How to Run Effective Remote & Virtual Sales Presentations

When it comes to selling virtually, virtual sales meetings and remote sales presentations are all part of your modern sales process, so it’s essential to know how to structure and deliver each for maximum results. Read on to discover our top actionable tips to help you deliver memorable virtual sales presentations alongside how to structure virtual sales meetings and an easy to follow meetings checklist to keep you on track throughout your sales cycle.

Also read:

• 11 Effective Sales Presentation Techniques That Close The Deal Faster
• How To Run A Great Sales Meeting
• The Ultimate Guide To Selling To The C-Suite

What is a Virtual Sales Presentation?

A virtual sales presentation refers to a remote version of the classic sales presentation. A sales presentation is a meeting between an individual salesperson or sales team and a company, usually a panel of key decision-makers. They attempt to persuade key stakeholders to close the deal by displaying the offerings capabilities, benefits, and features. Sales presentations must align with your prospective clients’ needs to achieve the desired outcome and therefore require extensive planning and preparation to be successful.

What’s the importance of giving an effective Virtual Sales Presentation?

According to a study of B2B buyers by McKinsey & Company, 90% of B2B decision-makers expect the remote buying and selling model to be popular in the long term. What’s more, 75% believe it’s just as effective – if not more- as pre-COVID selling methods.

Also read: 9 Virtual Selling Best Practices To Host Effective Virtual Sales Meetings

How to run effective Remote & Virtual Sales Presentations

Virtual sales presentations can be daunting, especially if you haven’t held one before. That’s why we’ve created a guide to the steps you should take to ensure it’s successful, discover them below:

1. Before the sales presentation

Before the virtual sales meeting, you need to prepare to ensure you get what you want from the interaction. To do this, always research the company you’re talking to – not only will your knowledge impress, but will it help you to deliver a concise pitch that accurately explains how your solution will solve their problem. Then create a meeting agenda that includes instructions on how to join the meeting alongside the content to be discussed. Lastly, decide on the software you’ll be using and double-check you know how to use all of the functions correctly.

2. During the sales presentation

Next, start the virtual sales meeting as you would in a face-to-face setting – by building rapport for at least 2 minutes. This is usually your chance to casually catch up with them and certainly check in on them, especially around how economic situations have affected business. Once settled in, you want to confirm the agenda and solicit feedback on the meeting. If possible, make sure you double confirm, “Is this what you had in mind? Are we heading in the right direction? Is there anything else you want to talk about?”

Transition into introducing the meeting contents and then start to run the meeting. In the end, you also want to make sure you have a nice wrap-up, recap, and summarise critical points to clarify everyone understands. “Here’s is what we talked about, here is what we agreed and this is what’s important to you”.

3. After the sales presentation

Lastly, it’s time to ensure that both parties agree on what are the next steps. Post-meeting, send a recap email to your prospect, and add all of your notes to your Customer Relationship Management software (CRM), adding reminders for critical dates and setting a specific follow-up schedule. Ultimately, as sales professionals, we never want our customers to wait on us; instead, we want to be waiting on them.

5 Top Virtual Sales Presentation tips

Your virtual sales meeting needs to be a skilful and orchestrated experience -while you may feel underconfident at first, you can use these actionable tips to settle into creating effective virtual sales meetings.

1. Know your tools

It’s critical to ensure you practice and master your video calling platform before using it for the first time – figure out what all of the buttons and options do.

You need to master elements such as chat functions, sharing files, screen sharing, and muting and unmuting yourself. Also, learn how to assign a different host or co-host, record or stop recording, and change your mic and video inputs.

However, unfortunately with you being the service provider, you’ll need to use whatever platform your customer or prospect wants to use- so you need to be prepared.

Besides mastering the platform, you’ll be using – you also need to make sure you have a stable and robust internet connection (ideally hardwired), great sound and decent lighting.

2. Do your research

The last thing you want is to start a call or meeting with “tell me about your company”. You instead want to frame your conversation around, “Hey, I know you do this and this. How are you handling such and such based on that context?

At the least, you’re showing awareness of who they are and what they do. Therefore, your research should also include baseline information about the person’s role and their company. For example, who are their ideal target customers, who are their competitors? What are their reviews like?

3. Look great on camera

When it comes to virtual sales meetings, you may find that that there is sometimes an information gap because less information is naturally transmitted. We used to be able to see many things happening like body language and facial expressions. Therefore, you need to look and sound your best on camera to be understood well and communicate your intentions effectively. So how can you do this?

• Raise your laptop to eye level if needed; simply use books or one of those stands. 
• Ensure you have a clean and tidy background! If needed, turn your desk around, or place a company banner behind you. There are even free video call background software you can get to customise your surroundings virtually. 
• Test your audio out ahead of time to make sure it works, and use a mic whenever possible. 

Another key to looking great on camera is remembering:

• Memory & Movement: Moving graphics gain attention and actually raise your prospects’ dopamine levels. However, ensuring they change frequently needs to be graceful to avoid your prospective client becoming overwhelmed.
• The 20% Rule: To give always give 20% more emphasis on your voice, movement, and facial expressions when connecting via video. This not only makes it easier to understand you but raising your voice to an unnatural level actually eliminates filler words.
• The Unseen: Everyone has a hidden emotional agenda; it’s perfectly normal. What happens in a prospective client’s day might affect their decisions, so it’s important to remember that trust is everything. Don’t ignore the signs; if they’re distracted, you can always suggest rescheduling to another time.

4. Do a practice run

A virtual sales meeting requires less commitment from your prospect or customer. Therefore you must be sure your presentation is consistently engaging and informs the other party what you bring to the table in terms of value. To do this, you must prepare and practice by doing a run-through with a co-worker. That way, not only can you practice using the technology, but you can also amend any sections where your audience is likely to lose attention.

5. Personally engage participants

In a face-to-face sales meeting or presentation, your prospect is likely to build rapport with you on an unconscious level by observing your body language and using eye contact. This advantage is not available with virtual sales presentations, so you must overcommunicate by emphasising your facial expressions, tone, and mannerisms.

Your virtual sales meeting checklist

You’ve got to be highly organised when it comes to selling virtually. Here’s our pre virtual meeting checklist to help you stay on top of your virtual sales presentations:

1. Meeting Confirmation Email sent
2. Log in details to virtual meeting provided
3. Familiar with virtual meeting platform (how to screenshare, mute, unmute, etc)
4. Summary of topics to be covered sent
5. Calendar event with virtual meeting details sent
6. Make sure you look your best on a video call: Background, audio and video check
7. Reminder email sent morning of meeting
8. Research your prospect
9. Plan out how and what you want to present in the meeting
10. Have all websites loaded in new tabs
11. Have all presentation materials easily accessible

Virtual Meeting Checklist Infographic from Tom Abbott, CSP

Master the art of closing deals remotely