It doesn’t matter if you’re speaking in front of a crowd of 400 or meeting over coffee with one uncertain insurance prospect. If you want to be a compelling presenter, learn how to speak well, and mold your presentation into a compelling sales pitch. There’s no room for public speaking anxiety in insurance sales. Many of the most successful agents, business professionals, and even sports personalities understand the value in being a compelling presenter.

Being calm and collected earns trust; your audience can pick up on your trepidation so let's hammer out some ways to build your confidence. Speaking clearly and with confidence isn’t the only way to be a compelling presenter. Employ some – or all – of these presentation strategies before following up on your next insurance lead and see if you notice a difference in the flow of your conversation. We're hoping it leads to your next sale!

Open strong

When you read the newspaper article or a blog, how far do you get from the start before losing attention? Chance are it happens pretty quickly. To really capture your audience’s interest, make an impact immediately. Try a stat, financial model, or impactful visuals to to help you set the tone and capture their interest from the start. 

Tell a relatable story

After creating such a captivating lede, don’t you want your leads to continue following those selling points you've been working on presenting? Storytelling is a great way to keep your audience connected to your presentation. There are several good techniques to weave story throughout a presentation. For a life insurance pitch, case stories or cautionary tales work well. For property and casualty agents, it might be good to highlight minor incidents that can balloon into catastrophes. Health agents and those focusing on Final Expense might simply use the ever-increasing cost of healthcare or burial costs.

However you do it, make it personal, relatable, understandable. 

Get the wheels turning

Rhetorical questions help your audience relate to your presentation. A simple, “Do you have enough money to pay off your mortgage if you were to pass away tomorrow?” or “Are your children’s education costs covered?” will get your leads thinking about the importance of insurance. No, you don’t want or need your audience to actually answer you, but you do want them to think to themselves about your statements.

Try shock value

You started with a lede to immediately capture your prospects attention, you’ve continued with storytelling to keep them interested, but if you really want to get their attention, try a tiny bit of eye-opening "shock value". Be smart with your ending.

Just as you started strongly, you want to end your presentation with your audience members feeling satisfied. Even better, you want to leave them wanting more.

Use multimedia

Don’t be fooled into thinking that storytelling is done with words and words alone. You can bring a presentation to a completely different level by incorporating visuals, like images or videos. Better yet, come prepared with video testimonials from happy clients.

The only word of caution here is to make sure your material is ready to go instantly. You can easily kill a possible new sale when your presentations don't work or there are technical difficulties.

Use takeaways

Give each of your insurance customers something to consider on your exit. Leave them with a tactile reminder of your presentation. A business card is a good start, but to stand out from the crowd of other insurance agents, you’ll need more. Hire a graphic designer to create a Life Insurance Planning handout you can share with your audience or pull together a summary of the statistics you shared.

The point is to make it clear and concise. The most important parts of your takeaway should focus on 1) supporting what you presented in clearly understandable visuals and stats and 2) your call to action (CTA) or how and where you can be reached for follow-up questions or to discuss the options further. 

Make time for a Q/A session

Before you ask for a sale, ask for questions from your audience about your presentation. Not only can you clear up any confusion, but you can use the questions to update your next presentation.

Here’s the thing about Q&As: make sure you’re prepared with answers. Stumbling, mumbling, and bumbling will take away from your well-presented pitch.

Adapt to your audience

You’d sell life insurance differently to a 20-year-old than you would an almost retiree. Make sure your sales pitch reflects the audience you’re speaking to. Yes, you’ll be sharing the same information to all audiences, but you’ll speak to different needs and values.

You also need to find a way to individualize it. Adapting a presentation changes your sales strategy. Individualizing it makes the entire about your audience. If you’re speaking to an employer group of mental health clinicians, say, “You teach your clients the importance of self care. Put that lesson into practice by investing in life insurance to protect your family.” When meeting with an individual with young children, point out how life insurance can fund their college savings in the worst-case scenario.

Be concise

If you have 60 minutes for your presentation, only use 45. By presenting all the information about your life insurance policies in a clear and timely manner, you’re positioning yourself as an expert. Also, by speaking less, you’ll allow more time for questions...and more time to ask them for a close.

Take a breath

Want to know to ruin a presentation? Rush through your message speaking as quickly as possible without taking a breath for a pause. If you don’t ruin it by losing the interest of your audience, you surely will mess it up when you pass out from a lack of oxygen.

Take a breath in between sentences. You’ll sound more professional, and it will give your leads time to truly take in your pitch.

Practice

If you really want to be a compelling presenter, you’ll practice...and practice some more. There’s no need to memorize your presentation. Chances are a memorized speech will make you sound like a robot.

Which strategy do you think is the most important? Are there any other strategies you’d add to our list? Comment below.