Bringing Production Designer Details to Prospects
Or as swipe files templates tell me this post ought be titled; Smell the Scenery - What a Hollywood Legend Teaches Us About the Perfect Demo. And how about this option, from an AI bot; The Godfather of Great Demos: Why the Best Demos Often Feel Like No Demo At All.
Dean Tavoularis. Oscar winner across The Godfather trilogy. If that wasn't enough, also with incredible Apocalypse Now. Here's insight from one of his recent obits.
What [top directors] hired him for was his meticulous and imaginative attention to detail. For the Italian grocery store in The Brink’s Job, for example, he had garlic and oregano crushed into the floor so that the place smelled like an authentic deli rather than like a freshly painted film set. You could not smell it on screen, of course, but it helped the cast get into character.
I thought of this as I recently had a demo where there was no demo.
In the bad way.
I learned quick that the best demos were when there was no demo.
In the good way, this is where such a positive discussion occurred with the prospect. When you practically say at then end, 'blimey, I'd better show you something, hey, here you go, that report you crave...' Click-click-boom.
So there's almost a binary at play here. Either the masterclass signal of a super meeting where verbally all buyer dreams are 'met' and unique progress flows. Or the red flag that there isn't actually any product to demo.
Even today, I still experience demos where the demo-dolly (yes, an affectionate unisex ol' Brummie term for whoever presses the keys) explains each button you can see, reciting their label, and announcing progress through screen-by-screen narration. Ew.
There's two types of demo remember. The front demo, and the validation.
They can actually be both. Whether they are depends on your best process.
As in some cases, a front demo alone could be redundant. Where you show dummy data (or with permission, someone else's). As opposed to the tailored view with the prospect's own to 'validate'.
Broad capabilities versus their personal data. Think of the difference between just showing a feature and creating an environment for the buyer to believe.
One trap you don't want to encourage, is thinking a no-show demo is automatically in the 'good' place.
It does not follow that just because you didn't click through anything, the demo was a belter.
When doing your demo finessing back at base, this is distinction you must pay attention to.
Such as I refer to earlier, where the conversation is so strong you almost forget to click anything. But then the right click at the right moment feels like confirmation rather than performance. That’s when you’ve designed a winning demo.
And as the lauded movie production designer knew, letting the assembled cast smell their scenery is the winning way.
In our terms, the steer is simple. Aim for where the magic happens. With validation of their reality.
footnote, harking back to my tangential intro para above, here's what a LinkedIn 'expert' suggests as better 'optimsed hook' opening for that (what happens when middling performers discover personal branding as C-Wanna-Os) medium;
What if the best sales demo you ever gave… barely used the product?
Dean Tavoularis, the genius behind The Godfather, crushed garlic and oregano into the floor of a film set so actors could smell an authentic Italian deli.
They couldn’t see or smell it on camera.
But it changed everything.
That’s exactly how the best demos work...