How To Build A Buyer Centric Demo Booking Experience In HubSpot
Build a demo booking experience that aligns with how buyers want to buy.
👋 Hey, I’m Stuart – welcome to the 95 new readers who joined since the last ConnectedGTM newsletter. Today’s HubSpot playbook was created by Natalie Marcotullio, Head of Growth and Product Marketing at Navattic.
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What happens when someone requests a demo on your website today?
For most B2B companies, it looks something like this:
→ Fill out a form and wait (19% never even respond)
→ Get routed to an SDR (57% of first responses come from SDRs)
→ Schedule a "discovery call" (91% push for discovery vs. actual demo)
→ Maybe see the product... eventually
According to Natalie, and research polling over 2,000 SaaS customers conducted by Navattic and Chilli Piper, the data is clear:
Despite buyers wanting to evaluate products on their terms, only 31% of top B2B SaaS companies make it easy to try their product before talking to sales.
Today, we're digging into how to build a demo experience in HubSpot that actually aligns with how buyers want to buy.
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The Buyer-First Demo Framework
Let's start by evaluating what makes a truly buyer-first demo experience:
There are 3 key criteria successful companies are focusing on:
❌ Accessibility - How quick and convenient is it to evaluate your solution?
❌ Usability - Can buyers get hands-on with your product before a call?
❌ Visibility - Do you provide clear information about pricing and capabilities upfront?
So what can we do instead?
Natalie laid out the playbook she's implemented at Navattic (and seen work consistently across thousands of B2B companies) to implement a demo booking experience that combines:
Interactive product demos (now used by 31% of top B2B companies, up from 17% last year)
Automated follow-up (43% now use a combination of automation and human touch)
Multiple engagement options (varying from quick product tours to detailed feature demos)
Here's how it works in 5 steps:
1. Design for different buying stages and segments - Instead of forcing everyone through the same path, create multiple entry points into your product.
"If you have a very specific ICP, you might just send an automated email. But if you sell to multiple verticals, with different reps assigned to different territories, you need to think about the experience more carefully."
2. Show before you tell - Let buyers explore relevant features before committing to a conversation.
"If a champion wants to go share with other members of their team, they might not need to book another demo. They can just share that interactive demo, for example, if you know your manager only cares about the analytics, we would send just an analytics interactive demo."
3. Personalize pre-demo communication - Don't just send a calendar invite. Share relevant context and examples.
"We see you’re in this specific industry, and say, here's an example of one of our top interactive demos in the same industry, this shows I am an expert. I understand your industry or your use case."
4. Enable your internal champions - Make it easy for your initial contact to share specific features and approaches to how you’ll sole problems with their team.
"By sending them those resources (interactive demos post-call), it can make the entire process more automated and doesn't have to be just a bunch of one-on-one demo calls."
5. Track engagement signals - Use demo interaction data to inform your follow-up strategy.
"We can see specific features they visited. So our reps can go in and say, 'oh, I saw they went through this demo. They clearly care about this feature.'"
Why this buyer-centric demo playbook works
1. Makes product evaluation easy on the buyer's terms
Prospects can explore independently before committing time
Sales conversations start from a place of understanding
Every stakeholder gets relevant information for their role
2. Creates a more efficient sales process
Enables more relevant personalization
Gives reps insight into how to best tailor live demos
Focuses follow-up on areas of demonstrated interest
3. Builds trust through transparency
Instead of hiding your product behind forms and qualification calls, you can demonstrate confidence in your solution by letting buyers explore freely.
Step-by-step: Building a Buyer-Centric Demo Experience in HubSpot
Let's see how to implement these demo booking principles. Whether you're using interactive demos or not, here's how to create a more buyer-centric experience based on Natalie’s experience:
Step 1: Audit your demo experience for buyer-friendliness
Start by evaluating your current demo request process against these key criteria (if possible recruit a friend or teammate to go through your current process from scratch):
Accessibility: How easy is it to book time with your team?
✅ Calendar scheduling available on website
✅ Response time under 24 hours
✅ Clear next steps in follow-up
✅ Multiple booking options (call, email, chat)
Usability: Can prospects try before they talk?
✅ Interactive product demos available
✅ Self-service exploration options
✅ Feature-specific demos or examples accessible
✅ Easy sharing mechanisms
Visibility: How transparent is your process?
✅ Clear expectations about demo format
✅ Pricing information available
✅ Implementation requirements outlined
✅ Technical documentation accessible
Total Score: x / 12
💡 You don't need to implement everything at once. Start by identifying your biggest gaps and prioritize improvements that align with your buyers' most common friction points.
You can also grade your website and demo follow-up sequence with Navattic’s Buyer First Scorecard.
Step 2: Use automation to reduce time delays in your demo booking experience
These workflows in HubSpot can help support each stage of your demo process - from initial request through post-demo follow-up.
1. Create an automated “Demo Request” Workflow
⚡️ Trigger Criteria: Form submission
→ "Demo Request Form" is submitted
As Natalie called out in our chat, allowing prospects to book a demo directly on your website is the fastest way for them to make progress towards a live demo without the risk of a delayed booking experience playing email tag.
But, that doesn’t mean you have to put your scheduling link directly on the first page they visit on your website. Here are 2 alternative options to consider if you want to vet who can book time on your sales team’s calendar:
Use a HubSpot form on your demo booking page to capture information about your prospect that can be used for qualification and routing that then directs prospects to the appropriate calendar to schedule time on submission.
Use that same form on your website but send your demo scheduling link in an automated follow up email.
Now you have an email address and your prospects have the option to book a demo themselves, we can use an automated workflow to support their progress.
⏰ Add a Delay:
→ Type: For a set amount of time (to give the prospect enough time to schedule in the same session on the next page after the form)
→ Delay for: 20 minutes
🌴 Branch: Check branches in order
→ Meeting Booked: Associated to meeting with known date
→ No Meeting: No match branch
IF Meeting Booked:
✉️ Action 1: Create a task for the assigned rep to send a pre-demo email
→ Template: Industry-specific interactive demo
→ Add pre-demo context and agenda
IF No Meeting Booked:
✉️ Action 1: Send automated reminder email
→ Template: Include industry-specific interactive demo
→ Add pre-demo context and agenda
→ Include sharing options for other stakeholders
2. High Intent Prospect Workflow (if using interactive demos)
⚡️ Trigger Criteria: Demo engagement (with Navattic or other interactive demo tool)
→ Demo Engagement Score > 50
→ Company matches ICP criteria (either in a list or individual workflow filters)
→ No open opportunities
✅ Action 1: Create high-priority task for sales
→ Type: Email
→ Due Date: Immediately
→ Assign Task to: Existing Contact Owner
👥 Action 2: Add to Static List
→ List: LinkedIn demo retargeting audience
📧 Action 3: Enroll in personalized nurture sequence
→ Either use the go to workflow action to send an automated sequence of marketing emails, or use the enroll in sequence action to trigger a 1:1 sequence of touch points across channels from a sales rep.
💡 Keep your initial automation simple. Start with the demo request workflow and add the high intent and post-demo workflows once you've established your baseline process.
The key to improving your demo booking experience is to focus on enabling buyers to evaluate your solution on their terms, while building in the analytics and automation to help your team be more effective.
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