Stop! The Demonstrations

Control Your Demos!



The demo is at time bomb that destroys as many sales than it makes. I’ve seen the prospect choose the wrong products because the best team did an awful demo and the worst product because that team aced it. A demo can only do three things and two of them work against you.



First, a demo can expose you to loads of questions and potentially show a side of the product that the customer hates. As a result, you are left trying to talk you way out of a hole, dragging the demo out far too long. What you can’t see when you are doing a web demo is the key decision makers walking out of the room when they get bored. You may think you are still selling, but you might as well be talking to yourself from then on.



Second, a demo can show the customer a few areas that they like and cause them to focus on and ask questions about those features. Unfortunately, if these are not on the prospect’s "must have" list, you again drag out the demo and miss the real target. After they have seen four or five of your competitor’s products, they know the basics and just want to see what they need to see.



Finally, the demo can confirm for the prospect that this is the product that fits their needs and has the features they require. Do this right and do it quickly to move the sale forward to a close.



Here is a process that works and maximizes the effect of your demo:



1. Hold the demo back as a prize that you only show those who are pre-qualified.

2. Tell the client that you can save them valuable time by asking questions first and gaining a true understanding of their needs. The truth is that your offering might not be right for this prospect and the demo will waste valuable time for both of you. Ask the tough questions, including the ones that might disqualify your product.

3. Dig into their decision making process and find out who else you will need to sell. Ideally, you want to give one demo to the entire team after you have identified their real needs and have both the user and the economic buyer included in the demo.

4. When you do the demo, don’t walk through everything! Their attention span is short, so get to the features that you know they need first, then go back and fill in the details as needed. Most of all, forget about showing your favorite features unless they will help close the sale. They are irrelevant to the prospect and only serve to show that you were not listening to them in the questioning phase.

5. A demo is a tight rope walk and every thing you show can turn against you. Your job is to help the client see that our offering will do what they need it to do, not to give the grand tour.



Done correctly, the process of probing before the demo will dramatically increase your sales and reduce your demo time to an absolute minimum.