I have attended many many hours of software demos the last couple of months. Some have been great but unfortunately most have been mediocre. So, I thought I would write up some quick software demo tips for the Vendors out there. Most of these seem OBVIOUS to me but if they were obvious to the vendors, I guess I would not be posting these tips.
Do’s:
- Show up early and get your equipment up and running in time for the start of the demo. My time is valuable.
- Make sure you have appropriate network connectivity at the customer site before you agree to come onsite and demo your software.
- Have a backup plan in case the customer network connectivity abruptly ends for no apparent reason (Hint: An AT&T, Verizon or Sprint 3G data card would probably be handy).
- Make sure you know the data in your demo system. If you are trying to demo a particular feature, know the demo data needed to show the feature.
- Practice your demo and then lock down the demo environment so no one can change your data (surprise!!) until after the customer demo.
- If this is an HR application demo and you have employee pictures in your demo database, make sure the pictures and the gender match.
- If you have bugs in your software, know about them and own them.
- Be professional. You can have fun but don’t poke fun at the customer. Wow, I can’t believe I have to list this as a tip but there you have it.
- Know your audience. If you demoing salary planning to the compensation department don’t start by explaining the purpose of salary planning.
- Did I mention that you should practice your demo? Well, it bears mentioning again. Practice your demo, again and then again. When you think you have it down, do it one more time.
Don’ts:
- Don’t fall back to a previous version of the application because you forgot to configure a feature you need to demo in the new version of the software. Make sure you have everything configured and ready to go before the demo (see tip above on practicing).
- If part of the demo audience is in a remote location using Web Conferencing software, don’t do part of your demo on a whiteboard if it can’t be seen by part of your audience. Really.
- If part of the demo audience is in a remote location, don’t make them ask you every 5 minutes to speak up because they can’t hear you. Make sure a microphone is near you, use you conference call voice and speak clearly.
- If your product is missing functionality requested by the potential customer, don’t blame the product strategy department. In fact don’t blame anyone, just take some notes.
- If you have bugs in your software don’t try to cover it up or blame the developers.
- Don’t forget to practice your demo. Really, I mean it this time.
I’m sure you have some great tips as well so leave them in the comments. Any Vendors out there want to leave some demo tips for the customers?
{ 1 trackback }
{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
So, do you recommend a vendor practice the demo at all?
Seriously, excellent list of what should be obvious points, but as you say often need repeating.
Good stuff.
the best comment I can make is "right on!" – but I will add, please make the vague attempt to ask the questions necessary to configure the demo for my needs. If I'm a 100 person company, I don't need scalability above 1000 (or the associated pricing)
And yo, software companies… the little guy doesn't want to live with spreadsheets forever, otherwise we don't get to be the big guy. We need software too!
great post, sir. Keep going.
and visit the HR Junkyard in the next few weeks. I'm sure you have a few things to throw out, right?
http://www.junkyardhr.com
Tammy
As a IT vendor presenter for the past 2 years and someone who has had to sit through a number of less than stellar presentations, I think these are all great tips! I used to be in software development and I must say that being customer facing is a whole different world. As requested by the author, here are my customer tips.
My biggest pet peeve is not having the right people in the room… or no room at all. Please be respectful to the vendor and make sure to reserve an appropriate size room and people. There is nothing worse than having to repeat the demo over and over.
My second pet peeve is, when possible, put the blackberry down and close the laptop. Trust me, nobody is more guilty of this than myself, but these vendors do work hard and hopefully the solution they are suggesting will help you!
Finally, be patient and have fun. We LOVE to help the customers who treat their vendors as peers. I know many customers that have ended up either working for us or used us as a network to find their next job. It's a small world!
I can say personally that the travel is rough, I have to balance hundreds of customers in all industries with a quota over my head, and all the while trying to keep up with a wide range of rapidly evolving products built by thousands of developers adding new features in each release. It's tough, but wow, when you make someone happy, it's all worth it! Great post
Steve, the first HRM packages, primarily payroll applications, appeared in the early 70's. These tips were appropriate then, and they're appropriate now. Why on earth they still need repeating is unfortunate — but true.
Spill, Mike. What applications are you buying?
Isn't it amazing how much the obvious has to be stated, and restated, and restated, and . . .
Thanks for putting aside frustrations and restating.
BTW, please check out my blogpost regarding whether businesses should be loyal to vendors. I'd love some input.
Steve – Practice makes perfect.
Tammy – Good addition. Yes the vendors should setup the demo for your specific needs. BTW I commented on a couple of your blog posts. Have fun with junkyardhr.com
Benjamin – Great customer suggestions. Thanks.
Naomi – Yes, It seems they still need repeating.
Bill – I won't tell you what I am buying but I will tell you that some of the recent demos were Authoria, Workday, SumTotal, Taleo and PeopleSoft.
Joan – Lather, rinse, repeat. Heading over to you blog now…
Ha! Those are great. You have to spill the beans on the story behind this one:
"You can have fun but don’t poke fun at the customer."
Great tips! All I would add is to spend most of your prep time determining exactly what business problems the customer has. Then, focus only on the software capabilities that solve those business problems.
Wish I had stumpled upon this blog earlier!
Thanks – Matt
how to do configar outlook microsoft office with demo
I can’t tell you home many demos I have been in and when something goes wrong, the presenters “blame IT.” You could just list ‘remove the word ‘blame’ from your consciousness for demos. Sorry I missed this the first time – this is great.