Sales presentation 101: tips that will help you close deals

The way you handle your sales presentation has a big influence on whether your customer is interested in buying from you instead of your competitors. Unfortunately, most presentations lack what it takes to win over buyers. But how does one make and present a good sales presentation? We provide some valuable tips that will help you transform bland presentations into convincing conversations. 

What makes a good sales presentation?

Let’s start at the basis. What is a sales presentation? 

It is a brief presentation, accompanied by visuals and slides, in which you present your product, service or solution to a potential customer with the aim to persuade them to purchase.

A sales presentation not only helps you build a connection with potential customers, but also helps to increase awareness of your product and brand. There are no strict rules on how you should structure or order your presentation, but there are some key elements you should definitely keep in mind when working on your slides.

Key elements of a sales presentation

First and foremost, before you even begin working on your slides, you need to do your research. About your audience, your product, the market, … About anything that will help increase the value of your product beyond the purely desire-based context. With this in mind, you can start on the presentation. It should include a brief introduction, the presentation of a problem your audience has, the solution to said problem, the necessary data to support your claims and to conclude, you should give a short summary of what you discussed, followed by the next steps to take from there.  

ResearchKnow your audience. Do your research. 
StorytellingHook, story and offer. That’s the best formula to live by when presenting a product or service. Start from the buyer’s perspective. 
A value-propositionWhy do they need your product? What’s in it for the buyer?
ProofDon’t try to convince them, show them! Give them the proof they need. 
CTAWhat do you want them to do next? Make sure you have a clear action plan for them to follow in order to lower the threshold.

Now to the question that you’ve been asking yourself, what makes a good sales presentation? A good presentation: 

  • Thinks of its audience. 
  • Knows its value and benefit.
  • Does not have slides overloaded with numbers, statistics or text.
  • Keeps the audience alert and engaged. 
  • Turns leads into customers with ease

It is important to have a clear idea in mind of what you want to speak about with your prospects. Some may say experience and intuition are the two big factors that help close deals. We believe that a good preparation will turn all your sales reps into star sellers.A well-thought-out presentation will ensure you anticipate possible questions and pitfalls beforehand. Making it a lot easier to respond without coming across as unprepared, and therefore somewhat unprofessional, or being slowed down by saying things you have to verify first. 

A good sales presentation is the way to convert leads into customers. So you should invest effort and time into creating the perfect slides to represent your firm, your brand and your product well.

Sales presentation tips and techniques

1. Focus on what your customers want

Your product or service undoubtedly has a lot of interesting features and an incredible backstory. Things you proudly want to share with the world. But does the customer really care about all this information? … We’ll give you some time to come to terms with the answer to this question. 

When preparing your presentation, always keep this one simple question in mind: “what’s in it for the customer?” Let this be the motive throughout your entire sales process. Because in the end, customers only buy whatever suits their needs or fixes the problem they’re having.

2. Do not just present, interact

Leave room for questions during the presentation. Don’t make the error of only providing some extra time on your very last slide. Take your time to elaborate on anything your audience has to ask. Things that aren’t clear? Discuss them right away. Perhaps no one is asking questions directly, but believe us, the faces of your audience will tell you if you need to pause and check if everything is clear. Especially when you’re talking about complex matters. 

3. Send your prospect the presentation before the meeting

You’re most likely thinking: “Sending them my presentation? No way!”  But we promise you, once you’ve read the reasoning behind it, you will see the value of this winning move.

First off, it is a great way to make sure the meeting is still on. You can integrate it in a reminder email as an elaboration on the topics that will be discussed. 

Now, if you have a good presentation, your buyer will want to ask you more about it after having seen it. This will give you the chance to dive deeper into certain topics. You can even start off by asking the buyer where they would like to start the presentation, elaborating on what they really want to hear. This allows for a quick start of the sales process and also saves you time. 

Also interesting, is that you can even predict what topics your buyer will want to talk about. Not through a crystal ball, but through data and insights. The Audience Advantage platform, for example, provides you data on who opened the presentation, who they shared it with and how long they looked at each slide. Clever, right?

4. Don’t just tell them, show them

Great storytelling is a must, but good visuals help a great deal. So when you’re preparing your presentation, make sure to integrate compelling visuals that really represent your product and brand. If you’re not particularly creative, you can ask the design team of your company to help. Or you could invest in a platform that enables the use of branded presentation templates, so you just have to open a template and fill in the content you want to share. Easy as that. 

Did you know Audience Advantage provides just that?

5. Make it memorable

You want people to remember what you talked about, and how do you do that? By turning your presentation into something memorable. But then again… How do you make it memorable? 

Think outside the box to find innovative ways to present your product or service. Put in some interesting quotes or exclusive information. Offer them an experience they won’t forget. You can even integrate virtual reality or configurators

6. Confidence

Last, but not least, have confidence. If you lack confidence, then know that knowledge is confidence. Know your product, know your audience. Confidence comes from knowing what you’re talking about, having faith in your storytelling skills.

The don’ts

  1. Don’t put every detail in the presentation, and definitely don’t read from your slides. 
  2. Avoid technical jargon, simplify instead.
  3. Don’t be defensive. Stay positive, be open and honest.
  4. Don’t forget to smile, nor breathe.
  5. Don’t turn your back to your audience.