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9 Comments

Offer a demo of your product and you will lose 2 out of 3 customers

Several reasons for this:

  • Your customers want to test the product themselves

  • The process is longer with a demo

  • The product doesn't necessarily need it

To get maximum conversion, here's how to do it:

  • Leave the choice. (Demo or not)
  • Propose a Freemium / Free Trial offer
  • Let the customer test the product.

They will make their own opinion, if your product is good.

You will have more customers.

A good product does not need someone to explain it.

And you, which approach do you use? 🤔

  1. 2

    I agree with this when the target market is small businesses or the product is B2C. I think by allowing for a free trial or using a freemium model, you can let your product showcase its effectiveness and also this is a known marketing strategy in product-led growth.

    This is working well for us in https://repozix.com, a marketing reporting platform where we allow users to have a free plan and if they find the tool useful for them, they subscribe to one of our paid plans to get access to more features.

    1. 1

      Yes that's it ! Letting the customer choose if he want a demo or not can (maybe) improve his overall product satisfaction !

      Great solution for your product Abdel :), did you experiment both strategy ?

      1. 2

        Thanks Jahnoy, for now we are sticking with the freemium strategy. It is proving to be right for us and also we are targeting small marketing agencies and freelancers so this is the most appropriate option for them.

        They can play around with our product before paying for it.

        1. 1

          I see, it's great ! 👏

  2. 2

    This is not always true though. With a higher priced SaaS, a demo almost always leads to higher conversions and a better overall experience. Especially when you're in the B2B space or have a more complex product, you can't necessarily just throw a lead into a test environment or free trial, especially when that person isn't the decision-maker or the one that's going to be using your SaaS.

    At Removaly though we do a mix. There's an option to get a taste of things for free (i.e. sign up and get a free scan) but we also demo to B2B clients or even sometimes individuals looking for a more hands on experience.

    I hope that gives a bit of insight / things to think about. Sure if you have a $10/month SaaS it makes no sense to only offer a demo. But if your LTV is high or you're just starting out, you might find you actually get a few more leads by offering one 👍

    1. 2

      Yes I totally agree with you ! :)

      It's less risky to offer a demo when the product is more complexe or when the price is higher. I also think it's useful when there is a lot at stake (big customer, etc).

      The best alternative would be to offer both choices to the customer as you do (demo or discovery) imo

      but I still see a lot of SaaS products offering only demos when it is not necessary at all

      Product-leg-growth approach can also be a good way to solve this problem too 🧐

      Thanks for giving your opinion on this !

      Your product is very interesting ! Just took a look at the page 🙌

  3. 1

    In the industry I'm trying to enter (software for schools) nearly every product is only "schedule a demo" to see how it works and "contact sales" to get pricing.

    I've tried to be very transparent with my products and pricing. I haven't gotten any customers yet, although I've received several questions about some aspects. I think what I'm missing is a video walkthrough of how the product works. Thoughts on that?

    1. 1

      Yes it really depends on what industry you're in. Some are more complex than others

      1. Have to get in touch with a Sales to know the prices is counter-intuitive imo because it doesn't allow to sort out the prospects only interested in the price and those who agree with the price and want to go further. Giving the price in advance allows you to sort out the prospects who are really interested (unless the price is different for each user)

      2. I thought about building a Saas to allow others build custom and really effective onboarding. It's so helpful for your new users to be able to learn about the software through videos etc without having to book a meeting with a Sales for explanations (unless they really want to). I think you are on the right track with the onboarding videos :)

      Here's my opinion on all this 😉

  4. 1

    This comment was deleted a year ago.

    1. 1

      Same for me when I can handle the tool myself

      I don't stay on the site when they only offer the demo 😕

      I saw this statistic on a Medium article and I rather agreed.

      Here's the link : https://medium.com/the-marketing-playbook/freemium-vs-free-trial-vs-hybrid-customer-acquisition-model-b8cd3287f9f0

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