Behind the Scenes: Tactical Demo Tips from Top Sales Engineers

The art of delivering compelling product demonstrations can make or break deals. To dig into what really works, we recently hosted a webinar featuring three veteran SEs: Michael Ammaturo, Head of Solutions & Partnerships at Experience.com, Mark Rida, Director of Solutions Engineering at Saviynt, and Matthew Young James, Senior Presales Consultant at Wise.

Together, they shared hard-won tactics for making demos more engaging, resilient, and impactful. Watch the full recorded webinar here:

Effective preparation goes beyond knowing product features. It’s about stepping into your prospect’s world:

Research your audience:

"Look at LinkedIn, press releases, and use AI to understand what's happening at the company," advises Michael. "You should know if, for example, you're going into a call and there's a merger that's been announced. That's happened to me where it was good that we knew that this merger was coming.”

Define clear objectives:

"What are the two or three key points that we wanna make, and what does success look like for that given call?" Michael emphasizes. Having focused goals prevents the dreaded "show up and throw up" scenario.

Align with strategic initiatives:

Mark recommends connecting your solution to larger company objectives: "What's the big strategic initiative that's occurring in the business that we can start to attach our program to? What are they doing today? What do they want? What's the impact of what they're doing today? What's the outcome they're looking for, and how are they going measure that outcome?”

Even the best prep won’t prevent surprises. Top SEs stress agility in the moment:

Get prospects talking early:

"I aim to get the people in the meeting speaking as soon as possible," says Matthew. "Because if you start by opening the first ten minutes and you don't allow any space for anyone, it starts to become more of a listening exercise.”

Have backup plans:

Matthew uses a parachute analogy: "It's best if you don’t have to adapt, but it's going to happen. When you need to call on those extra resources, it's best if you can have something prepared ahead of time."

He advises: "Have a PDF downloaded as well as your slide deck. If you're doing a live demo in production, is there a video you can have just in case production has some sort of hiccup?”

Crowdsource direction changes:

When calls veer off-track, Mark suggests: "Crowdsource it right out of the gate. 'Hey, you know, we originally planned for this. I know we're gonna talk about that, but let's just put up to the team. We can cover these three things today, or we can cover these two. Give a thumbs up or a thumbs down in the chat live.' That tends to work, and you get some people participating that way as well.”

Tools can take demos from good to unforgettable:

AI as your co-pilot:

Use AI to generate demo data, role-play objections, or analyze call transcripts for insights. Mark shares: "A lot of my guys will lean on it for quickly building out an integration. We have our own Amazon Bedrock and Amazon Q internally that we've trained on everything from our documentation, our product schema, all of the pieces, our API layer.”

Make demos tactile:

Matthew shared how his team built an iPad demo that prospects could physically handle, making the experience stickier and more memorable.

Matthew's team created an iPad-based demo where "we would slide it over across the table to the person sitting there who we're speaking with. And then suddenly, they get to do it themselves. And that hit on a lot of different things because suddenly, the technology becomes tactile.”

Show up on video:

Being on camera increases connection and often nudges prospects to do the same. Michael emphasizes: "Even I've been on calls where only myself and the account executive were on video, and it was uncomfortable for the first fifteen minutes, but then as our customers or prospects got more engaged, they actually turned on their video.”

Facts inform, but stories persuade:

Share customer success stories that link the product to real-world outcomes.

"The stories are the best," says Mark. "Customer stories, experience stories, personal stories, something that connects the cognitive with what you're displaying.”

Be open about challenges or missteps. Prospects value hearing how issues were solved more than a polished, “perfect” narrative, making the product feel more real.

Mark continues: "What people are really interested in hearing actually is where has there been a mistake even with the current customer. Because, you know, software is never perfect, in my opinion. And how did you overcome it? What was the results of overcoming it? What were the resources needed? How did it happen?”

Focus on the feeling. Prospects may forget details but will remember the confidence, clarity, or relief you left them with.

Matthew references Maya Angelou: "People won't remember what you said, but they will remember how you made them feel. And I think that's true to an extent. You do need to make sure your words are correct. But in the world of a customer, this one hour demo that you have with them is just a tiny sliver of their day job. They're not gonna remember all of the details, but they will take away those big things that you're looking to establish.”

Over time, even polished demos risk going stale:

The "Neuralizer" Approach:

Matthew recommends: "Use the neuralizer and try something new. It can be very easy to get into a routine and a rhythm, and there are really good things about that. You have your really strong talking points. But if you can't get out of that, you're going to end up not putting yourself in."

Internal Practice Sessions:

Mark shares: "We do what we call immersion training where we'll grab a small group and have people practice with each other, give them scenarios. We'll bring our really experienced SEs, and we'll put our new hires in the same room. And we'll play stump the chump. And the seasoned team, they all come back, and they go, 'Wow. I learned so much actually doing that.'"

Value First, Technical Second:

When asked how to balance technical depth with value, Mark advises: "I always say it's value first, technical after. Because the value is why somebody's buying. How the sausage is made is honestly not really congruent to the sale. It's congruent to somebody's tactical life."

For small SE teams stretched thin, efficiency is key:

Stay Close to the Money:

Michael recommends: "You're here to drive revenue for the company, and you have the livelihoods of people who are not in sales and not in the revenue side of the team who are relying on you. So when you are getting pulled in directions, prioritizing and biasing toward revenue generation will just immediately help you better prioritize where you should spend your time."

Create Self-Service Resources:

Mark suggests: "How do I get the collateral that I know my SEs are going to be able to reuse and then deliver quickly to AEs so they can almost be little self-service or self-sufficient? I don't need my SE spending time building out a deck because that AE doesn't know how to use PowerPoint."

Treat Internal Time Like Client Meetings:

Matthew advises: "Almost treat your time internally as if it's an external partner meeting. What are the things that you need to get accomplished? What are the highest bits of impact? What are the KPIs that your part of the business is trying to achieve? How do you then have the highest leverage on that?"

With prospects often doing extensive research before ever speaking with you, every demo is a chance to reinforce value, spark engagement, and build authentic connection. The best sales engineers continually refine their approach, learning from each interaction and improving the next.