Episode 12: Bad Demo Gone Well

In this week's Check-in with the Doctor I interviewed Ramzi Marjaba, host of WeTheSalesEngineers podcast.  I asked him if he had ever given a demo that went horribly wrong.  He shared a story of a demo that started out in the worst possible way and proved to be one of the best demos he'd ever given.

WHY?  Because all of the technical details he had prepared were based on the wrong set of requirements.  He was not part of the technical discovery process, and as such, had to rely on what his sales counterpart told him.  Unfortunately, his sales counterpart misunderstood the requirements.  So what Ramzi prepared for the demo, was completely and totally irrelevant for the prospect he was meeting.

What did he do?  He skipped over all of technical details and minutia that he was planning to present and got right to the bottom line - as if to say, "regardless of which technology infrastructure you deploy our capabilities on, these are the end results you will achieve."  In other words, he did PRECISELY what we should be doing anyways - BEGIN WITH THE END.  Go right to the punch line!

And what happened as a result?  The client LOVED IT.  He made the sale.  In fact, the product manager, who happened to be in the meeting told him it was the best demo of the product he had ever seen.  And why?  Because they left out the unnecessary details and went right to the bottom line.

Well done Ramzi!  And great reminder for us all...

Enjoy!

Also available on YouTube Episode 12 - Bad Demo Gone Well (w/ Ramzi Marjaba) - YouTube