How to Pitch Like No One’s Watching?
Here’s a recipe.
Have a pitch coming up? Want to share your story?
You likely also want to make an ask to the audience?
For their faith, funding or feedback.
Consider this. A good pitch is like a good meal. The right ingredients in the right proportions, and a simple process — can lead to some astounding results.
First things first. Let’s do the mise en place.
1. What is your enduring one liner?
Do you have a phrase that defines your work? A teeny paragraph that uniquely captures the essence of your value proposition? Make that the centerpiece of the conversation.
That’s your core.
Make sure the audience can walk away with at least that, if not more. Attention spans are rationed more than ever today.
Be memorable.
2. Who’s your bull’s eye?
Are you pitching to a funder — for capital?
Are you pitching to a customer — for a potential purchase?
Think about your audience very carefully. What matters most to them? Can you show them a side to you — that will resonate with their innermost beliefs and expectations?
You’d wear different outfits to an interview and a cocktail dinner, wouldn’t you?
(Ad)dress for the occasion.
3. Life is a stage — and we must all rehearse.
The story is yours, yes.
You’ve lived it.
You want to go extempore? Straight from the heart? Off the cuff?
Don’t.
Free, unfettered storytelling is great for a bonfire party.
Don’t take a chance with your pitch.
Practice. Crystallize it in your head. Have your pitch at the tip of your tongue.
Rinse. Repeat.
Prepare so well that even if someone woke you up in the middle of the night, you’d say the lines right.
After a point, it’ll become second nature to you, giving you the mind space to focus on your real work, which is your raison d’etre anyway, isn’t it?
4. Make Time your best friend
Whatever you intend on saying — practice saying it within the stipulated time. You don’t want to be cut off while you’re in the middle of explaining your impact numbers.
Do timed run throughs that allow you to practice saying what you need to while avoiding the timekeeper’s ire.
5. Leave the laundry list back at home.
You know what you do — inside out. You also have multiple ideas in your head for what you envision happening in the future.
The pitch is probably not the time to bring it all out.
Your audience doesn’t need to know everything, only the key message you want to drive home.
6. Bring out the essence of ‘you’.
What makes you — you?
Want to take the pitch from cookie-cutter to authentic?
Include the nuances of your self in it.
What’s your story?
What are your unique skills?
What is your background?
Garnish the pitch by sprinkling some of your own seasoning.
Congratulations. It’s time to turn off the heat.
Bon Apetit.
About the authors: This article was written by Shayan Roy Chowdhury and Nikhil Saraf.
