Pitch Archives - Page 8 of 8

This Is How You Practice Your Pitch In 9 Steps

by admin | Jul 3, 2017 | Pitch

When it comes to practicing there is a big misconception going on. Many people say: ‘you shouldn’t practice your pitch too often, this makes your pitch sound unnatural’.

It’s quite often the same group of people who use lots of bullet points in their slides, as they are scared for a blackout. Summarizing, these people don’t practice their pitch and their slides are full of distractions.

This is a real pity, since they honestly believe they are doing the right thing.

Are you one of these people? Don’t worry, you are about to learn why and how you should practice your pitch.

Why practicing doesn’t make your pitch sound unnatural

If you practice your pitch a lot, you will have no trouble recalling the text of your pitch. In fact, you should have studied it so thorough that if somebody wakes you up in the middle of the night, you wouldn’t have trouble doing your pitch.

The reason why you should study your pitch text so thoroughly has to do with your focus. A good pitch is always a combination of two things:

The Perfect Pitch = Saying the right things + Saying it the right way

If you studied your text thoroughly, your brain doesn’t need to focus on that part during the pitch. Since your brain has focus left over, it can focus on the way you present it.

Now your brain has time to focus on your body language and the way you speak. If you didn’t study your text, your brain is working on all these things at the same time. You probably understand that doesn’t yield the best results.

Studying your script

Studying your script looks a lot like studying for your exams when you were on high school. It starts with simply reading your text over and over again. At some point you can try to cover up your text and see if you can replicate it.

When you mastered this, it’s time to practice out loud. Use the voice recorder of your phone to check if you are able to replicate the text of your pitch for the full 100%.

When you are done, it’s time to add your speaking legend to it. Practice your pitch with the right intonation, volume and silences.

A quick summary:
1. Read your text
2. Cover your text and replicate it in your head
3. Practice your text out loud. Use a voice recorder to see how you are doing
4. Add your speaking legend. Practice your pitch with the right intonation, volume and silences

Full Practice
When you are done studying your pitch text with the right intonation, volume and silences it’s time to focus on the body language.

Start off by practicing in front of a mirror and pay attention to your body language. When you did this a few times it’s time to practice in front of a camera. For some people this might be intimidating and a bit confronting, but this is the only way to master your pitch.

Use the camera of your phone and record yourself during your pitch. After you completed your pitch, play back the video and focus on your body language. If you really want to excel at this part, try watching your video without the sound on.

Do you notice any differences? Do you seem happy? Do you seem confident? Do you get a pleasant feeling while looking at this video?

If you are not satisfied with the results of your practice, show the video to some friends or colleagues and ask them for their feedback.

A quick summary:
5. Practice in front of a mirror
6. Practice in front of the camera of your phone
7. Watch the video to see where you can improve
8. Watch the video without sound on to see where you can improve
9. Show the video to a friend or colleague

Conclusion
Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who believe in the misconception that they should not practice their pitch. They believe this makes your pitch seem unnatural.

Now you’ve read why this is not the case and you should to the opposite. Take the time to practice and keep on practicing until you are satisfied.

The best pitchers worldwide practice up to 200 times before they perform a pitch.

What you learned
– How to study your pitch
– How to practice your pitch alone
– How to practice your pitch with others

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How To Design Your Pitch Slides (And Why You Shouldn’t Use Bullet Points)

by admin | Jul 3, 2017 | Pitch

Bullet Points In Your Pitch Slides?

Many people who pitch back their story up with a presentation. This presentation usually consists of slides which summarize the points they are trying to make.

If you are one of those people, please stop.

The reason why a lot of pitchers put their presentation text in bullet form on their slides is to have a backup. They think ‘if I forget my text, I can always check my slides’.

And although that’s a fair point, it ruins your entire pitch.

When your slides are full of bullet points and other symbols, you bring the attention of the listener to your slides. He doesn’t listen to your pitch; he studies your slides.

This is what happens in the mind of your listener when your slides are full of distractions: ‘What a nice pitch. Oh hey I see some text on the slides, let me read that.

Oh but he keeps on talking while I’m reading the slides, let’s pay attention to pitch’. And this goes on and on.

By having distractions in your slides your listener is in a constant confusion and therefore isn’t able to listen to your pitch. Therefore, always have your slides as minimalistic as possible.

PS: Have a look at these amazing web design tips

Slides or no slides?

After reading this, you might be wondering: ‘should I use any slides at all’? And to be honest, that’s a fair question.

Several of the best pitchers worldwide argue that you shouldn’t be using any slides at all. There is a lot to say for this, since this enables you to grab the full attention of your listener.

At the other hand you miss out on the opportunity to bring some extra life into your pitch. Therefore, it’s recommended to use some slides unless you are a truly experienced pitcher.

Designing your slides

You just read to bring your pitch alive with some slides. However, you also read that you should be really careful with the designs of your slides.

As too much distraction on your slides can kill your pitch, you have to be minimalistic.

So what do the perfect slides look like? The answer to this question is very simple.

Pictures.

Nice high definition pictures without any text on it are the key to a visual attractive pitch. Simply use one picture on full screen size per slide and you will be good to go.

Since a regular pitch consists of 6 building blocks, you should have 6 slides and therefore you will need 6 pictures.

There are numerous websites you can use to find beautiful royalty free stock photos to include in your pitch. A few examples:

Unsplash (free) https://www.unsplash.com
Pexels (free) https://www.pexels.com
Shutterstock https://shutterstock.com

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Attributes?

If you are pitching a physical product, it’s possible to bring an example or a prototype of it on stage. Depending on the looks of your product this works really well.

This way your listener as an easier time understanding what you are pitching about.There are a few exceptions in which case you should not bring the physical product in your pitch:

• If the product doesn’t look visually attractive (yet).

• If the product is really small. In this case it’s better to take a good picture of your product and have it as one of the slides.

Conclusion

Creating the visuals for your pitch isn’t hard. Unfortunately, many people make the mistake of including (too much) text in their slides, which makes their listener confused.

The best thing to do is to use a few slides which are full screen picture. Going minimalistic on your pitch slides is the way to go.

When you are done creating your slides, it’s time to start practicing your pitch with these 9 steps.

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Use These 3 Methods To Start Your Pitch

by admin | Jun 30, 2017 | Pitch

I Opening

During the opening of your pitch you should only have one goal in mind: Get the attention of your listener. Research shows that the first few seconds of a pitch will determine whether somebody will pay attention to the rest of it.

There are a few ways to get the attention of your listener:

Start your pitch with a personal story

Starting your pitch with a short personal story helps you build a relationship with your listener in under a minute. A personal story helps the listener to get to know you better. At the same time the listener feels sympathy for you because you opened up and put yourself in a vulnerable position. Make your to keep your personal story short, as you don’t want to bore your listener. An example:

‘During my studies I participated in a lot of start-up competitions. I probably saw over 200 pitches. I have to confess something; of those 200 pitches I can only remember 2. Almost all of them lost me within the first 5 seconds of their pitch’.

After you did your personal story follow up with an explanation in one or two sentences.

Start your pitch with a question for the listener

This one works especially well with large audiences as it forces everybody to listen and put their phones away. A question stimulates your audience to actively participate in your pitch. Very important: this question should always be a yes or no question, as you don’t want to start a conversation with your audience at that moment. A few examples:

‘Raise your hand if you think my pitch will be awesome’

‘Raise your hand if you have ever been terrified to present in front of a large audience’

An extra benefit of questions like this is that it’s a good opportunity to make your audience laugh. If you decide to start your pitch with a question you should keep a few things in mind:

Raise your own hand when you say the words ‘raise your hand’. This way the audience directly understands what is expected of him.
After your asked the question and the audience replied with their hands, continue your pitch with a small increase in volume. This way you make sure to ‘kill’ all the conversation which might occurred during your question.

Start your pitch with a bold statement

This is my personal favourite. Starting off your pitch with a bold statement usually has a big impact on the listener. A good bold statement has a small shocking effect to the listener, which will ‘wake him up’ and have him listen to you for the rest of your pitch. A few examples of bold statements:

‘95% of the pitches suck’

‘Every day 52.000 people are pitching to an investor. Almost all of them do a horrible job’

After you did your bold statement you follow up with an explanation in one or two sentences.

Every great pitch has a clear structure. Usually you start with your opening, followed by the problem, the solution, the business model, your team and a call to action. By grabbing your listener with a catchy opener, you set the foundation for a great pitch.

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9 Tips For Your Body Language In Your Pitch [Infographic]

by admin | Jun 30, 2017 | Pitch

Scroll down to go to the infographic directly.

The success of your pitch largely depends on your body language. Research shows that a big proportion of our opinion on the quality of a pitch is based on body language rather than the text itself.

Well some might say the body language is a talent which cannot be learned. That’s not true.

Numerous researchers worldwide have found patterns in body language which influence the opinion of the listener. This chapter will summarize the most important body language tricks you should know before you go on stage. Make sure to practice them in front of a mirror or a video camera.

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According to public speaking expert Paul Finkelstein about 55% of a presentation is non verbal, 33% is tone of voice and only 12% is content.

Your body language beats your content.

Paul Finkelstein

Public Speaking Expert

How to use your hands & arms during your pitch

What you should do:

1. Use a presentation clicker to give your hands a position

Many people are unsure where to put their hands. This is a fair point, since putting your hands on the wrong place can mess up your pitch completely. Get rid of this uncertainty by buying a presentation clicker.

By holding a clicker in your hand you will naturally keep your hands in front of you, which happens to be the exact right position for your hands during your pitch.

2. Show hand palms to show that you are honest

Seeing somebody’s hand palms creates a connection in a human’s brain which refers to safety. This goes all the way back to prehistory. When you get to see somebody’s hand palms you know that person doesn’t have a weapon in his hand.

Although the chances that somebody is holding a weapon are pretty low, the connection in our brain still exists. Therefore, if you want somebody to trust you, you have to show you hand palms early regularly.

3. Show your wrists to show that you don’t hide anything

The reasoning for your hand palms works as well for your wrists. In the past many travellers used to wear knives hidden behind their wrist.

To make sure your conversation partner didn’t have a knife they even invented a handshake where you grab each other’s wrist to make sure he was clean.

Even though the chances are pretty low you somebody is carrying a knife, the connection in our brain still exists. Reveal your wrists as much as possible throughout your pitch to make the listener trust you. You can do this by rolling up your sleeves when you are wearing a shirt.

4. Put your index finger to your thumb, this makes you look smart, goal orientated and sharp

To come across as capable during your pitch you should make use of a pose where your index finger and your thumb touch each other.

This is especially true when you are telling something very detailed and you want your listener to pay close attention to what you have to say.

5. Rub your hands slowly when you talk about the business model

Traditionally rubbing your hands is related to profits or benefits. You should use this to your advantage by rubbing your hands slowly during your part about the business model. When you apply this method please be careful as this could hurt your pitch a lot when misused.

Research shows that rubbing your hands fast refers to a profitable situation for the speaker, not the listener. Therefore, make sure that every time you rub your hands you do it slow.

Scientists did a research amongst car salesmen and they found that every time they rubbed their hands fast, the potential buyers were scared off more often than when they rubbed their hands slow.

6. Make your arms wide when you address an important sentence

When you come to most important part of your pitch, you should emphasize this by moving your arms wide.

By moving your arms in a wide position you suggest that the topic is very important, therefore the listener will pay more attention.

The same goes the other way around. By moving your hands close to each other you suggest the topic isn’t that important and therefore your listeners will be less interested.

Make sure not to overuse this method, as your listener will experience an ‘inflation’ of important topics.

What you should not do:

7. Don’t point with your finger, this makes you look aggressive and unpleasant

Do you remember your parents pointing at you when you did something wrong? Probably you didn’t like this when you were a kid.

The funny thing is, adults like it even less when somebody points at them when they are talking. Your listener will experience this as aggressive and unpleasant.

8. Don’t put your hands in your pockets, this makes you look uninterested and arrogant

When you are waiting for the bus or in the elevator, chances are you have your hands in your pocket.

Whenever people are bored or doing something interesting (such as waiting) they tend to close their body language. In this case it shows by hiding your hands in your pocket.

You might say: ‘but when I’m pitching I’m not bored; I just like to have my hands in my pocket’. Too bad for you, because even when that’s the case, your listener won’t know. He will just assume that you don’t care too much about this pitch, and therefore he won’t either.

9. Don’t cross your arms, this makes you look uninterested

Just as putting your hands in your pocket. The same reasoning goes for crossing your arms.

By closing your body, you give the impression that you don’t care too much about this pitch. Avoid this and keep your arms in the air.

I promised you 9 tips

But I want to thank you for reading this far.

That’s why here are 4 more tips you should use for your body language in your pitch.

These tips are all about using your feet during your pitch. The last one is about how you shoud use your face in a pitch.

How to use your feet during your pitch

10. Stand wide and steady (Bonus)

Throughout your pitch you want to have your legs in a wide, steady position. This ‘power’ pose shows you are confident and gives the listener a pleasant feeling.

11. Stay in the same position (Bonus)

When you are pitching, it’s your job to make sure the listener pays attention to what you have to say. Anything which can distract your listener from your words will hurt the quality of your pitch.

Therefore, it’s best to not move your legs during your pitch. However, when you get more comfortable with pitching there is an advanced move you can include in your arsenal, which will be discussed in the next section.

12. Walk strategically (Bonus)

As mentioned it’s best not to distract your listener by walking from one place to another throughout your pitch. There is one exception to this rule:

Move to a new spot when you address a new subject.

By moving from one spot to the other you suggest that something new is happening. Normally you don’t want to do this as it distracts your listener from your pitch.

However, when you are changing the subject in your pitch, walking 2 or 3 steps could actually help your listener understand that you are changing the subject.

I advise you to be careful with this move, and practice with this before you perform it on stage. Experiment this method in front of a group of friends and ask them afterwards if it distracted them or not.

We only laugh 15% of the time because of a joke, the rest is to make contact.

How to use your face during your pitch

13. With regards of your face there is only one piece of advice you need to remember. Smile. (Bonus)

Research shows that smiling is contagious and impacts the mental state of your listener. When you smile, your listener is likely to start smiling as well.