You know how they have a warm-up guy for TV shows, like Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel or even Deal or No Deal – well here’s a truly innovative idea for your corporate presentations to help you engage your audience early!

So, here it is – ‘The Pre-Presentation Presentation’

When coaching people to deliver sales presentations, the first questions are always ‘Who’s the audience? and What makes them tick?’

This is where there’s often a bit of umming and aahing -followed by something like –‘it’s the managers and a couple of marketing guys’

Hardly an auspicious start!

Now, thanks to the wonderful world of technology, there is a new way to understand your audience and engage them BEFORE they even arrive at your office for the triple mocha lattés and smoked salmon sandwiches.

Here it is:

  1. Set up a blog e.g. ‘The Kibitzer Presentation’ or password protected space on your website and distribute the URL or connection to your client’s key contacts – the pressure’s on them now!
  2. Give them a list of topics. Ask them to rate the area of interest they most want to cover eg Solution design, Pricing, Support presence, etc. Ask them why – engage them early.
  3. Ask them for real questions or comments
  4. Post relevant white papers, press releases, industry awards and accreditations specific to their areas of interest
  5. Ask them to view the boring 5 slide ‘We’re a wonderful company with 50 offices and 2000 people, and we sell left handed widgets on Fridays’ again BEFORE they physically arrive for the actual presentation. This prevents you from being boring during the ‘live’ presentation and enables you to have a strong client focused business conversation from the beginning.

The outcome of all of this is that you will have engaged them so much more before the presentation and you will have learned so much more about them in order to be persuasive on the big day.

Heeeeeeere’s Johnnnny…!!

Salient Communication CEO, Elliot Epstein is a sought after keynote speaker and corporate trainer who has coached and trained over 4000 people including CEOs, senior management and successful sales teams throughout Australasia and Asia including Hong Kong and Singapore.

 

Elliot is a specialist sales speaker and trainer for high profile corporates having spoken at over 1500 conferences, workshops and break-out sessions on presenting, selling, negotiating and pitching for leading companies such as HP, Avaya, Commonwealth Bank, Hitachi, Computershare, CUB and SEEK. He is renowned for ensuring presentations are engaging, interactive and relevant to winning business in competitive markets.

 

Email: elliote@salientcommunication.com.au

 

Elliot is based in Melbourne, Australia where he lives with his wife and two expensive children.

 

©Salient Communication