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All of that goes up in smoke
when the presenter sucks. After
having attended numerous confer-
ences and webinars and moderated
many panels, I’ve come to realize
that speakers are a lot like politi-
cians; they have talking points to
get out whether it fits or not. That
makes for an awful presentation.
I watched a senior vice presi-
dent at Cisco years ago show
videos during his keynote when
he wasn’t reading the slides to the
audience. Is that how he presents
to the Board or his CEO? Of course
not. He would get fired. How is that
audience any different than a con-
ference audience?
Attendees have paid to be there.
They are giving up their time to lis-
ten. And the presenter chooses to
cheapen it by not preparing and giv-
ing an ordinary talk.
This brings us to the second
hitch: Getting the attendee to hear
and take action.
Humans like stories. It is how
we relate and how we learn. It is
why case studies are popular.
I understand that you want to
show off your company, but you
need to frame it in a way that
says, “What’s in it for the listener?”
Would you have coffee with a
friend and give the same presenta-
tion? Then why do it to a stranger?
Today, with the number of confer-
ences, road shows and webinars
increasing, there is more opportunity
to get in front of potential partners.
This is a chance to make that first
impression. Are you going to do that
by puking on them about the com-
pany fact sheet? I hope not.
There are a number of ways to
personalize it. One way is to start
with what you like best about the
company or why you joined the
company (other than I needed a
paycheck). Maybe the company
culture is better than most provid-
ers or the uptime is higher. What is
the value prop?
Another way is to just talk about
the last deal. Or talk about an up-
sell: “A partner brought in a client to
buy network and after discussion we
found that the client was also wor-
ried about security so we bundled
managed security with the WAN.”
These will be required to sell
SD-WAN. It will be use cases over
and over to get the word out about
Most Effective – and Challenging – Lead Nurturing Tactics (79% B2B; % of Respondents)
Tactic
Most Effective
Most Challenging
Creating relevant content
60%
59%
Personalizing campaigns
40%
32%
Targeting by prospect persona
39%
39%
Targeting by decision stage
38%
40%
Nurturing campaign workflows
35%
33%
Segmenting lead data
31%
29%
Multichannel integration
20%
31%
Source: Ascend2/Research Partners, December 2015
Source:
MarketingCharts.com;IDG
58
CHANNEL
VISION
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July - August 2016