A great business pitch is key when looking for exposure for your startup, whether you are looking for investing and funding opportunities or selling directly to a client. Master your pitching skills with our top 6 tips for pitching your business idea!
What Is A Business Pitch?
If you own a business or are planning on starting one, you should be prepared to present business pitches all throughout your project’s life. It is a great way to showcase your product or service to potential investors, clients, partners, and more!
Business pitches are essentially structured presentations where you showcase your business idea. They include a general overview of the project as well as specific information people need to make their decisions, such as how you plan on making a profit if you are pitching to investors, or how your product will solve a consumer problem if you are pitching to clients.
There is an art to creating a great business pitch, and not all pitches are created equal, so we have come up with 6 of our essential tips for pitching your business idea to help you successfully showcase your unique product or service:
Why? A great business idea goes nowhere if the team is not right for it. Whoever makes up your team of success should build trust in your potential partners, investors, and clients. Make sure all team members are not only fully committed, but that they add value to the project and are prepared to do whatever it takes to make the vision come to life.
2. Master your storytelling
After assembling your perfect team, the second thing on your to-do list is to practice your storytelling.In business, storytelling is a way to present facts without making them seem like facts. It focuses on the human aspect of what you are presenting, which makes what you say much more relatable to your audience.
Before you choose how to tell your story, consider who you are presenting to. What are they like? What are their interests? Why are they listening to your pitch? Keeping your audience in mind at all times will help you create a pitch that will create a connection with your listeners.
Although most pitch decks cover the same basic ideas (such as who you are, what you do, and what your goals are), the way you tell your story will change. You will also have to include more specific information on certain aspects of your business depending on the audience.This post by Venngage has a ton of templates for all types of pitch decks!
4. Create pitches that vary in length
You will not always have the same amount of time to present your pitch. Sometimes you will get a full 20 minutes, but it is likely you will be in situations where all you have is 5 minutes or even just 30 seconds. It is important to be prepared for all types of situations and to be able to showcase the most relevant aspects of your pitch in the time that is allotted.
The variations of the pitch you should prepare are:
Elevator Pitch (30 seconds to 1 minute)
Rocket Pitch (5 to 10 minutes)
Investor Pitch (15 to 20 minutes)
This article by Huffpost covers examples of what you would say in each type of pitch if you were presenting specifically to investors. You can use this as a base for your structure and modify the information based on your audience and what is already included in your pitch deck.
5. Keep your information clear and concise
When pitching your business idea, you have a limited amount of time to showcase all of your ideas. In order to avoid filling up your pitch with unnecessary content, make sure you prioritize your topics and say only what truly needs to be said.
You can do this by using different brainstorming techniques to come up with questions and bullet points of relevant topics, such as what your product or service is, what makes it unique, who your target audience is, and how you intend to acquire customers.
You can then begin to separate redundant information and topics that are not absolutely essential to your pitch from the must-have information. These non-essentials can be added as an appendix in your pitch deck and covered later if your audience asks about them.
5. Keep your information clear and concise
Lastly, you should always follow up with potential investors, partners, and clients after you complete your pitch. Make sure you remember to ask for contact information so you can send a thank-you-note afterwards, as well as additional communications when necessary.
According tothis article by Ash Rust, you should be prepared to send more than one follow-up message after each meeting. You can read the post to find a guide on which information you should include in, and how to structure each message.
Time To Master Your Pitch!
Now that you know the best 6 tips for pitching your business idea, you can go ahead and create your own killer presentation. If you have pitching experience, share some of your favorite tips and hacks with us on social media!