Use this approach to build trust, foster understanding, align teams towards common goals (more MQLs! More conversions!), and genuinely listen to their concerns and pain points. Encourage stakeholders to contribute potential solutions to address friction in their domain as subject matter experts, and maintain smooth communication and feedback loop.

What will ultimately determine your experiment's success or failure goes beyond the plan's design or the creation of the self-serve experience (AKA product brief). It depends on whether your counterparts in sales, customer success, marketing, and revenue operations have embraced the idea and are ready to support it.

We utilized this artifact in various ways. Initially, we conducted a "train the trainer" session, during which I met with BDR leads and provided them with an overview of the hypothesis, goal, user experience, and test plan. They had the opportunity to ask questions, request additional information or tools (such as extra email sequences), and discuss common objections their teams might encounter during the experiment. This step was crucial for refining our approach, gaining buy-in, and enabling team leaders to reinforce the desired treatment for the generated MQLs.

I also referred to this document as an introductory or FAQ resource in subsequent conversations and meetings. It proved to be highly useful for socializing with stakeholders across the board.

Product-Led Growth (PLG) focuses on identifying opportunities for growth by enhancing customer journeys through product usage or demonstrations, rather than relying on extensive but partially relevant content or lengthy discovery calls without a demo.

Therefore, before investing in automation and scalability, it is necessary to iterate and navigate the complex intersection of product, marketing, and sales. You start with what is already working in a high-touch motion, looking for low-hanging fruit to automate or translate to self-serve flows. This is where learning occurs, but organizations not designed initially with PLG in mind may struggle to establish this connective tissue between teams and organizations.

Cross-functional alignment is crucial, more than anything else. No matter how detailed and comprehensive your brief is, it won't be effective if nobody reads it or takes action accordingly.

Understand your stakeholders' goals and Jobs-to-be-Done (JTBD) to demonstrate how an initiative can support their daily operations or business objectives. It's essential to start there before diving into specific details.

Within 4 weeks of the experiment, we reached significant results (we thought it would take at least double that time), and the form submission rate doubled. Within 8 weeks, we started seeing strong signals of MQL to Meeting rates increasing for upmarket segments.

The only time we encountered some issues was when this information was communicated to sales leadership without my presence in the room to address any additional questions. Ask your stakeholders to be invited to any forum that might yield follow-up questions.

Shelly Eisen-Livneh

At Heap we tested a self-serve demo experience with minimal investment from the Engineering-Product-Design (EPD) team. This artifact was at the heart of my enablement mission, right before we launched this experiment.

Toward the end of my first year at the Heap, the Marketing organization shifted its primary focus to maximize Top Of Funnel (TOFU) traffic volume and MQL count. Simultaneously, a new sandbox environment was created for solution consultants and partners to showcase value to prospects. I saw this as the perfect opportunity to test a self-serve demo experience with minimal investment from the Engineering-Product-Design (EPD) team at Heap, which we had wanted to do for some time.

As the PLG lead in the Marketing organization, I reviewed the company's OKRs and identified multiple priorities this initiative could support. For example, it could assist larger accounts in their discovery and validation process and provide value to less technical or less experienced prospects looking to learn about the value proposition before talking to a rep. This helped the initiative get the buy-in and resources it needed. This artifact was at the heart of my enablement mission, right before we launched this experiment.

Self-Serve Demo Experiment Writeup at Heap

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