Pillar 5 – Introduction to Pitching

Pillar 5. Introduction to Pitching

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Why should I learn to pitch?

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There are many scenarios in business that could be viewed as a pitch so you must learn the art well. Pitches come in many shapes and sizes, the obvious one is for investors, but when you consider the full spectrum of business conversations such as suppliers, employees, board members, customers, to name but a few, they will need persuasion of some sort.

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If they need persuasion then they will all need a pitch of some sort. This is why you will need your pitching & communications skills razor sharp so that your message can be heard very clearly, with understanding to achieve the necessary buy-in. No easy task, but necessary if you are to succeed in the long haul.

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If you are a poor communicator then odds are you won’t raise money because investors won’t buy into you, they won’t believe you can manage a team, they won’t trust your ability to sell and critically they won’t believe you can create a return on investment.

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Fundamentally though you must learn to pitch because it’s the integral step in the process of securing investment. Its purpose is to secure that meeting, so you may only get one chance. Miss out and it’s gone, spiralling down the toilet to the abyss, never to return.

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Learning to pitch isn’t just for fundraising. It’s a critical skill in selling, so when investors are assessing your suitability for investment, they are also questioning whether you are able to actually convince potential users to convert to paying customers to build a profitable business.

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Why is pitching so hard?

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For the natural sales people out there it’s not. Their silky smooth tongues and minds can weave a story that naturally sucks you in to believe even the wildest of stories and hooks you in for the ride. But, there are very few naturally born storytellers that can spin a story so compelling and pitching therefore is unfortunately a skill few naturally have, but it can be learned and honed over time and it must! It takes practice, preparation & patience for you to really master it but when you do it’s one of your greatest assets in your toolbox.

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Pitching is hard because you need to do one really important thing, which is to put yourself in the other person’s shoes and understand what they need to hear to convey your message effectively.

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Your audience doesn’t know what is in your head,
They will not have the full context of what you want to say
They may not understand the subject of what you need to say
They may not actually be interested in what you have to say
They may have different motivations to you
They will only give you a brief moment of attention

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These are variables that change from audience to audience, situation to situation so even before you’ve said a word you have an uphill battle to effectively deliver your message with impact so it is heard, understood, retained and acted on.

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The cost of getting your pitch wrong?

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Opportunity lost, simple. The wrong pitch can turn off an audience in seconds and the consequence could be anything from a £1k Angel cheque to the £2m VC term sheet. Investors are deal flow rich and time poor, so the importance of a pitch, whether it’s on a pitch deck, in person or on the phone you must cease the moment as best as you can because as our favourite diagram from Freshpaint.io reminds us; that one investor could impact a cascade of cheques that could be either your first pivotal investor, or the difference to closing your round! (Note below: circles are Angels & squares are VCs).

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The cost of getting a pitch wrong could be the difference between success and failure. Whether its your early pitch to get the round off to a start or to an investor with a large network to bring along, the cost of not perfecting your pitch is huge and needs time allocating in advance to getting it right.

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Mixing art with science to create magic

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For the gifted few they make pitching seem an art form, like a masterpiece hanging in a museum, they can cast a majestic story that makes an audience fall deep into. There surely can’t be a science to this process people say in disbelief as it seems so effortless & natural. Well, there is. Film makers, salespeople and successful business people alike know the formula for a good pitch and importantly they know the pitfalls to avoid. Some founders when fundraising are pure storytellers that pin investors to their seats and have them hooked on needing to learn more on their opportunity. They grab attention with a compelling vision, are excited with the opportunity, they create a journey you can’t afford to miss and they make you believe they will make you a very handsome return on your precious investment funds.

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They work hard to ensure they will;

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Capture their audience
Speaking to them in their language
Create engagement and interaction
Prepare for the situation
Have a clear message to transmit
Give the audience something to remember
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This is art mixed with science to create a powerful potion that successful fundraising founders must have in vast quantities.

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How do pitches go so badly wrong?

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Like a crash in slow motion, a poor fundraising pitch is terrible to watch. Cringing behind a cushion, you want it to stop for both parties’ sake as you feel this business isn’t even going to get off the starting line. Lifeless, confused and with no clear goals, a poor pitch shuts down a room or reader, loses attention and is impossible to get back.

There are a whole host of reasons that pitches fall at the first hurdle, some examples are:
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No initial attention hook
No flow
Information overload
No clear structure
Not understanding your audience
Reading your pitch word for word
Using acronyms people just don’t know

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The list is vast and it highlights the importance of learning the basics to pitching whether spoken or written because the odds of achieving investment are so stacked against you that any opportunity to rebalance them is a must.

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What are you pitching?

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Yes, you are pitching a business opportunity, but investors are trusting YOU with the money. For early stage businesses, investors invest more in you than the business as they want to be part of your vision, mission, journey and roller coaster which should make a positive impact and hopefully a tidy return.

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You need to prepare and practice selling yourself. Understand why people would and should invest in you, how you will safeguard their investment, why you can create a team to shoot to the stars and why you over the millions of other founders are worthy of backing.

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Focusing 100% on the business and not the founder/team in your pitch will block you becoming investable with the investors. You should always be selling yourself as well as the business.

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Practice makes perfect

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Like the picture that hangs over a music teacher’s piano saying; “practice makes perfect”, pitching for funding is the perfect example of this. Practice creates refinement, which improves flow, which builds confidence, which perfects delivery.

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If you invest the time to perfect your pitch it will create a night v day scenario where you can hone and streamline your pitch to pack more punch than an angry Mike Tyson and allow you to deliver your message with surgical precision and skill.

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Whether you chose the mirror, your colleagues, family, or even your dog, the act of repetition out loud helps you to create rhythm and learn what to cut out. Often it’s about cutting a large portion, then adding back the very succinct points to create that high impact presentation. This allows you to understand how you create your various length pitches for different scenarios and how it works in harmony with your deck.

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How we help

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The FundingHero Pitching pillar 5 is designed to help you prepare, deliver and more widely communicate successfully with investors and stakeholders for your fundraising process. If your pitch goes smoother than silk then you’ll hopefully be one step further on your way to smashing your funding targets in no time.

To make it simple, within our platform we have broken this area down into 3 easy to use canvases so you can understand the before, during and after of your pitching needs. They help you to understand the nuances to create the perfect pitch, in any situation and find your pied piper technique to win investors hearts & minds.

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Pitch preparation
Pitch delivery
Communications

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Fundraising shouldn’t have a 99% failure rate…

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FundingHero is your all in one platform for tech founders looking to raise their early stage funding. We teach you the rules of fundraising to help you to Learn, Prepare & Raise.

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Our platform gives you access to:

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