The Pitch Every Salesperson Should be Using
Learn about what you can do to increase the effectiveness of your pitch.
Episode 146: The way the majority of salespersons have been delivering their pitches often follows the same pattern. They start by talking about their company, their products, and then why it matters.
The main problem that comes from using this templated pitch approach, is that you may be losing the attention of your potential clients before you even get to why they should be doing business with you.
In this episode, we dive into ways you can increase the effectiveness of your pitch and increase sales.
Would you like a free consulting session with Jamie Irvine? Visit HeavyDutyPartsReport.com/Consulting to learn more.
Watch the Video
Disclaimer: This content and description may contain affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, The Heavy-Duty Parts Report may receive a small commission.
Sponsors of this Episode:
- Want to look up parts but don’t have a part number or the VIN? Download Diesel Parts for free on Desktop or on your Apple or Android device.
- Looking for high-quality fuel injection for heavy-duty applications? Visit AMBACInternational.com/Aftermarket
Buy Parts:
Are you looking to purchase heavy-duty parts and get your commercial vehicle repaired? Get access to one of HDA Truck Pride’s 750 locations across the United States and Canada. Visit HeavyDutyPartsReport.com/BuyParts.
Transcript of Episode:
Jamie Irvine:
You are listening to The Heavy-Duty Parts Report. I’m your host, Jamie Irvine. And this is the show where you get expert advice about heavy-duty parts that keep trucks and trailers on the road longer while lowering cost-per -mile.
Would you like to sell more heavy-duty parts? Would you like to be able to convert more customers at a faster rate? What would that do to your results this year as a sales professional for you personally, and also for the company that you represent? One of the big challenges that I see a lot of salespeople and companies face is how they put together their sales presentations. Most companies and most salespeople spend a lot of time talking about themselves, their company, their products. I see sales presentations that are 30 or 40 slides long. And I see that the first third of the presentation is typically all about the company. The middle is all about the products, features and benefits. And then the conclusion is usually a lot of technical information and how to do business with that company at a greater degree. Now, you would think that sharing all of that information is exactly what the customer wants, right?
So the customer is contemplating changing suppliers. Wouldn’t they want to know that the supplier they go with that’s been in business for many, many years, has lots of experience? Wouldn’t they want to be reassured that the products that they’re buying are high quality and wouldn’t they want the technical information to back that up? Wouldn’t they want to know about the global footprint of the company or the competitive pricing models, the excellent customer service? Like isn’t all of that information exactly what a customer wants to hear when making one of these decisions and evaluating a new supplier. The reality is that information, although it is important, is often shared way too early in the engagement with the prospective customer. And there’s an abundance of this information and a real lack of something else. So what’s missing? Well, what’s missing is an identification of who the ideal customer is, so that the person on the receiving end of this information can self-identify and say, ah, yes, they’re talking about me.
So that’s the very first thing that needs to be there. Something that removes any doubt about whether or not we’ve got the right people in the room talking to each other, or on the virtual video call. Another piece of critical information that I don’t see salespeople and heavy-duty parts companies spending enough time on is a articulation of the types of problems that ideal customer faces and a in-depth understanding of the economic impact and how that is negatively impacting the prospective customer. Let’s talk about where you should be taking your sales presentation. Let’s talk about what elements need to be in it. How long should it be and how should you go about approaching prospective customers? Number one, if you’ve got a pitch deck that has 30 or 40 slides in it, I want you to get ready to slash, slash, slash. The pitch decks that I help my clients develop typically have eight slides.
That’s it. Eight slides. So if you’ve got 40, you’ve got a lot of work to do to cut that down. Second, we’re not going to talk about you, your company or your products until almost the conclusion of the presentation. This is a big departure for many, many sales professionals and many heavy-duty parts companies. They’ve never done this before, they always spend at least the first two thirds of the presentation talking about themselves. Their products, features, benefits, those kinds of things. So instead of talking about yourself, what would you be talking about? We’re gonna take a quick break. We’ll be right back. Don’t have a heavy-duty part number and need to look up a part? Go to parts.diesellaptops.com or download the app on Apple or Android to create your free account. Looking for high quality fuel injection for heavy duty applications?
Having one supplier for fuel injection allows you to better serve customers by providing them with a complete line, which increases your sales and profitability. Learn more at ambacinternational.com/aftermarket. Well, you need to talk about the customer, but you can’t just walk up to the customer and start the presentation and say, I’m looking to talk to people just like you, and here’s all the information I have about the problem that you are facing that will work. You’ve gotta start the presentation off with a statement that frames the entire conversation and the entire presentation. Remember your customers have a lot on their minds and you need to frame exactly what you want to talk about in such a way that it gets their attention, peaks their interest and keeps them engaged at least to see the next slide. So that’s step one. Then you want to demonstrate to that customer that the right people are in the room talking, that you are looking to do business with exactly who they are.
They are an ideal customer for you. And you need to describe that in a way that helps them in their mind self-identify, ah, yes, they’re talking about me. And then you wanna demonstrate how much knowledge you have about their situation. And you do this by going into a discussion around the central problem, that your opening statement, that frames the conversation is aimed at. You see, in order to really give the person who you’re talking to confidence, that you are someone who can help them, you have to demonstrate to them that you understand the problems that they’re facing. Why? Because in business, people don’t buy products, they buy solutions to problems. So you have to show them, you get their situation, you are looking to deal with someone just like them. You understand their situation. But beyond that, you need to go another layer, even deeper, and you need to demonstrate the economic impact of these problems.
That’s where you really start to get engagement with your perspective customer. Once they understand that the problem you solve is a large enough one, that it should get their attention and that it does need to be addressed now you have the basis then to move forward and talk about solution. So these are some tips that I hope help you kind of reimagine how you can go about presenting to your customers. And if you would like some assistance in developing your pitch, there are a few more, remember I said there were eight slides in total. There’s a few more slides that we would need to talk about and I spent a lot of my time working with my clients to help their sales teams, to develop their pitch, to get it down to this nice, concise message, eight slides. To build a presentation that is engaging right from the beginning.
From the moment that you begin the presentation, a presentation that helped the customer see why they should fix the problem that you solve now. And to help them to see that this problem has a real economic impact in their business and therefore warrants, resources, time, and effort to fix. And then I will show you, and this is what I work with a lot my clients, I show them how to then tell their customers about themselves, their products, their solution in such a way that you maintain maximum engagement. And then at the conclusion, how to go about asking for the business. And it’s not what you think.
So if you’d like some assistance with this head over to heavydutypartsreport/consulting, and learn more about our consulting services there, you can schedule a meeting with me where we will offer you one free consultation. This is an hour-long consultation where we will talk about your situation and I’ll give you as much information as I can to help you. And from there, if it’s a good fit, then we can talk about how we can work together on an ongoing basis. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode. We’ll talk to you very soon.