Tech Demo Guy

Often when I attend a presentation I have ideas about constructive feedback to give to the presenter. While I used to deliver my feedback and criticisms in a very direct and honest way, hoping that they would be taken at face value, I often found that presenters with disheartened with my feedback. Over time I learned a method to deliver feedback in a way that it would help the presenter in the future and learned how to take feedback better myself.

In their excellent book “Switch“, Chip and Dan Heath point out a studies that have shown that our perception and memories of “bad” events are much stronger (and longer-lasting) than “good” events (see the end of Chapter 2 in the book). People have a very strong tendency to focus on the negative, and this is very much true for feedback and criticisms they receive.

My current approach to giving feedback takes this phenomenon into account. When I give feedback on presentations I recognize that even experienced presenters are really exposing themselves when they stand up and talk in front of a group. I have been presenting professionally for many years now and I still get just a little nervous before a presentation and find myself hungry to know whether the audience approved afterwards. Feedback on presentations hits people where they are very vulnerable regardless of how confident they may be during a presentation.

Keeping that in mind I give feedback that is very specific and I balance every criticism with at least 3 positive observations. The specificity is important because it signals to the receiver that you were really paying attention. The 3:1 ratio helps balance the scales of our tendency to focus on the negative. The place where it is easy to make is mistake is being too general in your positive feedback. Imagine I came up to you after a presentation and said:

Wow, that was really a great presentation! I really like your style and you seemed very comfortable in front of the audience. I did notice that you made a mistake on our current number of customers: it should be 195 not 155. I did really like the flow of your demonstration overall!

That has three positives with one negative mixed in. But notice how general the positive comments are when compared with the negative? That signals that the one piece of feedback you want the receiver to focus on is the negative and the rest are just pats on the back to cheer them up. What if you heard this feedback instead:

Great presentation! The way you opened up with a story really grabbed their attention and I really liked how it related to what they read in this morning’s paper. The flow of the demo was really nice, particularly around how you compared it with their current experience and showed just how much better their life would be in the future. I noticed that you had 155 customers listed on that one slide, I think the number is closer to 195. I think that your style of being both confident and humble really made a connection, particularly with the IT manager who I saw you talking with at the break.

By softening the one criticism and being very specific in the positives you can take the edge off quite a bit. The reality is that all but the most clueless presenters are going to still focus on the negative, so there is no need to emphasize it. The reason why this approach is so important is that confidence in front of an audience is one of the key factors to success in a presentation, so you don’t want to undermine that for the presenter in their next presentation. You also want to be sure that they keep doing the things that are working (the positives) rather than just focusing on fixing the things that are not.

When it comes to receiving information I have also changed my approach over time. One of the challenges if you are a successful Sales Engineer is that sales reps may end up seeing you as a valuable resource that they need to compete with other reps for. This may not be true in your company, but I have certainly experienced it in the past. Because of this they may not be willing to give you honest, direct feedback on your presentations because they are concerned about whether you will want to work with them on more deals. Over time you may just get congratulations and kudos for every presentation, whether you felt you did a good job or not. We all need feedback to improve and that goes for even the most experienced and capable presenters.

To make sure that I get the real story from people in the audience I just ask them “Is there anything I should do differently the next time?” or “Is there anything that you think I could have changed in the presentation?”. Then, when they answer I make sure NOT to try to justify why I did it the way did, I just listen to the feedback and make sure I clarify what they are saying. So if I heard this feedback:

“Well, I am not sure if I really liked the analogy you used at the beginning of the presentation”

I would resist launching into my justification or explanation of why the analogy really should have made sense and instead ask what about it did not line up. So instead of responding with:

“Yeah, but I think the point I was trying to make really did fit with that analogy for this prospect…”

I would instead try to clarify exactly what they meant:

“What about the analogy broke down? Would the analogy work in other situations or does it just not make sense at all? Are there any other ways I could explain that topic?”

If you actively seek out feedback, you need to make sure to really take it rather than becoming defensive if you don’t agree.

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Skills, Demo Tips, Learning

Sales management often talks about selling “business value”. There’s a good reason for this: in most cases it is not IT making the decision to buy software, but rather the business users (although IT may have veto power). For many Sales Engineers (especially technical ones) that means that if you are talking about technology, you may not be helping to win the deal because your message may go right past the business audience.

So how do you effectively sell technology to a business audience? First off you should strive to have a combination of both business and technical people from the prospect attending your presentations. This mix can help you to really sell the business value of technology, although many SE’s dread presenting to “mixed groups”. To make presentations to mixed business/technical audiences work well, you should follow these guidelines:

1. Move back and forth between “day in the life” examples and down in the weeds technical explanations. It’s important not to water down your presentation for either part of the audience. Don’t be afraid to talk tech when challenged, but always make sure your examples are relevant to the business users so that they stay engaged.
2. Go for the “head nods” from the geeks. This should remain your goal throughout the presentation: to get the technical people to nod their heads when a business user says “can your system do X?”. Even though there may be animosity between the IT and business groups in a company, it’s likely they trust their fellow employees more  than they trust your sales team. So getting them to see that your solution passes muster with IT during the demo is critical.
3. Control the conversation – don’t go down a “rabbit hole” with the technical people. It’s likely that technical people will ask detailed questions (often with little regard for the other audience members). If you can answer quickly, do it, otherwise you should defer the question for follow-up. If you feel you will lose credibility by deferring, you can offer to answer the question during a break. But if you do, make sure to point out your discussion (and get a head nod) once you start again.
4. Use examples relevant to the business users. This may seem obvious, but I know many SE’s who do demonstrations that have a very technical focus. Showing the XML generated from a web service or the SQL output from a process may fly with IT, but you will lose the business users quickly with this approach. It’s not that you can’t show technical results, but you need to bring it back around to the business users in a way they can appreciate (which is usually something visual). A great way to do this the classic “cooking demo” where, ala Julia Child, you show the process (including some tech details) and bring out the beautifully baked pie at the end. Taking this approach means that both the techies and the business users will be satisfied that they saw something of value. Of course it also means that SE’s really need to understand the business processes, not just the technology.
5. Make the business users feel they can understand the complexity. Many business users feel that the technical folks are speaking another language, and they are often right. But if you can explain a complex technology in terms that make sense to a business user you can really win them over. Using analogies is one great way to accomplish this. Because many business users have given up on being able to communicate with IT, by providing a bridge you will show how your technology will benefit them directly.

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Skills, Demo Tips, Selling

In one of my earlier posts I talked about one reason why you should consider presenting first in a sales cycle: so that the audience will pay attention to you during a long day of demonstrations. This is just one of the strategies that you can apply in a “Demo Marathon”.

If you have never been on the buying side of a corporate purchase, you probably don’t have a sense of just how tiring an evaluation can be. It takes you away from your normal activities, and that may be exciting for a bit, but writing RFP questions, grading the responses, talking to vendors and attending endless meetings can quickly become a drag. It’s no wonder that many prospects choose to cram all the vendor presentations into one day: it allows for easier scheduling and gets everything over at once. But demo marathons can be a disaster for vendors because the audience is often burned out after the first or second demonstration.

That is the argument for going first: you want to avoid presenting when your audience is getting tired. But if you can’t present first (often you are not in control of the order) there are a few other things you can do to be successful during a demo marathon

1. Wow them in the first 2 minutes.

This is a good rule for any presentation, but it applies particularly well when you are trying to deal with an overloaded audience. Studies have shown that people pay the most attention at the start and end of a presentation, so you want to make a powerful first impression. The critical factor here is to deliver your most important message first thing and make it memorable. Don’t waste time introducing your company, your team, etc… Instead, just tell them the one (or two, or three, if you can make it short) things that will matter most about your product. You can even say “If you forget everything else you see today, I want to be sure you remember these three things about our product…”

2. Make coffee or caffeine containing soft drinks available

I have mentioned this before, but if you want your audience to be more receptive, you should make it available before your demo. Studies have shown that caffeine puts people in a more receptive mood. It has been suggested that this factor is more important than any other in a presentation. So bring that Starbucks coffee-in-a-box with you!

3. Nail your follow-ups

Almost every presentation I have given ends up with follow-up questions that could not be answered on the day of the presentation. Often these can drag on for a while and prospects or vendors will forget about them. If a prospect has just been through a demo marathon they will probably be getting the vendors mixed up in their heads after the demo. If you can follow up on any questions quickly, you will have an opportunity to stay top of mind. Instead of researching the answers to every question, get as many answers together as you can in 24 hours or less and send them to the prospect. Make sure to include the reasons why they should purchase your product along with your follow-up answers.

4. Change presenters several times

The rule about the start and end of the presentations commanding the most attention applies for each presenter. So that means if you change presenters often you have additional chances to deliver your message. Even if it is just the Salesperson standing up for 5 minutes to discuss company financials, breaking up the presenters can have a positive effect. Of course this needs to be choreographed well to avoid confusion, but it can increase the impact when you have an important message to deliver.

5. Give them a rating sheet

Although prospects often have some sort of rating sheets (I will have a post about that soon), you might consider giving them one for your product if they don’t. This is particularly effective if there is a large scripted demonstration. If you give them a grading sheet that follows their script and has a check box or rating box after each item you will encourage them to follow along with your demonstration. And if you are the only vendor that gave them a rating sheet it will make a very personal leave-behind that will be brought up in further discussions. Either way it will help keep their attention during a long demo day.

Those are just a few examples of ways to keep attention focused on your products during a demo marathon. I welcome other suggestions for readers in the comments.

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Prep, Demo Skills, Demo Tips, Selling

I have been asked by the folks at SoftwareCEO to put together a seminar to help smaller software companies with their demonstrations. I thought it might be good to start by outlining what I believe are seven important tips for having a killer demo. Follow these suggestions and you well on your way.

1. Start your presentation with a demo

This ties in with my post on the 30 second demo. People who come do a demo want to see product and you should do everything possible to show them what you can do as quickly as you can. It does not need to be long or involved, but it will calm down those “show me” types at the start.

2. Get enough sleep

It may seem strange to put this in as #2, but it really is important to be well rested before any sort of presentation. Demonstrations can be particularly taxing, both mentally and physically, so being well rested is critical. If you have to choose between doing final preparations and getting enough sleep, choose getting enough sleep.

3. Make sure you have a few things nailed and show them first

First impressions go a long way in a demo. If you show a few relevant and powerful things in your demo right up front, you will have the audience on your side. If, instead, you do a “B-minus” job on a bunch of things, you will lose credibility fast. So prioritize the items you know you can knock out of the park and put them up front. Even if they have a script for the entire demo, suggest that you want to show a couple things up front to orient the group to your applications.

4. Use a day-in-the-life approach rather than feature dumps

Whenever you can show a prospect/customer how they will use the application rather than the features you provide you will be at an advantage. “A Day in the Life” scenarios are good for this approach as you can guide them through what how the application will apply to the work they do. This works best if you have the chance to do some discovery with the prospect beforehand, but it is still effective if you are going in blind. I will probably do a longer post on this topic in the future.

5. Make coffee or caffeine containing soft drinks available

I don’t drink coffee or anything else containing caffeine, but if you want your audience to be more receptive, you should make it available before your demo. Studies have shown that caffeine puts people in a more receptive mood. It has been suggested that this factor is more important than any other in a presentation. So bring that Starbucks coffee-in-a-box with you!

6. Do a dry run

I already have a post on the importance of dry runs and you should absolutely do at least one dry run with the entire team at least 2 days before your demonstration. It is worth the time and effort.

7. Bring a backup computer

Murphy’s Law definitely applies in demonstrations. Bring a backup computer (or at least a backup hard drive) and be ready to switch over quickly if needed. You can blame your problems on Microsoft Windows all you like, but the customer is still going to judge any problems you have in your demo on your software.

There are lots of other ways to give a killer demo. What are your suggestions?

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Prep, Demo Skills, Demo Tips

If you have worked for a while in pre-sales, supporting salespeople by showing a prospect your software applications, then you know there are times when salespeople will say the darnedest things. Here is my partial list of “never say this during a demo” for the salespeople I have worked with (and I am sure they have a list of “never do this!” for me as well):

1. “Can you show that thing you did yesterday?”

I will could do an entire post on why this one is a bad idea, but the short explanation is that your demo guy/gal may not want to show that thing because it is going to blow up today! If you want to see a demo of something, ask before the presentation.

2. “Let me introduce Dave who is an expert in…”

Most Sales Engineers I know don’t like the word expert and all that it implies. It is just setting us up for our credibility being knocked out later in the presentation. Better to talk about experience, years with the company, or just let us introduce ourselves.

3. “I just heard from Product Management yesterday that we are going to add that feature in the next release…”

For a Salesperson to be effective they have to build trust. For a Sales Engineer to be effective they need to build credibility. Undermining a Sales Engineer’s credibility during a demonstration by pointing out a mistake they made is counter-productive. It’s not an ego thing – Sales Engineers are wrong all the time and need to learn from their mistakes. A better approach is to wait until the break and discuss it directly with the Sales Engineer. Besides, you may have misunderstood what the Product Manager meant by “new feature”…

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Skills, Demo Tips, Selling pre-sales, sales, sales consulting, sales engineering, salesman, salespeople

As a Sales Engineer you depend on Sales Representatives for your success. Sometimes they are a great help during a demonstration, but sometimes they say some pretty dumb things. My first example is when a Sales Rep says to a Sales Engineer:

“Can you show that thing you did yesterday?”

Although your Sales Engineer may have done a spectacular demo yesterday and really wowed the customer, but that does not mean they can do the same thing again today. Your demo guy/gal may not want to show that thing because it is going to blow up today! Or, just as likely, they don’t think it will add to the demonstration (perhaps it is a feature that detracts from what the prospect is really looking for).
So what should you do if you saw a great demo yesterday that your SE seems to be forgetting? Your first choice should be talking to your SE before the demo and going over what they are going to show. Second choice would be to wait until a break to ask them or slip them a note during a lull in the presentation. And if you have to ask during the middle of the demo, then be prepared to be the cause of a disaster you will need to clean up later.

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Tips, Selling sales, sales engineer, sales engineering

One of my signatures in product demonstrations is to start with a “30 second demo”. In most cases this is a demonstration of a key feature of the software, such as a simple configuration, that I do right at the start of my presentation. There are a lot of good reasons to start a presentation in this way.
When I say, “the start of my presentation”, I really mean at the very beginning, even before I introduce myself. Studies have shown that people are most focused at the start and end of an activity, including a presentation. The first few minutes of a presentation are critical, and often wasted on introductions of both individuals and companies. To take advantage of this phenomena, the first words out of my mouth once I am introduced are:

“Hi, before I get started, I wanted to show you something quickly”

Then I dive right into the application and show a 30-second demo of one key feature that I want to highlight. Immediately after that, without pausing to allow for questions:

“My name is Dave Sohigian, and that is just one quick example of the power of our applications. We’ll refer back to what you just saw in that demo as we go through these topics…”

Here is an example (actually about 45 seconds) showing how to add a plugin to WordPress:

Where you go from here is up to you, but the point is to get the product in front of the prospect as early as possible. In the example above I could refer back to this quick “demo” whenever there were gaps in WordPress functionality that required a plugin (“you already saw how easy it would be to add a plugin…”).

The 30-second demo accomplishes many things:

• Shows them product while their attention is very high at the start of the presentation
• Gives them comfort that they will see your product before the end of the demonstration
• Many people that attend a demo are itching to see how the product performs. Although it is very useful to give them a context for your demonstration and you need to build your credibility with an effective introduction, there will be people in the audience getting impatient right from the start. “Would you just do the demo?” you can almost hear them saying during the obligatory company introduction and list of key features. By doing a demo, even a ridiculously short one, you can put these people at ease so that they are more likely to hear your initial message.
• Ensures that everyone sees the product, at least a little.
• Often people come and go during a demonstration, but most try to at least make it to the beginning. By doing a quick and effective demo you can ensure that everyone will have a chance to see something powerful about the application.
• Avoids starting at the beginning This post from Kathy Sierra at Passionate Users outlines how you should start “after chapter one” in your presentation, and doing a quick demo does just that. You get to the compelling stuff first and add a bit of mystery about where you are going right from the start.

So instead of making your audience squirm in their seats while they “wait” through your introduction and setup slides, why not just give them a quick taste of what is to come. Try it in your next demo!

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Demo Skills, Demo Tips, Selling demo, demonstration, presentation

Here is a program that will enhance any demo (and your general productivity): ActiveWords. The application is a little thing that runs on top of your OS and can fire off commands based on words you type. For example, you can launch an application by entering a keyword (which you define) and hitting F8 (or another function key you define) it can launch that app. It can also got to a URL, open a folder or even execute full scripts. Here are some examples of what I am already using this for:

• Launch apps: ot = outlook, psp = Photoshop, xl = Excel etc…
• Open specific URLS: app = local install, blog = blog view, remote = remote server etc…
• Open Specific files: tech = Standard Tech PPT, vb = vb code for .NET demo etc…

I am going to work on the scripting aspects of the application – might make some of the more rote tasks much simpler. You can script long sequences (it’s not terribly technical) that you fire off with a single word. A great example of how this is useful in a demo is to fire off background processes by typing a single word (even batch files or other funky technical stuff).
The only downside I have found with Activewords is that it uses up some CPU, and, like any other system level program there is the potential of conflicts. But my experience with it has been very positive and it can make for a very slick demo experience if used wisely.

Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Applications, Demo Tips