Have you ever thought about how many different tools you would have to use to give an interesting, interactive online presentation? Including all the preparation and follow-up? Perhaps in one tool? You will be surprised! The following is a compilation of needed tools… EXPERIMENT: Try to do the above steps on an iPad. But there is an easier way in one tool! For all the above operations you should only need one tool, which is ready to use without setup. The need for multiple monitors should be gone and easy to use on all desktop and mobile devices. Automations should replace many manual steps and save time and money.

Presentations often come with a portfolio of in-depth documents that answer detailed questions. These documents should be accessible quickly and, above all, seamlessly. A system that stores these documents and makes them available with one click is recommended. It should be avoided that the participants see how to search for additional information. Unfortunately, the view of all participants on their own desktop is still very common in practice and does not look very professional. Also documents and links which can fit to the topic should be deposited. Furthermore, all documents available in the company should be quickly retrievable from a document library, e.g. by tagging them. Stored links should automatically switch on the streaming mode, so that the participants see no difference between the presentation and the desktop streaming.

It is modern to enrich presentations with interactive elements. The goal is to break the ice, to increase the attention of the participants and to keep it over the duration of the presentation. If the participants themselves become an active part of the presentation, the connection to the presentation is also greater because they have interacted themselves. Interactive elements can include consent, gamification, polls, survey  or approvals. The goal is to have the participants actively express themselves. Such interactive passages of the presentation should be used in a well-dosed manner on the one hand and seamlessly integrated in presentations on the other hand. Leaving the presentation should be avoided at all costs. Currently, however, calling up a link to an external survey or polling system is the norm. Besides disrupting the harmonious flow of the presentation, exiting the presentation environment also poses technical risks: Will the poll be displayed correctly? The results are also displayed in the external system. The same applies to switching between interactive presentations and desktop sharing. This process must be completely seamless for the participants and the host and must be conveniently executable with only one screen.

Pencil selling means that a salesperson illustrates his offer with a pencil during the sales talk. In this way, both sides of the customer’s brain are addressed at the same time: the left half with words, the right half with pictures. Pencil selling is therefore a brain-friendly form of communication that is generally more comprehensible and credible and is better stored in the memory than purely verbal communication. A large part of humanity understands things more easily and can retain them better if they are underpinned by images. This is exactly where Pencil Selling comes in, because it accommodates the way our brain works. On the one hand, visually highlighting important aspects for the customer helps him to quickly grasp the relevant information. On the other hand, he can comprehend complex facts much more easily. Because the eye in particular is addressed by the painting, the sales talk takes on a completely different dynamic. This creates an additional opportunity for interaction that involves the customer even more. Pencil Selling Online Online, you have the choice of using an external whiteboard. In case of doubt, the whiteboard is too slow, because you have to draw all the standardized elements as well

In the classic desktop sharing presentation, you use the mouse cursor to direct the attention of the participants. If you want to point out a specific point or area, you move the mouse there. Modern online presentations, however, are interactive and dynamic. Often, other documents or online content are shown alongside the presentation. The mouse movements of the presenter are transferred here also with the search for suitable contents inclusive the display of his screen so that one can watch him. This problem can be solved elegantly e.g. with Ping Points. Only a click into the presentation triggers a ping point visible for all participants. Also the participants have the possibility to create ping points by clicking into the presentation and thus to direct the attention to a certain area, e.g. in case of a query. This mechanism promotes the dialog during a business talk and ensures that only the desired is pointed out.

During a business talk, topics are discussed and results achieved. These results must then be recorded for all to see. The classic method is for one participant – usually the presenter – to take notes and then make the results available to the other participants in writing. This process not only involves a time lag (you may not have time to rework the talks until a few days later) but also the risk that other participants may have understood the talk and the agreements somewhat differently. The possibility to make notes directly on the individual slides for all to see helps a lot here. All participants can approve on the content of the individual notes so that no questions remain unanswered. Immediately after the meeting, the presentation should be summarized with the notes in a PDF Document that can be sent to all participants without any time delay.

One of the biggest differences between an online presentation and a face-to-face meeting is the ability to recognize body language and facial expressions. If you keep an eye on the facial expressions and body language of the participants, you can recognize much earlier whether the participant expresses agreement or disagreement. For this, however, it is necessary to have the participant videos always in view. The position of the participant videos and the own camera should be placed in a line, e.g. at the top in the middle, so that you can look the participants in the eyes. A typical negative example is that the video and camera are on monitor 1 and the presentation you are looking at is on monitor 2. This causes you to talk to the participants with your head turned away – neither elegant nor polite. The possibilities to score points with your own facial expressions and body language are very close to an on-site conversation.

How often does it happen that spontaneously additional persons are to participate in a meeting in order to be able to cover the expertise in further specialist areas. However, additional participants are difficult to identify when simply taking part in an online meeting. The presentation flow is stopped if you first clarifies in peace who the additional participant is and in which function he participates. Furthermore, the follow-up of such an appointment is more time-consuming, since the additional participants also want to have the results of the meeting sent and they must therefore first be recorded in the CRM. In this case systems can help, which on the one hand query this elementary information before joining to presentation and on the other hand store permanently, so that you know in the follow-up who participated and which function the participant has. Ideally, the system captures the email address of all participants to send them the result of the conversation. This way you can be sure not to lose any information and to send the results of the conversation to all participants with a minimum of effort.

Reworking an online meeting is time consuming and laborious. You transfer your handwritten notes into a CRM. Furthermore,  you summarizes the results in writing to make them available to the participants. This time can be saved with automatic recording systems. Content, participants, results of surveys and polls, comments and notes are automatically recorded and summarized in a result PDF. This result PDF is automatically assigned to participants in the CRM and previously unknown participants are automatically created. This way, you never lose track of who has seen what and can concentrate on the tasks to be completed. If notes have been made on the individual pages, these can be transferred to a CRM as tasks.