“Can you or should you use your b2b prospect or customer’s logo in your sales presentation?”
Several times this question has come up from sales people so I thought I should share my response to help as many b2b sales people as possible.
The answer is “Yes,” you should use their logo when you are talking about a proposal to the company. However, their are a couple of additional tips to offer you as well as a couple of things to check. First, using the logo of another company is fine – as long as you are addressing this company’s buyers or decision makers. It helps to personalize the proposal.
Second, a couple of additional things you can do to influence the buyers during the sales presentation.
- Use a picture of their corporate office as the background for the lead slide as well as the proposal cover.
- If you are looking to change their equipment, take a picture of the existing machinery and use Photoshop to replace the existing piece of equipment with a picture of your equipment.
- If you are changing their processes which will change their inventory storage or warehouse situation, then take a picture of the area to be changed, again using Photoshop change the image from cluttered mess to organized. Or convert a previous warehouse space to an open area. Then use a series of slides to show alternative uses for the space – production lines, office space, etc. This allows the decision makers to “see and visualize” the outcome of your sales presentation and proposal.
- Use a video testimonial from an equal rank user or decision maker talking about how your solution solved a problem (Super effective when it is the same problem the decision maker and team are experiencing.)
Third, if you are not handy with computer software like Photoshop you can usually find one in your marketing department. If you are with a small company and have no marketing department, you can usually find a local design studio or independent graphic artist who can do this project fast and cheap. By the way, you can use a website www.elance.com to have people from around the world bid on your project. You can give the specifics of the job and budget limits and then get a number of quotes from people willing to do your design project. (They could probably do your presentation visuals and slides also.)
Fourth, a couple of times to watch out for when using another company’s logo.
- It is better to either download a copy of the logo, have the customer send you a copy or maybe your marketing department has purchased a CD or DVD with thousand’s of actual logos available for use.
- Do not attempt to reproduce the logo. If your font does not match the official logo trademark, you could cause a bigger problem for yourself.
- Do not change their colors. Logo’s are usually color coded a specific way and again are part of the legal trademark and should not be changed. (Learned this one by accident, when building a train the trainer system for a client, their color was black rather than the dark blue used. Had to go back and change everything with their logo. – bummer!)
- Regarding the photos or pictures inside the plant or office. Be certain you do not take any pictures that would show any unique systems or special developments or even new product launches. If you do, you may get more questions about things you never intended, if you know what I mean.
Finally, there you have some major b2b sales presentation tips. Use them to be more effective with your sales presentations. Be different from the thundering herd of sales presentation that are using the standard Microsoft Templates.
By the way, if you are using the standard PowerPoint templates, you are running the risk of showing a presentation used during the local Rotary club, social club or school presentation. When this happens – and it does – the decision makers will be thinking about the other presentation rather than your great information. Be different and win more sales.
Voss Graham
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It can certainly be a minefield using a client’s or a prospect’s logo in your sales presentation. It’s good advice to use the best possible image you can get, preferably directly from the client or prospect. So many presentations are marred with grainy, low resolution pictures copied from a website. It looks unprofessional.