Your elevator pitch — your purpose statement, mission statement, unique selling proposition, value statement — needs to be concise, clear and problem-solving. If it’s not, you’re losing opportunities with those who can’t find you AND those who find you but quickly move on to another health or wellness coach. With this blog post, you will get clear on WHY this is so crucial to your success and HOW to write an elevator pitch that grabs attention.
Why Your Elevator Pitch Makes or Breaks You
Giving your elevator pitch the time and effort it deserves is a hot and much-overlooked topic. I know this because it’s often the topic chosen by hosts when I guest-speak on podcasts for wellness coaches.
Think about it this way. Your elevator pitch is your first impression — your billboard for people passing by via the online highway. In regular highway traffic, you have 5-7 seconds to catch somebody’s attention with a physical billboard. Think how fast you can click around online and our ever-deteriorating attention spans. You have 3-5 seconds at best to get somebody’s attention online — usually while reading your profile or website home page.
When done right, your elevator pitch quickly says what you do and why or for who.
Your elevator pitch should be integrated into your social media profiles and website, front and center. So if visitors are not seeing what resonates with them, they will keep clicking without even looking at your feed. This is why your elevator pitch can make or break you.
To clarify, there are different variations of an elevator pitch. You can have a 2-minute one that you use at a networking event. You can also create 60-second, 30-second and 10-second versions. Here’s one of my first elevator pitches, trying to pack too much information.
But for the online world, I encourage something more unique, challenging and impactful — a 10-word elevator pitch.
When you get your pitch focused by using only 10 words (there’s a little wiggle room), you’re selecting those words very carefully, right? That means you will come across much clearer. People won’t mistake what you’re offering. You will STAND out. And you need to stand out from other health coaches to have a successful business.
To recap, your elevator pitch is critical because:
•It explains what you offer.
•It’s your first impression.
•It’s your billboard.
•It can help you succeed when well written.
By well written, I don’t mean it uses proper punctuation and grammar, though that helps.
I mean it’s written strategically and from your heart. It’s right for you and it doesn’t feel too salesy.
How to Write an Attention-Grabbing Elevator Pitch in 7 Steps
1 Ask yourself: what do I do? What do I offer? This can be a list. Just “blurt” it out on paper — without editing yourself. I encourage you to use a pen to paper always because it’s more “magical”. The act of writing has proven to stimulate creativity. Journaling helps you release suppressed thoughts. Typing is just no match for taking pen to paper.
2 Ask yourself: who do I serve? If you’re just starting and aren’t sure, then ask who do I envision serving? Who do I feel led to serve? Jot down all that comes to mind.
3 Write down WHY you are doing this thing — this area of health coaching or wellness coaching. If you’re just focusing on thyroid or Hashimoto’s, infertility, whatever it is, why did you choose that? Because more often than not, there’s a story behind it.
4 Journal your story — write unedited or even just bullet point the milestones of your life. This may sound like overkill, but when you do it, you’ll start to (or more clearly) see that you’ve been led in a direction.
Then you can 1) see if you’re traveling on the same path or need to course-correct and if on the right path, 2) express more confidence in your offer. Plus if you feel unclear about the people you’re serving or services you’re offering, this will help you focus.
For example, maybe you’ve coached women 50+ with diabetes and anxiety and young women struggling with over-eating. You loved working with them all. You want to continue to help them all. But your marketing and messaging, including your elevator pitch, should only focus on one of them.
Looking back, maybe you used to struggle with weight. Then you had clients with diabetes and realized the connection to weight. You also know that mindset plays into both health issues.
But overeating is a big part of your story. And you know more older people currently. Your elevator pitch can state your mission to help women in their 50s lose weight to overcome diabetes and run marathons, play with grandkids or hike rigorous trails [insert one of your greatest desires] again. Forget about anxiety and mindset for your pitch and simply let those serve as tools you integrate into your program instead.
5 Revisit your lists and narrow it down. See the big picture of where God’s led you, where you’ve been put and where you’re being called to serve. Make sure it’s all in alignment.
Don’t be afraid that if you’re off track you’re going to have to completely start over. More likely, you just need to get back in your lane with more clarity — a very awesome place to be. Here’s my improved version.
6 Write why she should work with you and not someone else. You can even do an exercise I learned from Susan Sly — to write 100 reasons why somebody should hire you. It sounds like a lot, right? But by doing this exercise, you will build your confidence. You can also eliminate doubts such as:
•Am I an expert enough?
•Do I have what it takes?
•Can I give enough?
•Am I giving too much?
7 Last, pull it all together into 10 mindfully selected words. Don’t tell everybody everything. (You don’t have to tell them how you do it — that can be a follow-up conversation.)
What SOLUTION are you offering her and WHAT SUCCESS does she get from it? **THIS IS YOUR TEMPLATE!
She doesn’t just want to lose weight (part of your solution). She wants to lose weight — and not just for “better health” but for a deeper reason (her success). Perhaps to overcome diabetes and drop medications or to be pain-free. She wants you to help her go from feeling/being X to feeling/being Y.
Do you see the impact this process can have? It does take some time and massaging. But when you’re doing this for your business, and you’re doing it as a first step, you will save an incredible amount of time and effort — even money.
I know this now because I didn’t do this well enough in the beginning. I spent a year or longer spinning wheels and doing all the things but not getting very far with my business.
Learn from my mistakes. Do these journaling exercises and get to the heart of what you’re doing. When you have that strong heart connection, you can feel more passionate about sharing your services openly, excitedly and confidently.
You may want to tweak this in a few months or each year. And that’s okay. Your elevator pitch is meant to evolve as you do.
You’re growing as you help others grow and get well. It’s a divinely crafted relationship.
When you take these steps, you’ll be able to craft a clear, concise and problem-solving elevator pitch and you will STAND out online!
Now you know WHY it’s so dang important to craft a well-written elevator pitch and 7 steps to help you do it. For even more detailed steps on writing your attention-grabbing, lead-getting elevator pitch, grab my free workbook here.
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You’ve laid this out so clearly step by step. I love how you showed the evolution of your own “elevator pitch”
Thank you, Denise. I’m glad it’s clear and helpful!