“When you’re doing presentations or pictures to deliver much more interesting slides. Get rid of the words, get rid of the complex diagrams, keep it to a minimum, get out there, and stun your audience because your slides will be so great.” – Trevor Lee in today’s Tip 1400
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the Daily Sales Tips podcast and I’m your host, Scott Ingram. Today’s tip comes from Trevor Lee. Trevor uses his 35+ years of experience at the senior manager and director levels specializing in presenting, speaking, and sales to help business people deliver more confident and more successful presentations and sales pitches. Trevor also hosts both the Better Presentations More Sales and the Running 44@60 podcasts. Here he is:
Trevor Lee: Sort out your presentation slides. That is my top tip. How many times do you sit through a presentation and you think, this isn’t very interesting? And it’s usually because those slides aren’t very interesting. So come on, folks, let’s really make 2023 an opportunity to get rid of those boring, hopeless slides that no one’s interested in. Where you put far too many words on the slide, you put far too many complex diagrams.
So here’s a challenge for you. When you start putting your slides together, do two things.
Number one, get rid of the marketing templates on every slide. We don’t need that. People won’t have forgotten between slides who you are, for goodness sake. Okay?
And the second top tip is to get rid of the words. So start with one word and see whether you can work your way up to maybe six at the most. Now you’re going to be thinking, god, this guy is crazy. Why on earth would I want to get rid of all those words on the slides?
Well, I’ll tell you what. You’ll make life more interesting for you and for your audience. And remember, when you’re doing a presentation, it’s not about the slides, it’s about you. People buy from people. So make sure you’re the focus of your presentation, not those chunky, clunky full-of-word slides. It will make such a difference. It’ll be so refreshing for your audience, and it will be liberating for you, because you won’t fall into that trap of turning around and starting to read the slides in the same way the audience are reading the slides as well.
So come on, folks, let’s really get to grips with this, and let’s get out there and let’s make our slides far more interesting for our audiences. Because let’s not forget, a presentation or a sales pitch is a golden opportunity and you don’t want to waste it. And one of the ways of wasting it is those slides.
Now, I know this from here’s, a little bit of experience. I can tell you why it works. Whenever I do a presentation skills workshop, at a certain point I talk about PowerPoint. It’s usually about two thirds of the way in. It’s the fifth of my seven PS of presenting. And at that point I have a little challenge and I give people a chance to win my book, Twelve Business Lessons From Running an Ultramarathon. And I simply say, how many slides have I used so far?
Now, I can tell you that the answers at that point. And it’s a similar presentation, not the same one, but it’s a similar one to most groups, is usually anywhere between 15 and 30. Okay, there’s the odd outlier who goes 60 or something like that. They are absolutely astonished when I tell them I’m on slide 122. And honestly, that is the case. And whether that’s virtual or in person, it’s the same thing. They cannot believe how many slides I’ve used, and that’s because the slides I’m using are very image-driven and they’ve got very few words on, and we tend to move them forward with nice transitions in between.
Now, the other thing, of course, you could do is get rid of the slides altogether. Go slideless. Do you really need slides? If you’re doing a five-minute presentation or something like that? Think about not using slides. And if you’re speaking at a little networking event, they might not have great kit. A lot of events have got small screens. It’s not ideal for using slides anyway. So ditch the slides. Get yourself a few props.
I’ve got an old suitcase I take round to gigs, and I’ve got all sorts of things in it, from a wetsuit, a T-shirt, a sponge, a tambourine, you name it, it’s in there and it is memorable. Years later, people say, oh, I remember the presentation with a suitcase, Trevor.
So there you go, ladies and gentlemen. There we go. Make 2023 your mission. When you’re doing presentations or pictures to deliver much more interesting slides. Get rid of the words, get rid of the complex diagrams, keep it to a minimum, get out there, and stun your audience because your slides will be so great. Good luck.
Scott Ingram: For links to connect with Trevor, and to his podcasts, just click over to DailySales.Tips/1400. Once you’ve done that. Be sure to come back tomorrow for another great sales tip, or just go back to any one of the previous 1399. Thanks for listening!