It’s So Easy

 

Ryan Downard has good reason to show off his bright, white smile. As sales services manager at Dentsply International, it’s up to Downard to ensure that his sales force presents the most compelling picture possible of the Pennsylvania-based manufacturer’s dental products. It’s no easy task, but Downard has discovered a portable presentation tool – the Motion Computing M1400 Tablet PC with wireless connectivity – that guarantees his sales reps a brush with success.

 

Welcome to the world of high-tech, lightweight portable presentation tools. Long gone are the days of painfully obese projectors, workstation-swallowing desktop computers and immovable amplification systems. Today’s sales professionals demand tools that are light enough to take on the road, wireless enough to use anywhere and high tech enough to impress even the most jaded audiences. That’s not all. Sales pros such as Downard also rely on practically weightless, versatile and user-friendly presentation technology to take a bite out of the competition’s market share.

 

The Motion Computing M1400 Tablet PC is a perfect example. Although weighing in at only three pounds, this tablet PC refuses to sacrifice screen space for portability – a 12.1-inch XGA LCA display promises excellent viewing angles in all types of light. The result is a lightweight presentation product that is ideal for helping Dentsply’s 135 sales professionals demonstrate the company’s "technique-sensitive and technology-driven" products in both an interactive and collaborative fashion.

 

Downard says, "The light weight of the Motion Computing M1400 Tablet PC allows us to very quickly pull it out of the bag – no different than a piece of literature – and make that literature come alive." What’s more, nearly half of Dentsply’s sales force is currently using the wireless version of the M1400 Tablet PC. Supported by Intel Centrino mobile technology, these tablet PCs allow users to quickly establish reliable 802.11b network connections around the office, at Wi-Fi hotspots on the road or in a client’s boardroom.

 

"If a company has updated a presentation or a data sheet, a salesperson can wirelessly connect and get that latest and greatest information," says Debbie Crosek, Motion Computing’s director of product marketing. By accessing information on the go, salespeople can increase productivity and immediately address administrative matters – such as updating customer profiles – that might otherwise cut into revenue-generating activities.

 

Other high-tech features of the M1400 Tablet PC include a biometrics-based, integrated fingerprint reader for added security and integrated Bluetooth wireless connectivity to peripherals, such as a wireless mouse, phone or handheld device.

 

Impressive visuals are only half the battle when staging a presentation. Getting your audience to hear what you have to say – loud and clear – can make the difference between uninterested prospects and brand-new clients. It’s easier said than done, given the expansive size of many of today’s corporate boardrooms and hotel conference halls. Not to mention the fact that some of the amplification systems provided by today’s hotels appear as if they date back to prehistoric times.

 

"Most PA systems used for sales meetings, presentations, training sessions and seminars are rather heavy. A typical speaker can weigh 30 pounds or more, and there are two of them," says Keith Roberts, Interlink Electronics’ director of Corporate Communications. Add a microphone and microphone stand to the mix, and the load gets even heavier.

 

Fortunately, Interlink Electronics has developed a lightweight voice amplification system called GoSpeak. Thanks to flat-panel speaker technology, GoSpeak delivers clear omnidirectional sound that can reach audiences of up to 200 people. Weighing only 4.8 pounds, the device’s thin and light design allows users to simply plug in the speaker and connect a microphone. Sales professionals may also add sound effects and music to a presentation by connecting a computer or other auxiliary audio system.

 

Today’s high-tech presentation gadgets might be shrinking in size and poundage, but nothing’s more portable than a software program. Take, for example, Wildform’s Linx Flash Editor. This software application helps users combine, edit and manipulate Flash files to create multimedia presentations. Users need only drag and drop any type of Flash file into Linx to create an audience-captivating presentation.

 

J. R. Getches can testify to the powers of Linx Flash Editor. A Webmaster at Motley Rice, a plaintiffs’ litigation firm, he’s responsible for creating presentations for some of the toughest audiences – a judge and jury. "In the same way somebody that’s selling a product has to make an emotional connection with a potential buyer, we’re seeking to make an emotional connection with a judge and jury," says Getches.

 

To accomplish this, Getches uses Linx Flash Editor to embed interactive components in PowerPoint presentations. For example, one of the presentations Getches has created for the firm’s attorneys is a timeline outlining the events leading up to and following the 9/11 tragedy. When a Motley Rice lawyer moves his or her cursor over this timeline during court proceedings, pictures and video clips of passengers, crew members and terrorists automatically pop up onto the screen. In the past, Getches says creating a presentation with this type of emotional impact and technical sophistication would have been cost-prohibitive for the firm.

 

"It would have cost us an incredible amount of money. We would have had to hire all kinds of experts to actually appear in these presentations live," says Getches. However, with Linx Flash Editor, Getches can quickly and cost-effectively create power-packed presentations that can easily be carried from courtroom to courtroom.

 

Similarly, Accent Technologies’ Librarian is a browser-based solution that helps today’s road warriors develop presentations, using the most up-to-date sales and marketing information available. An advanced document-management tool, Librarian serves as an online repository of PDFs, PowerPoint slides and other vital sales assets, granting sales professionals easy access so they may tailor presentations at a moment’s notice.

 

"Presenters can very quickly search from within hundreds, even thousands, of presentations and keep drilling down to get exactly what they need," says Andrea Rogers, Accent Technologies’ product services manager.

 

Such easy access has helped Manulife Financial Corporation’s sales team expedite the sales cycle and increase productivity. Prior to implementing Accent’s Librarian, the Toronto-based company’s sales reps would have to log on to a network and sift through any number of databases in order to access the latest sales collateral – a difficult task for reps on the road.

 

All that’s changed since Manulife deployed Librarian’s one-stop-shopping solution in October 2004. According to Javed Khan, Manulife’s marketing manager of sales concepts, Librarian has "refocused a lot of our [sales professionals] to be doing what’s most important, and that’s building relationships with customers and selling."

 

What’s more, by creating a secure online knowledge base of pre-approved corporate collateral, reports and product information, Khan says Librarian "allows for a collaborative effort between marketing and sales."

 

Erik Bower understands the value of virtual technology. Bower is senior manager of e-marketing at Veritas Software, a California-based data management software company. Given the technical complexity of the company’s solutions, Veritas’ sales professionals would often have to invite clients to any one of its three executive briefing centers around the world, or painstakingly install the software on a laptop, to conduct a demonstration. As a result, many clients would miss the opportunity to experience Veritas’ software firsthand or would miss out on important segments of the enterprise software with limited laptop viewing. That is, until Veritas turned to Surgient’s Virtual Demo Management System.

 

Surgient’s VDMS stores a company’s software applications on a server so users may access them on demand via a centralized online demonstration system. Using a Web browser, sales professionals may access demonstration files and conduct a presentation virtually – using nothing more than a laptop. Once a demonstration is complete, resources are available for the next user. Surgient VDMS maintains the original file in the demo library ready for any user at any time.

 

The system has helped Bower’s sales professionals out of a number of sticky situations. In fact, Bower recalls a time when a Veritas sales professional learned that she was to provide a product demonstration to a new customer and had yet to install the necessary software. Rather than redirect the prospect to one of the company’s distant executive briefing centers, she was able to access Surgient’s VDMS and create the ideal presentation for the very next day.

 

"She found out about the presentation just in the nick of time, called me and I helped her get set up in a matter of 10 minutes. The next day, she went to the customer site to demo the software," recalls Bower, who says Surgient’s VDMS has helped Veritas save $950 per demonstration on reduced hardware costs, enhanced productivity and increased sales.

 

While there’s no beating the portability of virtual solutions such as Surgient’s VDMS, Access Technologies’ Librarian and Wildform’s Linx Flash Editor, today’s lightweight gadgets also promise unprecedented durability without the fear of technical glitches. For example, despite its small package, Interlink Electronics’ GoSpeak amplification system speaks volumes about resilience.

 

"GoSpeak has a clam-shell type of case that, once closed, is pretty rugged," says Jim Reisteter, Interlink Electronics vice president of Sales and Marketing. The Mobile Computing M1400 Tablet PC is no exception. Downard of Dentsply says he’s tested out the sturdiness of plenty of tablet PCs with varying results. As for the M1400 Tablet PC, he says, "the durability of the unit is excellent." That’s all the more reason to smile about today’s portable presentation tools and technologies.