Pitching

Talking More

Garth Beyer

When I pick up the phone to pitch to journalists I don’t know… When I type up an email to send to a CEO I’ve never met… When I attempt to write a personal note on a LinkedIn invite to someone inspirational, but has no clue who I am… fear tends to creep up on me.

If you think cold calling is tough when selling, consider how tough it is to connect cold, to establish a relationship with someone who knows nothing about you.

Here’s what gets me through it.

Before I reach out to anyone I’ve never met, I remind myself the more people I talk to, the easier it will be to do, ask, and connect with people later down the line.

If you had to guess which scenario feels better, would you rather dial the number of a journalist who has never heard of you before or would you rather dial the number of a journalist who you’ve talked to before, if even once.

Or… would you rather send an email to someone saying “Hey, I’m friend’s with John Appleseed. He’s spoken highly of you. Would you have time to chat for a few minutes?” That’s certainly better than “Hey, would you have time to chat for a few minutes?”

The more people you talk to now, the more times you put yourself out there to warming a cold connection, the easier things will fall into place for you in the future.

The quickest way to dissipate the fear is to dive straight in it.

 

Stay Positive & Who Are You Connecting To?

The Voices In Our Heads

Garth Beyer

Are not the ones we want to let do the handwork, the grunt work, the creative work for us.

Caring a lot about doing good work doesn’t mean you need to listen to the voices in your head critiquing your work, constantly whispering that it could be better, that you might as well give up because you won’t get it perfect, and it should be perfect.

Real creative work – the valuable stuff – comes from shunning the voices in your head and speaking as a human, just putting yourself out there.

You may not create something remarkable on your first shot, but it gives you a better place to work from than if you think too much about it (and people who think too much are really saying they’re talking with the voices in their end, trying to reason with them, and there simply is no reasoning with the lizard brain).

We have 60 seconds before the lizard brain speaks up when we’re faced with a decision to purchase a product or not. I’ve noticed the same time frame when pitching on the phone and writing creative posts for clients.

60 seconds before we begin to lose our human touch and the lizard brain takes over.

Follow your heart when purchasing. Don’t think about all the scenarios that can happen once you dial the phone, just pick it up and go. And most importantly, write right away. You can always return the product, give someone else a call, and revise your writing.

The point is to start and speak from the heart, not the head.

 

Stay Positive & Don’t Let The Voices In Your Head Stop You

Two Principles Of Strategically Pitching A PR Plan

Garth Beyer

PR Pitch

I haven’t pitched more than a hundred times, but I’ve learned a few things from the number of times I have pitched, and I’m happy to share a couple of tips.

1) When you’re pitching, find ways to make it personal and connected to whoever you’re pitching to. You can do this in two ways. First, you’ve got to interact with the clients before the pitch. Second, you then take something you learned from that interaction and bring it up fluidly during your pitch.

While presenting a rebranding strategy for Mexico tourism, I overheard the judges talking about how much they loved ultimate frisbee. During my pitch about Mexico I mentioned all the activities one can do in Mexico including ultimate frisbee. During the pitch one judge tweeted at me “you had me at ultimate frisbee.” He was sold.

Why did he choose to tweet at me? Because I had managed to get a one-on-one with him before the presentations started. I noted to him that we had tweeted at each other a few times in the past and it was nice to meet him in person. Just something simple.

If you can manage to get a one-on-one with any of the board, the judges, the skeptics, anyone who will be hearing your pitch, don’t pass the opportunity up.

2) What you’re actually selling is passion. One thing I’ve seen ruin team pitches? No passion. When you’re pitching with a team, smile, nod in agreement with whoever on your team is talking, and show some movement to indicate your excitement. Passion sells. Show your support and encouragement.

I’ve had clients say they chose my team to work with over others because others didn’t believe in their pitch, didn’t bring the energy, didn’t hold each other up.

 

Stay Positive & Succeed With Preparation And Design

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How To Make Hard Work Smoother And Success Easier

How To Make Hard Work Smoother And Success Easier

Garth Beyer

Putting Yourself Out There In Something Bigger Than Yourself

I’ve tackled some large projects, some valuable pitches, and some heavy team building strategies over the last few years. What has made my practice flow and get me to quickly reach various successes (milestones I defined for myself)  has been to have a single target I want to reach. Let me explain,

  • If you want to work at a PR agency, choose one and make that your primary focus.
  • If you want to be a blogger, choose your corner of the internet and put all your worry, anxiousness, concern, and attention into it, and not any other corner.
  • If you want to travel to Nepal, put all you’ve got into making that happen.

BUT, be casually (not actively) open to new, different opportunities.

The benefit of working like this is that because you’re so focused on one thing, it makes anything and everything else seem nearly effortless.

  • It’s painless to go into and interview at an agency you’re not 100 percent sold on and rock the heck out of the interview because you don’t see it as a defining moment in your life.
  • When you’re focused on your corner of the internet, you’re more likely to get published on other outlets because you didn’t over think the writing you’ve submitted to them. You save the over thinking for what you publish on your blog.
  • It’s easy to “apply and see what happens” for a trip to Cambodia, even though your primary target is Nepal.

When you’re so focused on achieving one goal, you’re more carefree, open, vulnerable, true, and authentic when it comes to other related options. When you have your one target, it makes hitting any other targets much easier.

The best projects I’ve landed were ones I never truly aimed for, thus never stressed about.

Bonus tip: If you’ve got a big pitch or event you’re hosting or project you’re selling at a certain time of day. Plan something larger to do after, something that scares you more. It’s the same concept as described above. When you set a lofty target or goal for yourself, it makes everything else much easier.

 

Stay Positive & How Will You Use This Life Hack To Your Advantage?

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There’s A Reason It’s Called A/B Testing

There’s A Reason It’s Called A/B Testing

Garth Beyer

AB Testing

Much of the time when pitching options the only rule of conduct you need is “Here’s option A… and here’s option B, which do you choose?”

No remarkable designer goes into a pitch with only one option. Doing so makes the audience feel obligated to find a reason to dislike it or pick on it or point out a miniscule detail they don’t care for.

Just showing option A is not a smart move.

Nor is showing five to 20 other options.

It’s called A/B testing, not A/B/C/D/E/F/G/H/I/J/K/L testing.

You can certainly develop a bracket system, but I would push on whether your ideas are great or if they are merely good, which is why there are so many to face-off.

 

Stay Positive & Just Think On This Next Time You Pitch Anything

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Unnoticed Celebrities

Unnoticed Celebrities

Garth Beyer

I'm A Celebrity, Go Away

You’re one of them. Me too.

What does the noticed celebrity artist have that you don’t?

You may say “a following” or “venture capital” but both are snub excuses because you have the same resources that any celebrity has or had at one point to build a tribe and acquire funding.

Drake needed Lil Wayne to lift him up. What’s stopping you from reaching out, asking for help, finding a mentor?

All of these businesses needed capital. What’s stopping you from making pitches, asking for sponsorships, finding a partner?

How you become a celebrity, an expert, an artist isn’t that difficult to figure out. Following through with all the hows is the difficult part.

 

Stay Positive & Just Like Them, You Can Do It

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How Is There So Much Crap In The World


					

				Garth Beyer			

			


			

			
Crappy television series, crappy hyped up box office movies, crappy books, crappy food, crappy insurance plans, crappy businesses, crappy ordinances, crappy cars. There’s a lot of crap out in the world. How did it get there?


You can’t tell me you haven’t seen a movie that you wondered, “How the hell did this ever make it to the big screen? Who would buy this?” Let me tell you.


People know how to sell their crap. Producers, companies, publishers, they all buy crap from time to time. The thing is, they don’t know they are buying crap. What they think they are buying is a really great idea. And you know what, it’s not their fault. If someone has mad sales skills, mad storytelling skills, mad ethos-persuasion skills, then heck, they deserve to have their crap bought.


A well-known publisher in Madison just told me today she knows one author who has had a handful of books published, but never any of them really selling well. She said, “He will come into a meeting and say to the agents ‘Yea, that one didn’t do very well on the shelves, but here’s this other book idea.’ He would go onto pitching [selling] this new book and would end buying that one too.”


You can make it big in this world, but you have to know how to sell.


The same publisher also told me she had read hundreds of books that were exceptional, but the author just couldn’t sell them to the agents.


Only when everyone learns how to sell well, will the real content of any art be taken as serious as it deserves.


 


Stay Positive & This Is Why It Doesn’t Make Sense To Me When Someone Says Their Work Isn’t Good Enough, It Can Be If You Learn How To Sell It. Bittersweet Isn’t It?