A perfectly planned and delivered elevator pitch can help you to achieve your business goals. Or, if you get the pitch wrong, you’ll be left where you started with little to no interest in your idea.
Because elevator pitches are succinct, they need to be impactful. Not only do you need to convey all of the key information about your business idea, you also need to make it compelling. Without buy-in from your listener or listeners, you will quite literally be wasting your breath.
If you’re struggling to get your concepts and proposals across with clarity and persuasion, learning about the elements of a successful elevator pitch can help you to up your game.
Strong Opening While Defining a Problem or Need
Elevator pitches last anywhere in the range of 60 seconds to a few minutes. If you don’t come in strong and capture the attention of your audience, then you’re going to struggle to gain interest throughout the rest of your delivery.
Start with a strong opening statement. It can be effective to outline a problem or a need. The problem should be communicable in just a few words. Practice your opening statement and use it to take control of the rest of your pitch delivery.
A Successful Elevator Pitch Focuses on the Solution
There’s no time to talk about who you are. The only thing you need to worry about in an elevator pitch is what you or your product can do.
How will your idea solve a problem or address a need? What would make it unique in the market? How does it function (the basic concepts) and how will consumers use or interact with it? Investors don’t need to know about your history. They want to know about what you have to sell.
Display Knowledge of Your Target Market
A business that doesn’t understand its market is one that is bound to fail. Good product and service development comes from understanding consumer needs and wants. If you’ve developed an idea, then it can be assumed that you’ve done your market research. If you haven’t, then it’s time to get started before you even think about delivering your first pitch.
Show your audience that you have an in-depth understanding of your target market, and relate this understanding to the benefits that your idea provides. This creates buy-in, as potential investors and business partners will gain a clearer understanding of the potential of your idea.
A Successful Pitch Displays Knowledge of the Competition
Who are your competitors? What do they do well? Where are they lacking? This needs to be covered in your elevator pitch. There’s no need to go in to details about performance and other metrics from your competitors, but you do need to show that you know who they are, and you should have a strategy in place (or a superior offering) that can allow you to outperform them and take from their market share.
Turn a Pitch into a Conversation
When delivering a pitch, always keep the tone conversational. It’s essential that you are able to speak to your audience naturally. A carefully prepared and delivered script will feel insincere and flat. Knowing your idea inside and out, and having confidence in your delivery, will inspire confidence in your audience.
Tell a story about the product or service that you’re pitching, or use impactful scenarios to illustrate the benefits that your unique idea provides.
The Numbers Do Matter
Some financial information is necessary in a pitch. Profits don’t come from guesswork. If you have a great idea and an effective way to monetize and market it, then you’ll need to be able to display how the finances will work. How much investment do you require, how much will it cost to finalize a product for market, and what kind of resources are needed to achieve your goals? Create a complete financial overview of your idea and distill it down to a few effective sentences that can be used in your elevator pitch.
You’ll also need to know the detailed information inside out, so that you’re ready to answer any follow-up questions while networking with investors and potential future partners.
A Bonus Elevator Pitch Tip from Kevin Harrington
In a 2010 interview with Success Magazine, Kevin Harrington shared a powerful piece of advice for anybody delivering a pitch…
“Forget about the people and the cameras, and believe in yourself and in your product. At that moment, all you have to do is talk to us and convince us. Do it just like you’re talking to your banker—with your excitement and your belief in yourself.”
Of course, Kevin was referring to the pitches delivered on the hit ABC show Shark Tank, but the advice is transferrable to any scenario. Believe in what you are promoting, and it will be that much easier to get your message across. A passionate elevator pitch delivery will make your idea attractive, and tapping into your passion will give you a powerful confidence boost.
Learn more about business success with key insights and advice from today’s business leaders, including Kevin Harrington, with AsSeenOnTV.pro.