Going Up? Where Your Elevator Pitch Meets Your Video

Do you need an elevator pitch? There’s a healthy debate going on about the concept of the elevator pitch. You’ve heard the scenario: You step into an elevator and standing there is someone who has the ability to make your career or fund your new business. The elevator goes up and you have a precious few seconds to make an impression. What do you say?

Author Milo Frank wrote the best selling guide to the elevator pitch “How to Get Your Point Across in 30 Seconds or Less” in 1986. There are plenty of arguments that the elevator pitch is outdated. In today’s fast paced social media world, supposedly no one has the time to listen to your elevator pitch.

As visual storytellers, it is our mission at Point Across Media to bring our clients’ unique stories to life in a compelling video. The elevator pitch can provide a good starting point. The story may be informative, dramatic, powerful, funny…or all the above. You can tell it yourself or through the words of your customers. But at the end of the day the video should answer three key questions:

1. What do you do?
2. How do you do it?
3. Why do you do it?

If you think about it, a strong elevator pitch answers those same questions. It doesn’t matter if it is a 1 minute video on your website, 30 seconds in an elevator or 140 characters on Twitter. It is all about telling a good story that leaves a good impression.