How to Make a Great App Demo Video

Partner marketplaces are a rapidly growing channel. HubSpot's App Marketplace, for example, averages over 900k views a month.

A top notch demo video can help convert more of these viewers to customers. Strong videos showcase the app's features while also explaining the value proposition and business use cases.

Browsers of app marketplaces have a higher level of intent than someone scrolling through LinkedIn or reading a blog. They are looking for tools to use.

A common mistake is to make the demo video purely focused on the high level value proposition, while gliding over the setup and features. This often leaves prospects without a clear understanding of what the app does or how much work it requires.

Pitches like "close more leads" or "get better data" without explaining how the app works may result in prospects moving on to a different listing.

Prospects usually have a number of apps to select from in any given product category so if they don't understand what one does, it is easy to just check out the next one.

In marketplaces, customer are searching for software that complements the marketplace's product or platform. They want to understand how the software works with the platform, not just as a standalone system.

If your SaaS is likely unknown to browsers of the marketplace, you should quickly explain what it does and then shift to showcasing the integration.

Lucky Orange's demo video provides a strong example of how to explain what their product does quickly before pivoting to show the integration.

The prospect does not have to wait long to understand how the integration works in Lucky Orange's UI and the platform (in this case, HubSpot's) UI.

Lucky Orange's Demo Video in the HubSpot App Marketplace

Lucky Orange's video illustrates another component of strong demo videos. It clearly identifies the users of the integration and which teams benefit from it.

While some apps may only have one user persona, many apps often have different users leveraging different parts of the app.

Informing viewers which features of the app that different users will benefit from helps to ensure the viewers gets the full picture of both how to use the app and its value.

The Lucky Orange video shows the different ways that the Lucky Orange data can be viewed inside the HubSpot app as the narrator covers the value for the business.

Calendly's demo video in the HubSpot App Marketplace is another excellent example of how to showcase both the app business value and features.

Calendly's Demo Video in the HubSpot App Marketplace

The video starts with the value the prospect will see with the integration and then jumps right in to the installation process.

Calendly details the requirements needed to install the app and then shows exactly how to do it.

Some apps require higher paid plans and extensive setup so sharing the process in the video keeps prospects informed on how much time and resources they will need to allocate.

Next, Calendly walks through how to use the app and at the same time explains the business value. 

While doing this, they show what data or features appear in both apps. Prospects want to get a visual of what data they will see and where once the integration is running.

It can be tempting to overly focus on how the data will appear in your SaaS product, but remember marketplace browsers want to know how the integration will extend the marketplace platform.

In general, marketplace demo videos should be kept as short as possible to cover the important features and benefits, especially if they can't be marked by section or split up into multiple videos.

Some apps are more complicated and a longer video may be needed to explain what the software and app does. Salesmsg SMS, for example, has a longer marketplace video that effectively covers the software and app in more detail.

Once you have launched a marketplace video, set a reminder to check in every 6 months and see if it needs updating.

Any notable product or app changes should be captured in a new video. Dated videos will often leave prospects confused or disappointed.     

An app demo video can be featured in many different channels. A marketplace demo video may also work well for the internal enablement of your sales reps, for example.

But you may want to make multiple videos or edit your video to optimize them for each audience.

Try to understand who will be viewing the video and what their intent and goals are.

Your sales and CS teams, for example, are likely looking to understand as quickly as possible what the app can do for their customers and what the value prop is.

Your partner sales and CS teams may have similar goals but will need additional context on your product itself.

If someone is viewing a demo video on your Support pages, they are likely not that interested in the value prop and just want to know how it works.

Marketing demo videos are generally targeted at a lower intent audience with the goal of getting them to click to learn more.

These videos will focus more on the value proposition and less on features. They will also be shorter and have a higher production quality. 

Strong Channels for App Demo Videos