Improve your demo and get more for yourself.

One of the developer’s responsibilities is to present features and changes to clients and product owners. In this article, I would like to give you a few suggestions on how to can improve your presentations, make a good impression and build your look as an expert.

Build a plan

The first and most crucial step is preparing your presentation. Some people prefer to go with the flow just checking the list of done stories and showing them one by one. It’s acceptable when giving this kind of presentation to coworkers or friends. Still, you must remember that any mistake or unexpected situation will put you in an uncomfortable position.

Prepare yourself

Build a plan. Before the demo, go through the changes and the flow you want to show during your presentation. Afterwards, test it a few times, and try to make this process automated. It will allow you to focus more on the changes and potential questions.

Pareto principle

If you look back at your work before the demo, there is a huge chance that most of the time you spent on things that are not worth showing. This is exactly what Joseph Juran called the Pareto rule. In general, the principle says that 80% of the value is brought by things on which we spend only 20% of our time.

Knowing that we can select which functionalities are more valuable for the client even if we spent only a few minutes or hours on them.

Remember that the most important thing is customer satisfaction, so even if your ego says that you should talk more about some challenging items, if they don’t bring much value to your customer, just skip them.

Make a good impression

Psychologists have already been studying the human brain to discover the mechanism of building options for other people and products for ages. The results of their work are often used in marketing and other industries to increase sales or learn faster and better.

Serial-position effect

It’s a tendency to recall the first (primary effect) and last item (recency effect) of the series best. You had probably experienced this when you were a student — things that you learn at the beginning and at the end are the ones that you remember best. In the case of demo hosting it can be used to build a positive impression by starting and ending your presentation with well-working functionalities that can satisfy your client.

Halo effect

The halo effect (sometimes called the halo error) is the tendency for positive impressions of a person, company, brand, or product in one area to positively influence one’s opinion or feelings in other areas. Marketing also uses the halo effect of the image of movie/music stars to influence their advertising brands. The Halo effect is not sustainable, it will disappear after a few days, but still, you can use it to build a good impression. Being positive and enthusiastic can help you to survive your beginnings.

Be an expert

Of course, clients expect to have things done and this is our goal, but why not use it to build your position? Proving your competence and building trust can help you to get a more prominent position and promote faster.

Talk about challenges

We are only humans so it’s normal that our work can cause some trouble. During your presentation feel free to talk about challenges that you struggle with during your work. Try to focus on high-level problems and describe the solutions that you provided.

The majority of your audience will be impressed by your answer if you describe obstacles well because it will sound like something they will need more time to understand.

Prepare for questions

Depending on your listeners you need to be prepared for answering different types of questions. If your audience works in the same domain, questions can be more precise and you need to check the details of your changes to be able to answer them. If clients/product owners are not so familiar with technologies you need to be able to answer the questions in the simplest way possible, at the same time remembering that the client should not feel offended.

Last word

Don’t be afraid to present your work, it’s the easiest way to build your brand and expert opinion. Follow these steps and bring your presentations to the new level

• Prepare a plan, make notes and check everything twice
• Use primary and recency effects to make a good impression
• Use your knowledge and skills to build your expert image

Good luck!!!