Ten things you MUST do in your next pitch

(nod of thanks to Seth Levine, Gordon Whyte and David Teten for blogging about these tip sheets when I first put them on my site)

1. Get to the “ah-ha” immediately: Why is your business a great investment? What’s in it for investors?

2. Attend to audience and desired results first. Everything you say and show serves both or doesn’t belong in the pitch.

3. Cut the PowerPuke clutter – .ppt file is not “your presentation” it’s a visual aid. Keep only slides that illustrate your talk. Chuck the rest.

4. Those slides you kept? Chuck a couple more and streamline the rest. Try to read your slides from across the room. (Stuff the detail where it belongs – in an appendix of your business plan.)

5. Say something on slide titles – replace “Company History” with “Substantial Value Built” (Investors recognize a management team slide without you labeling it “Team” – use the title to tell them about your team.)

6. Prepare effectively. Practice in front of your team, in front of a camera, in front of a group of laypeople, get their feedback, refine the logic flow and try again.

7. Know your best style. Earnest, clear speaking beats stilted, overproduced and even “by the rules” reciting any day.

8. Interact with the audience. Refer to handouts, ask thought questions, make genuine eye contact. End by asking them to do something incremental like drop by the booth or website.

9. Ask yourself: How can I make it easier for these investors to do their jobs? (You’re in customer service and they’re the customer)

10. Features = characteristics (adjectives). Benefits = actions (verbs). Benefits matter the most. Know the difference.

11. Give a little something extra…

Great Presentations Mean Business

Effective commerce demands effective communication. A great idea is not worth much until a viable market hears it and acts on it.

Step one. Identify the market. Step two. Describe, not the product itself, not its features, but its benefits. Construct a vivid picture in your audience’s mind. Take them on a journey that shows the world that could be, that would be, if only they… invested, committed, agreed, supported, signed up, signed on… well, you get the idea.

Oratory is an ancient art, but the majority of PowerPoint-based business presentations have completely “lost the thread” on doing it well. Books and classes on effective speaking and presenting can teach “tricks and techniques” but they can’t get at the root of most bad presentations – the message itself. Messages must be well-honed and laser-focused on achieving a specific result with a specific audience.

We all should know better. One can’t convince by merely describing. So why do so many presentations deliver a “laundry list” of content on their topic? The response that approach generates is along the lines of “Hmm? Oh, that’s nice. Is it time for my next meeting?” We believe every presentation worth making should stimulate the audience to act in specific ways that generate positive results. Otherwise, you’re wasting time and money.

In practice, most professionals have little to no opportunity to acquire and improve their skills before taking the stage. This “trial by fire” – at its worst – results in some spectacular failures. Most presentations stumble along with mediocre delivery, moderate to poor focus and results that are just left to chance.

Anything short of a great presentation wastes time, money and business opportunities. There is no substitute for personal training and iterative rehearsals to develop compelling, persuasive presentations with lively, solid delivery.

Great ideas, great services, even great products are worth absolutely nothing in a vacuum. Great presentations, on the other hand, mean business!

Your Investment Pitch is NOT Your CV

True story -- at a major investment fair, I saw an entrepreneur (waste) a number of their 8 scarce "pitching" minutes outlining the development of the core idea behind their business from Grad school onward.

Now, raise your hands all the Investors in the audience who give a sh*t about when you first thought there might be something to your idea.

Okay, how many of you want to know: "Is the idea is scalable, lucrative and competitive in a viable marketplace?" "Is it a good match with my objectives?""Do I think this team can do it?"

Point is, too much pitching tries too hard to show how good the idea is instead of how good the investment is.

Other point is, what were you thinking? If you MUST use milestones and timelines to show your business has traction and value (HINT: there are much better ways) please AT LEAST put the most IMPORTANT at the TOP of the list, NOT the bottom.

No investor cares how brilliant you were in Grad school, unless your mom's a VC.

Did they use a PowerPoint to present their findings?

Hurrah -- scientific evidence that reading your slides makes the audience less likely to understand you. They'll remember you, perhaps, but not in the way you want them too! More on Professor John Sweller's work to come...

Guy Kawasaki's 10/20/30 Rule

Pretty darn good rule, as rules go. (Hint: I am not a fan of rules, except that knowing them allows you to break them productively...)

Why We Hate "Book Reports"

Presenters, PLEASE remember, you're not in 4th grade anymore, trying to use your book report to prove to the teacher that you read the entire book (you know you didn't) by including every possible fact.

In every presentation, even project and performance reviews or status checks, you need to work to accomplish a well-defined business objective.

(HINT: Not "tell them every piece of data possible about the project")

All joking aside, even when the presentation/objective requires significant detail, deliver it in comprehensible ways. Handouts, supporting documents, heck even white papers = good, presentation visual aids = bad, fillibuster-style speaking = bad. Your presentation guides the audience through the material, as opposed to shoveling it onto their heads until they're smothered.