When you are asked “What business are you in?” or “What do you do?” and you answer in a short 30 second statement about yourself and your business, while capturing their attention and interest, you have just made an elevator pitch. For some, this is very difficult to do especially when pitching your business idea to an investor or even proposing a new idea to your boss.
You know your business. You are passionate about your idea and you have most likely spent hours and hours perfecting it. You now have an opportunity to present this idea to an investor and suddenly you are overwhelmed with emotions. Doubting yourself and terrified your idea might be rejected, are all very common feelings, but you don’t have to let it determine your fate.
Here are a few pointers to delivering a dynamic elevator pitch to blow their socks off:
- It should entice and inspire the listener. Remember that the person who you are pitching too, needs to see your uniqueness together with the proposed value.
- Remember an elevator pitch should be short, approximately 5 sentences or about 200 words.
- Be yourself – a lot of the time, people buy into your personality and determine through that if they will be able to trust you or not.
- Grab their attention. Find a hook to entice them by creating a scenario that they can relate to. Make it relevant to them. Compare your products or services with something they use every day.
- Write one sentence about who you are putting a personal touch to. Remember to mention your name and the role you are playing in the company.
- Use your mission statement to describe what you do in no more than 2 sentences.
- Write in no more than 2 sentences who your ideal customer is.
- What is your unique selling point? Write about what makes you different from your competitors.
- End off with a 1 sentence call to action. What do you want to happen next? Is it R200k investment because you want to expand, take the company to global markets, buy a manufacturing machine? Or do you want your advertising idea on every billboard in South Africa? Ask yourself: “What do I want to accomplish with this pitch?”
- Practice your pitch a lot that it becomes second nature and doesn’t look prepared, but looks like you are talking with ease, confidence and passion.
- Everyone wants to know different things. Make sure you know who your audience is and what they would like to hear. Are they family centered or hard-core financial fundi’s? Are they technically orientated or people orientated? Adventurous or reserved? There are a lot of things to consider, so make sure you dissect everything so you can streamline your pitch.
- Your pitch should prompt engagement, meaning that the listener/audience would want to know more.
An elevator pitch can be scary. It can be extremely intimidating to think that there, next to you is the person who might change your life forever. Someone who might invest in your company or idea. Someone who might help to make all your dreams come true.
Writing and presenting an elevator pitch or even presenting a longer version like a proposal, are skills worth mastering. It not only increases your communication skills, but also enhances your confidence. The Mindspa Institute is a soft skills training company who are very much invested in the business soft skills training sector of the education in South Africa.
For more information on the various courses that develop your skills, such as Leadership, Confidence and Assertiveness, Change and Conflict Management etc.… Visit www.themindspa.co.za, phone 010 110 0227 or email [email protected] . The Mindspa Institute have corporate clients nationwide who speak with pride and great enthusiasm about all the courses offered in a practical fun-filled manner, and tailored to suite the individual needs of the company.
