Did you know that 20% of top sales representatives close 80% of all sales deals? What’s the secret? Well, they use proven techniques to achieve their targets and outperform everyone else on the team. But what’s this tactic? A winning business pitch. However, unfortunately, we have watched dozens of firms pitch to investors and venture capitalists, and a bunch of them are, at the most, merely passable. Of course, like the sales example above, some are excellent and nail all the core aspects of a pitch. Nevertheless, only a small number of those go above and beyond and are genuinely outstanding. When we consider what makes those standout pitches different from the others, it all boils down to one aspect – the successful ones share some similar characteristics. Now, let’s get into its details.
Smart Tips to Develop a Compelling Business Pitch to Investment Firms
You will deliver a business pitch that sticks with investment firms if you follow these eight guidelines for making a tremendous and exceptional pitch. The following advice will help you create a business pitch that’s engaging, personable, and, most importantly, persuasive so that your customer will say “yes.”
Recognize Your Audience’s Requirements
Knowing your audience is common advice. But, if you would like to improve your business presentations, go above and beyond by learning what your customers desire from you. Learning about your audience is not the same as knowing them. Try to comprehend your client’s problems, objectives, and motivations rather than merely identifying where they come from. Speak to them beforehand, read whatever they share online, and discover what motivates them. By doing this, you’ll be capable of adapting the business pitch around their needs, desires, and interests. For instance, it is logical to emphasize how your concept can have a good environmental impact when you are presenting to prospective shareholders and clients who are also environmentally sensitive.
Or, maybe you are pitching a website layout for women. You have to pay special attention to contours, colors, typography, and ease of navigation. Hence, learn as much as you can about the business or customer you’ll be speaking to in advance, but make sure all the facts you find are available to the general public. Additionally, you can pay attention to how they behave and speak throughout the process. You might even emulate their language when pitching to build rapport and a good impression.
Focus on the Fundamental Business Plan
This really is a vital part of your business pitch, and many business owners and independent contractors botch it. The most intriguing or least exciting aspect of your firm may be its business model. Getting into the specifics about how you’re accomplishing this can be monotonous and cause individuals to lose interest. It’s particularly applicable after the thrill of identifying a problem, demonstrating the remedy, and discussing the potential of thousands of others who might want to utilize what you’ve created. Instead, keep it succinct and visually appealing. In as minimal words and sentences, concisely describe your company model. Try to relate what you’ve been doing for a well-known organization to make your message more understandable.
Make an Impactful Pitch with Customized Templates
The presentation or pitch deck is the nucleus of your demonstration. The resources you deploy to create and give your pitch are crucial. It’s so 1990s, PowerPoint. You need something more sophisticated, like custom templates showcasing modern products to inform users. In fact, customizable templates can help startups create a pitch deck to secure funding for their company or develop a sales pitch to introduce products and services to prospective customers. They can even be used to showcase a partnership proposition or introduce a potential partner to a collaboration idea.
Customized decks can also include templates for reporting – that showcase charts, graphs, and other reports for presenting statistics before clients. They can be incorporated into financial presentations, search engine optimization (SEO) reports, board checks, and status updates. When creating a business report for your pitch, begin by selecting an appropriate report template. Next, you can edit the template’s existing content to transform it into your own business report. For brand alignment, take the help of slide styles. Embed your logo, personalize the color scheme, change the fonts or utilize custom ones, and save the design so it can be used in future presentations.
Integrate Your Narrative or Passion into Your Pitch
Your sales speech doesn’t need to seem like you’re reciting it from a manuscript that was written for you by someone else. When appropriate, give it your own flair. Simply put, make your presentation more personable. It will not only increase your relatability quotient but will also calm your nerves. You are, after all, discussing a subject that is dear to your heart. For example, you need to come up with a marketing campaign concept as part of a hiring procedure. To choose which concept to pursue, you can begin with a checklist of prospective concepts and their anticipated effects.
When doing this, you may come to the conclusion that you are most enthusiastic about proposing a campaign for video meetings. Again, nowadays, it’s a common practice to emphasize how your service advances the greater good, such as environmental conservation or assisting those who are less fortunate. You may make this argument far more effective by sharing a personal story about your dedication to the issue and how you intend to apply your proposed solution.
Additionally, try to include real people in your communication. Regrettably, most marketing messages, buying guides, and business pitches are impersonal and lack any character. Whether the person responsible is you, somebody you trust, or a consumer you lost, people recall people and the feelings that go along with them. We prefer short historical summaries. Your viewers will remember your pitch when you can relate it to them personally or by mentioning something you’re enthusiastic about. And then, your proposal has a high chance of getting approved!
Highlight the USP of Your Products or Services
Focus on your product or service’s unique selling proposition (USP). How will your offering meet customer wants and profit business associates when you have the audience’s attention? It all comes to be able to communicate the advantages of your good or service immediately. Investors want to understand your offering’s benefits to users and the plain, factual evidence. In the end, they would want to know if they will profit from any of this. For instance, to make a good sales pitch, you need to place yourself in the position of someone who is considering profit and basic business sense.
Highlight Your Recent Achievements
This implies that you must highlight your company’s achievements and growth from the beginning of its launch. Investors are interested in learning about your firm’s first clients, additional investments made in the business, significant media coverage, issued letters of intent (LOI) to acquire or collaborate, milestones for your products and clients, significant hiring, and so forth. Demonstrate to the financiers that you are able to sell your business to them. After all, during the pitch, you are seen as the lead marketer of your own organization.
Face the Competition Squarely
Almost all businesses face competition. Presenting your competitors in a grid format is one of the finest methods to demonstrate that you know your competition but are still convinced about your USP. The grid format is a graphical representation where you can show the market, including your company and competitors. Here is an example:
Provide Figures that Support Your Figures
If you don’t have experience doing this in a previous firm, don’t claim that you’ll have a $100 million enterprise in five years since most funders won’t believe you. Showing precisely how you might attain those numbers is more persuasive than talking large; what data about your business do you own that led you to predict those types of sales? Describe the underlying tenets of your business strategy. As an illustration, consider the following cost estimate for a particular company:
- We make use of partners X, Y, and Z’s website traffic and client base.
- 1 million unique users visit our community of websites each month.
- A thousand fresh leads are acquired monthly.
- The mean conversion is 0.25%.
- The monthly turnover rate is 6%.
- The typical lifetime value (LTV) of customers is 24 months.
- The average sales per customer are $150.
- Our client acquisition cost amounts to $15.
Bonus Tip: Showcase Your Product!
In several pitches, the company doesn’t even display its real product. While demonstrating a product can be difficult for some firms, it is usually simple for those making a fundraising presentation to investors. Showcase mock-ups even if the product hasn’t been finished yet. It’s incredible how much a visual depiction of your brand and company can improve the overall impact of your presentation. You would like to see the stock market participants pull out their smartphones and start crunching numbers. It is a positive sign because it shows they are interested in learning more about your thoughts and whether it aligns with their knowledge of your sector and the overall revenue figures you have provided.
Successful Business Pitch – Conclusion
When it relates to pitches, confidence is crucial. You must be familiar with your presentations before bringing them into any room, including a workplace. Speak aloud while you are practicing at your leisure. Play and replay the presentation you recorded. What makes an odd noise? Where and how do you commit errors? These problems are simple to ignore when reading aloud, but they become increasingly apparent when spoken aloud. With repeat practice, you will eventually master your pitch and present it confidently before your audience on the day of the real drill.