BuddyPress.org

@crashutah:

As @djpaul says live demos are the modern day equivalent of “don’t work with animals and children”. Great if you can make it work, but so many opportunities to go wrong.

You are talking about why it rocks, not an installation tutorial, so I’d also steer clear of any talk about platforms and servers. As @mercime points out, showcasing is where it’s at if you want to talk rocking.

I’d go with the following structure:

1. Whet their appetite with a quick showcase of a few real world sites

Use different types of sites – I see 3 main types in practice:- just niche social networks, pretty much the default BuddyPress with a little bespoke styling; complimentary ones where the niche social network is still obvious but there’s some additionality like a magazine (hmag, tasty kitchen, or our own Hello Eco Living or Fisherbook); and the ones where the social network is in the background supporting the main function (Travel Oregon, Volkswagen, GigaOM).

You could also show by vertical – in education (CUNY), big companies (Daily Telegraph Blogs)

Keep this short and sweet – leave them wanting more!

2. Tell them what they get out of the box

Do it with visuals of a group, activity stream, etc.

3. Tell them what they can add to the box (plugins)

Just a few strong examples – easy to appreciate ones: – e.g. EventPress (running your own event registration) and Media+ (photos, videos, who doesn’t want that!)

4. Finally walk them through one of the most exciting sites in more detail

Use screen dumps / graphics throughout (it doesn’t need a bullet anywhere – although a couple of big number slides is nice – a la Steve Jobs)

Ask them questions throughout to engage attention – “Who’s ever built a site where it would be great if they could get visitors registering?” – then show them an example in BP. “Have you ever wanted a twitter like stream on your site?”. “Have you ever wanted a site where your visitors could post from the front end, and see responses in real time?”, etc., etc.

This way, you’ve got them thinking already: oh yeah, I need that in my site, imagine what we could do if we added this, etc. You’ve painted the picture for them.

And for a bit of humour – you could always risk a live activity stream playing in the background – where a buddy sends a few ‘helpful’ messages as you talk.

Hope that helps!