Pitch Lessons from the “Power of Now” Guy
What Eckhart Tolle teaches us about effective pitch structure
I first learned about Eckhart Tolle in the summer of 2004, when a friend recommended his wildly popular book, The Power of Now. I had been struggling with a personal loss; reading it made me feel better.
Over the next ten years, I listened to Tolle’s audiobooks, often on nights when I couldn’t sleep, when my mind raced about one thing or another. Somehow, listening to Tolle quieted that voice in my head. Once, my friend Carla and I drove two hours to see him “perform” live: He just sat on a chair next to some flowers and talked, but that made me feel better too.
In 2014, I launched a consulting practice around strategic messaging and positioning—that is, helping venture-backed leadership teams get their story straight for fundraising, sales, marketing, product and recruiting — so I was thinking a lot about pitch structure. And one night, while listening to Tolle, I had the following epiphany:
Everything Tolle says in his books, lectures, retreats, seminar, and — even in his 2009 webcast with Oprah Winfrey (which shattered the previous record for most-viewed internet broadcast with a cumulative audience of 35 million) — is a single, expertly crafted pitch.
The thing that Tolle’s pitching—attention to the present moment—appeals to some and sounds like new-age fluff to others. But whether you dismiss Tolle’s message as spiritual mumbo jumbo or buy into it, anyone selling anything can learn a lot from a pitch that’s powered the sales of over 8 million books and regularly packs retreats around the world.
Yes, I realize that by holding up a self-billed spiritual teacher as a strategic messaging expert that I’m putting my credibility on the line. Certainly, I’m not advocating that you copy the content of Tolle’s message in your SaaS enterprise sales pitch. But if you can suspend judgement and look at the form of what Tolle says, there are five things you should emulate in any pitch you ever make to anyone:
#1. Eckhart names the enemy
To make an emotionally resonant pitch, you have to name the thing that’s standing in the way of your audience’s happiness. No one names the enemy better than Tolle. According to him, the antagonist that opposes our embrace of the present moment is an “entity” inside each of us (I know, sounds weird, but we’re all about the form here) that “feeds on attachment to past and future.” Tolle calls it the pain-body:
If you are not absolutely present, the pain-body takes over your mind and feeds on negative thinking … It may be shocking when you realize for the first time that there is something within you that periodically seeks emotional negativity, seeks unhappiness.
#2. Eckhart shows that he understands his audience’s struggle
Before people can be persuaded, they must feel understood. Tolle demonstrates that he understands his audience’s struggle by devoting most of his talks to the subject of suffering. He’s especially effective when describing his own suffering, from the period in his life before he “bought” his solution (and embraced the present moment):
At university, gradually my depression and states of high anxiety started. I did very well, and I worked very hard. But the motivation was fear…. So it wasn’t enjoyable. After I graduated, I was happy for two or three weeks, and then the anxiety and depression came back even worse than before. Then the thought arose, “I can’t live with myself any longer.”
#3. Eckhart answers “Why now?”
One of the least effective ways to design a pitch is as an argument. Rather than trying to badger his audiences to follow him, Tolle frequently states that many will dismiss him “because they haven’t yet suffered enough.” This approach can come off as passive-aggressive (“If you’re not ready to buy, you will be later”), but in Tolle’s case—as well as in all of the great funding and sales pitches I’ve seen—it’s an effective self-qualification test that resonates with his target audience. It makes Tolle the ultimate “pull” salesman, and his “prospects” feel part of an in-crowd:
You won’t be able to surrender [to the present moment] unless you’re completely fed up with suffering. Only when you’ve had enough suffering in your life are you able to say, “I don’t need it anymore.” … That is the case with almost all people who come to [my] retreats. …Otherwise, they wouldn’t be open to the message.
#4. Eckhart describes the Promised Land — over and over—and uses it as the basis for positioning
When I kick off strategic messaging and positioning engagements with CEOs and leadership teams, I start by asking why they called me in. More often than not, they say something like, “Our team lacks a strategic North Star.”
The North Star for every leadership team’s strategy— and every pitch story — is the change you want to bring to the world. For Tolle, that’s the “end of suffering,” which he reiterates over and over in different forms. For example, he frequently shares his origin story, describing what it felt like after he embraced the present moment. Note how he positions himself by distinguishing his Promised Land from that of “competitors” (drugs and alcohol):
There was a wonderful sense of peace. Not a desensitized peace — you can experience that if you take enough drugs, or drink enough. But a peace that was joyful and alive, and very alert.
#5. Eckhart has a sense of humor
Probably because he’s committed to living in the present moment, Eckhart doesn’t exactly rush to get to the punch line when telling a joke. But if you can handle his lazy, deadpan delivery, Tolle is actually pretty funny:
About Andy Raskin:
Andy Raskin helps leaders craft strategic messaging and positioning to power better fundraising, sales, marketing, product, and recruiting. His clients include leadership teams backed by Andreessen Horowitz, First Round Capital, GV, True Ventures, and other top venture firms. Andy also trains teams on strategic storytelling, which he’s done at Uber, General Assembly, HourlyNerd, Neustar, and Stanford. To learn more or get in touch, visit http://andyraskin.com.
