Whether you love them or loathe them, sales presentations are a big part of working in sales. You and your team have read the RFP or job spec and done all of your research to put together the most compelling offer. Now, it's time to impress the prospect with a great presentation. A bit of theatre and a lot of planning and coordination come together to pull off the winning pitch.
Having software that can help you organize your thoughts and make your presentation look polished and professional is table stakes today. But how do you know what software you should use? The options for sales presentation software continue to increase, so how do you cut out the noise and pick the tool that works best for you and your team? While the answer to this question may depend on a lot of variables, we'll look at some of the best on the market and how they came to be that way so you can make an informed decision.
Key Takeaways
- Using the right presentation software can help you make a strong impression in a sales presentation.
- Choosing the right software depends on the type of sales you do and the size of your company.
- There are great options for sales presentation software that fit every budget.
- Sales presentation software is starting to embrace AI. It's okay to embrace these features if they help make you more productive without diluting your message or adding false information.
How do you choose the right sales presentation software?
Like investing in any other type of sales software, there are a few things you'll want to consider when choosing your sales presentation software. First and foremost, what features do you need, and how much budget do you have to invest? If you need the ability to create a basic slide deck, there are many free tools you can use. You may also want to use a tool like Google Slides or PowerPoint if you have a large team and a designer on staff who can create a branded template so your sales team has a base to start from.
Using a more powerful tool that allows you to create a highly polished sales deck easily might be even more important if you have a smaller, leaner team and you're just getting started.
To pick the right tool for your tool stack belt, make a list of all of your requirements and order them from most important to least important. Then, align on your ideal budget for your tool. Having this information upfront will help you make the right choice more easily.
Features to look for in sales presentation software
Whether you're looking for something tried and true or you're ready to embrace new technologies on the cutting edge of sales presentation software, you want to get clear on your requirements so you don't end up with a piece of software that doesn't meet the needs of your team.
For example, if you have a highly collaborative and distributed team, you likely need web-based presentation software that allows for collaboration between multiple team members.
If you sell in the enterprise space and have large buying committees, you might need a tool that allows you to share a link with multiple people after the presentation and bonus points for analytics capabilities that allow you to see who has looked at your presentation after the fact and which part of the material they continue to revisit.
If your sales team skews older, you might want a simpler tool instead of choosing solutions requiring technical expertise to make them work.
Before you start shopping for your new or upgraded presentation software, make a list of the most important things you want to look for and any features you're hoping to avoid. This will help you make the right choice more efficiently and be able to start churning out visually impressive interactive sales pitches more quickly.
The best sales presentation software in 2024
There are many highly versatile tools on the market to help sellers quickly and efficiently create and distribute highly polished sales decks. Here are a few of our favorites:
Best for sales teams: Qwilr
We certainly have to toot our own horn first. Qwilr's sales presentation software cannot only be used to create and distribute sales proposals, one sheets, contracts, NDAs, and so many more sales and marketing materials, but it's also great for creating visuals for sales presentations.
Primary use cases: Creating sales and marketing materials and sales presentation visuals.
Standout features: Web-based platform with analytics that provide insight into who is viewing your materials, when (and how long) they view, and which sections they focus on. Qwilr's documents are visually impressive, and it's easy to embed rich images, videos, and other multimedia components, as well as spreadsheets and other detailed information to help your client or prospect understand the opportunity. Finally, when your client is ready to sign on the dotted line, eSignature capabilities make this easier than ever.
Templates: Qwilr offers a robust proposal template library making it easier than ever to create a winning presentation or proposal.
Qwilr has a range of templates such as :
- Marketing Proposals (Example such as Google Ads, Mobile App Development, Software Development)
- Enterprise Sales Proposal
- SaaS Proposals
Tracking & analytics: Built-in tracking and analytics allow sellers to see how often their sales pitch deck or proposal is viewed and what parts the viewer is coming back to over and over.
Integrations: Qwilr offers many integrations, including native integrations with many popular CRMs, so it's easy to follow the flow of information sellers share with their prospects.
Customer support: Need help? Qwilr's customer support team is only an email away.
Pricing: The business plan will run you $35/per user per month (when paid annually), and the enterprise plan will run $59/per user per month (when paid annually)
Best for early-stage businesses and startups: Google Slides
If your business is just getting started, Google Slides might be the best tool for your sales presentations. Included in the Google suite, users should have access to this with their business emails.
Primary use cases: This familiar presentation platform is used for creating decks and slides for sales meetings, virtual sales presentations, and other meeting points across a sales cycle (like customer onboarding).
Standout features: It's easy to share the presentation across your team to collaborate on building the slides needed to woo your client. If you already have a small marketing team or a freelancer doing branding and design work, it's fairly easy for them to create a branded slide template to build gorgeous and brand-compliant presentations.
Templates: There is an abundance of templates available online to get you started with Google Slides.
Tracking & analytics: Google Slides does not have built-in analytics at this time. Sending your presentation through an email marketing tool can tell you who opened the email or clicked on the link but cannot tell you what they viewed or how long they spent in the presentation.
Integrations: It's easy to embed data from Google Sheets or video in a presentation, but outside of the Google Suite, integrations are limited.
Customer support: Support is available for developers
Pricing: Free for personal use and included in Google Workspace for businesses.
Best for beginners: PowerPoint
Probably considered the OG of sales presentation software, PowerPoint is still one of the best-known tools for putting together highly-polished sales decks. While it has some limitations when it comes to interactive sales pitches, it can still easily help sales teams get their point across as the backdrop for an engaging sales conversation.
Primary use cases: PowerPoint is primarily used to create presentation slides, including sales presentations, pitch decks, and many other types of presentations that could happen over the course of a sales cycle.
Standout features: Slide masters and multiple layouts can make it easy for teams to create effective sales presentations without needing to customize them every time. PowerPoint also offers animations, slide transitions, and the ability to add some multimedia functions to help with the woe factor in a presentation.
Templates: Having a template can save sellers time when it comes to personalizing a presentation for a new prospective client. This is especially easy to set up in PowerPoint. Also, past presentations can easily be duplicated and reused.
Tracking & analytics: Tracking and analytics functionality is limited in PowerPoint. But, if you use an email marketing tool to send your slides after a presentation, you can easily see when the email (and the document) were opened.
Integrations: Has many integrations to help facilitate and share presentations, including Mentimeter for gathering feedback, Lucidchart for diagrams, and Adobe Acrobat.
Customer support: Microsoft does offer product support to signed-in users.
Pricing: Plans (Business Basic) start at $6.00 per user per month
Best for freelancers: Pitch
Billed as "an online presentation maker that's fast, flexible and free" Pitch makes a great tool for freelancers who need to dazzle prospective clients. It allows them to build successful sales decks quickly and efficiently so that they have time to deliver on commitments and run their business efficiently. If you've ever freelanced (or you're a freelancer), you know what a challenge it can be to wear all the hats in your small business.
Primary use cases: Pitch is used to create professional-looking presentations for all of your needs. It works across all your devices so that you can create and edit presentations on the go - no more being tied to your desktop.
Standout features: A modern yet delightful user experience and the ability to bundle brand assets and fonts for consistency and extra polish.
Templates: To combat the very common pain point of knowing where to start when it comes to a freelancer sales pitch deck, Pitch offers over 100 professionally designed templates to help freelancers get started.
Tracking & analytics: Built-in analytics allows freelancers to understand who is watching the presentation what they care about and provides insights into content performance in real-time.
Integrations: Pitch's website does not list any integrations at this time.
Customer support: Pitch offers a robust help center for self service support, or the ability to contact the team if you can't find the answer to your question.
Pricing: Pitch offers a fairly comprehensive free tier, but if you want the analytics features, you will need to pay. Plans start at $25 per month which buys you two seats and one analytics link. For a freelancer (especially in the early stages) the free level may be more than powerful enough to get you started.
Best for creatives: Canva
Whether you've used it to create social media assets or edit a photo, if you're a creative, you're more than likely already familiar with Canva. But did you know that you can also use it to create a successful sales deck? If you haven't tried using Canva to create a presentation or even a template, now is the time to give it a try!
Primary use cases: Canva can be used to design all types of projects, from business cards to social media posts and even sales or capabilities presentations.
Standout features: If you're a creative with limited graphic design skills, Canva can help you show your creativity without needing advanced design chops. It offers a comprehensive suite of different content types and the ability to create a brand template to house your logos, fonts, and images of your projects.
Templates: Canva offers an almost unlimited number of templates that range from business formal to extremely creative. No matter what vibe you're going for, you'll look like a pro when you start with a Canva template.
Tracking & analytics: Users are able to see who has viewed their designs. Paid users have access to more robust analytics.
Integrations: Canva offers integrations with many popular social media scheduling tools and other products. View their full list of intergations to see if any of the programs you already use can be easily integrated.
Customer support: For easy assistance, Canva offers a chatbot and a help center. Queries sent to their team will be answered within 24 hours for pro users, but free users can expect to wait up to one week.
Pricing: There is a free tier, but for paid users, the pricing starts at $119/year for pro. If you have a team expect to pay $119/user per year for Canva for teams with a minimum of just two users. Canva also offers special pricing for nonprofits and education.
Best for not-for-profits: Tie between PowerPoint and Google Slides
If you're looking to put together sales presentations for your nonprofit, our pick for your best tool is a tie between PowerPoint and Google Slide. The right choice for you will depend on whether your office uses Microsoft or Google Suite. The latter may be easier to collaborate across the team, but both are inexpensive and easy to use.
That said, if you require more sophistication because of a high volume of presentations or a particularly large sales team, it may be worth considering another tool from our list!
Final Thoughts
When it comes to creating a winning sales presentation, the right tool won't just make you look polished and professional. It may also save you time. By choosing a tool that allows you to create a template for each type of presentation, you will never have to start from scratch. You can focus on tailoring each slide to the needs of your audience.
If you want to see how Qwil can help you put together professional, engaging and easy to share sales presentations, reach out today to schedule a demo or start a 14 day free trial. While we can tell you how much you'll love building presentations in our software, we'd rather show you!
About the author
Marissa Taffer|Founder & President of M. Taffer Consulting
Marissa Taffer is the Founder & President of M. Taffer Consulting. She brings over 15 years of sales and marketing experience across various industries to a broad range of clients.
Frequently asked questions
Key factors include the features you need, your budget, the size of your team, and the type of sales you do. It's also important to consider whether the software allows for collaboration, provides analytics, and integrates with your existing tools.
Look for software that allows for collaboration, provides analytics, and integrates with your existing tools. If you have a large buying committee, consider a tool that allows you to share a link with multiple people and track their engagement.
Some of the best options include Qwilr for sales teams, Google Slides for startups, PowerPoint for beginners, Pitch for freelancers, Canva for creatives, and either PowerPoint or Google Slides for not-for-profits.
Sales presentation software can help you create polished, professional presentations. It can also provide analytics to help you understand how your presentations are being received and which parts are most engaging.
Google Slides is a good option for startups. It's included in the Google suite, allows for collaboration, and has an abundance of templates available online.
