BEING A SALESPERSON WITHOUT THE CHEESY PITCH
I was recently asked by a close friend for some advice on how to present her company’s brand to a room of key decision makers. Not knowing the exact business model and arena of her company’s industry, I offered some basic themes and points to remember when presenting any product or service. It turns out that this format helped her better formalize her personal pitch moving forward… and maybe it will help you too.
When presenting your product or service, you want to have a few major themes memorized in your mind to guide your presentation flow - whether in meetings or on a telephone call. Here is a sample list of themes I typically use on my sales calls:
1. Intro/Agenda Overview
2. Make them Talk
3. Introduce the Brand
4. Discuss Brand's Value Proposition
5. Ask for the Order
The bullet points above are high-level themes to trigger your memory and to guide your presentation.
1. Intro/Agenda Overview:
This should be the general small talk portion before you get startted. You need to be friendly but not ditzy. Tell them you thank them for their time in letting you present your company. Tell them what you will be covering in your meeting (Ex. Today I want to start out by learning more about your agency and your specific advertising needs for your clients. Then I want to tell you a little about my company and how it’s the fastest growing news media portal in the United States and finally answer any of your questions you have about my company).
2. Make them Talk:
Put the ball in their court and make it conversational. Ask a couple solid questions to engage them. (Ex. How was 2012 for you and your agency? What websites provided your clients a positive return on their advertisement investment? How far along are you with planning for 2013?). Whatever they say to the last question, then use it as an intro to the brand introduction.
3. Introduce the Brand:
This is where you need to get created and really “brag” about why your company is so kick-ass and why your company’s product or service will make them a better product of service. Go over your pitch but start out by asking if they are familiar with the brand you are presenting then use some tangible stats about how amazing your company is (Ex. Did you know that the average website visitor spends 4 minutes on a gien website, while our visitors spend more than 9 minutes on our site?).
4. Discuss Brand's Value Proposition:
Go over more of the meat of the presentation (PowerPoint, literature, etc.). Ask a couple questions in this part to re-engage them. This is where it gets dry, so make sure you do not lose them here.
5. Ask for the Order:
After you are done with the “selling” portion of your product/service features, ask for the order in a soft way. You can summarize by saying.... “I would love to be given the opportunity to quote on the next opportunity. All I ask is that at any point, you send me your RFQ so I can be given the opportunity to let my company impress you”. You should understand that you are likely to not get a purchase order on the spot, but if they can commit to keeping you in the loop, then you are in good shape.
Remember the 5 points... build the content below and you should be ok with having a natural script in person, on the phone, at an event or at a dinner function. As cheesy as it sounds, practice really does makes perfect.
