I have some left over marketing thoughts, I guess due to the two days in Boston last week at the ISA Marketing and Sales Symposium. Jason Calacanis, Web entrepreneur and one of the founders of TechCrunch 50 that will be held this week in San Francisco, offers tips for demoing products here and here. These ideas work for demoing for editors, too. I’ve been on both sides of this aisle–I still remember the time I demoed my product circa 1989 for John C. Dvorak and Jim Seymour of PC Magazine. I learned ;-}
He also offers tips for trade show booths–timely given the beginning of the fall season. I’ll be at the Invensys Operations Management user conference, Emerson Exchange, ISA Expo, Advantech User Conference and Rockwell’s Automation Fair (and the Safety Automation Forum and perhaps PSUG), while Wes will be at Pack Expo and OpsManage 09 (formerly known as Wonderworld). So we’ll be busy seeing demos. Hope you reinforce your knowledge of how to make a good one 😉
He forgot a couple biggies:
1. Bring technical people, not just the sales dudes. If I ask technical questions, I want real answers, not marketing speak.
2. Wear comfortable shoes and bring chairs — you’re going to be on your feet a lot.
Some good tips there. No matter how many times you do these, you always learn something new. I’ll also be attending Emerson Exchange, ISA Expo and Rockwell’s Automation Fair. Hope to get a chance to meet up with you at one or all of them.