How To Write A Pitch That Converts Prospects

The main point of writing the perfect pitch is to keep your audience’s attention throughout.

The second they lose interest, you lose them.

Below are five ways to write a sales pitch that resonates with your audience.

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Understanding The Modern Sales Pitch — Your Goal Is To Help

You’re a consultant.

If you’re trying to convince your prospect that they need your service, you need to show them how you’ll solve their problems.

Show them the vision: What will their lives look like with your product or service. 

Studies show that pain motivates us more than pleasure. By putting their problems front-and-center, you can show them how you’re there to help.

It’s called the Problem-Agitate-Solve formula.

Problem: Pain point they feel on a daily basis.
Agitate: Really hone in on how bad it is.
Solve: Offer a solution (your product or service).

Read on to see how to write a pitch that puts the prospects first so you can solve their pain.

5 Ways To Put Your Prospect Front-And-Center In Your Pitch

1. Know their needs and how to cater to them.

Do. Your. Research.

82% of salespeople are not aligned with the needs of their buyer. They’re wasting their time on prospects who might not even need their service.

Best case scenario? You close a deal but your customer ends up unhappy because you wasted their time and broke their trust.

How to avoid this: Gauge their pain level so you can understand how badly they need your product/service.

Ask them how much their pain points bother them on a scale of 1 to 10.

If they rate between 7 to 10, they are your most qualified prospects.

You can also try out these qualification questions:

1. What does your current process look like?
2. Where do you run into hurdles?
3. What problems are you trying to solve by looking at solutions like ours? How often do you run into those problems? How much do they bother you on a scale of 1 to 10?

2. Practice the power of persuasion with the right techniques.

Which is a better description of this post?:

1. This post will help you craft better sales pitches. 

OR—

2. This post will help you craft better sales pitches because it has real examples and is backed by science. 

We can all agree on the latter, right? It’s the power of “Why.” Explaining why something will work and including an explanation (“because”) drives people to action.

This way, you can show them the end picture.

How to do this: Think of in The Wizard of Oz when our four heroes are skipping down the Yellow Brick Road, off to see The Wizard.

How do Dorothy and the gang justify that the Wizard is just the greatest?:

“Because, because, because, because, because —

because of the wonderful things he does!”

In your pitch, don’t just throw information at your prospects — take it a step further to give an explanation of why.

Example: Our product does {!service} because {!reason}.

Need more persuasive techniques? See 9 others here.

3. Listen to their concerns and be ready to help them.

Successful pitches are never one-sided.

You need to understand that there are going to be objections — but you can overcome them with the right kind of answer.

How to do this: Identify potential objections and how to turn them into opportunities.

If a prospect already works with a competitor, you should know the competition’s strengths and weaknesses.

You could create a battle card that references each of your competitors and how they stack up against your company.

Pro tip: Memorize facts about each so that you’re prepared going into the pitch.

Here’s an example of the battle cards we use at Yesware:

4. Leave them with a call-to-action.

You know when a story doesn’t have a satisfying ending? It leaves you feeling letdown.

Prospects shouldn’t feel that way after a pitch. 

The Recency Effect in psychology tells us that the last thing said in a series sticks with us.

Instead of leaving your sales pitch on a questionable final page, give your prospects the perfect ending they deserve.

How to do this: Recap who you are (with contact information) and your quality promise to be there when they need you.

Take a look at what your sales team uses for their final presentation slide:

“We’re here for you” — Shows comfort and consistency.
The proof — Name, role, email, phone number.

5. Giving more than you’re asking to take.

Something to avoid at all costs? Asking your recipient for too much right from the get-go.

Or else they’ll end up feeling like:

Understand that throughout your pitch your prospect has a mentality of “what’s in it for me?” They don’t owe you anything in the first place, so asking for too much will only turn them away.

How to do this: Use the rule of reciprocity to show your prospect all that you have to offer, and then some. It’s the social norm of responding to positive actions with more positive actions.

Send a cold email pitch that delivers value before making an ask.

Here’s an example of a cold email that puts value front and center, helps the prospect envision the possibilities, and doesn’t make an ask until the very end.

Steal the template here:

SL:  At your service

Hi {!First Name},

This might sound impossible but this is {!service} made easy. {!What you do}.

You can {!action your product allows}.

In addition to this {!benefit of product}. This will {!pain point relieved}.

If this sounds like something that will make your life a whole lot better, let’s chat for 15 minutes this week. How does your calendar look this {!day of week}.

Best,

Save this template to a library that lives in your inbox to quick-insert.

Tip: 15 Sales Pitch Examples