Strategy for Elevator Pitches: Role Models

00:01 The best writers in the world learn to write in part by reading lots of other good writers. Great novelists spend their time reading lots of other great novels. They don't just read their time.

00:13 They don't spend their time reading comics or watching sports and never reading novels.

00:18 They immerse themselves in the world they want to excel.

00:22 The same should be true of you when it comes to giving your elevator pitch.

00:26 There are so many places where you can find great elevator pitches.

00:31 I mean, there's a primetime show on NBC Shark Tank where you can and it's on CNBC, too, where you can watch people giving pitches. Now, they're a little bit longer than what most people consider elevator pitches, but some of them are quite brief, and you can learn a lot from it because always within the first minute you get a sense of what their business is that's important.

00:56 You can go to other web websites like Ultralight Startups has tons and tons of fantastic elevator pitches.

01:05 They're really brief.

01:07 They're less than 3 minutes of Internet startups here in New York City.

01:10 Just go to YouTube and type in elevator pitch and you'll see all kinds of examples.

01:17 So don't try to just come up with something from scratch in a vacuum, learn from what other people do.

01:25 Now, if there are people in your industry you know are good at it, research them, go to their websites, don't copy anyone's style or say exactly what they're saying, but have influences.

01:38 If you spend hours and hours and hours looking at other people, give great elevator pitches, it's going to rub off on you.

01:47 Some of it. It's going to shape your thinking.

01:50 It's going to elevate your standards.

01:52 So before we really dive in here, I do want you to spend a little time finding some elevator pitch role models.

01:58 So please do that. Now, if nothing else, just go to YouTube and type in great elevator pitches.

02:04 See what you find.

02:06 See what you like.