Live product demos can boost your sales process, but they come with challenges. Many businesses struggle to make demos engaging and effective. Instead of just showing a key feature of your product, a good demo should address customer needs, show how the product solves their problems, and build a connection.
If you're in sales or run a business, you’ve likely faced these issues—keeping your audience interested, tailoring your demo, or handling tricky questions. Doing this well can turn potential customers into loyal clients.
In this blog, we’ll guide you through mastering live product demos. Learn how to prepare, engage your audience, handle common issues, and follow up effectively. With practical tips and strategies, this guide will help you deliver demos that win customers. Let’s dive in!
What is a Live Sales Demo?
A live sales demo is an interactive presentation where one shows potential customers how their product or service works in real-time. A live demo allows direct communication with a sales rep. This lets customers ask questions, give feedback, and see the product in action. The main goal is to help them understand the product’s value and benefits of what you're offering.
The primary purpose behind conducting a live product demo is to make a powerful impact on your potential customers by providing them with an immersive exploration of your product. Key objectives include:
- Showcasing Product Capabilities: Highlight its features, functionalities, and how it can fulfill its specific requirements.
- Building Trust: A live demo enables you to build credibility as you’re able to present your true knowledge and passion for the product.
- Encouraging Interactions: Prospects can immediately ask questions or request a deeper dive into specific features, making the sales pitch more interactive and personalized.
- Proving the Value Proposition: Uses real-life scenarios and social proof to demonstrate how the product provides effective solutions, helping prospects see its value.
What are the different types of live demos?
Three primary types of live demos can be utilized depending on the nature of your product and the requirements of your potential customers.
Type of Live Demo | Description |
|---|---|
Individual Live Demo | One-on-one demonstration tailored to address a specific prospect query and exact use case. |
Group Live Demo | It involves multiple participants where general product features are showcased and are suitable for an audience with similar needs. |
Hybrid Live Demo | Combines elements of individual and group demos, usually reserved for complex products with varied applications. |
The chosen type of demo should effectively communicate your product’s unique value and benefits of your product to the target audience.
How do you prepare for a live sales demo?
To prepare for a live sales demo, begin by understanding your prospect’s needs, crafting a tailored script, setting up a smooth demo environment, and checking all technical details. Below, we’ll guide you through these steps to ensure your demo runs smoothly and wins over customers.
1. Run a discovery call
Begin with a discovery live sales call to uncover your prospect’s specific needs and challenges. This initial conversation is crucial for gathering information about their role, company, industry, and the tools they currently use. Understanding these details allows you to focus your demo on their pain points, making it more relevant and impactful.
The more you know about your potential customer, the more tailored your demo can be. The goal isn’t just to showcase your product but to clearly communicate how it solves their unique problems. A well-prepared discovery call sets the foundation for a demo that resonates and drives conversions.
2. Craft an engaging script
An engaging demo script serves as a roadmap, helping you focus on key points that address your prospect's needs and show how your product provides a solution. Start by outlining a logical flow—from introduction to conclusion—highlighting the product's benefits and relevance to their challenges. This keeps the demo focused and ensures you cover all essential steps.
While a script provides structure, it should be flexible enough to allow for natural conversation. Avoid sticking to it word-for-word, as this can make the pitch sound robotic. Instead, use it as a guide to facilitate genuine interactions, encouraging questions and discussions that make your demo more personalized and impactful.
3. Set up the demo environment
After crafting your script, setting up an effective SaaS demo environment is crucial. This includes selecting the right technology, organizing the layout, and adding visuals or interactive elements to make the presentation more engaging. A clean, user-friendly interface with relevant dummy data helps personalize the experience and makes complex products easier to understand.
Ensure the demo environment accurately represents your product without exaggeration. The goal is to showcase your product in the best possible light, helping prospects clearly see its value and encouraging them to take action. A well-prepared environment enhances the overall impact of your demo.
4. Test technical aspects before going live
Technical issues can disrupt a live demo, so testing everything in advance is crucial. Conduct a dry run to check your demo platform, ensure clear audio and video, and verify the functionality of interactive features. This helps prevent unexpected glitches during the presentation.
Also, ensure your environment is professional—check lighting, noise levels, and internet bandwidth to avoid disruptions during your product walkthrough. If your product has any missing features or issues, communicate this clearly to your prospects and provide an update on when they can expect them. This preparation helps maintain a smooth, professional demo and reduces potential embarrassment.
5. Final preparations and walk-through
After completing all key preparations, do a final walk-through of your demo. This helps you visualize how the presentation will flow and spot any potential issues that might disrupt the demo. Addressing these beforehand ensures a smoother user experience.
Anticipate possible questions or objections from your prospect and prepare answers in advance. This preparation boosts your confidence and shows expertise, positively impacting your prospect’s perception.
How can you engage your audience during a live demo?
Captivating your audience in a live demo is more than just showing major features; it's about connecting with them, telling a story, and addressing their concerns. We'll cover these tips below to help keep your audience engaged.
Storytelling and building a narrative
Storytelling is a powerful way to engage your audience during a live demo. Start by presenting a particular problem that resonates with your audience, then show how your product offers the ideal solution. The end of the demo should have a positive outcome that demonstrates the benefits your product brings.
Craft a narrative where the prospect’s pain points are the conflict, your product is the hero, and their business goals are the ultimate achievement. This approach helps make your product’s features a good fit to blend naturally into the story, fostering a deeper emotional connection and making the demo more relatable.
Schedule your live sales demo promptly
Scheduling your live sales demo can impact its success. Setting up the demo soon after your initial discussion is a good idea to maintain the prospect's interest and momentum. Propose a convenient date and time within the next five business days to ensure the demo remains fresh in their mind.
Quick scheduling helps avoid gaps in interest, keeps your product top-of-mind, and increases the likelihood of active participation.
Maximizing impact with your visuals
Visuals can greatly enhance your live product demo experience by making complex features easier to understand and leaving a memorable impression. Incorporate diagrams like jobs-to-be-done to show how your product achieves business goals, and use flow charts or process maps to illustrate how it integrates into the prospect’s operations. Infographics can help quickly highlight benefits or compare your product with competitors.
However, the most effective visual aid is to demonstrate the product live. Show it in action, addressing the prospect’s pain points directly. This live representation allows prospects to see precisely the value of your product in real-time.
Highlighting your product's unique benefits
Prospects attend your live demo to understand the unique benefits your product offers. Focus on how your product addresses its specific needs rather than just listing features to make the buying process smoother. Use real-life scenarios to show how your product solves its pain points and provide data-backed evidence of its success with similar customers.
Highlight key differentiators and premium features to emphasize your product's uniqueness. A strong value proposition helps prospects see your product as a vital solution, creating a compelling reason for them to make a purchase.
Handle objections and questions during your live demo
Encountering objections or questions during a live demo is a chance to engage and build trust, not a setback. Addressing concerns promptly and transparently shows credibility and strengthens your product’s appeal. If you don’t know the answer, commit to finding it and follow up after the demo to maintain trust and integrity.
Anticipate tough questions or objections and include prepared responses in your script. This proactive approach ensures you handle challenges smoothly, enhancing the likelihood of converting prospects into customers.
Next steps: What to do after your live sales demo
After your live demo, send a follow-up email summarizing key points and share the recorded demo. Keep the conversation going by seeking feedback and answering any additional questions. Need help with follow-up strategies? We’re here to assist.
Send a demo follow-up email
Sending a follow-up email after your live demo is one key step in influencing your prospect’s decision-making process. A well-crafted follow-up email can keep you fresh in your prospect’s mind, reinforce your product’s benefits, and keep the conversation going.
Personalize your email, commend them for their time, and recap the main points discussed during the demo. If you promised additional resources during your demo, include them as well. You could also share a recorded version of your demo or an interactive demo for them to revisit at their convenience.
Remember, the follow-up email is not just about pitching your product harder, but continuing the rapport and subtly reminding them of what they stand to gain by choosing your product.
Encouraging interaction and participation
Keeping your potential customers engaged is crucial for transforming them from interested leads to happy customers. After your live demo, encourage them to interact further with your product.
If you have an accessible product trial, invite them to explore it. Alternatively, share access to interactive demos where they can check out different features at their own time and pace. Ask for feedback, continue discussions around their pain points, and offer suggestions on how they could effectively use your product to beat those challenges. Remember, every interaction is an opportunity to demonstrate your commitment to addressing their needs, which resonates stronger than any sales pitch and elevates your sales experience!
How do you tackle challenges during your live product demo?
Even with great preparation, live demos can encounter issues like technical glitches, scheduling conflicts, or difficulties engaging the audience. Identifying these common challenges helps you navigate them effectively and ensure your product makes a strong impression. We’ll explore frequent obstacles and provide strategies to overcome them, ensuring a smooth and impactful demo.
Technical issues
Technical issues ‒ like disrupted internet, problematic audio/video, or even a product demo software breakdown ‒ can disrupt your live demo flow unexpectedly. While it's impossible to foresee or prevent all potential tech glitches, being prepared can help you avoid some common problems.
Before every demo, conduct system checks to ensure all devices, software, and your internet connection are functional so the final stage is smooth. Have backups available for emergencies ‒ like a prepared offline presentation, in case you suffer network issues. If, despite all measures, you encounter technical issues during the demo, stay calm. Apologize for the interruption, assure them the problem is being fixed, and maintain professional composure.
Balancing time and pacing in live demos
Executing a live demo video within the scheduled timeframe while ensuring all critical points are covered can be daunting. Losing track of time can negatively impact the attention span of your audience and even leave crucial features unexplained.
Preparation is key to managing time effectively. Practice going through your demo a number of times, ensuring you don’t overshoot the allotted time. Subtly check the clock during the live demo to adjust your speed in a timely manner. While you should take care not to rush through the presentation, it's crucial not to linger excessively on a single feature that could lead to a loss of interest.
Use SmartCue live product demo
SmartCue is ideal for SaaS product owners and sales teams looking to enhance their live product demo video. It allows you to manage team access, repurpose demos into PDFs, GIFs, or videos, and track performance with detailed metrics. You can also seamlessly integrate with tools like HubSpot and Salesforce and enjoy an intuitive workflow.
Sign up for SmartCue’s 14-day trial to get a hands-on experience and explore. You can also check out SmartCue Demo tips and tricks for more information.
Conclusion
Mastering live product demos may seem challenging, but with solid preparation and presentation skills, it’s achievable. Use the demo to showcase your product and connect with potential customers by addressing their needs and concerns.
After the demo, follow up with emails and ongoing engagement to turn leads into sales. We hope this guide helps you host effective demos, shorten your sales cycle, and boost your business!
Frequently Asked Questions
What should I include in my live product demo script?
Your live product demo script should include specific details about your prospect’s pain points and how your product can address them. The script should discuss each important feature of your product and its needs, follow a logical progression, be flexible, and encourage open interaction.
How long should a live product demo last?
The duration of a live product demo can vary based on the complexity of your product and the prospect's familiarity with your industry. One of the best ways is to keep duration of 30-60 minutes for effectively conveying your product’s features without overwhelming the prospect.
What are some examples of successful live product demos?
Some examples of successful live product demos include Tesla’s Cybertruck reveal, Apple's iPhone launch, and Microsoft’s Windows 95 presentation. These demos were successful as they effectively highlighted the product’s unique features, created excitement among the audience, and resulted in significant sales figures.
How can I improve my live product demo skills?
Improving live product demo skills involves practicing your script, mastering product knowledge, understanding your audience’s needs, using visuals effectively, managing time wisely, and addressing technical issues proactively. Also, always seek feedback post-demo to learn about areas you can refine and improve.
