This is popular. Lots of companies put these slides at the beginning of their presentations:
“We’re the biggest _________ in the world”
“Our customers give us a 99.9% approval rating”
“Our sales have ________ in the past 5 years”
Here’s the deal. You can still leave (or talk to) these messages in your presentation. That’s fine. BUT, don’t lead off with them — speaking to them right off the bat significantly limits their impact.
People’s guards are up.
We’re not wired to trust new people right away, especially salespeople. Think about when you walk into a retail store and a salesperson approaches you – whether we need their help or not, our instinct is to say, “I’m okay”.
If you tell someone you’re the #1 company at doing X right off the bat, it simply won’t resonate. People’s guards are still up. They don’t know you yet, or at least don’t have a sense of who you are. We put people into categories of trust – and most people need some time to determine whether they like you and trust you before they believe and absorb your messages.
Build trust through value.
How do we build trust with our audience? Educate them. Provide them with some value. Share some information relevant to what they do. Talk to them about how your products work (or how products like yours work) coupled with stories or examples that are helpful/interesting to them. Schmooze a little prior to your presentation, so you’ve broken the ice beforehand. Humanize yourself if possible. Say things that allow your audience to relate you, things that show that you’re human too.
Trust can be built quicker than you think. You don’t need to go into a 20-minute pitch before trust is built, but the more value we provide in a genuine way, the more the audience will be on your side.
A wall and a hammer.
Think of a wall between you and your audience, and trust as your hammer. The more trust we create, the more we break down that wall – which in turn allows people to see us, hear us, and ultimately be open to believing and receiving our messages.
So, if you’re going to use slides that detail all the great stats related to your company -- my advice: move them near the end of your presentation, and if you’ve done a good job of building trust and value throughout, they’ll hit home and resonate much, much more.
Post-question: But wait, isn’t it important to give our audience the lay of the land before getting into our presentation? They should know who we are, right?
That’s fine. I agree, to an extent. Ask yourself, could this message come across as too boastful? If your gut-check says “yes”, then maybe just stick to messages that simply talk to when, how and why your company started. That’s not “bragging”. You can still do a company intro. without “selling”.