How do you respond to product demo requests?
I'm building a B2B product. Some people want to get on a phone/hangouts and get a product demo, even though they can try out the product themselves. The problem is that I don't have much time to do these in-person demos because the product is being built on the side after regular work hours.
Are there any tips on how to approach this kind of situation? I definitely want to avoid synchronous communication because it's very expensive for a variety of reasons. The only thing that comes to my mind is having a good user onboarding after you sign up. But I also could be completely wrong.
👏Congrats for getting people interested!
A few things, in the B2B world it's pretty common for people to expect personal attention before signing up.
They are used to paying per user rather than a flat rate, unlimited seats.
If you need to do personal demos for people to signup, rather than self service, your pricing will need to be higher to compensate.
Add a video demo walkthrough that they can watch before setting up a time with you.
Add an email drip for prospects who are not ready for a trial yet but might want more info on how to do OKC right.
Use a scheduling tool to coordinate with details and to re-enforce the demo will only be 15-20 mins on something like Zoom.
Get someone who knows your product to run the demos if you can't during the business day.
You can learn from Claire Lew founder of Know Your Company.
She did a personal demo for every single new customer for 3 years before she let people signup on their own.
Her pricing model is flat rate per employee, rather than # employees per month. Her company growth came as a result of customers hitting a growth phase and hiring more people, not just signing up more customers.
If you look at where they are now, she has a live dashboard view and a product tour page so people can look at what a fully engaged account looks like before signing up.
I've learned a lot from her in the regards to employee engagement and employee satisfaction for DistroMonk. I think you might get some ideas from her too since you're in a complementary space.
Hey Tadas, just checked out your product. With a price point of $50/month, I think you should expect some people to want to see a demo before signing up.
I would fully embrace these demo requests. It will do two things:
It will probably give you a much higher chance of closing the sale if you take the time to show it to them and build rapport vs. them just checking out a free trial themselves
It will give you a chance to hear exactly what your potential customers are looking for, and will probably give you very valuable insights.
I know for some people, doing a video chat with someone to demo your product might feel a little scary, but it will help grow your business faster and help you grow more personally.
If you can't fit a demo into your workday, I would try to find a way to make it happen in the early mornings or evenings.
We are also a B2B startup, LambdaTest.com and here we receive around 50 Demo requests per day.
We have demo form on our website page.
We reply to requests and ask for suitable timing for demo.
We do product by sharing screen.
We use tools like Google meet, Go to meeting , Skype for screensharing.
We got 70% conversion from product demo.
Good luck to you
With free trials you leak a lot of potential customers for each one you get, and raising the conversion rate takes time and careful attention.
In our product we actively encourage free trial users to request a demo, because we know some of them are struggling with the product, and others just want a walk through. Either way the conversion rate is much higher after a demo. If you have people wanting a demo thats a great sign and I think you need to embrace it.
Some ideas:
Put scheduling software links on your site/emails, so that users can only choose your available times. I use calend.ly
Take one morning off a week/fortnight specifically for demos.
Hold a monthly webinar and encourage free triallers to attend.
Consider marketing outside your locale (Aus/UK ?) because the times might match up better
What Michael suggest is a very valid point.
Then you could use Zoom or even Loom if they need any additional help. You could maybe create an help center with articles/videos covering the ones you see coming up the most.
There is probably a lot of upside if you could create a custom video on Loom for each though. At least that won't require you to meet them in person.
What about recording demos that cover certain aspects of your application and sending those out when requested? They're infinitely reusable and solve that "tier-one" demo request - any follow up would usually be specific to a smaller portion that you can easily demo live.
This is what I'm working on right now. I'll feature them both in my documentation section as well as a sort of content marketing. The bonus on top of it all is to send out to customers that request demos.
How pricey is the product? I would love to have people request demo's to try http://gif.com.ai
Consider yourself fortunate. You should embrace customer communication as the first priority.