How To Present Your Awesome Company

You need to work on client projects. You have a business to run. You have urgent issues to deal with. How can you find time to present your company to clients and prospects? “I don’t have time to present my company.” I understand. I’ve heard this from many consultants, coaches and professional service providers. You’ve got better things to do. You can’t spend time building your presentation skills—and talking about your business. Think again. The truth of the matter is that while you’re not presenting your company to clients and prospects…your competition is. But, no worries. You don’t have to go back to school, hire an expensive consultant or struggle with researching best practices. Just use these 5 tips to get started presenting your awesome company. Tip 1. Know Your Whyr As in many efforts, you have to have a big, clear ‘why.’ Identify why presenting is important to you. Will it help you grow your client base? Expand into new territory? Increase sales? Do more of what you love doing? Define your reasons. Build a solid foundation so you can move on to the core tips for presenting with impact. But don’t skip this step. Otherwise you’ll move ahead without a clear sense of certainty. Tip 2. Match Your Audiencer Different audiences respond to different presentations. It comes down to having a human-to-human conversation with your clients and prospects. To do this effectively, you have to understand what people want and need. With summer behind us, now is a good time to think about what your audience is really looking for. Are they hungry to get results in the final quarter of the year? Are they ready to sink their teeth into a project that they were on the fence about? Think about seasonal variations of interest and energy. Match your message to your audience—and the time of year. Tip 3. Simplify While They Watchr Last week we provided graphic facilitation for an 80-person, 2-day conference. The attendees were used to seeing PowerPoints. They’d never experienced watching a visual artist capture key ideas in colorful wall charts. They loved it! If you’re hosting a conference or client event, plan charts, diagrams and posters. Organize your message for visual simplicity. Several tips will guarantee success: • Draw a sketch at the whiteboard. This is engaging and extremely powerful—especially if clients are used to slide presentations. • Work with a visual expert to plan your sketch. You’d be surprised how little you need to draw to be effective. • Practice drawing in advance. Gain confidence so that you can do it while your audience watches. Tip 4. Solve Real World Problemsr The fastest way to ‘spell things out’ is to collaborate and solve problems. Work with your clients to solve their real-world issues. Pick one that is very important to them and show how what your company offers will make the difference. Yes, this is challenging. However, it is extremely memorable and ultimately convincing. When you take on a real problem and succeed, you’ll win their trust. Isn’t that more than worth the effort? Tip 5. Leverager Funny enough, many professionals and business owners forget this tip. Really it’s a question of hours in the day. The main goal here is expand the positive impact of what you’re doing. If you’ve solved a problem for one client…who else wants to know about it? Other prospects. Other clients. People you know across different industries. If you’ve presented your visual message and won rave reviews, who else is interested? Other clients. Other prospects. Other people you know in your network. The fastest way to ignite the Leverage tip is to ask this question: “Who else wants to know about this?” You’ve got an awesome company. Now use these 5 tips to kick things up a notch and attract more people to work with you.