Five Steps To A Perfect Elevator Pitch
1. Introduce yourself. Start the elevator pitch with a brief, easy-to-absorb sentence that includes your name, your company name and the service you provide. For instance, “I’m Mary Smith; my company is xx, and we offer xxx service.”
I’m Duncan Farquhar from ecoconnect.me we connect people to species and raise funds for research and development.
2. Identify the problem you solve for your customers. “What is the problem the potential client may have that your service can solve?” What’s in it for the listener has to resonate. Why should the person care what you do? Focus on the listener and the value of your proposition for him or her.
Living in harmony with nature is complex and can be overwhelming. And if you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem. This sits uneasily with me and many people every time they fill up a car, eat, or work in a building built on a concrete pad. Other species don’t vote or spend so these decisions are made in ignorance of these powerless lifeforms. So profound is our ignorance that we don’t yet even have names for 70% of the species on the planet let alone understand our impacts on their lives. These impacts are increasing to the point where after 5 Bn years, a million species, more than one in 10 are likely to become extinct in our time. Ignorance can work OK when we have little power or impact. We can live and let live. Now that our impacts reach every corner and niche on the planet our profound ignorance is a willful part of the problem. Extinctions are the most profound loss to science, and interspecific injustice of our time. Living in harmony goes beyond addressing the current extinction crisis. It could be the very definition of ‘Good life’, the pursuit of which all economics and our constitutions aim.
3. Announce your promise of a solution. What product or service will you provide the client? Be clear on the results the person can expect, but avoid selling.
To quote Edward O. Wilson from his book Biophilia
“To explore and affiliate with life is a deep and complicated process in mental development. To an extent still undervalued in philosophy and religion, our existence depends on this propensity, our spirit is woven from it hope rises on its currents.”
Knowledge can help us live in harmony and get to solutions. Naming species is a first step in understanding their ecology. There is no point in doing science if no one engages with it. With 8 Million species exploring and affiliating with the detail is beyond one person. If we divide this task up it is doable. With 8Bn people that is 1000 people per species. If we get to this level the burden on an individual will be light. If we collect $100 per person we will be able to pay specialists to help this process of building a living understanding. If we are connected for a lifetime our understanding will flow through the seasons and generations to be richer than the scientific paper that confirmed that the species exists.
Instead of ‘live and let live’ we will have a ‘harmony’ based in understanding.
4. Offer proof you can deliver and plan for next steps. How have you delivered on your promises prior to this? What have you accomplished, and what have people said about your work? Offer proof with one or two killer facts—and they must be facts—and an anecdote that crystallizes everything you just said as real Finish your pitch by offering a plan of action for delivering on your promise. Make it as personal as possible to fit whomever you’re talking to and his or her business.
I am an Agricultural Scientist and have worked in pesticide reduction programs in perennial horticulture. Management programs would routinely spray neurotoxin insecticides at two week intervals turning the orchards into ecological deserts. By understanding the ecology of pest species in Tasmanian vineyards and orchards we were able to eliminate neurotoxin insecticides from these production systems. A large part of achieving this change was building an understanding of these ecologies with the growers. The purpose of this ‘science extension’ work was better lives for farmers. This came from increased profitability, less pesticide exposure and a generally more enlightened approach to understanding agricultural ecologies. This change in mindset and practice took around 10 years to achieve and was not always comfortable as there were real production risks associated with the new approach.
Ecoconnections gives other species a vote through you. The $100 gives some spending power through us to understand and represent other species. This is a mindset change focussed on what ‘harmony’ might really mean. I will use experience with farmers to help anyone explore and affiliate with their species.
I have managed R&D programs with AgriFutures Australia. These include biocontrol of 13 priority weeds in Australia as well as emerging industries developed from native and non native species. See for example https://www.agrifutures.com.au/partnerships/rural-rd-for-profit-program/weeds-biocontrol/
https://www.agrifutures.com.au/rural-industries/emerging-industries/
This has given me an appreciation of the value of working together in research and development to reduce investment risk and access specialist expertise where needed. By ecoconnecting, members contribute a little to rigorous research based understanding beyond what could be achieved by an individual. Just as importantly ecoconnected members support a science based approach to biodiversity. This personal support will enable us to significantly leverage funds collected from ecoconnections. Ecoconnections will build a specialist Research & Development management capability taking the perspective of other species as our key stakeholder.
5. Know when to stop and listen. If at any point in your pitch you find that the listener is tuning out, stop talking
FAQ
Why can’t we leave it to governments?
Governments hate biodiversity. It is a cost center, other species don’t vote, the upside is beyond election cycles.