How to Prepare a Demo Case

Product presentations are much more effective when a live example is given.  Here are some tips that will help you prepare a demo case for just such an occasion.

Pick a travel case that is large enough to accommodate your product, but also light enough for you to carry easily when it is full.  These cases may be purchased through companies who sell luggage as well as some major home improvement stores.  Don’t think conventionally.  Your demo case doesn’t have to look like a suitcase.  Evaluate your product and choose the case that will best protect it and even help to present it.

Compile your company’s literature, your business cards, some pens, and some paper and include these things in the demo case.  If your product includes many small pieces, make inserts with separate compartments to include in the case.  If your product needs electricity to function, determine a way to have only one power cord and use it to supply all of the devices.  Verify that the power cord is long enough to stretch at least 10 to 15 feet from the case.  Many electrical devices are designed to be mounted to a surface or a rail.  If your product includes this feature, mount it to a clean and professional looking board.

Before each presentation, stock the demo case with plenty of products.  It is common for a customer to like some features of a product but not others.  If you have a variety of products in your demo case, you have a better chance of showing them exactly what they want to see.  If your demo case is successful, make several duplicates of it and supply them to your distributors so that they will have the same sales tools.

Tips

• Don’t make the demo case too heavy.

• If your travel includes commercial transportation, be sure your demo case meets all of the necessary requirements.

How to Demonstrate a Product to New Customers

How do salespeople make someone see the value in a product that they’ve never seen or heard of before?  It’s not that difficult for the average person to do when they follow several easy steps.

Learn everything that there is to know about your new product.  Have several associates write down as many questions as possible and then determine the answers for each one.  Know all associated facts, figures, and test data that is relevant.  Be an expert on your product and know a lot more about it than your competitors.  Practice your demonstration in front of a test audience who has no prior knowledge of your product.  If you are performing this demonstration at a trade show, try to condense the most important parts of the presentation into the first 15 to 20 seconds.  You may not have much more time than that initially.

Do not assume that your potential customers know anything at all about this new product.  Begin by asking several pointed questions to evaluate how well they know the type of product that you are presenting.  Adjust your communication with them appropriately and speak on their level.  Now, identify a problem area in their life or in their job that your product will satisfy.

Use as many visual aids as possible.  The majority of the world learns easier when you show them something rather than just tell them about it.  Find a way to demonstrate your product that will defy their logic.  Try to determine the best visual display to impress them and help them to remember what they saw for at least for several days.  Don’t leave them hanging with unanswered questions, though.  Form a bridge of thought that will lead them back to the practical use of your product to meet their needs.

The most important thing to do is to collect the potential customer’s contact information so that you can follow-up with them later.  When you do call, be sure to reference something memorable from your demonstration that will help them to remember who you are.  Be sure you are the one to call.  Don’t leave this important follow-up to someone else.

Get the business and then be sure to thank your new customer.

Tips

• Know everything about your product

• Be aggressive, but not obnoxious

• Even if you know that someone probably won’t buy your product, tell them about it anyway and do it with enthusiasm.  They just may tell their friends and who knows where that will lead?