What Makes a Good Sales Presentation [Answered by experts]
- Ink Narrates | The Presentation Design Agency
- 3 days ago
- 7 min read
Our client, Jake, asked us an interesting question while we were making his sales deck.
He leaned forward in the Zoom call, eyes sharp, and said,
“What makes a good sales presentation… really?”
Our Creative Director didn’t even flinch. She smiled and answered,
“A good sales presentation makes people want to give you their money.”
Boom. Simple, brutal, accurate.
As a presentation design agency, we work on dozens of sales presentations every year. Pitches for funding, pitches for clients, pitches for partners, pitches for people who are so damn tired of pitches they need something that punches through. And in the process, we’ve noticed one common challenge: most sales presentations are drowning in bullshit.
Yeah, we said it. Overstuffed slides. Confusing narratives. Bad visuals. Way too much ego, way too little focus on what the buyer actually cares about.
So, in this blog, we’re going to cut through the noise and tell you straight: what makes a good sales presentation and how you can actually deliver one without boring people to death.
You ready? Let’s go.
In case you didn't know, we specialize in only one thing: making presentations. We can help you by designing your slides and writing your content too.
Why Is It Important for You to Understand the Difference Between a Good and Bad Sales Deck?
Let’s be brutally honest here — you’ve probably sat through (or maybe even delivered) a sales deck that sucked.
You know the type.
Slides crammed with text that nobody reads.
Buzzwords vomited across every page like a corporate word salad.
Charts that look impressive but make you go, “What the hell am I even looking at?”
A presenter who talks at you, not with you.
Look, we get it — it’s tempting to think a bad sales deck is just an inconvenience. But here’s the hard truth: a bad sales presentation doesn’t just waste time — it kills deals.
You need to understand the difference between a good and bad sales deck because your buyers are overwhelmed.
They’re sitting through pitch after pitch, meeting after meeting, trying to figure out who the hell actually understands their problems.
If your deck is bad, you’re making their decision easy, they’re cutting you off the list.
A good sales presentation, on the other hand, does something magical. It cuts through the noise. It makes people want to listen. It makes them say, “Damn, these folks get it. Where do I sign?”
So yeah, it matters. It’s not about looking pretty (though design sure as hell helps). It’s about moving people from indifference to action.
If you can’t tell the difference between a deck that sells and a deck that sinks, you’re gambling every time you present. And let’s be real, in sales, you can’t afford to gamble.
What Makes a Good Sales Presentation?
We’re not going to dance around this: A good sales presentation makes people want to say yes.
Not “that’s interesting.”
Not “let me think about it.”
Not “send me the slides and we’ll get back to you.”
YES.
That’s the entire job of a sales presentation.
And if yours isn’t doing that, then congrats — you’ve got yourself a glorified information dump, not a sales tool.
Let’s break this down into the hard lessons we’ve learned designing these decks for years.
1️⃣ Stop Talking About Yourself
Here’s a little slap of reality: nobody cares about your company’s life story.
You’ve got five minutes, maybe ten, to grab their attention. So why, oh why, are you opening with
your company timeline,
the “About Us” slide from 2005, or
ten bullet points about how “innovative” you are?
Newsflash: your buyer doesn’t care how innovative you say you are. They care if you solve their damn problem.
A good sales presentation flips the focus:
Not “Here’s why we’re amazing.”
But “Here’s how we fix the thing that’s keeping you up at night.”
Start with their pain. Show them you understand. Make it so specific that they feel like you’ve been reading their email.
Only after you’ve nailed that do you earn the right to talk about yourself — and even then, only as it directly connects to solving their problem.
2️⃣ Ditch the Data Dump
We’ve seen decks with 57 slides. No joke.
And you know what? By slide 8, the buyer is on their phone.
Too much information is as bad as too little. When you overload a sales deck with stats, charts, technical specs, or — god help us — your entire product manual, you’re not impressing anyone.
You’re just making them work to figure out what matters.
A good sales presentation does the heavy lifting for the audience. It answers:
What’s the one key insight they need to remember?
What’s the one stat that proves your point?
What’s the one story that brings your solution to life?
Less is more. But let’s be clear — less doesn’t mean empty fluff. It means ruthless editing to surface only what moves the sale forward.
3️⃣ Tell a Damn Story
Here’s where most sales decks fall flat.
They’re structured like a product brochure, not a story. And people don’t remember brochures. They remember stories.
A good sales presentation follows a narrative arc:
Here’s the world as it is (with the problem you’re facing).
Here’s why that sucks (and why ignoring it will cost you).
Here’s the better world you could have (with our help).
Here’s how we get you there (the solution + proof).
Here’s why now (the urgency to act).
Notice how that’s a flow, not a pile of disconnected slides?Good storytelling creates emotional momentum.
We’ve seen it time and time again: The decks that close deals aren’t the ones with the fanciest graphics or the longest feature lists — they’re the ones that make buyers feel something.
Solve my problem. Help me win. Make me look smart.
That’s the emotional juice you need.
4️⃣ Design Like You Give a Shit
Okay, let’s talk design.
Because here’s where most people shoot themselves in the foot.
You can have the best story in the world — but if your slides look like they were made by an intern at 2 a.m. after six Red Bulls, you’re dead in the water.
Ugly slides signal that you don’t care. Or worse, that you don’t know what you’re doing.
And no, we’re not saying you need Hollywood-level production.But you do need slides that are:
Clear
Visually clean
Easy to follow
Aligned with your brand
Designed for the audience, not your own ego
Good design makes complex ideas simple. It draws the eye where you want it. It reinforces the story without overwhelming it.
And most importantly? It shows respect.
Because if you can’t be bothered to design your pitch well, why should the buyer trust you to deliver anything else well?
5️⃣ Practice Like You Mean It
We’ve sat in too many practice runs where the presenter shrugs and says, "I’ll just wing it.”
Oh, honey. No.
You don’t wing it in sales. Because the second you stumble, ramble, or lose the thread, the buyer is gone.
A good sales presentation isn’t just well-designed — it’s well-delivered.That means:
You know your key points cold.
You can adapt on the fly if the conversation shifts.
You don’t read off the slides like a robot.
You engage, listen, and respond like a human.
We’ve seen great decks die because the presenter couldn’t carry the room.And we’ve seen okay decks close deals because the presenter was so damn confident, clear, and connected.
Practice matters. If you’re not rehearsing, you’re not respecting the opportunity.
6️⃣ Build for Conversation, Not Lecture
Here’s a wild idea: your deck isn’t the star — the conversation is.
The goal isn’t to deliver every slide you made. The goal is to create a space where the buyer opens up, shares their real concerns, and feels like you’re solving their problem, not pitching your canned solution.
Good sales decks are designed to be flexible. They let you skip around. They let you dive deeper where needed. They let you respond to what’s happening in the room.
Rigid, over-scripted decks? They kill conversation. Good decks spark it.
7️⃣ Make the Ask
This one sounds obvious, but you’d be shocked how many decks we see that don’t do it.
If you want the sale, ask for it.
What’s the next step? What’s the clear call to action? What do you want the buyer to do right now?
A good sales presentation ends with clarity.
No vague “we’ll follow up.”
No “let us know if you’re interested.”
Instead:
“We’re ready to onboard you next week — shall we get the contract in motion?”
“Let’s set up a pilot — does Tuesday work for you?”
“We’d love to lock in the next meeting — how’s your calendar looking?”
You don’t get what you don’t ask for. And a deck that doesn’t close with an ask is just a fancy lecture.
Bonus Tip: Read the Room
Want to know the real secret behind every good sales presentation?
It’s this: read the room.
A good deck is just a tool. The magic happens when you, the presenter, are fully tuned into the people in front of you.
Are they nodding along?
Are they confused?
Are they engaged or zoning out?
Adjust. Pivot. Respond.
Your slides won’t save you if you’re not paying attention.
We’ve seen presenters stick to script even as the buyer clearly wanted to talk about something else — and guess what? They lost the deal.
Good salespeople use the deck as a launchpad, not a cage.
Stay present. Stay flexible. Stay sharp.
Why Hire Us to Build your Presentation?
If you're reading this, you're probably working on a presentation right now. You could do it all yourself. But the reality is - that’s not going to give you the high-impact presentation you need. It’s a lot of guesswork, a lot of trial and error. And at the end of the day, you’ll be left with a presentation that’s “good enough,” not one that gets results. On the other hand, we’ve spent years crafting thousands of presentations, mastering both storytelling and design. Let us handle this for you, so you can focus on what you do best.