Posts

Perfect Pitching: My 7 Top Tips

June 9, 2020/0 Comments/in Blog /by Eric Dixon

Perfect pitching requires bringing together a lot of elements. It is more than just a presentation – but is never just about the hard sell. We coach people and teams to give great pitches and there are a few things we always look out for.

1. Perfect Pitching Starts with Questions

To do a great pitch you have to squarely meet all the needs and desires of the buyer. What exactly do they need? What are their concerns or reservations? What do they want to hear? You will never do a good job if you just roll out the last pitch you did with a few updates. Carry out a thorough analysis of the potential client first and ask questions of them in whatever way you can.

2. Introductions

Keep introductions short and sweet. They can quickly become boring, especially if you have a team of people on the pitch. If you provide written biographies in the handout you can just cherry pick a few key points. If you can make the introduction interesting and fun that is absolutely worth doing – but don’t labour it.

3. The Creds

It is always important to have a short section in a pitch that explains your credentials. However, this is another area that can quickly become very dull. Consider leaving the credentials to the end of the pitch – after you have explained what you can do for this particular client. If you fear they won’t listen until they’ve seen the creds, try again to do it succinctly. Just because it is succinct doesn’t mean you can’t use the odd interesting, unusual or, if appropriate, gossipy bit of information about one of two of your previous projects. You are looking to pique interest. If it prompts a follow-up question, you are doing well.

4. Keep the Slides Clean

Too much information on the slide is a classic problem. We see it all the time. The font gets smaller and the client is faced with prose rather than summary. Clients often say: ‘we have to do it like this because we print out the slides as the handout’. Such an approach will ensure your pitch or presentation is suboptimal. If you put the detail in presenter’s notes, you can print out a version that includes the slide and the presenter notes together. That way, the client is left with all the information but hopefully, during the pitch, they are concentrating on you and not the small print.

5. Don’t Read the Slides

This is related to the point above but is so important it is worth underlining. If you include a lot of text on the slide you will be faced with the dilemma: do I read out the slide or assume they will read it while I am talking. Neither option is good and definitely sitting watching someone read their slides is never going to make a client love you. Instead, think of your pitch as a performance (not a read through) and remember you are required to entertain.

It’s all about connection

6. Rapport is King

People buy people – or teams. Selling often – even usually – hinges on personal relationships. Whilst you will have important information to deliver, the whole point of inviting people to pitch is so that the buyer can make a personal assessment of the team. Although the presentation is the vehicle, the key focus should be to create rapport or opportunities for rapport. Lindsay Williams (MD of The Media Coach) has urged me to read Chris Voss ‘Never Split the Difference’. She points out that Voss urges negotiators to watch the reactions of the other team. If someone reacts facially or physically to a piece of information find a way to check what the reaction means. Questions should be open – don’t assume you have read it right. But asking ‘have you come across that before?’ or even ‘I am thinking you perhaps disagree with that?’ allows the buyer to connect with you and is likely to give you useful information.

7. Hold Back the Last Slide

In business life, there is nearly always a Q & A after a pitch. That is a good thing and is often when some real work is done. However, it presents a danger. If you have been discussing some relatively minor and perhaps sticky point for a few minutes and then come to the end of your allotted time, the buyers are left with that subject in their minds. I suggest you take a few seconds to say ‘ well we have come to the end of our time but can I just leave you with our key points…’ and put up the last slide, a short succinct summary of what you are offering. That way you leave your message in their minds.

The Media Coach team can help you and your team with their pitch whether that is online or face to face. If you think your pitch performance is not yet perfect, why not give us a call? +44 (0)20 7099 2212 or drop us an email enquiries@themediacoach.co.uk.

Featured Image Credit, Claudio Schwarz via Unsplash (Licensed under a CC0 1.0 licence)

A Minute With The Media Coach: Avoiding Jargon

August 5, 2019/0 Comments/in Blog /by Lindsay Williams

This week, instead of our usual blog post, we have decided to continue our theme of ‘A Minute With The Media Coach’.

Today we bring you the second in our series, where fellow trainer, Eric Dixon and I discuss the problem of jargon and business-speak.

Fake Outrage – Simples!

March 4, 2019/0 Comments/in Blog /by Lindsay Williams

Fake outrage has had a great outing in the last week. The Prime Minister, Theresa May, sparked masses of column inches when she quoted the annoying Meerkat on the ‘compare the market.com’ adverts – by using the word ‘Simples’ in the House of Commons. [I’ve posted here previously about fake outrage].

The Meerkat’s favourite catchphrase was used by the PM in the House of Commons.

Fake Outrage in the Headlines

Apparently, this was a ‘misguided lunge at cultural relevance’ according to Michael Deacon in the Telegraph.

According to the Daily Mail it was ‘embarrassing’.

Huffington Post went for ‘bizarre’.

The Maybot

Theresa May is a terrible public speaker and she deserves the ‘Maybot’ tag. But really. Why does the fact that she used a made-up word, currently in common parlance, worthy of any coverage at all, never mind all this fake outrage? If anyone else had used it (Ken Clarke, John Macdonald, Amber Rudd) I doubt it would have been mentioned except on BBC Radio 4’s dreary Yesterday in Parliament.

Of course, it now seems she was persuaded to use the phrase by an aide, Seema Kennedy who had a bet on it with Simon Hoare MP. Bullshit Bingo, as it is called in several places I have worked, is a common little game that wordsmiths play: there is a small reward for the first person to get a particular – often unusual, bizarre or specific – phrase into a report or a speech or a broadcast. Journalists play this game all the time!

Bullshit Bingo

This is a bit embarrassing for the Prime Minister, especially as she was probably unaware of the Bullshit Bingo bet. It makes her look gullible. Having said that, it is surely not worth comment that someone who is doing an almost impossible job and talking publicly about it every day, has people around her who suggest particular lines or phrases.

Using a phrase from popular culture is really not a crime. Nor do I understand why it can be characterised as ‘a misguided lunge at cultural relevance’. In many ways being colloquial is a good idea. It makes your speech less boring. And let’s face it, important though Brexit is, right now we are all pretty bored with the minutiae of the arguments around it.

Journalists manufacture fake outrage to entertain us all. They also pretend or imply that everyone else feels the outrage. There are many things that prompt outrage in me but ‘Simples’ is simply not one of them.

what not to do when making a presentation

5 Things Not to Do When Making a Presentation

September 16, 2018/0 Comments/in Blog /by Lindsay Williams

This is a quick mini-post: revision notes for those that have already worked with us.

Doing a really good presentation is an art and usually requires a fair amount of work. But I am aware lots of people would be happy to just give an okay presentation, without feeling it might have damaged their reputation with colleagues or clients.

But here is my choice of the top five mistakes I see most often and are most easily fixed.

What Not to Do When Making a Presentation

1. Don’t Read Your Slides

Look at the audience instead! You are the main event, the slides are there to support you and make the talk more interesting. It’s fine to glance at the screen, even better if it is on a laptop in front of you, but 90% of the time you should be connecting with the people who are listening.

2. Don’t Dance or Pace

Some careful movement to support your narrative can be effective, especially on a stage. But pacing up and down or dancing from side to side is distracting.

3. Don’t Rush

You may not want to be there, you may not want to draw attention to yourself but rushing through your presentation means the whole experience is poor for the audience and for you. It will not do your reputation any good. Speak slowly and clearly and pause sometimes. This helps you to collect your thoughts. You’ll probably say fewer words but land more meaning. You can speak too slowly but this is rare compared to the number of people who speak too fast.

4. Don’t Crowd Your Slides

Strip your slides to the basics, keep them uncluttered and a minimum of words. That means 5-10 words, not 40.

5. Don’t Make the Audience Work Out What the Point Is!

You should know what your message is and you should summarise it for the audience in a clear and concise way. This can happen at the beginning and at the end, or just at the end. But it must happen.

We love helping people with particular presentations or pitches, or to improve their presentation skills in a more general way. If you or your team need to up their game when it comes to presentations, give us a call on: 44 (0)20 7099 2212.

5 ways to improve that presentation

April 9, 2018/0 Comments/in Blog /by Lindsay Williams

As a team, we at The Media Coach both give and watch a lot of presentations. I find watching someone else give an unprepared and hesitant or confusing presentation deeply physically uncomfortable. I am also horribly aware when occasionally I fall short on some of these very simple rules. So for all of us at the coal face of business communication here are a few simple reminders.

1. What is the message?

I know, I know, I am obsessed with messaging but for a very good reason. My suggestion is, once a presentation is done ask yourself ‘do I have a clear takeaway message’ closely followed by ‘will that message be as clear to my audience as it is to me’. Sometimes I think this big message should appear at the beginning and at the end of the presentation. But my colleague, Eric Dixon, often sets up a problem or a question at the start and answers it at the end. Either way, if you don’t know what your message is – in a short simple sentence – then it is unlikely your audience will be clear either.

2. Add chapter headings

There is a real danger that your presentation will lose people in the detail. If you have simple ‘chapter’ slides that can be flashed up quickly between different sections of your talk, your audience will find it easier to follow the argument. Any sort of sign-posting, verbal or visual, helps a presentation.

3. Reduce or eliminate bullet points

Bullet points encourage you to read your own slides. This is never going to be a good way to give a talk. Occasional simple bullet slides are alright as a summary but limit the number of bullets and limit the words in each bullet. Leave out the jargon. Pictures, animations and diagrams are much better than bullet points.

4. Ask ‘is this relevant to my audience?’

Assuming the presentation is broadly relevant to the audience (hopefully you wouldn’t have got this far if it is not) ask can you make it more relevant? Can you refer to something that everyone in the audience is aware of? That might be President Trump’s latest tweet or the food in the canteen. But look for points of common experience to make the audience feel the presentation is built just for them.

5. Treat it as a performance

A presentation is not just a chat. Rehearse it and deliver it with energy and animation. Try not to apologise, hesitate or waste the time of the people listening to you. If you don’t know why a slide is there, take it out. In particular start and finish with clean, rehearsed narrative.

We have previously written about this topic here. The Media Coach has a number of experienced presentation trainers. If you would like general training on presentations or help with a specific presentation or pitch, please do give us a call +44 (0)20 7099 2212.

Dull presentations are endemic but can be avoided

October 3, 2017/1 Comment/in Blog /by Lindsay Williams

Dull presentations that bore the audience and damage people’s careers are to be found, it seems, in every industry and sector. At The Media Coach, we have seen a lot of prize specimens.

Established practice is often bad practice, riddled with overly long bullet points, statements of the blindingly obvious mixed in with obtuse arguments barely understood and rarely remembered. And there are the branding departments who insist on colour schemes, headers, footers etc.

So how can you lift your presentation above the crowd? Below are some of the basics of best practice and some common mistakes made by dull presenters.

Aim to lift your presentation above the crowd. Remember established practice is often bad practice.

Dull presentations can be avoided

The basics:

• Plan on paper. It will make your structure clearer.

• Have a clear take away message.

• Write for your specific audience – typically, the more tailored the presentation, the better.

Be picture or data led, keep text to a minimum

• Be picture or data led – limit text and bullet points. No one can read and listen at the same time and if you have lots of words on the screen you will be tempted to turn your back on the audience to read them. For a guide watch how little text appears on television graphics. It can be a revelation.

• If it is a long presentation divide it into clear chapters, and tell the audience when you move from one chapter to the other. If you know how to use the message house (anyone trained by us will know what this means) this is a very good basis for a presentation, although clearly not the only template possible.

• Don’t be scared to introduce or summarise an argument in a few words on an otherwise empty slide. It can really help to signpost your presentation in this way. Just don’t leave it up too long.

• Rehearse aloud.

• Face the audience and not the screen for at least 80% of the time.

• Speak slowly with energy.

Boring your audience should not be acceptable. If you think your presentation is destined to be dull, send an email instead.

Dull presentations. Consider just sending an email

We think presentations should not be just about informing an audience. It should be entertaining and inspiring. As my fellow trainer Eric Dixon would say, if just passing on information is your goal send an email; you will save yourself a lot of effort and both you and the audience a lot of time. Presentations should leave people with something new to think about, inspired and galvanized depending on the circumstances.

Dull presenters are often guilty of these common mistakes

• Copy and pasting an old presentation and then fiddling with it to save time. Whilst there is nothing wrong with reusing old slides it is often simpler and better to start with a clear plan and then fill in with some old and some new slides.

• Writing presentation notes on the slide. As mentioned above you want as few words as possible on the slide. There is a special place for presenters’ notes – use it. You will give a better presentation this way.

• Putting a tiny picture on the slide and a lot of words. I am a huge fan of Garr Reynolds who uses full frame photos and limited text. In this case the image becomes a prompt for each element of the argument. I highly recommend his book Presentation Zen. It will transform your presentations.

• Always using the company template. I know sometimes you are told to do this and you have to suck it up, but ask yourself does every single slide have to be branded? Isn’t there some possibility to break it up with a different style, a visual surprise? How about using the branding only on the chapter headings?

Dull presentations will be lifted by a story or example

More common mistakes:

• No stories, examples or anecdotes. We say it at every possible opportunity but here it is again: tell stories, use examples, and raid your personal life experience or someone else’s to make a point. The scientific evidence is overwhelming – people may be impressed by facts and numbers in the moment but overwhelmingly they remember stories over data. Any stories are good but learning to tell stories properly will improve all your communications.

• No media inserted. In this day and age there is little excuse for not using sound or video in your presentation. Above all remember to keep this short. Just 20-30 seconds of something relevant will lift your presentation from the pedestrian to the entertaining.

• Not rehearsing. Polish comes with rehearsal. 20 minutes rehearsal is ten times more use than 20 minutes chit-chat about what the presentation might cover. Rehearse, revise and rehearse again.

• Over-running your speaking slot. Time yourself in a run-through and then add another 20% – it always takes longer in reality than in rehearsal.

Our trainers aim to inspire. We tell lots of stories and we rehearse.

Take every opportunity to practise in front of an audience, your loved one, critical children etc. It’s all valuable.

And of course, if you need help with either a particular presentation, or improving your personal style, the Media Coach team would be delighted to oblige. Just give us a call to discuss on +44 (0)20 7099 2212.

First two pictures used under cc licence from Pixaby
Third picture owned by The Media Coach

Media Training Basics: on-air presence

October 3, 2016/1 Comment/in Blog /by Lindsay Williams

Media training basics include how to behave on-air so that your audience trusts you.

Whether you are a US presidential candidate, a new prime minister or a business leader launching a product or vision, we think this requires three key things:

Warmth – because it is a good idea if the audience likes you.
Authority – because it is an even better idea that it sounds as if you know what you are talking about.
Animation – because the studio and the microphone will ‘shrink’ you. Most people have to be themselves plus 10% to come across well on-air.

But if you don’t have these great attributes how do you acquire on–air presence?

Our tips for improving your on-air presence

Media Training Basics: animation

Animation is perhaps the easiest attribute to acquire. The people who are naturally good on television are those that are larger than life and often rather hard work at dinner. This is not always true but people who seem quite normal on TV are often really big characters. An occasional interviewee doesn’t need to cultivate a whole new persona but just use a little more energy when speaking. Hand movement and head movement can be good so long as they not so noticeable that they are distracting.

Media Training Basics: authority

Authority is more intangible. We know it when we see it but trying to cultivate it can be challenging. There are, though, some basics.

Don’t speak too fast. This is probably the most common way that people undermine their own authority.
On television make sure you are looking in the right place. This can be straight at the camera or at the interviewer depending on the set-up. But hold a steady gaze and don’t let your eyes flick up, down or sideways if you can help it.
Don’t use highfalutin language. We mention this every other week so do not need to labour the point here, but jargon and professional language does not make you sound clever; it makes you sound arrogant and out of touch. Be colloquial.
Consider a personal anecdote. People trust the opinions of those that have relevant personal experience. These need to be planned, rehearsed and above all short but they can really work.

Here are some other tips about being more authoritative in general. And here are some tips written especially for women in an article in Forbes, although most apply to men as well.

Having a coach to help you improve can make a big difference

Media Training Basics: warmth

Warmth is perhaps the most elusive. Some people have it by the bucket-load even if they are not the most polished interviewee. It is worth a lot. If you don’t have it naturally on-air you can try the following things.

Try smiling more, particularly at the beginning or end of an interview. Even on radio, you can hear a smile.
Try to be less formal. Often people lack warmth because they think they are required to be very, very serious and correct.
A trick I have often used is to ask the interviewee to pretend they really like the interviewer. Of course, in reality, they probably hate the presenter and the process but if they can pretend or act ‘attraction’ or ‘affection’ it will come across. Clearly, this could be taken too far and it will be acting. When coaching people we find that once they hit the right tone – and then watch it back on video playback – they can usually find it again. With coaching, it will become their default on-air tone at which point it is ‘job done’.

Think about the tone as well as the words when preparing for an interview

Getting the tone right is half the battle and will compensate for other missteps in an interview. In the end ‘people buy people’ as the saying goes: so developing a good on-air presence is something worth working on.