Sales Effectiveness Articles

Interaction Throughout the Presentation

Moving from Monologue to Dialogue to encourage audience interaction and involvement.

A couple of weeks ago I was preparing a sales team for a two-day presentation session. The prospect is outsourcing a $1 billion IT project and scheduled 14 different sessions, 30-90 minutes each with 25 presenters and contributors in total.

In a sales situation like this, the more the prospect talks the better. So as the presenter, how do you encourage participation, control the debate and build on the relationship? Continue reading →

The Pursuit of Happiness

Not for the first time, I’m wondering about the insanity that is the global procurement process. One of my clients is bidding on a £1 billion IT outsourcing project – alongside 10 competitors – a process that has collectively cost these companies upward of £10 million. Eleven teams, eleven solutions developed over the past year and only one that will see the light of day.

Of course, I believe the team we are supporting is the clear leader –  not just because their presentations are going to be Killer – I think they are going to win because they’re happy! Continue reading →

Lies, Statistics and Audience Recall

A friend e-mailed me last week with this great article for adult learning professionals (instructional design). I encourage you to read it, but the gist is that the following data are lies:

People recall:

• 10% of that they hear
• 20% of what they read
• 30% of what they see

My friend was concerned that I refer to these stats in my book and corporate website. More specifically,  “On average, bullet-point slides yield a 15-20% recall of information after just five minutes.” 

While I am not about to make ANY academic claims,  I routinely do two tests with clients – one during the sales process and one during the training course. Continue reading →