Great... I'm up next to present, it's 2 PM, lunch is settling in, and half the room is asleep.
The guy pitching before me is covering some of the same material I was going to cover but it also showing so many charts that I'm starting to dose off as well. So I decided to call an audible, abandon my well written presentation, and start off with the picture of my daughter.
I am presenting to a group of home service business owners and I use the image to emphasize a point. "You operate in a trust economy. I have to trust your businesses enough to have one of your technicians go over to my house when my daughter and wife are home along"
Silence filled the room and I let the picture sink in. This moment created more understanding, realism, and impact than any other presentation I had done.
Immediately after my presentation there was a line at my table and in 30 minutes we had closed over $30,000 right on the trade show floor.
Looking back at this experience I'm reminded of one of my favorite quotes:
“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” -Maya Angelou
Find a way to insert emotion into the sales pitch. It makes you more relatable, trustworthy, and will do more for your success in sales than any stat or chart can do.