The Best Demo Is: No Demo!

A demo is, generally speaking, a form of proof or vision generation.  Our objective in sales is to secure the order using the least expensive form of proof. 

With that in mind, here, in order of increasing expense for the vendor, are forms of proof for a customer:

-          Reference call (to another, similar customer or peer) – basically free

-          Vision Generation Demo – very little resource required

-          Technical Proof Demo – moderate resource required

-          POC – (often) enormous resource required

-          Pilot – yet more (although some Pilots are paid-for, they still potentially consume huge amounts of vendor resources)

Our objective in a sales process is to stay as high as possible on this list.  (And shame on the sales team that offers a POC without the customer requesting it…!)

[Warning: Shameless Self-Promotion Alert!] Great Demo! Audiobook Now Available

Yes, due to overwhelming demand, Great Demo! is now available in Audiobook format at Amazon.com, audible.com. and iTunes.  So now you can sit back and simply listen to some compelling ideas, riveting stories, and amusing anecdotes – without the strain of moving your eyes back and forth.  Audiobooks are terrific for those car drives from account to account and on flights when you don’t want to have to interact with the person sitting next to you!

Please note:  a professional did the voice-over for the Audiobook, as the author would not (or could not) do the reading himself…

Competitive Differentiation - Why Did They Buy From You?

The best sales teams go back to their customers well after the sale has been completed and ask, “So, what made you choose us [over XXX competitor]?”  The answers are sometimes what you expect, but often you learn surprising new information on how customers perceive you as a vendor.  This information should feed back into your positioning, Discovery conversations and other elements of your sales, implementation and follow-up processes.  What have you heard from your customers that differentiates your company lately?

Harvest this information and use it!

Better Than "Thank You For Your Time"

Here’s an interesting challenge and an elegant solution to it:  In my previous company I was VP and then President of a business unit and had sales people calling on me as the customer.  I noted that nearly all of these sales people stated conversations or presentations with phrases like, “I know you are very busy…” or “Thank you very much for your time…”  While these phrases are courteous, they sounded very pleading and anxious, and seemed to result in these sales people (unconsciously) placing themselves as subservient to their customer.  Not a particularly robust starting point!

One of my colleagues offered a terrific alternative that we began to use, with excellent success.  She suggested, “I’m glad we were able to invest this time together today…”, resulting in our sales team positioning themselves as equals to their C-level and VP customers,   Much stronger!

Recording Web Demos Reduces Hostile Questions

A Great Demo! Workshop participant noted recently that announcing that you are recording a Remote Demo (e.g., delivered via WebEx or GoToMeeting) reduces the likelihood of hostile questions from audience members.  Not surprisingly, these “hostile” audience members don’t want their nasty questions or sniping comments captured in the recording!

[Warning: Shameless Self-Promotion Alert] Great Demo! Public Workshop October 9-10

Our next Great Demo! Public Workshop is scheduled for October 9-10 in San Jose, California – Registration information can be found here (http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2012/10/23/great-demo-workshop-on-oct-9-10-2013/).

This is a 1.5-Day Workshop, with the first day focusing largely on core Great Demo! concepts and the morning of the second day addressing more advanced topics and techniques. This is an excellent opportunity for individuals, small groups or for teams that have new hires.

Register using the link above or contact me for more information (PCohan@SecondDerivative.com).

The Insufficiency of “So What?”

A number of sales methodologies have done a good job at helping sales and presales people move from talking about features to discussing the advantages that specific capabilities offer the customer.  The phrase, “So What?” represents one tactic that helps push vendor representatives to talk about advantages as opposed to features.  This is a good start, but we can do better…

During demos, there is inherent risk anytime you introduce capabilities that the customer has not yet requested – and, in particular, the level of risk depends greatly on how the capabilities are introduced.  The “So What” tactic presumes that the customer will want or need the capability being introduced – and that’s a dangerous assumption! 

Here’s an example of why:

Feature Statement:  “We provide support for the software in 22 languages…”
So What Statement:  “We provide support for the software in 22 languages, so that your team can access the software anywhere in the world using their native languages…”
The Risk:  The customer says, “Everyone in our company speaks English and we want to make sure that all information is captured consistently in the system, so that everyone can access all information equally – without having to learn 21 other languages…” 

In this example, the “So What” fails, because the vendor presumed the 21 additional languages would be desired by the customer.  (Note that a good job doing Discovery would have clarified this – and avoided the faux pas…).  But wait, there’s more…

The customer then adds, “…and we don’t want to pay for the additional 21 languages, since we won’t be using them – so either take out the support for those languages for our implementation or reduce your price accordingly…”

“So What” has backfired – and the vendor is now at risk of “buying it back”.

Another Example:

Feature Statement:  “Alerts can be automatically generated and sent to you via email…”
So What Statement:  “Alerts can be automatically generated and sent to you via email, so that can be notified of any problems right away…”
The Risk:  The customer says, “I hate email.  I get way too much already and I’m always spending too much time deleting messages – I’d be concerned that I’d delete the alerts, thinking they might be spam.  I’d rather simply login to your system periodically…” 
The Additional Risk:  The customer adds, “…and I don’t want to pay for the email alert functionality, since I won’t be using it – so either take it out or give me a discount…”

Same Example, Even Worse:

Feature Statement and Demo:  “Alerts can be automatically generated and sent to you via email – here, let me show you how this can be done in the software…”
So What Statement and Demo:  “Alerts can be automatically generated and sent to you via email, so that you can be notified of any problems right away – here, let me show you how this can be set up and done with the software…”
The Risk:  The customer says, “I hate email.  I get way too much already and I’m always spending too much time deleting messages – I’d be concerned that I’d delete the alerts, thinking they might be spam.  I’d rather simply login to your system periodically…” 
The Additional Risk:  The customer adds, “In addition, that looks really complicated and confusing – too many features and functions to remember.  I think we’ll go with your competition, whose software was much more aligned with exactly what we need…!”

Solutions

The best solution?  Introduce your capabilities via questions in Discovery, well before a demo.  Once you’ve either uncovered a need (and the customer has confirmed their desire to have the capability), then presenting that specific capability in your demo can be done as a benefit statement.

Michael Bosworth, in his sales methodologies Solution Selling and CustomerCentric Selling, outlined the idea of Feature, Advantage, and Benefit statements – simplified here:

Features:  are the description of what the feature does
Advantages:  are why it might be good for the customer
Benefits:  are why it will be good for the customer, based on the customer’s previous statements (e.g., from Discovery sessions) or (best of all) when the customer verbalizes the benefit statement!

This difference between an Advantage (presumed benefit) and a real Benefit (confirmed benefit) can be huge!

Revisiting Example 1, we might have a different conversation and result:

Feature Statement:  “We provide support for the software in 22 languages…”
Advantage (So What) Statement:  “We provide support for the software in 22 languages, so that your team can access the software anywhere in the world using their native languages…”
Benefit Statement:  “You had mentioned that you need support for 5 languages so that your team can access the software anywhere in the world using their local native languages – we do support all five of those languages as part of our standard offering.”
The win:  The customer says, “That’s terrific – that’s exactly what we need.  Interestingly, one of your competitors said they support a pile of languages, but we didn’t want to pay for all of those extra capabilities since we’ll never use them…” 

An alternative approach, based on what were benefits for other similar customers, is called a Biased Question – see my posts in this blog or as articles on my website: “Stunningly Awful vs. Truly Terrific Competitive Differentiation” or “Competitive Demo Situations – Biasing Towards Your Strengths” (at www.secondderivative.com/Articles.html) for further information on these ideas (or send me an email at PCohan@SecondDerivative.com and I’d be happy to send you the articles).

Stunningly Awful vs. Truly Terrific Competitive Differentiation – What, When, and How

Competitive Differentiation:  vendors want to differentiate, vendors try to differentiate, but most vendors fail to meaningfully and successfully differentiate, in the opinion of their customers.  When done poorly, differentiation can be stunningly awful; when done well it can be truly terrific!  Let’s explore…

What Is Competitive Differentiation? 

Most vendors define this as “capabilities that we have or do better than our competition”.   Pretty straightforward, right?  But do customers share this definition?  Likely not. 

Customers are looking for solutions that fit their perception of their current and expected future needs.  A vendor with capabilities the meets these current and future needs exactly is clearly the best choice, everything else being equal (such as price). 

With that in mind, a vendor who seeks to “differentiate” by simply presenting capabilities that another vendor lacks is at risk.  What if the customer doesn’t see the need for these additional capabilities?  What if they don’t care or, worse, can’t use them?  Then these additional capabilities become a liability. 

For example, let’s say you are shopping for a new set of kitchen knives.  At the store, you are looking at several knife sets and the sales person steers you to one particular set of 10 knives, saying, “This set is better because it has 10 knives – one more than most – plus a sharpener, so you can keep all of your knives razor-sharp.”  The other sets on display only have nine knives. 

Sounds like a win, right?  However, it turns out that your knife block only has room for 9 knives and no place for a sharpener.  You are concerned that the extra knife and sharpener will end up rattling around in a drawer – and possibly be a hazard.  Differentiation has occurred, but not positive differentiation!  The larger knife set is perceived as “too much” and possibly “too expensive” (if it costs more than the set of 9) or “cheap” if the price is the same as the set of 9, since the perception will likely be that each knife individually is worth less. 

The world of software is similar.  Let’s say you are looking for a tool that helps you to address availability problems with your website.  You’ve decided you want something that sends you an email message with an appropriate link when a problem is imminent, so that you can click the link that logs you into the system, find the root cause, and address the problem.

-          Vendor 1 does an excellent job doing Discovery with you – and then presents a demo that specifically shows email alerts and the ability to drill down and find root causes. 

-          Vendor 2 does a good job doing Discovery with you – and then presents a demo that shows email alerts and ability to drill down and find root causes, and also shows you a system dashboard while describing why dashboards are so wonderful.

Who will get the order?  Shouldn’t Vendor 2 get your business?  After all, they have what you need plus a fabulous dashboard.

You give the order to Vendor 1, however.  Why?  In doing Discovery with you, Vendor 1 learned that you hate to have to open a pile of applications and review dashboards.  You explained that you’d much rather only have to pay attention when a problem is pending – and email alerts are your preferred mode of receiving this information.  Vendor 1’s demo was right on target.

[Interestingly, Vendor 1 also had dashboard capabilities, but elected not to show them, since you had communicated your strong dislike of dashboards.  Turns out that both vendor offerings were essentially equal in capabilities, but Vendor 2 showed a capability you didn’t want or couldn’t use:  Negative differentiation. 

Note also that Vendor 1 asked a few additional questions in Discovery – with respect to how you want to consume the alert information – and uncovered your dislike of dashboards:  Vendor 1 achieved some additional positive differentiation through the more complete Discovery work.

In spite of the above rather sad scenarios (for the knife sales person and Vendor 2), most vendors view differentiation in terms of the features and functions of their offerings.  “Ours has this, and theirs doesn’t” or “Ours does this better than theirs does”.

Positive feature- or capability-based differentiation only takes place when the customer agrees that the capability is beneficial in their specific situation – when the customer visualizes using the capability sufficiently often and/or the problem the capability addresses is sufficiently important to solve.  Otherwise, the extra features and capabilities are perceived as making the offering too complicated or too expensive:  “We don’t need the Cadillac; we just want the economy car version…”

When to Differentiate?  All the Time…!

From the customers’ perspective vendors are “differentiating”, positively or negatively, with every contact, every meeting, and every deliverable.  Let’s explore possible negative differentiation first.  How do you feel about:

-          Vendors that cold call you – repeatedly? 

-          Vendors that take forever to answer your email inquiries – or ignore what you asked? 

-          Vendors that leap right to showing you a “solution”, without sufficient Discovery?

-          Vendors whose demos look complicated or confusing, in spite of having a pile of “competitive differentiators”?

-          Sales people that speak ill of their competition?

-          Sales people that are “cagey” about providing pricing information?

-          Vendors that over-promise and under-deliver? 

Interestingly – and sadly – the list above is what often occurs with typical, traditional vendors and sales people.  Most of us as customers perceive these items as unpleasant and they contribute to an overall negative impression.  Unwittingly, perhaps, these vendors and sales people have differentiated negatively.

Let’s look at the same list again, but with a different approach to each item:

-          Nurture or “trickle” marketing activities (as opposed to cold calling).  [For extra credit, contemplate the intent of this article…!]

-          Rapid, specific responses to email inquiries.

-          Thorough and intelligent Discovery – before presenting solutions. 

-          Crisp, focused, engaging demos of the Specific Capabilities needed by customers.

-          Sales teams that are clear and honest about their own offerings’ strengths and limitations.

-          Clear and transparent pricing information.

-          Building a vision of how the customer will move from their current (painful) state to their desired (glorious) future state with the solution in place and operating. 

Generally speaking, these activities are viewed favorably by customers.  Vendors that follow these processes are already differentiating positively in comparison with “traditional” vendors.

In addition to the observations above, there are (at least) three major opportunities to differentiate, positively, in sales interactions with customers:

1.      During Discovery

2.      During demo delivery

3.      During discussion of implementation and beyond

Let’s examine each…

How to Differentiate

During Discovery:

This is one of the most effective ways to out-flank your competition.  Do Discovery with a bias towards potentially differentiating capabilities you offer (and your competition lacks or doesn’t do as well), such that those capabilities become part of the customer’s vision of a solution. 

The use of “Biased Questions” is a terrific and highly successful technique of introducing capabilities that you believe should be important to your customer, but the customer has not yet requested those capabilities.  They may (often) be unaware that such capabilities exist. 

Here’s a quick example:  Let’s say that your offering provides alerts in the form of email messages when certain thresholds are reached (as many offerings do) – but in your case, you can also set alerts based on approaching a certain threshold. 

During Discovery, you might say, “Some of the other organizations we’ve worked with that had situations very similar to what you’ve outlined so far, found that the ability to set alerts based on approaching certain thresholds enabled them to take action before problems grew large – and they were able to save hundreds of thousands of dollars as a result.  Is this something you might also find useful in your practice?”

Your customer responds, “Why yes, that sounds really great – and I can see how we could use that.  Wish we’d had it before!”

This capability has now become a Specific Capability desired by your customer – and you can prepare and plan to demonstrate it accordingly.  Since your competition can’t offer the capability, but only the simple alerts, you have successfully positively differentiated.

Let’s explore this a bit further.  The “Biased Question” method has three elements that make it a successful and compelling approach:

-         The Similarity:  Your first step is to establish a relationship between your current prospect and other organizations – particularly those that are perceived by the prospect as being similar to them.

-         The Capability:  You describe the capability itself and its advantages and potential benefits.

-         The Reward:  You describe what rewards other, similar organizations have realized through the use of the capability.

Finally, you test to see if this capability also sounds interesting or particularly useful to the customer.  If it does, you have successfully and positively differentiated.  Look for as many opportunities to differentiate during Discovery as possible so that you set yourself up as the dominant or preferred vendor – the only vendor that can provide the capabilities now desired by the customer.

During the Demo:

Most vendors try to differentiate during demos – and very often end up “buying it back”.  This is an intriguing problem inherent in software sales.  From the perspective of most vendors, offerings with more capabilities should be better for the customer, right?

Nope!  Have you ever heard customers say, during price discussions, “Well, you showed us a bunch of stuff we’ll never use, so either take those capabilities out or reduce the price.”  The customers’ perspective is that they are buying much more product than they need (“Cadillac vs. economy car”), so they demand a price discount as compensation.  This is known as “buying it back” – a very sad situation for the vendor!

A more elegant and wise approach to differentiate during a demo is to use Biased Questions when you believe you may have uncovered an unmet need or other opportunity.  The process is the same as using Biased Questions during Discovery, but in this case you can also offer to demonstrate the capability (if the customer would like to see it).

During Discussion of Implementation – and Beyond:

Traditional sales people (and sales teams) are done with their sales cycles when the purchase order arrives, leaving implementation to their professional services team, partner organization, or the customer.  Stronger sales people and sales teams develop a vision with the customer of the steps and process of moving the customer from their current problem state to completed implementation – the “go live” date.  (Some sales methodologies call this process developing the “Transition Vision”).

The truly terrific sales people and sales teams carry this further out into the future – to the point where the customer has his/her first small win, small victory, or initial ROI.  This is also the point in time when the customer can become a real reference.  What a wonderful way to positively differentiate!

Beyond the Software

But wait, there’s more…  In earlier articles and blog posts I recommend (rather strongly) against inflicting corporate overview presentations on your customers.  Interestingly, some elements from typical corporate overview presentations can be harvested and used to differentiate very nicely – but not in the form of the dreaded traditional corporate overview. 

Once a customer has seen that your offering can provide a solution to their problem, they begin to be interested in learning more about your organization.  After all, they are not just buying your code, but they are also buying a relationship with a vendor. 

Think about how customers perceive your strengths, as an organization.  For example, what is your reputation regarding support?  Implementation?  On-time and as-promised releases (Oh, please…!).  Technology leadership?  Some of these strengths represent opportunities to differentiate, beyond your software.

For example, let’s say you have a particularly strong and active users’ community – and your competition does not.  Here’s an opportunity to use a Biased Question to differentiate:

You say, “Some of the other customers we’ve worked with that had situations very similar to what you’ve outlined so far, found that one of the most important aspects of the relationship with the vendor had nothing to do with the software itself.  They found that interactions with the users’ community enabled them to easily solve problems they had previously struggled with, deploy more broadly than expected, and implement new, unanticipated applications that were shared within the community.  They were able to realize hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional gains and savings as a result.  Is access to this sort of community something you might also find useful in your implementation?”

Your customer responds strongly in the affirmative.

You add, “Well, I’d be happy to connect you with some of the principals of the local users’ group so that you can get introduced right away…”

The result?  Positive differentiation based on organizational strengths.  [The process of identifying these strengths is known as “Whole Product Analysis”, the term coined by Regis McKenna and popularized by Geoffrey Moore in Crossing the Chasm” – really good stuff!]

What About Price?

Really?  If you have to differentiate on price you’ve failed to establish sufficient value – both with respect to the customer’s problem and especially the value of your solution.  (Time to return to doing Discovery…!)

Truly Terrific Competitive Differentiation – What, When, and How

What:  Look for opportunities to differentiate positively – capabilities or strengths that are perceived as beneficial by the customer – and be aware of how easy it is to differentiate negatively in the eyes of the customer.

When:  All the time(!); and especially during Discovery, during demo delivery, and during discussion of implementation and beyond.

How:  Through the use of Biased Questions – and sources for topics can come from either the capabilities in your software or the strengths of your organization.

 

[Of course, many Great Demo! practitioners comment that simply following the Great Demo! methodology is a terrific way to differentiate, positively!]

 

Copyright © 2013 The Second Derivative – All Rights Reserved.

 

Feel Good (Generally) When Someone Writes Something Down During Your Demo…

In face-to-face demos, you should feel good (generally speaking) when you see someone make a written note – particularly after you’ve shown a key screen or presented an important idea.  The higher the rank of the person making the note, the better…!  It means, hopefully, that the person has understood the import of what you just presented and wants to remember it.

An additional thought:  When you have multiple members of your team and the customer also has multiple players in the demo, I recommend mixing the seating – as opposed to having “them” on one side of the room or table and “us” on the other.  This enables you to glance and see what that high-level person just wrote down…!

Database/Toolkit Software and Vision Generation: Ingredients vs. Finished Product

Database and similar “toolkit” software are wonderful in that they can do so many things.  The corresponding challenge is that database and toolkit software can be difficult to present to customers who don’t already have a vision of how they want to use these tools.  This can be vision generation at its most challenging!

Part of the problem is that the majority of customers don’t know how to translate the enormous potential offered by these packages into problem-solving applications.  They may know they have a problem –and may be interested in solving the problem, but they don’t see how the database/toolkit will help solve the problem.

Most traditional database/toolkit demos show piles of capabilities, but leave it to the customer to figure out how these features and functions will manifest as a solution to customer problems.  One beautiful solution to this challenge is to show example applications – example finished products – so that customers get a vision of what solutions might look like and relate these examples to their specific situations.

Here’s a simple analogy of two strategies for vision generation that illustrate the idea above:  showing a collection of various food ingredients vs. presenting a selection of the finished dishes. 

You go out to eat breakfast at a restaurant and are seated at your table.  A waiter brings out a cart full of breakfast ingredients, including flour, butter, eggs, potatoes, onions and other vegetables, salt, pepper, sugar, milk, cheese, baking powder, baking soda, etc.,  and says, “Look at all of this cool stuff – just imagine what wonderful dishes we could prepare for you…!”  What are you going to order? 

Has the waiter succeeded in generating a vision of a meal for you?  Likely not…!  He presented the ingredients – the tools – not the finished product, and left it to you to figure out what to do.

On the other hand, what if the waiter brought that same cart out to you – but this time it had plates of waffles, pancakes, omelets, biscuits, muffins and egg dishes, all freshly prepared.  The waiter says, “These are delicious examples of what we can prepare in our kitchen.  Any of these look particularly interesting to you?  Our kitchen can make a range of versions of all of these to your specific tastes.”

Showing the finished product makes all the difference!

 

But wait, there’s more…  Have you ever been in a hotel that offered an “Omelet Station” at breakfast?  This offers a great analogy for a family of related applications.  The Omelet Station operates on the reasonable assumption that you (the customer) already know what an omelet is.  Based on that assumption, you typically see an array of ingredients in bowls or bins and simply choose the combination you want.  The Omelet Station chef then prepares your specific omelet to order. 

The same principal applies to families of related database and toolkit applications.  Once a customer has seen one example application in a family, he can generally used this to develop a vision of a solution, mapping that application to his specific situation and needs.

[Warning: Shameless Self-Promotion Alert] Upcoming Great Demo! Public Workshop October 9-10

Our next Great Demo! Public Workshop is scheduled for October 9-10 in San Jose, California – Registration information can be found here (http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2012/10/23/great-demo-workshop-on-oct-9-10-2013/).

This is a 1.5-Day Workshop, with the first day focusing largely on core Great Demo! concepts and the morning of the second day addressing more advanced topics and techniques. This is an excellent opportunity for individuals, small groups or for teams that have new hires.

Register using the link above or contact me for more information (PCohan@SecondDerivative.com).

Shadow Pointing in Demos – Don’t

In face-to-face demos, I urge presenters to go directly to the screen (when using a projector and screen) and point specifically at the elements of interest, using fingers or a stick or telescoping pointer. 

Occasionally I see presenters stand a short distance from the screen and point, but using their fingers or pointer to generate a shadow in the beam of the projector.  Don’t do this!  It is unclear to the audience whether to follow the presenter’s fingers (or pointer) vs. the resulting shadow – very confusing!

Demo Question Handling: "How do I...?" vs. "Can I...?"

Listen carefully to how questions are asked:

-           “How do I…?” typically suggests that the customer does want to see how a capability works (but confirm before showing).

-          “Can I…?”, on the other hand, may only require a “yes” or “no” answer, without any explicit need to show how something works.

You can save yourself a great deal of grief and reduce risk by listening and responding carefully!

End-to-End Integrated Overview Full Suite Demo – Analogies and a Few Solutions

The Situation: 

Management wants the presales team to show an “end-to-end overview integrated demo of our full suite…” as a part of a typical “introductory” meeting.  Management is convinced that “customers need to see the power of the integrated suite and all of the key modules”.  This has “Harbor Tour” written all over it (and a very lengthy one at that)!

Analogous Situations:

You are shopping for a new car – and the sales person insists on showing you all of the company’s models and having you test drive each (roadster, economy cars, sedans, SUVs, crossovers, etc.).  How would you feel?

You go to the hospital to see a doctor about a flu that has been dragging on too long – and the doctor points you to the pharmacy and says, “Give everything there a try and let me know what seems to work…”  How would you feel?

You go to a bookstore to find a travel guide to a foreign country for an upcoming vacation – and the store is organized such that you have to walk through (and sample) all of the various book genres (sports, history, cooking, romance, mystery, how-to, self-help, humor, magazines, technology…).  How would you feel?

[Online version of the above]  Imagine searching Amazon for the same travel guide and, instead of Amazon simply presenting the top 20 matches for your search, it insists on having you tour samples of all 36 online departments.  How would you feel?

Imagine sitting down n a nice restaurant – and the waiter brings and serves all of the drinks, appetizers, salads, sounds, main dishes, sides and desserts on the menu – everything the kitchen can prepare – and says, “Try each of these and then let me know what you’d like…”  How would you feel?

Ever been through an Ikea, looking only for one specific item?  How did you feel?

[Feel free to suggest your own analogies…]

Solutions:

The Menu Approach:  This strategy is almost tailor-made for these kinds of situations and has been proven to work delightfully well!  See my article “The Menu Approach - A Truly Terrific Demo Self-Rescue Technique” on our website at www.SecondDerivative.com/Articles.html for further information on the strategy and associated tactics.

Multiple Illustrations Approach:  Invest some time to select Illustrations that are representative of the “pay-off” screens for each module of major chunk of functionality.  Capture these in PowerPoint or KeyNote, preferably.  You can use these in conjunction with the Menu (or similar Roadmap) to literally Illustrate the key advantages/deliverables of each module/chunk.  Where your customer shows interest, you can offer to execute a crisp “Do It” pathway, if the customer wishes.  I’ve seen this approach work extraordinarily well!

Discovery:  What a delightful alternative!  Instead of inflicting a Harbor Tour or one of the less painful (and more considerate approaches) above, why not use the time to do Discovery?  The Menu Approach is a excellent tool to help kick-off Discovery, providing a list of topics to drive the Discovery conversation. 

When the Customer Explains the Value - Peer Teaching

We understand today that the very strongest way to learn something is to teach it to someone else (“Peer Teaching”).  In our quest to mark demos Remarkable we often suggest that presales people teach the key Great Demo! ideas to their sales counterparts, for example, to really crystallize their own understanding of the methodology.

A Great Demo! Workshop participant recently noted that you have the same effect (high retention) on the customer’s part when the customer tells others on his/her team how a capability can be used or otherwise articulates the value. 

This dovetails neatly with the earlier post to have your Champion present Situation Slide information (if he/she is capable and competent to do so) to the balance of the customer team.  It also suggests the possibility of a more active role for your Champion (when appropriate), for example, of doing summaries at the end of each demo segment or otherwise adding “color” during the demo.

"All You Can Eat" Buffet / Smorgasbord – and Price

Showing too many capabilities (that the customer does not perceive they will use) can cause vendors to “buy it back” when it is time to discuss price.  An “All You Can Eat” buffet offers a good analogy in the world of restaurants and food…

 An “All You Can Eat” buffet can be a great thing if you are (a) really hungry and (b) typically eat a large amount of food and/or (c) have several teenage male children.  On the other hand, what if you aren’t very hungry or don’t eat a lot of food at one sitting?  Then an “All You Can Eat” offering is likely too much – and may be perceived as too expensive. 

This last observation is very interesting:  the actual price for the meal at many “All You Can Eat” buffets may be in the middle of the range for a typical restaurant meal, but because we don’t plan to eat as much as others might, our perception is that the price is targeted at those more consuming eaters, leaving us with the feeling that we are paying too much for our meal.  Works the same way with demos…!

Additional Restaurant Analogy for Demos - "I'm Full..."

This one is rather obvious…!  With the exception of certain people (generally male teenagers), most people have a finite limit as to what they can eat at any particular meal.  Interestingly, we generally reach three stages, with respect to being “full”:

-          Satisfied:  “Ahhhh, that was good and I feel just about right…”

-          Definitely Full:  “Wow, that was wonderful, but I really don’t have room for dessert…”

-          Should Have Stopped Earlier:  “Ohhhhh, my stomach is really uncomfortable – I shouldn’t have had that dessert…!”

How might we apply these ideas to the wonderful world of demos?

Illustration Idea - Photo of the "Before" from Whiteboard

Great, simple idea:  Take a photo of the customer’s current process or workflow from a whiteboard discussion and present it as a “Before” Illustration image.  Tip:  the more convoluted, complex and generally ugly the “Before”, the better!

Surprisingly Delectable Demos – Delightful Dining Analogies

What could we possibly learn from the realm of restaurants and food that we can apply to the wonderful world of demos?  Much more than that one might guess!

Restaurants are all about Vision Generation – and tasting is Technical Proof…

From the moment we enter an elegant restaurant to when we pay the check at the end of a marvelous meal we are engaged in a surprising number of procedures and processes – all designed to heighten our dining experience and to generate incremental revenue for the restaurant.

Here are a few examples to whet your appetite…

Preparation, Preparation, Preparation

The restaurant opens.  The first wave of diners arrives and is seated.  Intriguing scents are in the air:  freshly baked bread, garlic, herbs, spices, butter, and a wonderful aroma of umami pervades throughout.  Appetites rise in anticipation.

The kitchen is prepared; ingredients have been shopped for and purchased, sauces simmered, soups thickened, fruits peeled, spices crushed, vegetables carefully trimmed and cut, racks roasted, brisket braised, fish filleted, and garnishes readied.

So, too, the dining room is prepared; linen laid out, napkins neatly creased, tableware aligned, glasses inspected, candles lit, and tonight’s “specials” menus have been printed.

Most importantly, the staff met, before the doors opened, to review the plan for the evening.  Any new dishes or wines?  Everyone clear on the descriptions of the menu offerings?  What is the flow of reservations this evening?  Any expected theatre-goers or others with time constraints?  Any particularly important guests or reviewers expected?  What should we push and promote tonight?  Any issues or problems?

Restaurateurs work all day to prepare for their lunch and dinner customers.  As much as possible has been prepared and is in place before the doors open – and plans are readied to handle expected challenges:  “Sorry to say we had a run on the swordfish and we just served the last plate, but the sturgeon is fabulous and frankly is my favorite…!”

Similarly, Great Demos are all about preparation.  Doing sufficient Discovery, preparing (and testing) the infrastructure, discussing and generating Situation Slides and Illustrations, organizing the “chunks” and choreography, agreeing on what will be shown and what will not be presented – all should be complete before the demo is scheduled to begin. 

Imagine sitting down at a restaurant, ordering the trout with hollandaise sauce and being told, “It’ll just be a few minutes:  the chef is out in the stream angling for your trout and the chickens are being urged to hurry it up with the eggs….!”

First Impressions

As customers, our first impressions are critical when we arrive and are seated.  We notice the fresh flowers and lit candle on the table, the feel of the linens, the ambiance.  We even note, perhaps unconsciously, the difference between menus already piled on the table vs. being presented an opened menu by the waiter personally.

Fresh water is poured (with a hint of lemon), warm bread and butter follow, and we are already enjoying the experience as we peruse our menus and explore the wine list.

Similar first impressions are (clearly) equally important at the start of demo meetings.  If taking place at your offices or Executive Briefing Center, the meeting room should be prepared for the customers’ arrival:  white-boards clean, cabling organized, lighting, projector and screen set up, refreshments prepared, etc.  As in a restaurant, details make a difference!

When meetings takes place at the customers’ sites, arrive sufficiently early to clean, organize and prepare their conference rooms!

The Menu

Have you ever been in a situation where:

a. You find yourself in front of an audience about which you know nothing of their needs or interests – and they’ve been promised a demo…
b. You are asked to join a web session, right now, and the sales person says, “They asked to see a demo…”  (Again, you have zero information about the customer…)
c. Someone walks up to you at a trade-show booth and says, “What do you guys do?” or “Show me a demo…”

Are you interested in a delightful self-rescue technique for situations like these?  It’s called The Menu Approach – and it is a logical, simple and surprisingly effective method for dealing with situations where your audience is partly or largely undiscovered.

Imagine walking into a nice restaurant – and you are quite hungry.  You sit down and a few moments later the waiter comes up to you and asks, “What would you like to eat tonight?”

You have no idea what they offer, so you respond, “What do you have?”  The waiter says, “Well, we have an extensive set of offerings – appetizers, main dishes, side dishes, desserts – what would you like?”

Very frustrating (and what a wonderful analogy)…!  Both of you are making no progress – and it is very much the same situation as requests for demos where neither party has a clear idea of the other’s desires or capabilities.

A solution?  Back in our restaurant, the waiter says, “Here, let me get you a menu…”

The menu provides a rapid method for the customer to assess what is possible – and to select what is most desirable.  A menu presents a high-level listing of the range of offerings – and we can apply the same principle to the wonderful world of demos.  [See the article entitled The Menu Approach – A Truly Terrific Demo Self-Rescue Technique on our website at www.SecondDerivative.com/Articles.html for further details on applying this terrific tool.]

In demos, the Menu Approach offers an additional advantage:  it (by definition) enables you to control what content can be explored.  With a restaurant menu, the range of offerings is typically limited to what is on the menu.  This keeps diners “on track” with respect to what the kitchen can prepare and serve.  The Great Demo! Menu Approach provides that same control when presenting topics to your audience.

The Wine Menu

“What wine would you recommend…?”

You know you are being played when you ask for a wine recommendation to go with your lamb and the waiter immediately suggests the most expensive bottle on the list.  Interestingly, many diners head for the shallower waters and choose one of the low price options.  Our waiter has failed in this upsell opportunity.

On the other hand, the savvy steward offers three recommendations:  one at the low end (a modest but earnestly appealing Pinot), a mid-range selection (an attractive Gigondas), and a spectacular Chateau Neuf de Pape (located just across the river from Gigondas, but commanding much higher prices). 

Which wine will most people choose?  Typically, it is the middle option that is often selected –representing an upsell from what the customer might have originally contemplated spending.
Customers dislike being perceived as “cheap”, both in restaurants and in selecting software.  The seasoned sales person presents three similar options when preparing proposals and providing pricing information to prospects…!

“Would you like to try it first?”

Wines, in particular, and beer, to a lesser degree, can be puzzling for many restaurant patrons.  We are presented with a wine list that may include dozens of choices – a few we may know; most we likely have never experienced. 

We ask the waiter, “What would you recommend with my rack of lamb?”  He replies, “Well, a Côte du Rhone is a good choice, a big California Pinot Noir works well, and some of the Aussie Shiraz can be a very good fit…” 

But (for many of us) we still lack sufficient data to make an informed decision.  In cases where wine is offered by-the-glass (and generally for any draft beer), the wise waiter asks, “Would you like to try a taste?” 

95% of the time the customer purchases a glass or bottle of that wine.  World’s Best Demo!

A Pause Between Courses

Your waiter has taken your order – appetizer, salad, soup and main course – and you are looking forward to your meal with great anticipation.  Ahh, here comes the appetizer and it looks terrific!

Two minutes later the soup arrives, followed swiftly by your salad.  You are now a bit confused, trying to decide which to address.  Moments later your Beef Bourguignon is presented.  Holy cow (no pun intended), the table is packed with dishes and you are overwhelmed.  Too much, too fast – you need a break between courses.

Traditional demos suffer from a similar lack of breaks – they are often presented as a constant stream of features and functions flung without a pause or breath of air:  “And the next really cool thing I want to show you is…”

Like a well-paced meal, Great Demos break up demos into manageable bites – consumable components – that can be introduced and explored in as much depth as the customer has interest.

Appetizers

Appetizers are the essence of Vision Generation:  often beautiful, intensively appealing, and a portion that is just enough to stimulate the appetite further.  They provide brief, savory satisfaction without overwhelming and set the stage for the courses that follow.

Great Vision Generation demos follow the same idea:  carefully crafted, not too long, just enough to pique your customers’ interest.  In Great Demo! methodology a beautifully executed Vision Generation demo might last 4-6 minutes and consist of an abbreviated Situation Slide, Illustration, and Do It pathway.  Delicious!

Does It Look Good?

Ah… Here comes the main course.  We watch the waiter place it carefully in front of us, rotating the plate to a precise presentation position.  Fascinating – we can learn two intriguing ideas from this…

First:  When we are served a plate of food in a restaurant, we typically assess three things, in the following order:

1. Does it look good?
2. Does it smell appetizing?
3. How does it taste?

Interestingly, as customers, we (often unconsciously) make a very similar assessment when presented with a software screen in a demo:  Does it look good? 

If an initial software screen looks confusing or complicated, we reject it right away (“yuck”) and the balance of the demo will be battling this first impression. 

Conversely, if the screen appears to be clear, compelling and logical (“yummy”), we are open to exploring further and (in a virtual sense) “tasting” the software.

This suggests that we should work to make our Illustrations and end deliverables appear to be as appetizing as possible!

Interestingly, a number of Great Demo! practitioners have commented that the equivalent of “Does it smell good” is the perception of ease of use…  It has been suggested that the number of clicks or taps required to complete a task is the software measurement equivalent of “does it smell good…”  The “Do It” pathway is, therefore, one possible indication of whether the software is perceived as easy to use (and thus smells terrific!) – too many clicks, on the other hand, and it stinks!

[Meanwhile, I eagerly await the advent of apps and software that provide real-time smell and odor capabilities…  Don’t you?]

Second:  Remember that our waiter carefully positioned the plate in front of us – presentation is key to helping it look as attractive as possible.  Garnish, sauce dots and lines, vertical structures – these all combine to make the food look as interesting and appetizing as it can.  But the plate doesn’t have to do all the work on its own: the waiter’s presentation (delivery with a white folded napkin in hand, followed by careful rotation to just the perfect angle in front of the customer and the verbal summary of dish…) – all conspire to increase the allure!

Similarly, in software demos, you can bias customer perceptions of the appearance of your software by drawing their attention directly to the key elements on the screen, supported through the use of props, examples and engaging stories.

The Desert Platter

The Menu Approach is a terrific tool to help customers understand what is possible and to choose what seems most interesting – but can we do better?  Certainly…!

Which restaurant will sell more desserts:  the one that presents diners with the dessert menu, after the main course is finished, or the establishment that has the waiter bring the tray of mouth-watering, irresistible desserts presented with a one-by-one exploration of the delights of each offering?

Tough guess, huh?

Think about it.  Restaurants have learned is that the visual combined with the verbal delivery describing an offering can make critical differences in perception (and purchase) by customers. 
The same principles apply to demos and especially when presenting Illustrations of end results.  If a vendor simply shows a screen and says, “So, what do you think?” that vendor is letting the customer come to his or her own conclusions – the customer may not understand the significance of what is being displayed.

On the other hand, pointing specifically to the key elements on the screen while verbally providing commentary designed to underscore the importance and value of those elements – well, that is what our more skilled waiter is doing with the dessert tray (and the augmented bill yields correspondingly larger tips).

Adding Some Bias

Our waiter in the above example does something else that we can learn from and apply to demos.  The next time you are in an elegant restaurant and you have the opportunity (and pleasure) to explore the daily specials or the waiter-presented dessert tray, listen carefully to what he or she says.

For example, does the waiter describe all of the dishes equally?  Typically not!  This one is identified as “the most popular” and that one is his “personal favorite”.  He is skillfully biasing your choice towards certain offerings, based (hopefully) on his personal experience or (unfortunately) what the kitchen needs to move that evening…

The end result, generally, is that those dishes and desserts that receive the most positive bias from the waiter will be sold in higher quantities.  How might we apply this to demos?

The very same way!  When presenting a set of choices (when using a Menu, for example), we can bias audience interest towards any particular item by suggesting a stronger positive angle – or cause other items to sink in ranking by down-playing their importance.

Japanese Restaurant Food Models

Imagine that you are in Japan, on business, and you decide to head out of the hotel for dinner.  You walk down the street and all you see is signage in Japanese (let’s assume you don’t speak or read Japanese).  What do you do? 

Fortunately, many Japanese restaurants have front windows that display a range of delectable offerings on shelves – noodle dishes, soups, fried items – enabling you to quickly decide what looks most appetizing to you.  To order, you don’t need to know the name of the item or find it on a Japanese text-only menu, you can simply take your waiter to the front window and point – what a delight, as you are really hungry!

A closer look at the dishes in the window shows, however, that they are not real – they are carefully crafted plastic models of individual dishes (which affords great expiration dating, by the way:  “Best used by 2815…”).

These models are excellent examples of Great Demo! Illustrations – showing the end result.  In this case, the end result is an excellent (plastic) representation of the dish, enabling customers to quickly scan what is possible and choose which item looks most palatable.

Cookbooks – and Pictures

You are paging through a new cookbook, trying to get ideas for an upcoming important meal.  Which recipes do you tend to explore – those that are limited to text descriptions or those that also include a photo of the finished dish?

Cookbook publishers know that most readers prefer cookbooks with photos of the finished product.  The pictures help readers gain a rapid understanding of what the completed recipe should look like – if it looks appetizing, it has a higher likelihood of being pursued.

Not surprisingly, pictures of the completed, plated, presented dish can tell us a great deal:

- What should it look like?
- Does it look appetizing?
- What are major ingredients?
- What is the mode of preparation?
- How should it be presented?
- What beverages does it pair well with?
- What are the complementary side dishes?

One picture of a completed dish is easily worth 1000 words of text description – which suggests that one good Illustration of your software should be worth… (wait for it…) 1000 clicks!

What can we learn from the restaurants that we can apply to the wonderful world of demos?  Clearly, a veritable buffet of ideas – bon appétit!

Copyright © 2013 The Second Derivative – All Rights Reserved.

Have Your Champion Present the Situation Slide

Just saw this in a demo recently and what a terrific idea! When your Champion is a strong presenter and you are about to deliver a demo to his/her team or his/her management, contemplate inviting your Champion to present the Situation Slide to the balance of the audience – very compelling!

Another Terrific Metric to Track Salesperson Effectiveness

One of the biggest challenges for presales staff can be working with sales people who don’t “get it” with respect to the need to do sufficient Discovery prior to demos.  Previously I offered a metric that helps separate the great vs. good vs. not-so-good sales people by measuring the dollars-of-revenue per number-of-demos done. In this case the more efficient and effective sales people will have larger numbers.

 Another good metric to track and measure is the number of demo meetings booked in comparison with the number that actually take place on the original dates.

 Very often, sales people will ask for a presales resource to be assigned for a particular date, but then that date moves (sometimes several times!). This impacts the entire organization negatively, as that presales resource could not be used for other opportunities (that might have been better qualified, with better Discovery completed, and a much higher likelihood of coming to fruition). With the less effective sales reps, we would often see requests for multiple dates for demo meetings for a single customer. Those dates often slipped and we received requests for new dates…

 In one infamous case, one rep had tied up presales resources for a full two-week window without ending up with a single meeting! (What a sad waste…).