The Six Minute DEMO

Story posted on 59 10, 2007

My clients complain about this all the time so I am going to just come out and say it...Whether you are at a meetup, at one of the DEMO conferences or speaking with the media in the hallway, you need to be able to talk about your business in six minutes. If you can't do that, you have lost the attention of your audience and you may not get it back - ever.

So how do you do a six minute DEMO? Well there are two things that should be happening simultaneously. The audience should be seeing something they want to use on the screens and hearing how important it is to their business//family/planet from a person speaking. The six minute demo takes two people. One person to drive the DEMO and another person to introduce the need and value while highlighting specific points in the DEMO. Keep it simple:

- Tell them who you are, what the product is called and what they are about to see
- Tell them why they care (i.e. what problem they have that you can solve)
- Tell them how big the problem is (i.e. "12,000 people get it every year" or it costs the industry $6 billion annually)
- Show them how to use it in three easy steps
- Show them the results
- Tell them who you are and why they care, again! And then tell them how to get one for themselves.

It’s a minute each and it’s easy. Even the most complex solutions can follow this guideline and get through the Six Minute DEMO.