Katie Haahr 00:00:00  What if you could secure your dream client with just one compelling pitch? How would that make you feel? Hi, I'm Katie, president of social curator, and in today's episode, we're diving into Jasmine's proven four step process for crafting a successful pitch that doesn't just stand out, but feels completely authentic to you. Whether you're seeking new clients, brand partnerships, or investment opportunities, this framework will help you present your ideas with confidence and clarity. Ready to elevate your pitch game? Let's get started.

Jasmine Star 00:00:29  Like always, when we get into these frameworks on the podcast, the pitching framework is research, craft, deliver and follow up. Now we're going to break them down. And in each one I'm going to tell you if there's that point or not okay. So we're going to start off with our for research. It's important here to understand that the people you're pitching to and the opportunity that is given, you have to understand them and the opportunity as much as possible. If you have any opportunity of knowing who is going to be in that room.

Jasmine Star 00:00:58  So if you're going to be meeting clients, it's totally okay to search for them online, figure out if you know what school they went to or their social media handles, or what sports teams they like. If you're going into a room full of investors, how diverse is the investors? Is it mostly female? Mostly male? Do they traditionally invest in underrepresented founders? Do they not? Are they tech forward? There's a lot of things that you can do, because the more you know about who you're pitching to, the better you can craft it. So research is going to be a big component. Now you can do this by researching basic Google or asking questions to three questions before you start crafting your pitch. So if you're in the research mode and you're like, I don't know where to begin, three questions. Number one, what are the top three specific needs, challenges or pain points of the audience? And how can your skills, expertise, or offerings address those needs effectively? Question number two what are the preferences, priorities, and the goals of your audience? How can you align your pitch to resonate with their preferences and priorities? And question number three who are the decision makers and what factors influence their decision? How can you make it easy for them to say yes when pitching to investors? You want to know your business backwards and forwards, specifically your numbers, as much as possible.

Jasmine Star 00:02:15  Now this could be an episode fully out on its own. We might get there if people want to ask for it, but to get you started, you're going to want to know at minimum, these four things in depth. You're going to want to know your business's sales and revenue growth over time, profitability, cash flow and outstanding debts, projections for future revenue. And the LTV, which, spoiler alert, I'm recording an episode on this in the next few weeks, so be sure to look out for that now. If you're pitching to clients, it's so important to know who you're actually pitching to. When I was a photographer, it was common for me to meet with the bride and groom. But over time, I started to realize that the more luxury weddings I began shooting, that the parents were often involved in making the decision about the payment to the photographer. So while the bride and groom might have been smitten with me, I had to know who am I actually selling to? So it was very common for me earlier in the conversation to know, okay, so great.

Jasmine Star 00:03:14  So talk to me about your wedding. Where is it going to be? Are you guys making this investment on your own, or are there other people I should be including this conversation? Because far be it for me to invest in our meeting with a couple and they're like, okay, this is great, but I really need to go back and tell my dad, no problem. But I should have known about that on the front end, because I could have facilitated the dad being there on that meeting or having a conversation with the dad prior to the meeting with the bride and groom. Remember, a pitch is getting people to yes, anything that's going to get in the way of the yes, you want to best prepare for it. So after you've conducted research on your audience, the opportunity and your numbers, you can move on to the next step of the framework, which is craft. This is the step where you're going to create a tailored pitch that highlights your unique value proposition. An important word here is tailored.

Jasmine Star 00:03:59  I cannot stress this enough. Every word you speak needs to iterate how you're going to make their life or business better, easier, or more successful. This is not about how they're going to help you, right? Oftentimes when you're pitching, it is always this is for you. Go into a pitch thinking, not me. This is going to benefit you. But creating a tailored pitch doesn't mean that you have to recreate the wheel over and over again. What you're pitching isn't going to be changing only who you're pitching to. So you can write like a shell pitch with room to customize and tailor it for your audience and the opportunity that you're pitching for. Okay, so let's kind of divert a tiny little sub point here. If you're taking notes, I want to talk about your shell pitch. Kind of like this is kind of like what I would call the foundation. Right. Or this is the thing that encloses everything. This is like the core of it. So your shell pitch should include your intro, hook, problem, statement, solution and call to action.

Jasmine Star 00:04:57  Now, if you've been listening to my podcast for a while, you'll notice that a lot of this follows the same frameworks that I use on social media In social media, we have hook incites call to action here when you're pitching its hook problem statement solution, call to action. They're very similar because we really do want these to be conversations, and we like to start them the same way and end them the same way with a hook and a call to action. I'm going to dive into each one. So your intro right. This is going to be your intro hook. I want you to begin your presentation with a hook to grab attention, and then introduce yourself and establish credibility and a bit of connection with the people you're talking to. So now you can start customizing and tailoring it to your audience using these four key elements. Now we have the shell pitch. Now we're going to dress it up with key elements. Now this is going to be expert level. If you're just getting started don't worry about this next section.

Jasmine Star 00:05:51  Listen to it. But don't put any pressure. But if you're a seasoned entrepreneur and you want to uplevel and you want to increase your closing rates, here are four key things storytelling, empathy, resonance, and social proof. Remember, this is for the advanced entrepreneur. So I'm going to explain. Let's start with storytelling. Our brains are wired to not only love but remember stories. So you want to create a narrative that engages your audience and illustrates the problem, solution, and the impact of what you're pitching. This is going to help you stand out and keep their attention throughout the pitch. Element number two empathy. Theodore Roosevelt said, quote, people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. End quote. Okay, so when you put yourself in your audience's shoes and you understand their perspectives, their needs and the challenges, then you can better tailor your pitch to address their specific pain points and show your care and concern. Not only does this make your pitch that much better, but you're more likely to build trust and rapport with the people you're speaking to.

Jasmine Star 00:06:52  And again, here again, that leads to a yes. Okay. Element number three for our advanced pitchers. Number three is resonance. Make your pitch resonate with your audience by aligning your message with their values, their goals, and their interests. By speaking their language and addressing their concerns, you can create a deeper connection and increase the likelihood of a yes and element. Number four relevant proof. Here again, I'm going to say it. This is for the advanced pictures. This is where you're going to want to provide evidence or demonstrations to back up your solution. This could be case studies, testimonial data, market size things of that nature. So we have covered research. And then we covered craft including those four up level elements. Now we're going to move on to deliver. Remember as a kid when your parents would say it's not what you say, it's how you say it. Or maybe my parents were the only people to say it because, like, I came out of the womb telling my parents this is my opinion.

Jasmine Star 00:07:54  Maybe it was just me. Maybe it's how I always said things. My parents always said it. Well, it's come actually back full circle now that I'm an adult and I pitch in a variety of ways in my business, the delivery of a pitch is just as important as the crafted presentation. Here's why. How you deliver your pitch, your tone, body language, confidence. It affects how your audience perceives it. A confident and engaging delivery grabs attention and builds trust. Well, you know, like a dull one. Oh, it's going to leave people disinterested. A strong delivery can make your message more memorable and more convincing by speaking with passion and authenticity. You're going to leave a great impression and inspire action. Oftentimes, people are making a decision based on how you are coming across to them. Your delivery is so powerful. So how do you deliver a great pitch? I'm so glad you asked. Here are three tips that I have learned over the years to help you deliver your pitch confidently and persuasively.

Jasmine Star 00:08:57  Tip number one you're probably going to hate this one. I hate it, but I use it. And they listed as number one because it's the most important practice and get feedback. This is how you confidently pitch Practice delivering your pitch in front of a mirror to your friends or your family, or in front of a mentor is going to be the best way for you to hone in your delivery. You can even record it and watch it back and like, tweak it and adjust. Whenever I give a webinar like a masterclass, I can't tell you how many times I practice it. There is a good chance that I am practicing a webinar at minimum 2530 times by myself. I'm also giving the presentation to my husband multiple times. I record it for the team multiple times, and I send it to people that I trust industry peers and I say, please help me make it better. What here is terrible about it? I want to get better. I need their feedback. Tip number two engage your audience.

Jasmine Star 00:09:50  You want to capture your audience's attention from the start and keep them engaged throughout your pitch. So how do you do this? I can tell you guys, I can tell you the best thing from a stage on a masterclass in a pitch room storytelling, relevant examples and interactive elements to make your presentation memorable and impactful. I'll never forget I was creating an illustration, I was giving a presentation and I was talking about comparison, how oftentimes we look at what we have and we compare it to somebody else. And so then, unbeknownst to anybody in the audience, I went and I bought a beautiful cake. But nobody in the audience knew that the cake was fake. So I carried this cake out into stage. And then I pretend to like fall. And I dropped the cake. And then there was like an audible gasp. And I was saying, that's comparison. You're looking at a cake and everybody in this room, oh, we all want to bake our cakes, right? And then all of a sudden we look like, why am I not making a cake? And then you see me come out with this like, beautiful cake.

Jasmine Star 00:10:50  But you know nothing about the cake. You don't know if the cake was given to me. And I said, you don't even know if this cake is real. Now, when I say that back, it sounds like a really lame visual example, but I'll tell you, it was really great when I used it. Okay, it's not so great when I tell it back right now. The point was that visual Element got so much attention because it riveted people out from like a dreary state. Like they saw like it changed not just me standing on the stage. I carried something out. I pretend to trip. The cake fell. That was that gasp. Everyone's like, oh my gosh, what's happening right now? Oh, they were kept rapt with interactive elements. So small things like that could really change things. Or if you're pitching to investors and you can show a demo or you have a physical product, please always use it. Please always show it. Okay. Tip number three is to use your body language and tone.

Jasmine Star 00:11:36  A friend taught me that when I'm telling a story and I'm talking about my husband, he said, when you are pitching or when you're standing in front of people and you want to create a different voice, a different voice to represent a different person, he says. When you talk about your husband, you should deepen your voice, stand tall, bring up your chest, take up space. And I thought to myself, interesting. And he says, when you're talking about your daughter Luna, I want you to shrink down. Use a higher pitched voice. End your sentences with question marks by doing those things we're giving visual cues with our body language and tone to convey our point and get somebody closer to a yes. And this helps keep your audience engaged and then they understand the narrative. Okay, okay, y'all, we've covered a lot, you know, I mean, so now you know what to research, how to craft your pitch, how to deliver a pitch. And now we're going to go over the final step of the framework following up.

Jasmine Star 00:12:32  Ladies and gentlemen, this is the magic I read a study by the Harvard Business Review that said that following up with leads within one hour of contact increases the likelihood of qualifying the lead by seven times compared to waiting longer. Y'all. If you follow up with a lead in one hour, it increases the likelihood of qualifying that lead seven x. What in the world? Okay, so what does this tell us? We need to have a follow up email prepared and ready to go before the pitch. So here are five things you should include in your follow up number one a personalized note thanking them for taking the time to meet with you and consider your solution number two. A recap of key points you discussed during the pitch to support your message and remind the recipients of your value proposition. Number three clear steps and action items to keep the momentum going and encourage further communication and collaboration. Number four an easy to execute call to action that encourages them to take the desired action like it could be anything from scheduling a follow up meeting, providing feedback, making a decision, saying yes.

Jasmine Star 00:13:43  And then finally, what should also be included in that follow up is a sense of urgency or an incentive to encourage immediate response or action, such as a limited time offer or exclusive opportunity.

Katie Haahr 00:13:54  Thanks so much for hanging out with us today. Remember, the key to a great pitch is all about your preparation, your confidence, and your willingness to follow up afterwards. If you enjoyed this episode, we'd love for you to share it with a business owner who could also benefit from listening. We'll see you again real soon.