Last night after a long day of video recording, I treated myself to a tasting menu at Crop in downtown Cleveland. The wine and nearly all of the courses were excellent – especially the seared foie gras on a small waffle with a cherry gastrique. THAT was one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.
But there was one big clunker on the menu – the beet salad. I have never been a fan of beets and cringed every time my mom served them so when the beet course came, I was apprehensive. I took a couple bites and didn’t like it. “Maybe it’s just me,” I thought. Then I looked over at the couple sitting to my left and saw that they too only took a couple bites of the infamous beet salad as well. My guess is a lot of beet salads went back to the kitchen unconsumed.
Are you wondering why the heck I’m talking to you about beets? Have I lost my mind? No, there is a moral to my little dining tale and here ’tis…
Like a well constructed tasting menu, your sales presentations are made up of different component parts and those parts need to be put together in the proper sequence.
I have a VERY specific formula I follow whenever I construct ANY one to many sales presentation. One section flows naturally and gracefully into the next and builds momentum to the close. I analyze my presentation as I practice it. My conscious and subconscious are always looking for (FEELING) where things just aren’t right. When I find something that doesn’t work or feel right, I rework it. I don’t cut the component part out but rather change it so it flows better.
In the case of the tasting menu, the chef shouldn’t cut out the salad course because then the meal would be incomplete, he should change the component piece that isn’t working, namely the beets.
Closers know that everything in a presentation matters and work to make each component part as effective as possible. Do you?
Kick butt, make mucho DEEnero!
Dave “Beet Hater” Dee
P.S. Just a reminder that today at 11:00 ET, Dan Kennedy are filming a new product “Growth Hacks: 12 Strategies To Double Your Profits RIght Now” and you can watch the whole thing for free. This will be four hours of content and not a sales pitch although you will have the opportunity to buy the recordings and get some bonuses if you choose to. Get the details here.