Beyond the Elevator Pitch

How many times have you asked someone, “What do you do?” only to get a pretty much incomprehensible answer? For some reason, people tend to get lofty when they try to think of a boilerplate phrase to introduce themselves and their business. Unfortunately it’s very easy to get caught up in words like “optimize,” “facilitate,” “customized,” “mission-critical,” and so on. I actually know consultants I see and talk with at meetings and events regularly, whose websites I’ve read thoroughly — and I still have no idea what they actually do.

Whether you call it a tagline, a magnetic introduction, a sixty-second commercial, an elevator pitch, or something else — we all need one. I’ve recently had a great time helping a few clients develop new pitches that are working well for them. In the process, I began to realize how important it is to practice and test whichever words you use. Even if you hire a brilliant writer to write a captivating script for you, you’re still the one who’ll have to believe in it and deliver it. It’s like learning to snowplow when you’re skiing downhill: until you try it and have the experience of it actually working, you’re scared to death of crashing or careening out of control.

I’ve also discovered how much fun it is to get two or more clients together to try out their new pitches. The client is usually self-conscious and reluctant to have faith in the new phrase, and they can’t totally trust my opinion because I wrote it. But having other people around to provide an immediate non-verbal reaction really does the trick.

In fact, maybe I should take my own medicine for a change and get a few peers together to help me work on a pitch for myself? I’ll have to get around to that one of these days.

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