By John Lavey | Hammock President and COO

A typical sales call never goes exactly as planned. You may have worked hard to ensure that all decision-makers would be in the room for your presentation. Only after you arrive, do you sometimes learn that a key attendee won’t be present.

Someone typically minimizes the importance of the absence, remarking, “Just email your presentation deck, and we’ll share that with [missing person].” This statement should set off alarm bells in your mind. However well-intended that statement may be, don’t head down that path.

In reality, most presentation decks are barely adequate for the job for which they were intended: the presentation. Good decks are rare, and they require good presenters to really hit the message home. The best decks enhance and complement the presenter’s ability to communicate and make persuasive points.

When you must share the points of a presentation with those absent, the best solution is a second-degree presentation. Think of the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game, where there are degrees of separation from the source. Second-degree presentations—which can be built as dynamic PDFs or small websites, but usually include a printable PDF version—are meant to effectively communicate the main ideas shared in a presentation. They include text, images and sometimes video. They become a much more dynamic leave-behind.

A second-degree presentation addresses the reality of long sales cycles. Maybe you’ve made a presentation to a prospect, but six months pass before they are ready to revive the discussion. A second-degree presentation is a great refresher of the conversation and how you will solve their problems.

Long sales cycles also require more touches to nurture relationships after an initial sales call. The more personal the better. Think of this group as a separate audience. At the very least, your message should be customized to them. Let them hear your voice.

This week’s Idea Email is an excerpt from Hammock’s most recent Idea Ebook: Seven Ideas That Will Help Your Healthcare Customers Make Better Buying Decisions. For insights on how superior marketing content plays a powerful role in influencing healthcare decision-makers, click here to download the second Ebook of our series, A Healthcare Marketer’s Guide to Enduring Customer Relationships series.

Image Credit | iStock

About Hammock Healthcare Idea Email | This post is part of Hammock’s award-winning Idea Email series. Idea Emails are sent every other week and share one insightful marketing idea. Idea Email comes in two flavors: Original and Healthcare. To subscribe to the original Idea Email (general marketing ideas), click here . To subscribe to the Healthcare Idea Email (healthcare marketing ideas), click here.