You can't improve what you can't measure. Learn the metrics you can use to optimize the outcomes of your sales demos.
Buyers today are completing an ever-increasing amount of their buying process before engaging with Sales, leaving only 17% of their time to speak with all potential suppliers. So, it isn’t surprising that most buyers want to discuss pricing and see a product demo during their first call.
With sales reps getting less time to engage with buyers during their decision-making process, it’s essential that your sales demo be as effective as possible. Otherwise, you risk falling out of contention for the prospect’s business.
Doing pre-call prospect research and customizing sales demos to the specific customer is important. After all, personalization is what potential customers want. This allows the prospect to see themselves using your solution in their day-to-day, get answers to their questions, and position your product as the best one to meet their needs. But, regardless of how well you prepare, aside from closing the deal, how can you measure your sales demo success?
Measuring the success of your sales demo
As it is with any selling skill, sales demo success increases with practice, testing, and adjustment. To adjust, you must first establish criteria for evaluating the success of sales demos, perhaps by fine-tuning one element at a time to see which version is more effective. Then move on to the next element until you have the perfect sales demo. Here are some metrics to get you started in measuring the success of your sales demos:
Percent of demos converted to customers
Since sales demos almost directly relate to your close, demo-to-close rate is a must track!
If this number is low, investigate further to understand what’s driving this trend. What is the feedback on your demos? Why aren’t customers signing deals?
Time elapsed from demo to close
This metric impacts the overall length of your sales cycle and the amount of time it takes to generate revenue. In case you’re wondering, here’s how the sales demo experience can help reduce the length of your sales cycle.
Average deal value per demo
The more successful your sales demos are, the more deals you’ll close, and the greater the average deal value will be.
Average deal value per proof of concept (POC)
If you’re creating individualized POCs the old-fashioned way, by having a sales engineer customize them, you’ll want to track average deal value per proof of concept. This allows you to be sure you’re offering them to highly qualified prospects worthy of the investment.
Margin per POC
Following along with our last metric, average deal value per POC, margin per POC sales demo is important for the same reason. It doesn’t make sense to invest too many resources into low quality, low margin prospects. And you want to be sure you’re getting the most of these labor-intensive customizations.
Number of demos per converted account
With so many different stakeholders on the buying committee, it’s a good idea to track how many different sales demos it takes to close each prospect account. Then, consider if there is a way to reduce the number of different demos needed to convert these accounts to paying customers.
How to identify who has viewed the demo
You may be saying, of course I know who viewed the sales demo because they were on the call! But if your sales demo is a sharable leave-behind experience you can meet with a few people from the buying team and still track who views the demo afterward. In fact, you can gain additional insights such as:
· Which features matter most to each stakeholder
· Exactly when the prospect is reviewing your demo
· Best time to follow up with the prospect
Interested in improving your sales demo success? Schedule a demo with a team member to see how Demostack can help you gain deeper insights.
