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Have you ever stepped on an elevator only to receive the dreaded question, “So…what do you do?” If you aren’t prepared, the conversation can be a disaster. If you’re thirty floors up and you still haven’t made your point, you need to work on your elevator speech.
Have any of these things happened to you?
1. You get introduced at parties as, “the girl/guy who does that thing nobody understands.” When you try to explain what you do, everyone silently disperses as if somebody let loose a particularly pungent fart.
2. At a party, someone asks about your profession. Ten minutes later, you realize you’re talking to yourself.
3. Someone enters the elevator on the ground floor, pushes the button for the twentieth floor and asks you what you do for a living. As you are explaining your occupation, he pushes the button for the next floor coming up and gets off. If you get off with him, he runs – fast.
4. When your kids have trouble sleeping, instead of asking for a story, they ask you to explain again what you do when you’re at work. When you start to talk, they’re snoring the moment their heads hit the pillow.
5. You don’t give an elevator speech, you give a Trans-Siberian Railway speech.
If any of these scenarios is familiar to you, do yourself – and the people you meet – a favor, and learn how to create your personalized elevator speech. There is a good reason for the name elevator speeches. It’s because they are short and sweet. If you cannot tell someone what you do for a living in the time it takes to ride from the bottom floor to the tenth floor, it is too long – and boring.
If you’re starting a business and need to excite potential partners, the cross-country railway talk isn’t going to inspire a lot of confidence. The goal with the elevator speech is to give a general overview of what you do. If others are interested in more than that, they’ll come to you with the questions. You don’t need to belabor them with too much information.
Four Crucial Tips for Successful Elevator Speeches:
1. Give Context. If you begin your response to “what do you do?” with a commonly shared problem, you will build on what other people already know. For instance, you might say, “You know how corporate revenues have dropped sharply with this recession, and how businesses everywhere are cutting costs?” This question should, if structured correctly, receive an affirmation. By getting people to say, “yes,” you’re involving them in your elevator speech, which draws their interest more.
2. One Sentence Description. This should tie into the context from above. “I consult with businesses to help them put efficiency standards into place to ensure that no money is wasted.”
3. Show Interest In Your Asker Once you’ve given your one-sentence pitch for yourself, by turning the question back on them and questioning, “So what exactly is it that do YOU do?” you will involve them further in the conversation. It is amazing how many people will leave the conversation wanting to know more about you.
4. Act Important. Don’t tell them anything else, but give them your card and ask them to email or call you. This may sound arrogant but it’s actually for your own benefit. When people start asking questions, you might be tempted to give long-winded replies. One moment of boredom in the conversation can ruin the brilliant first impression your elevator speech made.
With these four tips, you can craft an elevator speech that will wow everyone. The power of words is incredible when you know how to use it. Instead of putting business contacts to sleep, a properly delivered elevator speech will have them calling you non-stop to understand what you’re all about.
This author suggests exploring more on what an is by visiting the original blog post so you could learn not only about developing the ideal , but how you can build your future and not someone else’s.
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