To deliver a 3-minute pitch, must we dumb it down? Just the opposite.
Brant Pinvidic is a Hollywood producer who has sold more than three hundred TV and movie projects, including the mega-hit The Biggest Loser.
Pitching in Hollywood is no different from “raising money, convincing parents at the PTA meeting, asking for a promotion, marketing our company, and getting board approval,” he writes in his book The 3-Minute Rule: Say Less to Get More from Any Pitch or Presentation.
The first and most important thing we must do is be crystal clear on the value we provide.
How do we do that?
Step 1: We start with Post-it notes. We create a list of all the words or short phrases that describe what we do.
We ask: What do we do well? Why is it good? What do we want someone to do or buy? What’s in it for them?
We don’t edit ourselves. That comes later. Instead, we write down every relevant point about our business, product, or service. We should have a minimum of thirty Post-it notes.
Step 2: We organize these statements according to Brant’s “WHAC” framework: W—What is it? H—How does it work? A—Are we sure? And C—Can we do it?
Each Post-it note is sorted into one of these four categories.
Step 3: Turn each bullet into a short sentence. Brant calls these “statements of value.” Simple, declarative sentences.
“What you might notice is that the thirty bullet points just blossomed into forty or more statements,” he predicts.
“That’s good. Your simplified bullet points often yield other ideas you didn’t think of or skipped over. The process of stripping down and building back up opens up some new thoughts and some new statements of value.
“As you go through this process, you’ll hear in your mind a story developing,” he notes.
At this point in the process, we “are probably looking at a collection of more than forty statements of value and thinking, ‘I thought this was supposed to be a 3-Minute pitch?'”
Brant’s response: “I get that a lot. Remember, it’s not just about getting it down to three minutes; it’s about finding the best three minutes.”
Are we done yet? Not even close.
Step 4: We mine for the gold “that isn’t sitting in front of us in those forty statements,” he writes.
We look at each statement and say, “I don’t get it, why is that important?”
We “cross-examine ourselves. Before we commit to any piece of our pitch, before we decide which statements are important and which aren’t, we need to put ourselves through a serious interrogation.”
Is this fun? No. But it’s necessary.
“The first ten questions are easy. We already have those down. It’s the next ten that hurt, because we’re going to come across some that we can’t really answer well (for now).
“Say we run a hardware store in Akron, Ohio. If we ask, ‘Why would someone buy their tools from me and not online or from Home Depot?’ and our answer is, ‘Because I’m local,’ then ask, ‘Why does that matter?’
If our answer is “Because it keeps the money in the community,” ask, “Why would anyone care?”
If our questioning leads us down a dead end and our answers start to sound less than authentic, go back up the chain and change an answer.
The answer to “Why would someone buy from me and not online?” might turn into “Because people want to put their hands on it first.”
“‘But why would that make any difference?’
“‘Because they’d rather have it immediately than pay for shipping and wait for a delivery if they buy online.'”
Brant’s recommendation?
“Keep asking questions and keep pushing ourselves. . . I’ve never had a client not come up with some more gold when they mined through this interrogation. There is always something of value that pops up.”
Step 5: We have some difficult decisions to make. “It’s time to pull some of our value statements out and put them aside,” Brant writes. “They will not be making the final three minutes.
We begin by reminding ourselves of Brant’s “very important rule” from yesterday [hyperlink]: We can’t engage with our audience until we’ve inform them.
There will be statements that will land with our audience only after they clearly understand and have all the necessary information.
We aim to select the twenty-five statements that are the most informative.
We will likely need to eliminate some of our favorite statements. Worry not: These statements are often great to use during the Q&A after our three-minute pitch.
What else do we need to watch out for?
“Telling our audience things they already know is a very bad habit,” Brant writes. “It subtly shows a lack of respect for their time and their intellect.”
The bottom line?
“Many of my clients mistakenly think that simplifying their message means spoon-feeding every thought and detail to their audience. ‘Simplified’ does not mean dumbed down, it’s actually just the opposite.”
Here is Brant’s suggestion on how to spend our 3 minutes and 25 statements:
W—What is it? 9 statements. 1:30. Our core concept. The fundamental elements.
H—How does it work? 7 statements. 1:00. “The what and how make up 80 percent of the audience’s buy-in decision,” Brant writes. “If they understand the concept and the value we’ve laid out, they will be eager to verify and engage. They will be looking for this to work out.”
A—Are we sure? 6 statements. 0:20. “The facts and figures that back up or verify our offering,” he notes, “actually make up only a small portion of that buy-in decision.”
C—Can we do it? 7 statements. 0:10. “This is the smallest piece,” Brant writes. “Depending on the value we’ve created in the questions above, the answer to this question can be almost inconsequential.”
More tomorrow!
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Reflection: As a presenter, do I believe delivering a persuasive pitch in 3-minutes or less is possible? What would have to be true for this to happen?
Action: Discuss with a colleague.