything you’re saying as they are the ones that gave you the information. Assuming it makes sense (financial or otherwise) - and you should not be giving a presentation unless it does - your prospect will be very motivated to buy.
Tip #5: Only give sales presentations to people who are going to buy.
This tip may seem obvious but selling to prospects that aren’t going to buy is another one of the top 10 common sales mistakes. It’s a complete waste of your TMR giving presentations to prospects that aren’t going to buy so make sure you put your prospect through your filtering, or qualification process, before you give your presentation. You do have a filtering or qualification process, don’t you?
To implement what I’ve covered above, I suggest you do two things. First look back at some recent presentations (or proposals) you have given that went nowhere. Now look at these tips and see what you could have done differently to have avoided this situation. Your past “failures” are very valuable learning experiences - and you’ve paid for them with your TMR - so learn from them. Secondly I suggest you look at some current prospects you are talking to and see which tips you need to apply before you give a presentation.
Apply these five tips and watch how your sales presentations will consistently sell.
Tessa Stowe teaches small business owners and recovering salespeople 10 simple steps to turn conversations into clients without being sales-y or pushy. Her FREE monthly Sales Conversation newsletter is full of tips on how to sell your services by just being yourself. Sign up now at www.salesconversation.com.
I’ll take the newsletter, hold the guilt please
And now it’s time for a vent… this is my open letter to the marketers out there, especially the four from this morning who nearly induced a panic attack with some particularly poorly choosen subject lines designed to scare me into opening their emails.
I admit it. I’m subscribed to more newsletters and autoresponders than I can count. And at least 75% of the time it gets deleted before I read it. It’s my “quick scan filter.” You can get past my quick scan filter if I “know” you and know your content is valuable, or if the subject line really catches my eye.
But please, catch my eye with something that creates positive emotions! If you lead me to feel angry, sad, hurt, afraid, worried, or just plain cranky, sure I might read that email but there’s a 99% chance I will immediately then unsubscribe from your list and no longer consider purchasing your product or services.
Why? Because real life is tough enough. I do not need emails with subject lines like “Is something wrong?” or “What happened to you?!” coming into my inbox simply because I wasn’t ready to purchase the product you promoted to me last week. Maybe I’m still considering it. Maybe I am not sure I need it yet. Maybe I want to know more first. Or maybe I just can’t afford it at the present time.
But regardless of my reason, choosing to “sell” me with this type of psychological tactic isn’t going to work. Really, do you want me to buy from a place of negative emotion?
Consider that if a subscriber buys from negative emotion (fear, stress, concern) that negative emotion is going to stay powerfully connected to your product or service in the buyer’s mind. I don’t want to remember every time I pick up a great book that I only bought it because I felt guilty!
So stop trying to catch my attention with panic-inducing subject lines, please.
And don’t try to sell me with a scarcity perspective. If your product is going up 50 cents an hour, I’m not going to purchase it. Please, stop the gimmicks. I understand a pre-sale, that’s cool. But come on, you really want to charge your customers more as a punishment for not checking their email and being online every moment of the day?
Yeah, these things might work. I’ll give you that. But I hope that your concern for building a relationship with your potential customers and existing customers is worth more than a single sale. I hope it’s worth enough that you care about us and want to sell from a positive place.
Come from a place of inspiration, of positivity, and of genuine concern for me, my business, my family, and then we can build a relationship where you don’t just get a one -time sale, you get my respect and in turn my attention and referrals for the future. Wouldn’t you rather have that?
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11 Ways to Turnaround a Cash-Strapped Business or Practice
A Note from Michelle~ Most, if not all, small business owners have been in the tight spots where there’s not enough money for the house payment or rent, nevermind spending extra on advertising. In those times it’s so easy to get discouraged. But instead, pick yourself up and get BUSY! You CAN be successful in your business. Sometimes it just takes a little creativity or extra effort. The article below covers some great FREE ways to promote your products or services. Grab a sheet of paper and start taking notes on how you can use these ideas in your business and then get started. And now on to the article I’d like to share (be sure to visit the website listed at the bottom, you’ll find great resources there): =======================================
This past weekend I received a disturbing message from a dear friend. His business wasn’t generating all the income he needed. He’s exhausted all savings, started depleting credit card reserves and badly needed money to pay this month’s mortgage… Ouch! I wish I knew sooner…
Whether it’s pride or just human nature that keeps professionals from asking for help sooner, it’s just plain silly to keep “toughing it out” when there are so many strategies for generating new business fast.
You see, there is really no shortage of new business, there is only a shortage of knowledge how to get this business.
So if you are one of those professional folks who could use a few hundred bucks to help out with this month’s mortgage, here are a few strategies to get your business buzzing with new customers or clients:
1. Get on the phone!
Pick up the phone and call everyone you know. Contact all clients, prospects, friends and family. Make sure they all know what you do, who you are looking for as a client, and how to “give you away.”
2. Get out and meet people!
Sitting in the office, shuffling paperwork and piddling around with emails will not take you far enough fast enough. You need to be talking to people who can buy your product or service. Set a goal of how many people you want to see in person every day and find ways to meet that goal!
3. Stop competing and start leveraging!
Instead of being mad at your competitors for stealing all your business, approach them and offer to help out. At times we all get projects that are too big, too small, or too “whatever” for us to take on.
Contact your competitors and ask if they would be willing to outsource their “too whatever” jobs to you - so that you can both make some dough. (Yeah, I know, it sounds like eating some humble bread – but hey, I think it beats living under a bridge 
4. Ask for referrals!
You should be doing this anyway. Have a conversation with all clients (past and current) and help them think of people they can introduce you to right away. Oh, and don’t forget – just because a prospect says “no”, it doesn’t mean he or she doesn’t know someone who would gladly say “yes”.
5. Crank up your follow-up!
Do you have a stack of cards from people who turned you down once before? Maybe it’s time to resurrect them. Reach out to your “old” prospects - even if you previously gave up on them. Give them a call, send them a postcard or an article, and give them a special reason to say “yes” now!
6. Forgive your ex-clients!
Frequently ex-clients realize they made a mistake by getting involved with another vendor – but they are too embarrassed to admit it. Give them a way to gracefully come back to you and many will do it.
7. Catch a COI!
Form an alliance with Centers of Influence who can introduce to a large number of prospects at once and give you instant credibility. Well thought out and carefully executed strategic alliances with COI can infuse your business with all the new sales you can handle.
8. Educate, educate, educate!
Regardless of what business you are in you can always find things your clients and prospects would appreciate learning from you. How-to tips, informative case studies, industry reports – those are all great tools that can easily attract prospects hungry for your “stuff.”
9. Start thinking strategically!
If you are having trouble attracting enough new business, the marketing tactics above should help you get things hopping, but to achieve a long-term sustainable success you’ll need to address your marketing on a strategic level.
Identify or re-evaluate your ideal target market, clearly describe the benefits your product or service provides, create a compelling marketing message, re-evaluate your business model and re-define your methods of delivering your product or service, etc., etc.
10. Stop getting and start giving!
When you are in the “how I can GET a client” mode, you are focused on you – and that doesn’t make you very attractive. Shift your thinking to “how I can GIVE clients more VALUE” and you’ll become an irresistible client magnet!
11. GET HELP!
When you are in the midst of a demanding situation you cannot always have the clarity needed to creating solutions. Collaborate with a successful associate, start your own board of advisors or a mastermind group, or hire a marketing mentor to pull you out of the quicksand. Remember, when time and money count – you can’t afford the expensive “trial and error” learning curve!
Oh, and one final thought – now that you are done reading - get busy implementing!
(c) 2004 Adam M. Urbanski
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Adam Urbanski, the Marketing Mentor, helps Independent Service Professionals and Small Business Owners attract more clients. For more promotional tips and a FREE 32-page marketing guide go to http://www.themarketingmentors.com