{"id":29069,"date":"2018-02-20T10:27:41","date_gmt":"2018-02-20T10:27:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/?p=355"},"modified":"2026-09-15T19:56:31","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T19:56:31","slug":"the-menu-approach-a-truly-terrific-demo-self-rescue-technique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/the-menu-approach-a-truly-terrific-demo-self-rescue-technique\/","title":{"rendered":"The Menu Approach \u2013 A Truly Terrific Demo Self-Rescue Technique"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Menu Approach \u2013 A Truly Terrific Demo Self-Rescue Technique<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Have you ever been in a situation where:<\/span><\/p>\n

a.\u00a0You find yourself in front of an audience about which you know nothing of their needs or interests \u2013 and they\u2019ve been promised a demo\u2026<\/span>
\n b.\u00a0You are asked to join a web session, right now, and the sales person says, \u201cThey asked to see a demo\u2026\u201d\u00a0 (again, you have zero information about the customer)\u2026<\/span>
\n c.\u00a0Someone walks up to you at a trade-show booth and says, \u201cWhat do you guys do?\u201d or \u201cShow me a demo\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Are you interested in a delightful self-rescue technique for situations like these?\u00a0 It\u2019s called The Menu Approach \u2013 and it is a logical, simple and surprisingly effective method for dealing with situations where your audience is partly or largely undiscovered.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hungry?<\/span><\/h4>\n

Imagine walking into a nice restaurant \u2013 and you are quite hungry.\u00a0 You sit down and a few moments later the waiter comes up to you and asks, \u201cWhat would you like to eat tonight?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

You have no idea what they offer, so you respond, \u201cWhat do you have?\u201d\u00a0 The waiter says, \u201cWell, we have lots of items \u2013 appetizers, main dishes, side dishes, desserts \u2013 what would you like?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Very frustrating\u2026!\u00a0 Clearly, you are both making no progress \u2013 and it is very much the same situation as requests for demos where neither party has a clear idea of the other\u2019s desires or capabilities.<\/span><\/p>\n

A solution?\u00a0 For our restaurant scenario, the waiter says, \u201cHere, let me get you a menu\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The menu provides a rapid method for the customer to assess what is possible, what sounds good, and what items or combination of dishes to order.\u00a0 A menu presents a high-level listing of the range of offerings \u2013 and we can apply the same principle to the wonderful world of demos.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Menu Approach<\/span><\/h4>\n

Back to situation \u201ca.\u201d at the top, above\u2026\u00a0 You are in front of a group of 12 people, about which you know very little \u2013 and you\u2019ve been asked to present a demo.\u00a0 Instead of taking the customer on a painful and boring \u201cHarbor Tour\u201d, you start by presenting a list of topics that you believe may be of interest.\u00a0 For a Great Demo! Workshop, a typical list might look like:<\/span><\/p>\n

    \n
  • Remote Demos \u2013 Generating Interactivity<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Making Demos\u00a0Remarkable<\/em><\/span><\/li>\n
  • RFP\u2019s and Scripted Demos<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Storytelling and Demos<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Managing and Out-flanking Competition<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Managing Questions and Time<\/span><\/li>\n
  • POC\u2019s, POV\u2019s, and Sandboxes Tools and Strategies<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    You say, \u201cHere is a list of some topics we could cover.\u00a0 Let me describe each one briefly and then I\u2019ll ask for a show of hands \u2013 and each of you can vote for as many topics as you wish1<\/sup>\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

    At the end of the exercise, your list now might look like:<\/span><\/p>\n

      \n
    • Remote Demos \u2013 Generating Interactivity – 10<\/span><\/li>\n
    • Making Demos\u00a0Remarkable<\/em>\u00a0 – 11<\/span><\/li>\n
    • RFP\u2019s and Scripted Demos – 5<\/span><\/li>\n
    • Storytelling and Demos – 3<\/span><\/li>\n
    • Managing and Out-flanking Competition – 9<\/span><\/li>\n
    • Managing Questions and Time – 2<\/span><\/li>\n
    • POC\u2019s, POV\u2019s, and Sandboxes Tools and Strategies\u00a0 – 5<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      You then re-order, to yield a list that is rank-prioritized in accord with customer interest:<\/span><\/p>\n

        \n
      • Making Demos\u00a0Remarkable<\/em>\u00a0 – 11<\/span><\/li>\n
      • Remote Demos \u2013 Generating Interactivity – 10<\/span><\/li>\n
      • Managing and Out-flanking Competition – 9<\/span><\/li>\n
      • RFP\u2019s and Scripted Demos – 5<\/span><\/li>\n
      • POC\u2019s, POV\u2019s, and Sandboxes Tools and Strategies\u00a0 – 5<\/span><\/li>\n
      • Storytelling and Demos – 3<\/span><\/li>\n
      • Managing Questions and Time – 2<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

        Wow!\u00a0 You now have accomplished several, truly terrific things:<\/span><\/p>\n

          \n
        1. You\u2019ve uncovered the customer\u2019s most important issues (they\u2019re at the top of the list)<\/span><\/li>\n
        2. You have a road-map for the balance of the demo<\/span><\/li>\n
        3. You can organize your time to ensure you address the high-importance topics \u2013 and it\u2019s OK if you don\u2019t have time to cover everything on the list.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

          Additionally, you may have also expanded the customer\u2019s vision of what solutions and solution areas your organization provides, as it is possible that the customer was previously unaware that you have offerings across this range of topics.<\/span><\/p>\n

          A Few Subtleties\u2026<\/span><\/h4>\n

          When counting votes, remember that businesses are not necessarily democracies \u2013 and all votes are not necessarily equal.\u00a0 For example, if there is one C-level person in the room, and she is the\u00a0only<\/em>\u00a0one who wants \u201cManaging Questions and Time\u201d, that topic moves (magically and mystically) to the top of the list.<\/span><\/p>\n

          Similarly, you can choose to bias the presentation (and subsequent scoring) of topics up or down in accord with your current understanding of the customer\u2019s situation \u2013 \u201cMany of the\u00a0other<\/em>\u00a0customers we\u2019ve worked with in\u00a0very<\/em>\u00a0similar situations to what you\u2019ve shared with us so far found that the topic on managing POC\u2019s was most important \u2013 they were able to save months of otherwise wasted effort as a result of what they learned\u2026\u00a0 How many of you are interested in this?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

          Finally, when you complete a topic, you can use strike-through<\/span> text to show that it has been completed, giving you (and the customer) a written record of what was completed and what is still open:<\/span><\/p>\n

            \n
          • Making Demos Remarkable\u00a0 – 11<\/span><\/li>\n
          • Remote Demos \u2013 Generating Interactivity – 10<\/span><\/li>\n
          • Managing and Out-flanking Competition – 9<\/span><\/li>\n
          • RFP\u2019s and Scripted Demos – 5<\/span><\/li>\n
          • POC\u2019s, POV\u2019s, and Sandboxes Tools and Strategies\u00a0 – 5<\/span><\/li>\n
          • Storytelling and Demos – 3<\/span><\/li>\n
          • Managing Questions and Time – 2<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

            \u00a0\u201cShow Me A Demo\u2026\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

            If you have ever worked a demo station at a trade-show, you are familiar with the prospect who walks up to you and says, \u201cWhat do you guys do?\u201d or simply, \u201cShow me a demo\u2026\u201d (Clearly, they know not what they ask!).<\/span><\/p>\n

            A solution?\u00a0 Use The Menu Approach.\u00a0 You can have your list of topics available on your demo computer or tablet \u2013 or consider having a list produced as a poster, laminated, and attached to the wall of your demo station.\u00a0 You can then simply point to your Menu and begin the same process as above:<\/span><\/p>\n

            \u201cHere is a list of some of the things we do \u2013 let me describe each briefly and then you can let me know which one(s) are most interesting to you.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

            Delightful!<\/span><\/p>\n

            Many Great Demo! Workshop participants have reported that The Menu Approach is one of the most effective tools they have used.\u00a0 The Menu Approach \u2013 a truly terrific demo self-rescue tool for situations where your audience is partly or largely undiscovered.<\/span><\/p>\n

            1<\/sup>Often referred to as a \u201cChicago-style\u201d vote\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

            Have you ever been in a situation where:
            \na. You find yourself in front of an audience about which you know nothing of their needs or interests \u2013 and they\u2019ve been promised a demo\u2026
            \nb. You are asked to join a web session, right now, and the sales person says, \u201cThey asked to see a demo\u2026\u201d (again, you have zero information about the customer)\u2026
            \nc. Someone walks up to you at a trade-show booth and says, \u201cWhat do you guys do?\u201d or \u201cShow me a demo\u2026\u201d
            \nAre you interested in a delightful self-rescue technique for situations like these?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,8,12,10,21],"tags":[6,7],"class_list":["post-29069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advanced_topics","category-great-demo-blog","category-marketing_topics","category-methodology_basics","category-vision_generation","tag-articles","tag-blog"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29069"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29069\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47488,"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29069\/revisions\/47488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatdemo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}