David’s marketing team needed to rebuild the elevator pitch for his school’s MBA program. And he was looking for help coming up with a few sentences that’d capture what they did best and why it mattered. The problem, as he saw it, was a writing problem.
But that’s not what an elevator pitch is. It’s not a statement that says something; it’s an action that does something. A pitch is like a play, and it happens in the back-and-forth between one person and another. The words that get said are just props that help one actor get something done with another (a rose to draw them closer, a sword to scare them off).
So David and I stepped back from the page to think about the drama: who’s trying to make what kind of impact? On whom? What’s their setting? What just happened—and what’s about to? Instead of solving for the sentences, we tried to solve for the interaction.
What’s it like?
When you’re pitching an idea, you’re facing someone who doesn’t understand what you’re talking about. You’re challenging them to make sense of something fundamentally unfamiliar.
So don’t force them to do a lot of translating. Instead, give them an analogy that's easy to picture, some landmark ideas they can take their bearings from.
David and I came up with this:
It’s like Duolingo, but instead of learning Portuguese, you’re learning about marketing or finance. And you’re not just learning this content for fun: you’re getting credit that’ll count for your MBA.
The analogy felt pretty clear—but it also got people thinking of an app when they started thinking about the school. Maybe better to open by comparing the school to a brick-and-mortar university...and then adjust the mental model by focusing on mobile-first.
Solve a problem.
Put the idea to work, so people can see it in action—and understand what it’s good for. Show them the job your idea can get done, the change it can make, the problem it solves. Here’s what we sketched out:
Now that most everyone owns a smartphone, we’ve no longer got empty space in our days. We’re waiting for the train, or the tea to boil, or the doctor to see us—and we start scrolling. But mostly we fill in these gaps with stuff that's mindless.
What if we helped people get real value out of their in-between time? A chance to use those 5 minutes before the train comes to move a little farther through the course on your phone—and get that much closer to your MBA.
There are a lot of right moves that can help people get your idea. But none of them wins or loses on the page--because success isn’t about getting the sentences right. A pitch matters when the other person nods, and asks for more. When you pitch it, and they catch it.