Sales Presentations Training

NSA/Colorado Chapter is having it’s first meeting of the 2006-2007 year this Saturday ,September 9^th, 2006. The meeting will be at the Renaissance Denver Hotel located at 3801 Quebec Street, Denver, CO. 80207

The featured speaker will be Ford Saeks and his topic is Information Marketing mastery for Professional Speakers. Ford is the real deal and this high-energy “how-to” session offers you a multitude of creative direct & internet marketing techniques for professional speakers. Ford’s presentation will be one hour.

Next on the agenda is Tim Gard, CSP, CPAE. Tim is Colorado’s newest member of the Speaker Hall of Fame and will show you how he confounded experts be being true to himself and riding irreverence all the way to the top
of the speaking profession. Tim will share the secrets of how he runs his business and how you can create your own model for speaking success!

Debra Fine will conclude our monthly meeting. She talks on some of your best marketing opportunities are right around you and cost little or nothing. Debra, a nationally recognized expert on conversational skills and author of the acclaimed book, The Fine Art of Small Talk, will show you how to turn every conversation, hospitality suite, conference, golf outing, and chamber, civic or association event into a powerful business opportunity!Our Chapter meeting will run from 8:30 am to 12:30 pm

The charge for guests is $65

This will be a fabulous meeting with a lot of great information for public speakers, trainers and authors. Hope to see you this Saturday at our meeting Here is the link to National Speakers Association/Colorado chapter for more information.

Steve Mertz 

Come To a Great Meeting!

Technorati Tags: NSA/Colorado Ford Saeks Tim Gard Debra Fine National Speakers Association Public Speaking Presentations Money 

Somewhere, Somehow dull business presentations got firmly entrenched in our culture. Garr Reynolds has a great post on a new book by Daniel Pink called a Whole New Mind. One of Garr’s observations really jumped out at me:

“Indian physician Madan Kataria points out in Pink’s book that many people think that serious people are the best suited for business, that serious people are more responsible. “[But] that’s not true,” says Kataria. “That’s yesterday’s news. Laughing people are more creative people. They are more productive people.” Somewhere along the line we were sold the idea that a real business presentation must necessarily be dull, devoid of humor and something to be endured not enjoyed.”

We have all been subjected to financial and other business presentations that are completely devoid of humor. Another great reason to start building that humor file and using it regularly in our presentations! Here is the link to A Whole New Mind review.

Steve Mertz

Bringing Humor to Business Presentations!

Technorati Tags: Garr Reynolds, Daniel Pink, A Whole New Mind, Humor, Business Presentations

Sales Presentations Training is now available on a monthly subscription basis. This service includes an initial individual consultation for thirty minutes over the phone. We can help you tune up your presentation, work on your opening , help you develop memorable stories or work on a fabulous close. The monthly service also includes a monthly group sales call where we will cover a specif topic and have time for questions.

This service is a great addition to our one on one coaching-especially for those who need a tune up in between coaching sessions. This service will be most beneficial to the experienced presenter looking to take a presentation to the next level.

We have two options available for you. You can pay on a monthly basis for a cost of $97 per month or you can pay up-front for the twelve month program for a cost of $970.00 We have a secured transaction site for your telephone coaching membership and accept Visa, Master Card and PayPal. We are also offering a special incentive for the first 100 subscribers. You will be entered in our drawing to win a new Apple Video Ipod! All you have to do is to be one of the first 100 subscribers to win. Once that occurs we will pull a name and award you the iPod-Good Luck!

We will also be offering telephone coaching on an individual basis over the phone. The hourly rate is $300.00 and this would be appropriate for beginners as well as polished presenters. The sign up for that will be available this week. For now, click here if you would like to subscribe for our monthly coaching program. Operators are standing by…Call Now!!

Steve Mertz

Welcome to Telephone Coaching

Technorati Tags: Sales Training, Presentation Skills, Public Speaking, Telephone Coaching, Apple iPod

On Wednesday of this week the University of Colorado Medical school got a $6 million dollar gift from the Gates Family Fund. It was a huge media event and quite a coup for the medical school. I saw a clip on the evening news of the chairman of the department of neurology explaining how this gift would catapult CU to be a force in stem cell research. There was just one problem…He had his back to the audience and to the cameras.

He was reading a PowerPoint slide that looked to be about 12 point type and the slide was loaded with information! Let’s consider a few points about his public presentation.

1. Never turn your back to the audience

2. Do not read slides to your audience-they will start reading ahead of you and besides that I’m pretty damn sure that the audience there was very capable of reading all by themselves.

3. Let’s just assume for the moment that the average age of the audience was 50-distinguished physicians, administrators and some other potential large donors. Take 50 and divide it by two and his PowerPoint type should be 25 point!! Make

it easy for all those distinguished folks to read your slides that hopefully are enhancing and clarifying your presentation.

Last point, at this media event Dr. David Norris was no longer the chairman of the department of neurology-he was the chief evangelist and fund raiser for the University of Colorado Medical school. I saw him acknowledge and graciously thank the Gates family but I did not hear him lay down a challenge for other “Daddy and Mommy War bucks” to meet or beat the gift. What a great opportunity to issue a call to action!

Steve Mertz

Call to Action Friday!

Technorati Tags: Public Speaking, PowerPoint, Presentation Tips, Executive Speech Coaching

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Thank you to all the readers of my old blog and those of who who have followed us to WordPress. I owe you all a special Thank You because when I started this blog in March 2006 I knew there was a ton of competition to get a decent ranking out of Google. Guess what-if you go to Google and do a search for “Sales Presentations Training” that’s us at the #5 position out of 47,000,000 million! Thank you all very much and please feel free to suggest any topics you would like covered.

Steve Mertz

Thank You Google Gods and to you mom-47,000,000 searches-take tomorrow off!

PS If you want some search engine optimization tips check out my new blog callled Search Engine Optimization for Startups.

The address is www.seo4startups.com

If you tried to visit my old blog address at www.salespresentationtraining.blogspot.com you ended up here-you are at the right place. The transition to WordPress is now complete and thank you very much for your patience.

Steve Mertz

Thanks Again!

Thanks to all of you who have helped to make Sales Presentation Training a Success. Google recently ranked this blog with a page rank of 4-coming from a (0) I am very pleased! I also notice that when you do a search in MSN for “Sales Presentation” this blog is coming up number 2 in search results of 2,789,322! Thank you all very much for using Sales Presentation Training as a resource for your public speaking and sales presentations.

I am also instituting some changes to make this site more useful and user friendly. I will be converting to a different format that will have all this information categorized for easier viewing. You will not notice any interruptions but just wanted to let you know what the heck I’ve been doing. I should have this project finished by weeks end-Yeah!!

For the balance of the week Christie and I will be happy to answer any and all questions you may have about public speaking, sales presentations, openings and or closings for your presentations-whatever you would like us to answer. Please make your questions specific and to the point! Bring the questions on!

Steve Mertz
Thanks for All Your Support!

Technorati Tags:
Google, Public Speaking, Sales Presentations, Sales Openings, Sales Closings, Sales Training, Presentation

Have you ever shown a PowerPoint slide and have your audience gasp-in an awe struck, marvelous way? You know you’ve won the presentation battle at that point. I recently witnessed this very event at The Colorado Capital Conference that I’ve mentioned before. The firm was TheraTogs, Inc and they were presenting to venture capitalists, seeking additional funds for expansion.

They produce medical gear that helps those with neuromotor issues. They showed a slide of child walking without their product followed by a slide with the child wearing their TheraTog product-the audience and venture capitalists gasped at the marked improvement! That one slide could be the one that brings them in millions of dollars of additional funding.

Do you have that million dollar slide in your sales presentation? This could be an excellent area for you and your team to brainstorm on before your next public speaking engagement. Good luck!

Technorati Tags:
Sales Presentations, PowerPoint, Colorado Capital Conference, TheraTogs, Sales Presentations Training
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Steve Mertz
Leave Your Audince in Awe!

I frequently see a Google search with the phrase: “elevator speech financial advisor” or “financial advisor elevator speech”. It seems to go in phases, sometimes I get close to one hundred inquires a month so I did a Google search and here are some of the leading thoughts on “The Elevator Speech.” I just grabbed these randomly so there are no specific credits given.

One person says she is an : affluenziologist” who helps people transfer their values as well as their valuables to future generations.

Another quote: “I’m a money doctor. I make sick money well,”

Another: “My friends call me the financial farmer. I help my clients plant the seeds, nurture their crops and harvest the fruits of their labors when the time is right.”

I don’t know that I personally could of used these when I was an investment advisor but the test is this: Do potential clients get an a-ha moment or do they probe and ask more questions that eventually gets you an appointment and ultimately a client?

A real eye opener can be to ask your current clients why they do business with you-it may not be the reason that you think at all. From this information you may be able to construct that witty elevator speech that sets you apart from all others!

I don’t think there is just one answer but as a consumer I would want to hear a statement that was filled with benefits for me-after all, as a consumer, it’s all about me. I’ve told financial advisors before that they could feel free to steal one of my opening questions to audiences. I ask them how much the “average American” spends a year at Starbucks? The answer turns out to be between $1500 and $1800 a year. It’s then fun to ask the audience to envision their current portfolio and ask them if their current portfolio throws off enough in interest and dividends to pay for their Starbucks outing? It gets audiences thinking about their “exit strategy” and how you might help them.

So, if I were a financial advisor crafting an elevator speech I might try to incorporate something along the lines of: I position my clients portfolios to generate enough income to pay for their Starbucks outings as well as the other necessities of life! Food for thought-I hope this information gives you some ideas for crafting those elevator speeches!

Steve Mertz
Elevator Speeches are mini Sales Presentations!

Tags: Sales Presentation Training, Elevator Speech, Google, Public Speaking.

I’ve previoulsy posted about Guy Kawasaki. Many people consider him to be a world class speaker. I’ve followed Guy’s career for years and as an entrprneur found him to be very inspiring.

I’m going to point you to a video of Guy speaking, it is 39 minutes long and will post my critique on Saturday. Some of the points you may want to consider are the following:

1. Does he have a killer opening?
2. Does he stay on subject matter?
3. Is he passionate about his topic?
4. Does he involve the audience?
5. Does he use memorable stories to reinforce main points?
6. Does he say anything that a meeting planner/audience might find offensive?
7. Does he speak for himself or for the benefit of the audience?
8. Does he respect the alloted time?
9. Does he use humor effectively?
10. Does his PowePoint enhance his speech?
11. Would you give him a standing ovation?

Here is the link to The Art of The Start Video.

I would be curious to hear your thoughts or comments…so don’t be shy

Steve Mertz
Have a Fabulous Weekend!

Tags: Sales Presentation Training, Presentation Coaching, Guy Kawasaki, Public Speaking.