Pitching/Presentation Effectiveness

Pitching/Presentation Effectiveness

by,

Erika Wilcox & Leland Vogel

What is pitching?

• The process of presenting an actionable item with the goal of swaying your audience’s favor towards it.
• This is not merely teaching someone about the product, this is convincing them to buy it.

Introductory Video-Exemplary speaking at its finest...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXILI9Q1jIw




Preparation

• Develop the story
• Know what you’re talking about and organize it in a cohesive, comprehensive, concise manner.
• Rehearse
• Don’t get caught saying um.
• Create a backup plan
• Technology is great...when it works. Don’t put all your eggs in a powerpoint basket. Be prepared to for a curveball. Print out your slides.

Execution

• Showing the story
• People like stories. Use visual aids to engage your audience. BE AUTHENTIC.
• Create a dialogue
• Do you like being talked at? No. Neither does your audience. At the very least read their reactions and tailor your presentation to what they are telling you.
• KISS
• Keep It Simple Stupid. Avoid being overly complex and boring. Be mindful not to teach. Your audience does not want to be taught...they want to be convinced that there is a big enough opportunity in what you do that they should be interested in it.
• Utilize the Rule of 3. Your audience will realistically
• Be careful when using humor. You might not be as funny as you think you are. Different people have different senses of humor. Unless a joke adds to your pitch, you should just avoid it as it might take away from the audiences attention.

Concluding

• Power through
• Shit happens. React and recover. You can’t always control when something goes wrong, but you can control what you do about it.
• Recap
• Remember the rule of three. What do you want the audience to remember about your presentation.
• End strong
• Nuff Said

A real example of an exemplary speaker:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-zMRPZpvcw

General Tips

• Don’t Look at your powerpoint
• Make eye contact
• Keep track of time
• Be strong-don’t use wimpy statement (ex. “I believe this will do this)
• BE PASSIONATE-authenticity goes a long way

Questions:

• Who has an embarrassing story of when a presentation went wrong?
• Who have you seen that does this really effectively? What made them so good?
• What specific questions about effective presenting do you have?
• What are you nervous about regarding your pitch to the BAC?

References

http://www.instigatorblog.com/15-quick-pitch-tips/2009/04/20/

http://www.presentationmagazine.com/effective-presentation-techniques-the-top-10-149.htm

http://www.ted.com/talks/david_s_rose_on_pitching_to_vcs.html