If your sales team isn’t closing as many deals as they should, the problem might not be with your software — it might be your demos. Today’s IT buyers live in an incredibly fast-paced, hectic world. For many of them, setting aside time during the workday to sit through a sales demo is a tall order.
Especially if that SaaS product demo doesn’t give them the freedom to explore and experiment.
Similar to self-service customer onboarding, a self-service demo allows prospects to explore your software on their own time. Unlike with a free trial, the SaaS demo takes place within a simulated virtual environment. It typically replicates the prospect’s ecosystem, giving them some idea of how your software might interact and integrate with existing tools.
The end goal of a self-service demo is to give qualified leads an idea of what your software does — and more importantly, what it can do for them.
Compared to traditional demos, the benefits of a self-service demo include:
By providing self-service demos, you eliminate the need for prospects to schedule a meeting with your sales team. Instead, they can explore your software immediately and on their own time. This not only speeds up your sales cycle, but also improves productivity — instead of spending time and effort hosting demos, they can pursue other leads.
Because self-service product demos are themselves typically enabled via the cloud, they scale much more effectively than a traditional software demo. This allows your team to target a much larger audience than would otherwise be possible. It also means less time spent on setup and implementation.
One of the most powerful benefits of a self-service demo is that it gives a prospect the freedom to experiment. It allows them to learn how to use your software through hands-on experience rather than requiring them to sit through a PowerPoint presentation or a series of videos. And if the prospect runs into any trouble during the demo, they can easily reach out to a member of your sales team for help.
As a result, once the prospect is ready to make a purchase, they’re considerably more familiar with the software than they would be with a traditional demo.
Before you start hosting self-service product demos, make sure you take care of the following: