The way solutions consultants present and communicate products to buyers is undergoing a transformation. Lengthy demos and tech-heavy presentations are becoming a thing of the past. Buyers want solutions, and they want to see them faster. Solutions teams are scrambling to get the content together that speaks to the proper person at the correct stage of the sale, and often, a seller with a quicker process wins out.
SaaS software buyers expect high-value solutions delivered in easily digestible content that aligns with customized preferences at the pace at which they make decisions. The challenge? How do we take complex, often multi-hour presentations and transform them into bite-sized, engaging pieces of content that still deliver the same value?
To understand the shift in Solution Consulting, we can look no further than our smart device. We’ve witnessed the miniaturization of technology—smartphones replacing bulky diaries, notebooks, and even personal development tools like books and newspapers. Everything we once needed is now condensed into a single device that fits in our pocket. With this physical change comes a change in how we consume information and our attention spans.
In 2004, our attention spans were around two minutes, and today, they are around 47 seconds. How have SaaS demo presentations changed? How have product demo presentations changed? We have a lot more ways of crafting presentations, but the length of the presentation has not been revolutionized. Solution Consulting must now think about how to miniaturize their content.
How can we deconstruct the traditional software seller’s journey, which must include solution details and value demonstrations, and reconstruct it for the modern software buyer’s journey? We need to tame the complexity of our message and realign it with how buyers want to engage.
To break down the complexity of your traditional content into smaller, more digestible chunks, we can leverage a process called "atomization." The distillation process results in each “atom” addressing a specific need of different personas within a buying group, ensuring that each piece of content resonates and drives the desired action.
Understanding the context of who you are presenting to and what you want them to think or do as a result of consuming your demos. Where an in-person live audience allows a presenter to read a room, where we are building scripts for micro demos, we need to dive into discovery, research stakeholders, and review past touchpoints to arrive at either an evergreen point of context that meets a number of needs or a highly personalized context. The context is the foundation for refining messaging.
In a traditional live demo, the flow often follows a "screen-to-screen" format, where presenters navigate various interfaces to showcase the product’s features. While this approach sometimes has its merits, it can also result in a fragmented narrative that struggles to maintain engagement.
By contrast, a video-based micro demo moves from "scene-to-scene" rather than "screen-to-screen." This shift lets you focus on the narrative flow, ensuring each scene builds on the last, delivering a cohesive and engaging story that resonates with your audience.
Breaking down a traditional screen-to-screen demo into scene-to-scene micro demos is an iterative process of reductionism and refinement. This involves breaking down portions of your long-form presentation into their core components, stripping away unnecessary details, and focusing on the key messages that need to be conveyed. Through this process, you create content that is concise, impactful, easily aligned with the buyer’s journey, and evergreen.
You have between 7-30 seconds to capture your audience's attention, depending on whether your audience is live. Your content must be scripted to capture attention immediately, deliver value, and announce what’s to come. Crafting a true demo script—meant to be spoken, not read—is essential to achieving this. It is also about much more than the script; the delivery must be credible and authentic to drive confidence and engagement—every word and intonation counts.
As you break down your content into smaller pieces, consistency, and professionalism must be maintained across versions. Be sure to use a tone and voice that is appropriate for each audience or a neutral voice for multiple audiences. Consistency builds trust and reinforces credibility. We also recommend reviewing content for accessibility to meet audiences with disabilities.
One of the most significant barriers to effective content creation is the fear of complexity. Our consulting can help condense a complex message into short, high-impact content.
Our training principles are founded in collaborative and design thinking practices that unlock creativity and remove cognitive biases, common barriers to content creation. By working with us, your team gains the confidence and skills needed to distill long scripts into bite-size content that resonates with your audience and drives engagement.
The shift towards dropping bite-sized, engaging content for larger audiences before customizing demos to meet very specific buyer personas isn’t new. By deconstructing the seller’s journey to find moments where a micro demo can reengage and inform both the buyer and your sales team, you can ensure that your end demo content not only meets the needs of your stakeholder audience but also narrows what your messaging must be.
Ready to tame the complexity? Contact 2Win Consulting to learn more about how our demo automation services can help you master the art of demo miniaturization and create content from concepts that truly resonate.