How SEs Use Sandbox Demos to Scale Faster

Today’s buyers don’t want to see your latest sales deck. They want to see exactly how your product works – and not just the everyday workflows. They want to see multi-system integrations, complex automations, and approval processes in action.

This shift in expectations has put a lot of pressure on SEs, who are expected to provide more customized demos without relying on engineering help.

Sandbox demos help meet that demand. Rather than building a live environment from scratch for every call, SEs can create reusable, configurable demos that feel real and prevent technical hiccups.

Below, we share more about what sandbox demos are, why they work, and how top SaaS teams are using them in their presales workflow.

Sandbox demos are live, interactive product environments that SEs use to showcase various features during a demo call.

They’re built for reusability: SEs only have to create and customize them once, and then can reuse them until features change.

Because there’s no risk of broken flows, last-minute bugs, or integration issues, sandbox demos are ideal for:

• Conferences, where prospects may want to explore different parts of your product themselves
• Live presentations or in-person meetings, where technical glitches can quickly undermine credibility
• Complex workflows or integrations, where every step introduces a potential point of failure
• Multi-product use cases that are difficult to recreate live

1. It Scales Demo Creation Across the Team

Instead of waiting for engineering to spin up a new sandbox for every live demo, SE teams can build a sandbox once and have their AEs use it without needing any technical expertise.

And since all of Navattic’s demos (including sandbox demos) are housed in one central platform, reps can even find, modify, and deploy demos on their own.

One of our customers, SourceDay, added interactive sandbox demos as a part of their sales rep playbook. “Now, solutions consultants are spending 30% less time on early stage demos and can now fully focus on higher value and more strategic deals.

We are even enabling prospect champions to position the product internally without the need for multiple product demos throughout the sales cycle.”

2. It Saves Time and Elevates the Presentation

If your team creates a standard sandbox demo, each SE can copy and customize it for each prospect’s needs without having to build it from scratch.

This hyper-realistic kind of demo helps buyers see your product in action, without requiring them to configure their own account.

Navattic customer Singlify, for example, created a series of modular sandbox demos with roughly 10 curated screens to help “sales reps to dive deep into specific features without getting distracted.”

It worked: the team cut live demo time in half.

“Before Navattic, we either did a live demo or used PowerPoint slides with screenshots. The disadvantage of a live demo is that it was quite elaborate in terms of functionality, and there was potential for getting sidetracked by different prospect questions.

Navattic lets us demo on Salesforce and give customers a real sense and feel of Singlify. We can still guide them through the product in a prescriptive way in 20 minutes, which is what we would cover in 45 minutes during a live demo.”

3. It Reduces Technical Risk in Live Calls

With a sandbox demo, SEs don’t have to switch between environments or hope the product behaves. They control exactly what prospects see, every time.

That level of control makes sandbox demos ideal for showing integrations or mobile workflows.

For example, Singlify avoids the overhead of spinning up live Salesforce environments by using focused sandbox modules to walk through their app integrations.

If you’re not quite sure where to start with Navattic sandbox demos, here are a few of the most common ways our customers use them:

• For technical discovery. Some prospects have very specific technical, security, and compliance requirements that aren’t easy to showcase in an interactive demo, let alone a live demo. Sandboxes allow you to show that functionality in a way that looks real and overcome any objections early.
• As an alternative proof of concept. Instead of provisioning a full product environment, you can spin up a sandbox that simulates only the workflows your prospect actually cares about. It speeds up learning for them and qualification for you.
• To showcase integrations. Integrations don’t always play nice during live calls. With a sandbox demo, you can showcase how your product connects with a prospect's existing tech stack through interactive integration points (without worrying about how each system will behave).

Navattic customer, PowerSchool, uses sandbox demos to showcase their integrations – without wasting precious presales time.

“Before Navattic, our live product demonstrations, especially those where we show our platform’s integration offerings, had a lot of setup and takedown work involved for each and every demo. Navattic helps us solve our demo repeatability problem, saving valuable time for our sellers.”

1. Start With a Library of FAQ-Style Demos

Stakeholders often raise the same objections or ask the same questions again and again.

Preparing a library of demos specifically designed to address those objections can be particularly helpful during a live demo.

Maarten Rooney’s team at Singlify went this route. “Each one is roughly 10 screens that go into depth around that individual topic. This allows our sales reps to dive deep into specific features without getting distracted.”

As soon as an AE senses any pushback or hears a common question, they can open a pertinent demo, knowing they won’t run into any errors or blockers.

They could even clone a sandbox, convert it to a guided, non-sandbox demo, and send a link to it in their follow-up email, so prospects can test out a specific feature themselves.

2. Layer In Guided Beacons

Because sandbox demos aren’t as step-by-step as other kinds of interactive demos, you need to give users a bit more guidance.

Adding flashing Beacons and Triggers throughout the sandbox can help users gain a better understanding of where to go in the sandbox and how to explore some of the more technical features of your product.

Note: Beacons are hidden by default, but you instruct users to hold “Ctrl +B” to toggle them on for extra help.

3. Create Sandbox Templates For Different Personas

Your prospects want to see themselves in your product, so consider building a sandbox for each segment of your ICP, plus ancillary users like developers, architects, and administrators.

While they may not be using the product themselves, they will be dictating how others use it and want to see that experience live. That level of personalization can make the buying experience feel more engaging, even fun.

Alexander Yant at Slope points out: “Prospects really enjoy the personalized aspects of our demos, it can help relax any tensions and make it less seem like a rigid sales experience and more of just kind of a fun conversation.”

If you’re talking to a more technical buyer, you could even incorporate API call visualizations or code snippets directly within the sandbox to demonstrate technical integration capabilities.

4. Establish a Clear Workflow For Updating Sandboxes

If your company is like most, new UI and UX updates roll out every month (sometimes even faster).

To make sure SEs show the most up-to-date version of your product to potential customers, build a recurring task into your team’s workflow to review and refresh sandbox environments on a regular basis.

Note: Navattic’s sandbox builder captures and auto-links screens as you click through key screens in your app.

Automating this process makes building and updating demos so much faster.

5. Create Collaborative Sandbox Review Processes

Just like every SE has their own presentation style, every SE takes a different approach to building sandbox demos.

Hosting internal “demo days” where each SE walks through their sandboxes is a great way for the whole team to learn and reinforce best practices, get inspired by their peers’ creativity, and improve each other’s demos.

Does your SE team feel stretched thin?

Let them focus on storytelling and consultative selling, not basic high-level demos with Navattic Launchpad.

Try out our demo to see how it works.