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Brick No91: In Defence Of The Elevator Pitch
By Matt Weston, Friday 20 August 2004 Every time I write on one of my pet subjects - The Elevator Pitch - I get the odd thorny email lambasting me for coming over all Uncle Sam. We have lifts, not elevators this side of the Atlantic. The Elevator Pitch was Made In America, period. Just to get the uninitiated up to speed: your Elevator Pitch is simply a metaphor for what you would say about your business if you had just 30 seconds in a lift with Bill Gates. Accosting Bill Gates in a lift? How un-British. Maybe, but that reticence is wide of the mark. The point of the Elevator Pitch - why the term was coined - is not really about Bravado it's about Brevity. Not unwanted interruption but to-the-point communication. In a cluttered marketplace - and the Yanks operate in the most competitive economy in world history - you have to get your message across fast. Can you boil down what your business offers to a single soundbite to get the attention of Bill Gates/ an investor/ a prize customer? I didn't have time to write you a short letter Mark Twain (yep, an American) wrote: " I didn't have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one. " The point? It's far easier to leave in every detail than boil it down to what's genuinely important. The easy option is to leave in your darlings. The right option is to kill your darlings. Some collected thoughts and links: (1) The Elevator Pitch isn't what you say or write. It's what your listener or reader takes in. (2) Examples abound . . . Lonely Hearts ads, Movie taglines, and football pep talks. There's a hairdresser round my way called "It Will Grow Back" . . . genius. Any message where you need to get your most important point across fast is an Elevator Pitch. (3) Don't think you can wheel out the same Elevator Pitch whatever the occasion, and whoever the listener. You need to learn the technique . . . How To Get Your Message Across Quickly . . . and apply it to every different situation. I haven't room here to teach the technique, but watch this space. (4) Download this PDF by Guy Kawasaki: The Art of The Start. Pages 5 to 9 are particularly useful . . . How to boil down 50 word mission statements into 3 word mantras. (5) If you can get hold of it (not always easy) read How To Get Your Point Across In 30 Seconds Or Less by Milo O. Frank. Pure magic in a pocketbook! Remember to sign up: back to top |
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