The Perfect Pitch for the 4 types of audience members – 10 step pitch model

If you read my series on The 4 Types of Audience Members (4TAM), you’ll know that each audience may be made up of Visionaries, Empaths, Theorists and Pragmatists. One of my readers on LinkedIn asked for a pitch template that would cover the information that appeals to all 4, especially investors, so here it is!

In my last four articles, after highlighting the traits, interests and learning styles of each 4TAM investor/customer, I included a list of information that they might find especially compelling.

Taken together, here is the new pitch template, a recipe for success if you will:

1. STORY INTRO

This is for the Empaths, but also remember that all humans are evolved to respond to story; 

make sure this origin tale describes WHY you started your business. It should highlight the passion that you have, having experienced or witnessed something that you realized needed to be fixed, but also allow us to get to know you. Psychologically, the more we know of a person’s story, the easier it is to empathize with them, and therefore be likely to want to invest in them (if the business idea is solid of course). Try to paint the picture for us: where were you exactly, what did you see and hear, how did it make you feel?

2. PROBLEM in 3 PAIN POINTS

For the Visionaries, show that many other people have this PROBLEM you noticed, and it affects society or the planet at large; newspaper headlines from major global publications or striking images can work wonders here; also, for the Pragmatists, put your PROBLEM into 3 PAIN POINTS (e.g. wastes time, costs money and causes emotional stress) that you will then address in your SOLUTION next; finally, to get the Theorists onboard, a shocking statistic that demonstrates the issue (almost 64% of people …!).

3. SOLUTION 

Now that we’ve got all the 4TAM on board, we can start to follow a bit more of a conventional pitch structure; in this SOLUTION section, tell us how your company will solve the PROBLEM leading to 3 BENEFITS (this works great if it’s the opposite of the 3 PAIN POINTS; e.g. faster, cheaper, makes you happier). Set the scene for the:

4. PRODUCT DEMO/WALKTHROUGH

For the Pragmatists, show us how simple and easy your SOLUTION is to use. Simple solutions = happy customers = excited investors, and the Pragmatists should know exactly how your product works.

5. MARKET OPPORTUNITY

All investors are going to be interested in this; if the market is too small, they can’t get the 10x return or more they are looking for in an investment; if it’s too big, the Pragmatists and Theorists will dismiss you as deluded or even deceitful. Make sure you do the work to arrive at numbers that make sense.

6. BUSINESS MODEL

Again, for the Pragmatists (they and the Theorists tend to dominate the middle of the pitch, while the Empaths and Visionaries are hooked at the beginning and end); as my associate and friend Craig Major, The Startup Coach says: “Do we know who pays for what?” This may seem obvious but you would not believe how many pitches fall flat here. Make it simple, clear and realistic.

7. TRACTION

All investors need proof of concept; what can you show to prove your idea works? To make sure you’re still talking to the people-focused Empaths and Visionaries, customer testimonials and colour pictures of happy clients can be a great emotional addition to the common traction metrics like Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR), user growth, etc.

8. TEAM

This will also often appeal to all 4TAM, as investors know that execution is as important if not more than strategy, and that WHO YOU ARE matters. But especially for the Visionaries, who tend to make impulsive decisions based on the vibe they get from someone, showcase your team with professional matching colour photos, and tell us why YOU are the people to build this company.

9. FINANCIALS

This is where the Theorists really perk up, and they will scrutinize this like the Pragmatists do your business model, the Visionaries do your Team and the Empaths do your PROBLEM statement: do your projections make sense, are they big enough to be exciting but realistic, and is it clear how you arrived at these numbers? Make sure the answers to the above are “yes” and the Theorists will approve.

10. CALL-TO-ACTION + VISION

You’ve given all the necessary data, now it’s time to circle back to your original story to re-hook the Empaths and give some kind of exciting vision for what you can do together if the investors contact you at [email protected]!

With that as our template, let’s look at a pitch for a company I just made up (all info here is imaginary and may not make sense, but the idea is to showcase the pitch structure):

When I was in my 20’s I traveled to India. I was lost, depressed and had no sense of what I wanted to do with my life.

One day, in a village in Uttar Pradesh, I saw farmers struggling with poor crop yields due to drought, and could see the devastation it caused in the community.

When I researched it, I realized that farmers all around the world suffer from unexpected droughts, and 56% of crop yields are lost every year, leading to starvation, economic uncertainty and widespread fear of food insecurity. I realized I had found my calling, so I started PredictApp.

PredictApp can track droughts using AI to better predict when and where they will happen and allow farmers and their national economies to prepare. Farmers download the app, it find their location, and gives them the necessary info and updates to adjust their planting, while governments receive up-to-date policy advice based on the predictions. This leads to better fed communities, greater economic stability, and happier citizens.

This is a global issue, and our Total Addressable Market is a $7Bn market, while our SAM is $2Bn with a SAM of $760 M. The way we make money is simple: government departments and agencies pay us a subscription fee of $2000/month, and the farmers get the app for free.

So far, we’ve grown our users from just 500 in our first year, to over 3000 last, representing an incredible growth rate of 500%. This proves that we have what it takes to keep growing.

Our CTO went to Harvard and his dad is Jeff Bezos. If we get a cash infusion of 1 M, we can continue to expand our growth rate, and our profits should be at 35 million by 2023. 

Join me at PredictApp.com and help me make drought misery a thing of the past!”

Hope you enjoyed this article, and that it gives you some inspiration for your pitch!

Please like, comment and share if you know an entrepreneur that would find this valuable, and if you’d like some help on your pitch, join our Powerful Pitch Online Boot Camp here!