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July 2002

In this month's free e-news from Wilder Presentations, I'd like to discuss three ideas for presenters and one for designers. Test your skills with the monthly challenge at the end.

FOR PRESENTERS:

STEP 7: CONCLUDE WITH CONVICTION

TELL THEM WHAT THEY TOLD YOU

This is our last month on concluding a presentation. What's left to discuss is the most important point: Include your audience. You are almost done with your talk. You audience has participated in the discussion. In fact, they have made many comments. Write their key comments on something they can see - a flip chart, white board, or the notes feature in PowerPoint. Don't use a piece of paper that only you can see.

One way to show your audience that you have really been listening to them is to go over their comments. You could say, "As I conclude, let's go over some of the key issues you want to address as we move forward with this project." You end by showing them that you have paid attention to them. What better way to demonstrate that you listened and learned from them? In your conclusion, don't just tell them what you told them during your talk. TELL THEM WHAT THEY TOLD YOU.

FOR PRESENTERS: NICK MILLER'S "NICE RIDE"

Nick writes a monthly sales newsletter. I've shortened a recent column that is very relevant to creating and delivering presentations. Nick wrote:

I am the director of our town's well-established soccer club. We have a small competitive problem. One of our coaches recently broke away to set up a competing club, taking a number of our better players with him. He charges four times what we charge for a year's play. My Board members and I have been scratching our heads, asking, "What do people SEE in this guy? What's the deal here?"

It's not about giving our clients the answer (the product); it's about giving them a NICE RIDE. In my soccer world, the competing coach has figured out how to give his players and their parents a better experience than we have even though his product has fewer and less powerful features than ours does. And, his clients are willing to PAY for that experience.

"Giving the client a nice ride" has been the heart of effective relationship management (including good marriages) and client development for a long time. Community banks have long differentiated themselves from large banks by touting their "we know you, you're not a number" customer experience. Nordstrom built a successful business based on the experience of shopping there.

Ask yourself: What does "a nice ride" mean to your clients? What is the BUYING EXPERIENCE your customers want, and how can you give it to them consistently and improve it over time?

If you're going to build a "branded customer experience," a buying experience that becomes part of your differentiation, you have to be willing to: (1) identify the most important aspects of the buying experience, (2) translate "the experience" into specific sales and marketing behaviors, (3) develop a business model that shows how you and your sales people will make money, and (4) insist that your salespeople adapt their personal processes to the process you want to brand.

In my little soccer world, I need to help my volunteer coaching staff (my sales force) and club leadership team see that it's not just about giving our families a result (soccer skills, sportsmanship skills, etc.). It's about the ride. My little project for the rest of the year. Good luck with yours.

This is Claudyne talking: What is a "nice ride" for an audience listening to a presentation? Briefly, the audience's needs are spoken to, the presenter is clear and enthusiastic, the slides are readable and varied and most importantly, time if spent interacting with the audience and letting them talk.

© Clarity Advantage Corporation, 2002. All rights reserved. Nick Miller is the author of The Sales Accelerator: Fuel for More Sales, available at Amazon.com. Visit Clarity's Web site, www.clarityadvantage.com to subscribe to Sales Accelerator Thought for the Week.

FOR PRESENTERS:

EVER WONDER WHAT YOUR AUDIENCE IS THINKING?

Well, now you can get inside their heads.

Presentation Testing measures the effectiveness of presentations on a moment-to-moment basis using audience-controlled, hand-held dials. The system identifies the parts of a presentation that an audience finds interesting, boring, or confusing. You can "road-test" your presentation with a real-life, dial-tested, sample audience. Then you can remove the boring and confusing slides and sections.

Their dial-testing is the same type used to measure the effectiveness of political speeches, the believability of potential witnesses in trials, students' understanding of classroom lectures, and audience reaction to TV ads in development. Now Presentation Testing is applying it in the presentations market. Their website is www.PresentationTesting.com.

FOR DESIGNERS:

SUBSCRIPTS

Recently John Corbitt, of Sales, Marketing & Business Development at www.TheCorbitts.com/cv, pointed out something to me. How do you correctly write certain chemical and mathematical formulas like NOx, SO2, and E=mc2?

These formulas require subscripts and superscripts, which John has available with the other drawing tools as he frequently uses them. If you just need them occasionally, highlight the text, select Format>Font, and you'll see subscript and superscript on the font menu.

MONTHLY CHALLENGES:

PRESENTERS

Find ways to record your audience's comments so they can see them.

DESIGNERS

Check out the subscript and superscript feature in PowerPoint.

COMMENTS FROM OUR READERS

When to Give Your Presentation in the Sales Cycle

Ben Sabatini makes some very insightful comments about how to use a presentation:

I believe presentations hold a key role in establishing credibility. I use them at the appropriate time during the sales cycle. I use them to frame the issues established by the client during the discovery stage. I find audiences expect me to customize each presentation to them.

I Tossed out My Planned Speech

Betsy Roden discovered the art of involving her audience.

At the beginning of my last presentation, I asked my listeners what interested them the most about my title, "Lovers and Tribes." This is the title of my play I was to discuss with a group of scholars. I discovered what really interested them, as they are all scholars, was the research I did, why I had chosen to do a play on Sarah Bernhardt, how I found the title, and finally what in Sarah Bernhardt's past history interested me. So I tossed out my planned speech and talked about their interests. The result was a totally involved audience. My talk lasted three hours instead of the two planned. I was so pleased with my connection to my audience and their interest in my work. Instead of worrying about covering my presentation points, I truly engaged my audience and discovered the mystery and delight in truly sharing myself with a group.

Cut, Cut, Cut Is the Message

Steven Koch has this to say:

A few years ago I saw a great interview with Ken Burns, the filmmaker. He has done miniseries on Lewis and Clark and Frank Lloyd Wright. Mr. Burns said that the process of making a film is analogous to making soup. You put a big pot on the stove, fill it with water, then throw in vegetables, seasonings, etc. You simmer it down and throw away some of the vegetables and you end up with a final product that is a fraction of what you started out with, but something that is highly flavored and seasoned. He claimed that for every documentary film he has made, he collects six times more raw footage than he ends up using in the final film.

With presentations, people forget to perform the essential systematic planning and reduction processes. The key factor to remember is that you should not ever consider using PowerPoint until you have your message and story completed. Part of planning involves making decisions not to use certain materials and cutting out unnecessary details and information.

LICENSE TO TEACH THE WINNING PRESENTATIONS SEMINAR

If any of you are looking for materials to teach a presentation seminar, go see what I offer at:

http://www.wilderpresentations.com/products/license.html

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Copyright 2001, Claudyne Wilder. All rights reserved.