Alex, the presales team member, began the demo by carrying a large stack of paper into the room, walked to the front and dropped it onto a table with a loud “thud!” He handed several sheets from the stack to several of the prospect players, saying, “These, I believe, are examples of your current manual, paper-based process – please take a look and confirm this for me!”
The prospect team examined the examples and verified that yes, these were from their current workflow, and offered comments about “Handling these is a pain!” and “Oh no, this one is pretty old…!”
Alex smiled and said, “Yes, that one must have slipped behind a desk…” “And this one,” he continued, picking up another sheet, “smells like the ink is still wet. It’s like it’s raining paper on you!”
He grabbed another sheet, crumpled it, and tossed it into a box, where it bounced before settling at the bottom. “Anyone else want to join me?” he asked. Several volunteers leapt up and joined in the fun, crumpling, crushing, tossing, and pitching paper into the box (and at one another). It was like a snow flurry of wadded paper falling from the sky!
Was this audience engaged? Yes indeed! And were they eager to hear and see a solution? You betcha!
In communication, each additional sense you engage increases your audience’s retention by 10%.
See the stack of paper? 10% improvement.
Hear the “thud” when it hit the table? Another 10%.
Feel the individual sheets? Another 10%.
Smell the wet ink? Yet another 10%.
When presenting demos face-to-face, engage your audience’s senses by using props and visual aids that can be seen, heard, and felt, (and, if possible, smelled and tasted)!
Here’s another real-life example:
The vendor rep was discussing how their solution eliminated silos and enabled improved consumption of a prospect’s internal data. The rep took two sealed water bottles, held them up and said, “So, I understand your organization has its data sitting in silos, like these water bottles…” He banged the bottles together, pointing out that “You can’t bring this data together.” Bang, bang went the water bottles.
He then opened each bottle and placed a cup in front of him on the table. He said, “What we propose is to enable you to combine your data in ways you’ve never been able to do before…” as he poured water from both water bottles into the single cup. He then picked up the cup and continued, “…and enable you to consume your data in ways you’ve never been able to do before!” and he took a sip of the combined mix from the cup. He finished with a satisfied “Ah, refreshing!”
No comments:
Post a Comment