7 Stellar SaaS Product Demos Examples

More and more SaaS companies are turning the typical demo process on its head. Instead of pushing prospects straight to a live demo, they’re offering ungated product experiences that give the prospect a sneak peek of the product.

But how are they doing this, and what are some examples of companies doing it well?

In this post, we’ll:

• Define product demo software
• Describe how product demo software helps you create an accessible, effective demo
• Explain the different types of product demos
• Share 7 examples of SaaS companies nailing the product demo

Product demos are a way for prospects to experience what it’s like to use your product.

Product demos are created using video or no-code interactive demo software. They can be:

• Embedded on websites
• Linked out in outbound or nurturing sequences
• Sent to prospects during the sales cycle

Creating a stellar product demo takes a few steps:

1. Decide what software you want to use. You can use interactive demo software like Navattic or product video software to build your demos. Interactive demos give your prospects hands-on access to your product so they can see how it works themselves, whereas video demos simply show how a part of the product works.
2. Choose your goal. Product demos can serve various purposes, from boosting awareness to generating leads to enabling existing customers. Solidifying your objectives is important because they will influence the content you highlight and your calls to action.
3. Hone in on your audience. Different ICPs will care about different features. Nailing down what audience you want to serve will help you personalize your demo and guarantee prospects experience “aha moments.”
4. Pick your channels. You can leverage product demos in numerous ways — on your website, in email campaigns, blog posts, review sites, partner enablement materials, and more. Knowing where your product demo will be displayed can inform what areas of the product to emphasize.
5. Construct a storyboard template. Product demos should be a seamless, intuitive experience. Put together an outline of the story you want to tell before creating the demo to ensure a cohesive narrative.
6. Gate or ungate. If your goal is to gain more leads, it makes sense to gate your demo — you want their contact information. But if your objective is more educational, consider leaving your demo open so anyone can learn about and experience your product.

Product demos come in three main formats:

• interactive product demos
• product demo websites
• product demo videos

Below, we’ll define each product demo type and showcase a company doing it well.

Embedded interactive product demo examples

An interactive product demo is a walkthrough of your product that allows prospects to experience your product when it’s convenient for them.

They guide your prospects through key product features and enable you to cater your content to the persona you’re serving. In this case, it is embedded within an existing section of the homepage or product pages.

Example #1: Mixpanel

Mixpanel’s product tour is an excellent example. The very first pop-up explains what Mixpanel does and how users can benefit from it.

After orienting the prospect to Mixpanel, the interactive demo takes them through features they might care about, such as visualizations, reporting functionality, and opportunities to gain exciting insights — all within the platform.

Drawing prospects’ attention to each unique aspect of Mixpanel and showing how those components work get prospects thinking about how they could put the tool into practice in their organization.

Try Mixpanel’s product demo

Example #2: Dooly

Dooly, another B2B SaaS platform, strategically places its interactive demo just below the fold on one of its product pages.

Like Mixpanel, Dooly’s interactive product demo informs the prospect of what they’ll be seeing and doing within the tour. Step by step, the prospect is shown exactly how they would keep their pipeline clean, updating the stage of an opportunity, adjusting its close date, and logging next steps.

Try Dooly’s product demo

Product demo website

A product demo website is a webpage wholly dedicated to a self-guided tour.

Example #3: Ramp

For example, when you visit Ramp’s product demo and hit “Explore Product”, it takes up your entire screen, making you feel like you’re actually in a real, live environment.

Ramp doesn’t just tell users how their product works; they show them, using pop-ups and overlays to point out features that save users time and money. Importantly, prospects may not have encountered these features in a traditional free trial account.

Try Ramp’s demo

Example #4: Fivetran

Fivetran, an extract, transform, load tool, puts another spin on the product demo website with a demo center.

They’ve created an entire resource center dedicated to demos that show existing customers and prospects how easy it is to connect their data warehouse to various standard back-end tools like Jira, Hubspot, and NetSuite.

FiveTran allows visitors to filter by topic, solution, industry, partner, and more to make it easier for people to find the demos they need.

See Fivetran’s resource center

Example #5: Egnyte

Egnyte, a cloud governance and security software, has a similar product demo website that breaks down the complex aspects of their product by use case.

Users can access click-through demos for everything from CCMC Compliance to Content Intelligence to Ransomware Recovery.

Plus, every demo has a checklist so users can jump to different features that apply to their specific circumstances without leaving the tour.

Try Egnyte’s Product Tours

Product demo video

A product demo video is a filmed demo that prospects can watch on-demand. Like other product demos, they are tailored to a specific audience and show off particular parts of a product.

Example #6: Salesforce

Salesforce built an entire demo center full of product demo videos to help prospects understand how each of their products works without talking to a sales rep.

When prospects click on a solution they are interested in, they’re taken to a page that outlines the product’s benefits and suggests they watch a demo video. Once a prospect provides their contact information, they can watch the product demo video at their leisure.

See Salesforce’s demo center

Example #7: Zendesk

Zendesk employs the same approach. They store a substantial collection of product videos in their product demo center that leads can watch upon providing their email address.

Each video discusses a different part of the platform — from analytics to mobile selling to apps and integrations — to make it easy for prospects to find the information they’re looking for. After they download a specific video, reps can use that information to tailor their follow-up.

See Zendesk’s product demo center

Prospects want to experience what it is like to use your software — not watch a 10 minute static video.

Interactive product demos take product demo videos to the next level, improving:

• Engagement - Most people aren’t paying close attention when watching a product video. And on an average site, only 10 to 15% of visitors actually watch it. Embedded, ungated interactive demos on average see around 25 - 40% engagement rate.
• Cost-savings - Top-notch videos don’t come cheap. The average cost to produce a product demo video is between $1,000 and $3,000 per finished minute. Often, videos require an outside agency’s help, which can also increase overall costs. Interactive demo software is affordable and easy for any internal resource to learn.
• Time-savings - Creating a polished, effective video takes substantial time that most B2B SaaS companies don’t have. No-code interactive demo software templates make it easy for anyone on your go-to-market team to make customized demos in minutes.
• Relevance - Companies change their UI frequently, meaning any videos you created last year (or even six months ago) may not be relevant today. Interactive demo software allows you to easily swap new functionality in and out as needed.

Navattic empowers anyone to create interactive product demos. Using a simple front-end capture of your application as a foundation, you can customize a user’s interactions with your product by overlaying interactive guides and editing screen captures.

One customer, Trainual, switched from a product demo to an interactive demo and saw a 450% increase in free trial sign ups.

Want to learn more about how Navattic works? Check out our own interactive product demo today.