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Top 5 mistakes made when building a demo in-house

Many software marketers consider building their demo in-house to save time and money; but, here's the catch:

When you calculate the number of hours devoted to building your own demo---and the salaries of the employees who give up those hours---you spend more than you planned and almost always get less than you need.

As an organization that has been focused solely on building demos for more than twelve years, we know a lot about demos and can usually spot the ones produced in-house. 

How? They almost always include one--or more--of the following mistakes:

Mistake #1 - No professional scriptwriter
The first step toward creating a results-oriented demo is a professionally polished demo script. Without the right script, your demo suffers from the get-go.

Mistake #2 - No audio or, worse, poorly produced audio
An automated software demo should be narrated by a friendly and professional voiceover talent that is in sync with whatever is being highlighted--making it more engaging and helping reinforce the tone of your organization.

Mistake #3 - Clumsy technology
No controls? Slow to load? Doesn't play well with common browsers or mobile operating systems? These are all details that tend to creep up just as you are finishing production. Not only can they stall your project for weeks, sometimes months, they can make your organization look unprofessional and your demo under-utilized.  

Mistake #4 - No tracking features
As a marketer, one of your primary responsibilities is to measure the success of your lead-gen initiatives. Why would you leverage an automated demo that you can't track?

Mistake #5 - No sharing capabilities
Your demo should be able to go wherever your prospects like to hang-out. Can you watch it on YouTube? Share it on Facebook? Post it on an industry blog?

The best way to avoid these mistakes and ACTUALLY save time and money is to find a professional demo development company that can offer you examples of their work, provide case studies, and show you a long list of clients.

A professionally-produced software demo helps streamline overly complex sales cycles and delivers real lead-gen numbers. It elegantly showcases your product and seamlessly integrates into your family of marketing tools, extending your brand and initiating conversations across your social media networks.

We know how tempting it is to take a project in-house when you are part of a fully staffed marketing department.

But, we also know the unfortunate consequences of building a demo in-house. Rarely do you save time or money if there is not a team specifically devoted to software demo development.

Without professional scriptwriters, audio recording experts, and experienced demo-producers, you're taking a risk with what could be your number one lead generation tool.

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Tags : automated software demosdemo scriptproduct demossocial mediasoftware marketinguser tracking