The elevator pitch

You know those moments. Someone turns to you and asks, "So, what do you do?" and you hear yourself give a slightly dizzy, half-formed answer. It comes out differently every time, and just as often you walk away wondering whether the other person actually understood a word of it. This is exactly where the elevator pitch comes in. It exists for that one answer, so that it is not only clear, but lands right in the middle of what the person asking actually cares about.

How long?

Thirty seconds. No more.

What is it for?

To spark interest. That is all. You are not trying to close a deal or explain your entire life's work in half a minute. You are trying to make the other person lean in and want to know more.

The structure

Keep it to four simple steps, in this order:

1. What you do.
2. For whom you do it.
3. The benefit it brings.
4. The difference, what sets you apart.

An example

Here is how mine might sound: "I have worked for nearly ten years in training, speaking and coaching in presentation skills, for companies like Aftonbladet, Tele2 and Volvo. And I do it because I love watching people grow and develop as presenters. That love is also what sets my way of working apart, because I teach through practical training rather than theory. That way I know the participants will genuinely grow."

Notice what is quietly going on there. I borrow a little ethos from time, from history, and from the names of well-known companies. I bring in pathos through a single honest word, "love". And I round it all off with a logical argument at the very end. The whole rhetorical triangle, ethos, pathos and logos, plus all four steps of the structure, in about thirty seconds.

One important tip

An elevator pitch must never, ever sound rehearsed. So when you deliver it, play along and act as though this perfectly polished little answer is coming to you completely spontaneously, right there on the spot. Practise it until it sounds like you have never practised it at all.

Good luck.