Have you killed anyone lately?
- If you ever have to create presentations, you need to see this.
- If you ever wondered how to fuel word of mouth, take a leaf out of Alexei Kapterev's book
Help to find free images for your communications
Yotophoto | Find free photos... fast
Photo's are such a fantastic tool in communications if you can get your hands on the right ones. These days it is a lot easier to get access to great images to enhance your website, brochure or presentation, but for the average PowerPoint presentation or blog it's just not feasible to spend hundreds of dollars. Good thing there is so much for free on the web.
Yotophoto is the latest one I have come across, particularly interesting because they provide a search from a range of libraries, specifically looking for images that are free to use.
You'll note that a lot of the images come from sites such as Flickr and Stock.Xchng as well as Wikipedia, Morguefile, Pixelperfect Digital and OpenPhoto.
(Courtesy of Matthew Bowden - see more of his work here)
30 seconds between success and failure
Rands In Repose: A Glimpse and a Hook
On the surface, this post about writing good resumes has little to do with marketing or branding. But it does. A seasoned hiring manager gives us a crisp overview of how he forms his opinion of an applicant in "the first 30 seconds".
That's not a lot different from the amount of time we're likely to get from our prospective customers, now that time is the scarcest commodity
Nice case study on b2b marketing – audio presentations
MarketingSherpa posted a good little case study on the use of powerpoint style presentations with audio which caught my attention. A bit low-tech, was my first reaction. What about webinars? Isn't this a bit old fashioned? Really doesn't matter of course. The only thing that matters is whether it works.
In this case study the audience was the scientific community who are very knowledge oriented so whitepapers and brochures were tools of choice.
The marketing team decided to test a new format -- an audio + PowerPoint-style presentation they called 'On Demand Training.'
The idea was fairly simple. They'd put together a set of slides, perhaps 10 or so, and post these on the site along with an audio feed to talk viewers through the presentation. The tech required less bandwidth for a typical webinar (which some prospects in China and Eastern Europe may still have problems with.) Prospects could click to listen and view any particular slide or sit back and hear the entire presentation in order.
They tested the results and...
Turns out 30% of prospects in the scientific community prefer audio-enhanced PowerPoint-style decks to white papers, brochures, Web pages and webinars.
The article goes into some more detail on the "how to" which you can read here , but I've been thinking about why they would work so well. Here are a few thoughts:
- Education - a presentation is a really traditional way of educating and for most a much more engaging interaction than reading a paper
- Control -rather than a webinar or podcast, the presentation allows you to skip around the pages. This is the age of customer control, so that's right on the money.
- Human - a person, a human voice. We are people after all, and we still prefer dealing with other people over web pages.
Do you have any experience with this?
Presentation tips from McKinsey’s Gene Zelazny
Presenting in person is an activity that is probably not getting the airplay it deserves in today's sales and marketing environment. The focus is squarly on what the internet and technology is doing/can do for us, which is logical considering the impact it is having, the exciting new ideas around and the need to navigate our way through this maze of new "stuff".
But presentations are still at the core of what we do. We present as sales people, as marketing managers, as entrepeneurs, CEO's, teachers.
Not only that, it is often the real pointy end.It is where marketing results are presented (and sold), where prospects are won over, where banks give loans, where students either engage or switch off.
Two people, Gene Zelazny and Cliff Atkinson have really focused my mind on the essence of good presenting. Here is my take out, but make sure you read the interview and have a look at the web presentation by Cliff.( UPDATE: Michael McLaughlin sent me this link to this interview with Cliff. Thanks Michael)
1. Write down what you want peolple to do at the end of the presentation. Setting a goal like this will ensure that you stay focused.
2. Start with the key messages you want to communicate before you start creating anything.(From the interview with Gene):
McLaughlin: When you review a presentation, what is the most common piece of advice you provide to improve its quality?
Zelazny: I ask this question: what would you say and show if you had only two minutes of your audience’s time?
3. Create a script of your presentation to guide your story. You are telling a story not presenting facts.
4. Use visuals aids as aids, not the focus of your presentation. The presenter is the focus.
5. Stop thinking about yourself; put yourself in the seats of the audience members.(That line could go into any article on marketing or sales)
“All Marketers are Liars” – Seth Godin speaks at Google
| Seth Godin is the author of six bestsellers, including Permission Marketing, an Amazon Top 100 bestseller for a year and a Fortune Best Business Book. His newest book, All Marketers are Liars , has already made the Amazon Top 100 and has inspired its own blog. Seth is also a renowned speaker, and was recently chosen as one of "21 Speakers for the Next Century" by Successful Meetings Magazine and is consistently rated among the best speakers by the audiences he addresses. Seth was founder and CEO of Yoyodyne, an interactive direct marketing company, which Yahoo! acquired in late 1998. He holds an MBA from Stanford, is a contributing editor to Fast Company magazine, and was called "the Ultimate Entrepreneur for the Information Age" by Business Week.This video is part of the Authors@Google series. | |
Taking the sleeping pill out of powerpoint presentations
In business marketing, or b2b marketing the board room/sales presentation is probably one of the most common sales activities.
Some people are good at it, naturally. Some people struggle. But most people have never learnt how to put a good powerpoint presentation together. I came across this site by Cliff Atkinson recently and watched the recording of his webinar "Transform Your PowerPoint Beyond Bullet Points".
Some of the key points:
- Most presentations have all the content in the bullet points which is subsequently read out loud by the presentor.
- The vast majority of recipients of "standard" bullet point presentations find them boring or can't see the point in having someone read out what is already on the screen ("might as well email it to me")
- Studies have shown that when you take away the text from your standard bullet point presentation retention by the audience goes up by 28%
- The same study shows that if you remove the text from the screen the audiences ability to apply that information afterwards goes up by 78%
- Creating presentations based on the concept of a film story board is a much more effective way to do powerpoint presentations
- More images, fewer words.
Good stuff. It's a long presentation, but Windows Media Player does allow you to speed-up the video....
More on elevator pitches
Will Swayne has a good question/comment regarding my earlier post (April 21) on elevator pitches:
"Hi David - A lot of people I talk to are keen to come up with a great "elevator speech". I like the idea too but it's very hard to come up with one that works without sounding too rehearsed, salesy or corny. Can you share any examples of successful elevator speeches? "
I agree, it is very hard to come up with a good elevator pitch. The reason it is hard is because it is the final outcome of a fair bit of hard work. The elevator pitch is in essence a well-worded distillation of what your business/brand is about. One of the reasons why many elevator pitches sound rehearsed, corny or salesy is because they have been developed with the purpose of getting someone's attention, not to engage with them.
It's a bit like walking around with a flowerpot on your head: you will get people's attention, but I doubt they want to give you their business.
A good elevator pitch is nothing more than a distilled version of your normal sales presentation; and that's the catch. Unless your sales presentation clearly defines what specific problems you solve for your customers and how you differentiate from competitors it will have little impact.
The substance of a pitch is what sells first. The form is about understanding the emotional pressure points of your audience; what are their fears and motivations.
So if your elevator pitch is not as sharp as it should be don't just work on the appearance, work on the substance and go back to work on what actually differentiates your company. Once that is clear, tell the story based on those emotional triggers you believe your audience responds to.
What are your experiences with this?
Making an “elevator speech” work
Elevator pitches are a key part of most b2b sales and I read a good article by on this topic by Mike McLaughlin a site called "Guerrilla Consulting"
Although this particular article is focused on consultants, the essence of what is an effective answer to the question "so, what does your business do?" is no different.
The key observation in this article is that you need to create the "pitch" from your customers/clients perspective, not to grand-stand and to ask questions instead of blowing your own horn.
Now that may not sound too revolutionary to a lot of people, but it is by far the greatest mistake people make when they are put in the position to sell themselves or their service; they either undersell by giving some confused, convoluted, technical explanation or they go in to "sales" mode and lose credibility instantly.
Here is my spin on elevator pitches:
- Facts about the problems you solve
- Outline of what you do to solve these problems, including how you differentiate yourself
- Clarified through a typical client project
- Ending with a relevant question about their business to make it a two way conversation, rather than a monologue.
Write it down, rehearse it (tape it and listen to yourself) and refine it.
Powerpoint – “Ducking Presentations That Bore”
Ah, the PowerPoint presentation...mostly dead boring, mostly too many words, mostly too many slides, mainly not presented very well...Some interesting ideas from marketers around the world on how to keep your audience engaged.Marketing Challenge: Ducking Presentations That Bore
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