Steve Jobs (29 page)

temagno.typepad.com/marco_blog/blog_index.html.

exchange elicited a huge laugh. Jobs had literally crank-called

a Starbucks as part of the demo. Jobs has so much fun show-

ing off new products that his enthusiasm leaps off the stage and

rubs off on everyone in attendance. It is precisely because he

has fun that people enjoy watching him.

In another prime example of having fun with demos, Jobs

took some quirky photographs of himself while introducing a

feature called Photo Booth on October 12, 2005. Photo Booth

is a software application for using a Web camera to take photo-

graphs and video.

“Now I want to show you Photo Booth,” said Jobs. “This is an

incredible way to have some fun. I can just go ahead and take

my picture.” Jobs looked into the built-in Web camera on the

computer and smiled for a few seconds as his photograph was

snapped and appeared on-screen. He said, “Isn’t that great? Let

me show you some pretty cool effects.” Jobs proceeded to snap

comical photographs of himself using features such as Thermal,

X-Ray, and Andy Warhol. “But it gets even better,” Jobs said as he

smiled and rubbed his hand together. “We decided to put in the

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DELIVER THE EXPERIENCE

teenage effects.
”10
Jobs snapped more photographs of himself as the software distorted his face into funny shapes—squeezing it,

widening it, and otherwise contorting the images. The audience

roared as Jobs relished the moment.

Focus on the One Thing

Each new Apple product or application contains numerous ben-

efits and features, but Jobs will often highlight just one. Think

of it like a movie trailer that teases the audience by revealing

only the best parts. If people want the full experience, they’ll have to watch the movie.

At WWDC in October 2007, Jobs spent most of the keynote

presentation discussing OS X Leopard, but, as he often does, he

had “one more thing” for the audience. Jobs introduced Safari

for Windows, the “most innovative browser in the world and

now the fastest browser on Windows.” After telling the audience

that he would like to show them the new browser, he walked

to stage right, took his seat behind a computer, and started the

Add Pizzazz to Online Meetings

Seventy new Web meetings are launched every minute on

software platforms such as WebEx, according to Cisco, which

purchased the online meeting service. Today popular online

“webinar” and collaboration tools, including WebEx, Citrix

GoToMeeting, Adobe Connect, and Microsoft Office Live

Meeting, allow you to add some high-tech pizzazz to demos.

For example, you can create polls and receive instant feed-

back. Sales professionals can conduct a live demonstration

of a product from a computer—drawing, highlighting, and

pointing to areas right on the screen. Better yet, those same

sales professionals can turn over mouse control to the client

or prospect, letting the customer on the other end see, touch,

and “feel” the product. Demonstrations are important ele-

ments in any presentation, offline or online.

STAGE YOUR PRESENTATION WITH PROPS
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demo. He told the audience that what he really wanted to show

off was Safari’s speed compared with Internet Explorer (IE 7).

The demo screen showed both browsers side by side. Jobs

loaded a series of websites simultaneously on both. Safari accom-

plished the task in 6.64 seconds, while IE 7 took 13.56 seconds

to accomplish the same task. “Safari is the fastest browser on

Windows,” Jobs concluded
.11
The entire demo took less than three minutes. It could have lasted much longer, but Jobs chose

to focus on one feature and one feature only. Jobs doesn’t over-

whelm his audience. Just as he eliminates clutter on slides, his

demos are likewise free of extraneous messages.

In 2006, Apple added a podcast studio to GarageBand, a tool

bundled into the iLife suite of applications intended to make

it easy for users to create and distribute multimedia content.

“We’ve added a lot of great stuff to GarageBand,” said Jobs, “but

I’m going to focus on
one thing
to demo today, and that is we have added a podcast studio to GarageBand. We think GarageBand is

now going to be the best tool in the world to create podcasts. It’s

pretty great. Let me go ahead and give you a demo.”

Jobs walked to stage right, sat down, and created a short

podcast in four steps. First, Jobs recorded the audio track and

had loads of fun with it. He even stopped the first recording

and started over because the audience caused him to laugh so

hard. Jobs recorded the following: “Hi, I’m Steve. Welcome to

my weekly podcast, ‘Supersecret Apple Rumors,’ featuring the

hottest rumors about our favorite company. I have some pretty

good sources inside Apple, and this is what I’m hearing: the

next iPod will be
huge
, an eight-pounder with a ten-inch screen!

Well, that’s all for today. See you next week.”

After making the playful recording, Jobs walked through the

next three steps, showing the audience how to add artwork and

background music. Once done, he played the podcast and said,

“Pretty cool, huh? That is the podcast studio, which is now built

into GarageBand.
”12

Although Jobs did a nice demonstration of the podcast studio,

it could not compete with the first release of GarageBand in 2005:

“Today we’re announcing something so cool: a fifth app that

will be part of the iLife family. It’s name is GarageBand. What is

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DELIVER THE EXPERIENCE

GarageBand? GarageBand is a major new pro music tool. But it’s for

everyone. I’m not a musician, so to help me demo GarageBand, we

asked a friend, John Mayer, to help us.
”13 J
obs took a seat behind a computer, and Mayer sat down at a mini keyboard hooked to the

Mac. As Mayer played, Jobs manipulated the sound to make the

piano resemble a bass, a choir, a guitar, and other instruments.

Jobs then laid down multiple tracks, creating a bandlike sound. He

took care to explain what he was doing at every step, to show the

audience just how easy it was to create a studio-like experience.

Jobs must have rehearsed the demo for hours, because he

looked like an expert musician. Nevertheless, Jobs knows what

he doesn’t know, and sometimes, as in the case of GarageBand,

it makes more sense to bring in an outsider who speaks directly

to the intended audience.

Element of Surprise

Jobs stunned developers when he announced a transition that

had been rumored but largely dismissed—the transition from

IBM/Motorola PowerPC chips to Intel processors. During the

2005 WWDC, where he made the announcement, Jobs acknowl-

edged that one of the major challenges would be to make sure

The Next-Best Thing to John Mayer

Of course, you’re not going to persuade John Mayer to

perform at your next event, but do think about creative ways

to reach your target audience. I watched an entrepreneur

pitching his new Web service to venture capitalists in San

Francisco. The service was geared to the teenage market, so

it didn’t make sense for a forty-something entrepreneur to

demonstrate it. Instead, the founder introduced the company

and then passed the demo off to two teens (a boy and a girl),

who talked about their experience with the site and what they

especially loved about it. The demo was different, engaging,

and ultimately successful.

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