Foound Out. How To Pitch Right.

It was as if Danny and Aen foound themselves caught in an explosion of hype and activity after their pitch at the Echelon 2010 StartUp Launch Pad.

Everyone wanted a piece of them – from panelist and Geeks On A Plane founder, Dave McClure, requesting that everyone give them a standing ovation to TechCrunch’s Dr. Serkan Toto tweeting about their “world class presentation”, foound seemed to be the name on everyone’s lips.

How did they manage to earn that standing ovation from one of the harshest panelist at the event? By answering all the right questions and more importantly, putting their ideas across clearly and consisely such that the audience could immediately understand who they were, what their product was and of course, how their solutions were beneficial for their target group.

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Hitting The Right Notes And A Standing Ovation

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Some of us might have already forgotten the exact content of their pitch during the StartUp Launch Pad, however it is the simplicity and effectiveness in the manner which they introduced their brand and product which was what captured the panelists and audience alike.

Indeed, Aen shares in the COMA blog that the “slides were deliberately kept simple to reflect the values and messages of the foound brand“. Whilst other teams struggled with faulty equipment and poor internet connection, the team ensured an effortless and smooth presentation by relying on slides instead of a video presentation.

Moreover, the pitch hit all the right notes because it answered all the right questions.

Foound:

(The [timings] listed will allow you to view the exact section of the video where the points were made.)

1) Identified the problem and showed how it affected them personally such that it was in their interest to solve it [40.15 - 41.25h]

2) Proposed a solution to the problem outlined [42.28 - 45.35]

3) Defined their customer profile

4) Showed how their product was differentiated from their competitors’ offerings

(Foound starts pitching at about 39 min 30 seconds into the video.)

In addition to this, throughout their pitch, their speaker, Danny, had a varied pitch and timbre which kept their presentation interesting. Most fundamentally, they were prepared and spoke with brevity and clarity. The last 3 points being the most critical becauase poor presentations often mar a great product as observed for some of the other startups.

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Practise, practise, practise.

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Moreover, whilst Danny concurrs that there are no secret ingredients, he acknowledges that constant practice is at the heart of success. The team worked extremely hard over the past 3 weeks to prepare for the event with the team practically camping out at the COMA headquarters, working closely and intensely together to ensure a good presentation.

Of course, it also helps to research on who your team is going to be pitching to; how else do you think that they were prepared for their now (in)famous straightlined rebuttal “no way any normal motherf***** is gonna do this check – in sh**” which was made in response to the comparison with popular mobile location-based “game”, Foursquare?

Not yet checked – in? Find out what Foursquare is and why Mashable has described the game as the breakout mobile app at the South by Southwest (SXSW) conference.

Alternatively, for an introduction on what an effective Elevator Pitch consists of, read this.

Images courtesy of COMA and Karteha.

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