INTRODUCTION TO A FIVE-PART SERIES
A SHIFTING LANDSCAPE
We are in the midst of a massive digital transformation that impacts where and how we show up to sales presentations and how we engage our clients. There are forces dramatically affecting how we present today and into the future:
1. Hybrid presentations are becoming more the norm
As a result of social distancing, virtual meetings have taken hold and businesses are realizing there are more efficient ways to operate. By leveraging technology, fewer face-to-face meetings are needed. Gartner predicts that by 2025, 80% of B2B sales interactions will occur digitally.
Digital selling won’t entirely replace face-to-face meetings, nor will we see a full-scale return of in-person meetings. Hybrid meetings, where some attendees are in the room while others are virtual, will likely become the norm, presenting a new set of challenges. You cannot default to how you used to present in-person, nor can you continue to only present virtually. Client expectations are changing. In a hybrid meeting, you are doing both, simultaneously running an in-person meeting and a virtual meeting.
2. Clients are learning more on their own
Clients have easy access to more information than ever before, and they are doing their research. By the time they meet with you, they are more informed and have answered many of their questions on their own. Their challenge is to sift through all the information and decide what’s important and what applies to their situation. That’s why sales conversations are still critical. But your role has changed.
You are no longer the primary source of information for your client, educating them on what they don’t know. Your job now is to help clients prioritize and make sense of everything they are learning. Your traditional pitch book, full of information, is not as helpful as it used to be. More information is just that, more information unless you are crystal clear how it aligns with their situation and why it matters to them. Research shows that salespeople who help clients sift through, prioritize and, make sense of the information they are consuming are 26% more likely to win.
3. What clients want from a sales meeting is changing
Clients want you to deeply understand their challenges and know what’s important to them. You need to learn about them before you can prioritize and help them make sense of the volumes of information they have at their fingertips. Only then can you point to the information that fits, why it matters, and align your solutions accordingly. That’s why engaging your clients is now mission-critical.
Consciously and unconsciously, in-person and virtually, clients want you to:
- Be curious and empathetic to their situation.
- Ask questions to deeply understand their challenges and business objectives.
- Help them sift through and prioritize the information that matters most to their situation.
- Share only information that is specific to them, and that they are unlikely to find on their own.
- Bring new insights and identify questions they didn’t think to ask.
- Offer real proof that a new solution will work for them.
4. In the end, it’s about how clients feel
Clients today are more informed, but research has proven that they don’t think their way to decisions, they feel their way there, using facts simply to justify how they feel. “In many ways, today’s deals are less about what clients know, and far more about how they feel about what they know.” says Brent Adamson, Gartner. You can only make your clients feel the way you want them to if they are engaged.
When your client is engaged during a meeting, they are listening and asking questions. They are taking notes. They maintain eye contact. Their body language is mirroring yours because the mirror neurons in their brain are fired up. They are leaning into the conversation, literally. Their energy is high.
Salespeople need to be a lot more prepared for these new presentations. New techniques are required to run a hybrid meeting, engage increasingly more informed clients, and help them feel their way to a decision.
CHALLENGES
85% of senior leaders say sales meetings are a waste of their time
They feel this way because salespeople talk about themselves. About their product. About the features and benefits of their solution. They stay on script rather than engaging the client in a conversation about their challenges. Rather than yielding airtime to let the client tell their story. Rather than asking questions to understand what’s most important to the client.
In a hybrid meeting, the people and energy in the room will dominate the meeting
Presenters may have the best of intentions, but their attention is naturally drawn towards the people in the room with them. In-person attendees are more fully present, free from distractions, and better able to showcase their personalities. They are able to rely on the non-verbals in the room — glances exchanged, facial expressions, and personal eye contact — all of which make conversation flow naturally. Being physically together in a room creates an energy level that cannot reach the virtual attendees. As a result, it will be tempting and easier for you to put all of your attention on the people in the room.
Virtual attendees are at a disadvantage. Your slides take up 80% of their screen so they are listening without the benefit of non-verbal cues. Because they cannot see well, natural conversation flow between the room and virtual attendees is nearly impossible. It is difficult for those on screen to know when they can interject because they do not want to interrupt or talk over someone in the room. As a result, they are less likely to speak up when they have something to say and, in effect, concede the meeting over to those in the room.
You may be tempted to revert back to your traditional pitch book
You may be traveling to your clients’ offices again, so it’s natural to want to go back to how you presented before. But the world has changed — irrevocably. Some members of your buying committee may be in-person, while others are virtual. The same applies to your selling team. Reverting to your data-rich (and heavy) visuals will further exclude virtual attendees who are already at a disadvantage as they try to keep up with what’s happening in the room.
Regardless of where they are sitting, when you use complex slides, your clients get trapped in them, reading a lot of words and wandering round trying to figure out what it all means. When this happens, your slides no longer support you; they compete with you in telling your story. Your goal is to get your client to listen to you. After all, YOU are why they are at this meeting.
Your buyer has a short attention span
Today’s average attention span is 8 seconds, a sharp decline from 12 seconds in 2000 when smartphones hit the market. Without exception, your buyer’s attention will frequently drop in and out during the meeting, as shown in the Hammock and Spikes illustration here. You begin the meeting with 0% of their attention because they arrive at the meeting distracted, and it is highest at the end when you have 100% of their attention because they know you are about to summarize the meeting for them.
Clients are more distracted than ever
There is the awkward few moments at the beginning of a sales meeting when they come into the room (literal and virtual), heads stuck in their phones or laptops, piles of paper on the table from the presentation before, eyes looking weary. No one’s brain is in this meeting.
For those joining virtually, you are competing with everything on their desk, on their minds, and on their desktop. 100% will be multi-tasking when the meeting begins, and 65% of them will continue to multi-task throughout the meeting.
You now have to work much harder to get everyone’s attention and keep them engaged.
Pattern recognition works against you
Humans are hard-wired to look for patterns. That is why clients assume, right from the start, that this meeting will be no different than all the ones before you. Their inner voice says, “I’ve seen this movie before. They are going to talk at me for the next 45 minutes without any understanding of what I need.” Clients have come to expect a one-way sales presentation, not a conversation. This explains, in part, why they are multi-tasking.
Clients are more likely to read your slides than listen to you
It is scientifically proven that it is easier for us to read than to listen. Listening requires your client to interpret and understand what you are saying at the speed you are talking. This means they must intently listen because they cannot hit the rewind button to get a second chance. In contrast, when they are reading, they can go at their own speed and re-read the words on your slides as many times as they want. Since reading is easier, it’s what your client will default to. But people cannot read and listen simultaneously, so when they are reading, they are NOT listening to you.
Clients who join virtually have a perception of anonymity
In a hybrid meeting, those joining virtually feel anonymous. The more anonymous the client feels, the more likely they are to disengage, and the harder it is to draw them in. Some clients may even put themselves on mute or turn off their cameras, further distancing themselves and disconnecting their brains. You have to be deliberate about including the people who attend virtually.
You are in the room, but your subject matter experts may be virtual
You must think about how the selling team looks and sounds to the people in the room and to the people attending remotely. The client will assess, consciously and unconsciously, how well the selling team interacts with one another, how smoothly you transition from one speaker to the next, and how seamlessly you respond to questions. They are not just assessing how much you know, but also whether they want to work with you.
It is tempting to get on a roll and keep talking
It is challenging to manage a hybrid meeting so your natural tendency is to keep talking. The problem with this approach is that you allow the clients to observe rather than be active participants in the meeting. It’s the opposite of what they want from you. They want you to engage them — to listen, understand, prioritize, and align what you do with their most pressing challenges.
LESSONS IN THIS SERIES
There are four lessons in this series, each with a set of techniques you can use to improve your likelihood of a successful meeting. These lessons can be learned and applied in any order based on your interest and situation.
Preparing for a winning presentation
Using visuals and time to your advantage
Available upon request at info@thebardgroupllc.com