“Show me the goods, I’ll show you the money” is the basic principle behind product demos. You show people what your product does and they line up to order it. Well, that’s an overly simplistic view. In reality, not every product demo out there brings in the sales. There are ways in which you can ruin the sales for an amazing product – and bad product demos are one of these ways.
So, there are good and bad demos? It’s not enough to show them how to use the product? Sadly, no, it’s not about this. What the product does is a feature. What you need to show prospects in a demo are the benefits of using it.
Well then, how do you do it? Here are the key elements of a great product demo which will truly bring in the sales.
- Tell Your Customer a Story from Their Perspective
“And if you click right here, you’ll get a drop down menu and you select…” No, no, that’s not what your prospect wants to see. IF they decide to buy the product, they will expect to get the training for it.
Instead tell the customer how this product fits into their daily work and how much easier everything will be. “And when your long-term customer sends an email, it will be automatically input in our software which renews their order and issues the bill without you having to stop from your tasks. All you have to do is authorise the operation with a click.” Now, that is a story any busy entrepreneur wants to hear.
- Add Dimension to the Benefits
What does it really mean to the customer buying and using your product? Saved time? That’s good. Less chaos in their business operations? That’s better. Attracting revenues which they were constantly losing by using their old methods? That’s the best.
It all boils down to this: what is the key benefit of using your product and what is its quantifiable size? If you cannot put it in numbers, you haven’t convinced your prospect. “You’ll save quite a lot of money by using this energy saving software” is vague and makes you look like you haven’t done your lessons. “An average family can save up to AUD 25,000 per year on electricity bills with this energy saving solution” will make the sale (if you can back up your claims, of course).
- Redirect Questions Back at the Prospect
Every once in a while the prospects stop your presentation to ask a question. As much as possible, answer it with another question which will help you gain insight from the prospect. This is not a subterfuge to avoid answering (if the prospect insists, answer straightforwardly) but it helps you determine what is the top benefit they expect from your product.
In this way, you can adapt your presentation to suit the prospects’ needs by focusing on the specific benefit they want and making an in-depth presentation in this direction.
- Prepare to Deal with Technical Glitches
Every man-made item will malfunction or behave erratically at one point or another. Your computer and your products are no different. You must be prepared to deal with such an issue and keep your prospect interested enough to wait until you fix the issue or reschedule the presentation.
“That’s funny, it never did this before” is not good enough and you should avoid such phrases like the plague. People rarely believe them and they will either deem you incompetent or your product of low quality.
- Keep It Shorter than Expected
Here’s the deal, people don’t like wasting time on presentations and demos. If they notice that the demo took less time than expected, that will work greatly in your favour. In fact, make sure to point it out casually.
“And we’re done with this presentation and, wow, it only took 20 minutes instead of half an hour.” This will tell people that you respect their time, you are efficient, and that your product is simple enough to use by them if you could wrap up an entire demo in such a short time span.