How to Show — Not Tell — in Your Pitch

Happy March! Hopefully you have been getting some sunshine and using this spring energy.

Recently, I gave a workshop with MSDUK on the theme of pitching to corporates as part of their Pathway to Growth programme. (Which if you are looking at a pitch competition, they have one upcoming!)

But in this session, we looked at the common theme: metrics capture attention, but meaning adds context.

And, I wanted to share what I spoke about with them with you in this week’s edition!

In a business pitch, traction and metrics are key. The biggest indicator of future success is past success, so usually founder proudly states their traction, raddles of their progress, and shares their next KPI goals like a laundry list.

• X number of MAUs signed

• Y unit economic pricing

• Z% of SOM

All important figures—but this style of pitching can all be quite transactional.

Telling — highlighting data visualizations, clear succinct numbers, and those in-your-face metrics — does have a time and place in a startup pitch (especially in an investor pitch), but it should not be just numbers being floating in the ether.

Instead of splattering metrics continuously, flip the pitch on its head.

Let’s take this as a thought experiment. Ask yourself the following questions:

• What do you want the audience to be left remembering… A number or a feeling?

• How can you show them what you are accomplishing rather than telling them a quantified result?

• What do the numbers actually mean, especially in terms of your business and growth stage?

Instead of just rambling numbers, let’s try showing and contextualizing them.

Showing — providing meaning behind the metrics — can create a much better emotional and mental response, leaving the audience with that image in their head even after they walk out of the room.

Example: HappyHR and Reframing their Metrics

So, how can you show rather than tell in your pitch? Let’s take an example.

Take a log of your critical figures, (hopefully you do have these in a google doc or deck somewhere) and we can derive them into something with a bit more substance and resonance.

Example of a startup I worked with (but anonymized as a case study!):

HappyHR, an European startup in the future of work space. Their founders were great, hustling to get pilots and the team’s software is at the intersection of employee engagement and mental health. With an upcoming event, they had to pitch to senior stakeholders in their pilot study about the progress of their business.

In their original pitch, they stated that there was a 40% drop in sick days with staff while teams were using their service.

Boom—that is a great measure!

Now, there is nothing wrong with saying this in their pitch, but it feels very “telly.” Cut and dry.

I tried to probe them into a new way to reframe this metric by bolstering it with a contextual meaning, especially what this meant for their stakeholder audience, theHR department.

To resonate with the Head of HR and senior suite they were pitching to, we workshopped it to reframe it into a more powerful and evocative statement.

We put that meaning behind the metrics. 

Now, we could show the senior leaders the impact of this percentage by putting faces and impact to this number.

Instead of 40%, why not we say something along the lines of, 21 hard-working employees were healthier in the workplace, and they saved the company over 168 hours in lost productivity time due to sickness.

The senior leaders could visualize in their heads what 21 people looked like in their cubicles working hard, and more importantly, being happy doing so. The Head of HR could picture the time saved and the increased productivity. 168 hours is almost 21 days of productivity (and $$$) back into the company’s pockets.

Most importantly, the audience could leave that room with a vignette in their head of this company and feel their business’s impact.

This is useful tip when speaking with audience that care about impact.

Now, it is not always a one size fits all picture. And, one cannot always “show” in a pitch as there is a time and place for clear cut numbers.

But, ask yourself if there is a better way to evoke emotion— and stick in the heads of your audience—showing rather than telling.

Want support with your pitching? I am looking at open a few free pitch clinics this spring. Comment below if you are interested.

And don’t forget to submit your QoD.

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If this has been useful to you or if you have feedback to improve, please drop me a quick line. Or share with a friend!