Too many salespeople take the deck that the Marketing department provides, fill in the prospect’s name and organization and think they are prepared for the meeting. Using the deck this way is the biggest mistake salespeople make when using the company standard PowerPoint deck.
The deck has detailed information on the company and its products and services. Going through all of this is overwhelming for a prospect. No wonder they don’t commit to a next meeting.
Think of the standard deck as a starting point. After doing your research on the prospect and their situation, select the slides from the deck that will best address the problem they are having. Order the slides so that the presentation flows well.
Move detailed background slides to an Appendix that you can send by email after the meeting.
This way your presentation is focused and encourages discussion of what is important to the prospect.
1 or 2 screens?
Teams, Zoom, or Webex?
Windows or Mac?
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Where to go next
–>More articles on virtual presenting –>Training for your team on presenting virtually
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Dave Paradi has over twenty-two years of experience delivering customized training workshops to help business professionals improve their presentations. He has written ten books and over 600 articles on the topic of effective presentations and his ideas have appeared in publications around the world. His focus is on helping corporate professionals visually communicate the messages in their data so they don’t overwhelm and confuse executives. Dave is one of fewer than ten people in North America recognized by Microsoft with the Most Valuable Professional Award for his contributions to the Excel, PowerPoint, and Teams communities. His articles and videos on virtual presenting have been viewed over 4.8 million times and liked over 17,000 times on YouTube.