This past week I attended a computer industry event targeted to resellers, VARs, developers and the like. To my pleasant surprise I saw one Tablet PC on display. At least that’s better than nothing. Unfortunately, the distributor showcasing the Tablet knew little about it so you can imagine what happened when people tried to check it out. A self-running demo might have helped. But it also got me thinking about how important it is for the Tablet’s built-in apps, such as Journal–often used while demoing–to give immediate and obvious access to the things everyone wants to do.
For instance, Journal desperately needs a recognize button. Also, I’ve noticed that many people are having trouble figuring out how to select objects. Maybe there’s no way around this, but 9 times out of 10, people assume they can handwrite a few words and then tap on some button somewhere to recognize it. No selecting ink. No drilling down ink. No pop-up dialogs.
Yep, Lonestar/SP2’s new TIP is going to help out a lot on the recognition part in terms of demoing ink. However, just as Journal pushed ink-as-ink too far (in terms of demoing), I think the new TIP is going to emphasize recognition too much.
Here’s my concern: To try out the new TIP (and recognition) I’m guessing someone is going to open Notepad, handwrite something and check to see if the recognized text inserted into Notepad is correct. The problem is that Notepad doesn’t show off any inking capabilities. Journal would be a better app to demo. However, it doesn’t leverage the TIP in its main window. Hopefully, this will be addressed in updated versions of the Tablet OS.
I understand why Journal deemphasized recognition in the first pass. Journal is an excellent ink-based app. However, the problem is that Journal is being used in most demos, so it needs to do well what people want to try out—and that’s two things: recognition and drawing.
I think two issues are involved:
1) how Tablet PCs are being distributed and
2) the out-of-the-box impact.
When a new Tablet PC is powered on, Journal is the only preinstalled app on all Tablet PCs that anyone can show how the unit works. Most Tablet PCs do not come preinstalled with OneNote, Office 2003, Power Toys, or anything to use right out of the box. The Getting Started screen for new users is fine, but I agree with you, there definitely needs to be a 30-second and 2-minute auto-demo preinstalled on all Tablet PCs.
Plus, the distributors need to know how to work with Tablet PCs to show off the features. Based on experience with these distis, I doubt they’ll do this without someone holding their hand. For the last year, they’ve just skipped over the product because of several issues, but how to show it off has been one of the major issues. Someone will have to help train them so they can demo with a positive impact.
(By the way, it’s fantastic that you saw a Tablet PC being demonstrated by a distributor. WOW! That has definitely been rare. I hope we’ll see more of this.)
A demo should be started by asking the prospect how he uses his computer or how he would like to use his computer. Then the demonstrator must (using the appropriate application) show how the Tablet PC will make the prospect’s life better and more productive. No two minute or canned demo will do that. A trained demonstrator using a machine with appropriate application software is needed.
This is Sales 101 and a standard problem with all new complex products.
Yeah, our typical sales people have ZERO idea of how to properly demo the Tablets, typical demo is
1) Open Journal, Write ‘Hello’, Recognize ‘Hello’.
2) Convert model.
3) Tell customers they’re better off buying a normal notebook cause they’re cheaper and more powerful and that Ink is just a gimmick. :O !
Don’t believe that last bit? Believe me I heard it before…one of these days if I’m just gonna act dumb and see how well can a person sell one 😛
Yeah, Jim, a canned demos is probably not going to provide a rich enough experience. However, I was wondering if it would provide enough of an *initial* experience that the prospect wouldn’t get frustrated and walk away.
Actually, as I mention in the post, I think a better way to go is to tweak Journal so that it demos better.