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Are you struggling to perfect your elevator pitch?
An elevator pitch is an essential tool for networking and pitching your ideas, whether you're an entrepreneur looking for investors or a job seeker looking for your next opportunity.
In this article, we'll provide some real-life elevator pitch examples to help you nail your own, including templates to get you started.
Whether you're looking to sell a product, a service, or yourself, these examples will inspire and guide you on your way to crafting the perfect elevator pitch.
Need a little extra help creating your next elevator pitch? Visme comes packed with a comprehensive library of pitch deck templates that you can customize with our intuitive editor.
An elevator pitch is a short, persuasive speech that quickly and simply defines a product, service or idea and its value proposition.
It’s called an elevator pitch because it should be brief enough to be delivered during a short elevator ride. The purpose of an elevator pitch is to grab the listener’s interest and encourage them to take action — such as arranging a meeting, investing, hiring or buying.
An elevator pitch is typically given face-to-face, but you can also share a written or video version. The key is to keep it engaging and persuasive, regardless of how you deliver it.
Pitch decks and elevator pitches are both useful tools for communicating the value of a business or idea to potential investors, customers or partners. But there are key differences between the two.
An elevator pitch is short, concise and meant to be delivered verbally. Its purpose is to capture interest and get the message across within 30 to 60 seconds.
A pitch deck is a more detailed presentation that provides more information and context. Pitch decks include multiple, research-backed slides like the problem and solution, the target market, company financials, the business model, the team and more.
A pitch deck is often used in conjunction with an elevator pitch but is more comprehensive and visual. You can include charts and graphs, diagrams, images, videos and other engaging content in a pitch deck to boost the impact of your pitch.
Writing the perfect elevator pitch can be challenging. But if you follow some key principles, you’ll be able to nail yours down in no time.
In this section, we’ll answer several important questions and cover essential information to help you write a compelling elevator pitch for your brand.
An elevator pitch should be short and to the point, typically lasting 30 seconds to 2 minutes. The length of your elevator pitch will depend on your audience and the purpose of your pitch.
If you’re pitching to potential investors, for example, you might want to take some time to provide more detail and context. And if you’re pitching to a busy customer on the street, you'll need to be as concise as possible.
The key is to strike a balance between providing enough information to interest the listener and keeping the pitch short enough to hold their attention. An effective elevator pitch is well-planned and rehearsed, with each word chosen carefully to convey the most important and compelling information.
Whether your elevator pitch is super short or a bit on the longer side, it should cover the following key elements to be powerful and convincing.
We’ve covered the elements that go into a good elevator pitch. But there are nuances to keep in mind that can help take your pitch from good to knock-your-socks-off great.
Follow these tips to give or write a memorable elevator pitch:
1. Start with a hook. An elevator pitch is already short, which gives you only a few seconds to grab attention. Starting with a hook like a shocking statistic, a relatable problem or an achievement can help you instantly connect with the listener, prepping them for your pitch and ask.
2. Be clear and specific. An elevator pitch is no time to get wordy and beat around the bush. Get to the point, use clear language and be as specific as possible when talking about your product, its benefits, features, the problem you’re trying to solve and what you need from the listener.
3. Follow the 100/20 rule. David Meltzer’s 100/20 rule is all about having the energy of providing $100 in value while asking for only $20 in return. Strive to get that point across and you’ll have your audiences’ attention.
4. Be passionate. Believe in your own idea before expecting others to believe in it. Seeing how passionate you are about your business or product can inspire your listener to feel the same way.
5. Share your vision. Don’t be afraid to share your big plans — Elon Musk does it all the time by talking about how he wants to change the world. People love backing a visionary and if you have a long-term goal or dream for your idea, share it. It shows confidence and passion and automatically makes your idea look more appealing.
We’ve walked you through the basics of what an elevator pitch is and how to write one. But there’s no better way to learn than from the ones who’ve made it work in real life.
Here are three inspiring examples of elevator pitches from well-known brands and founders.
Back in 2014, Elon Musk gave an excellent elevator pitch for Tesla in Beijing, China.
“What we trying to do with Tesla is to change the world by bringing electric cars — sustainable transport — to the world and showing people that an electric car can be fun and sexy and fast and long-range. But in order to be successful in that, we need people to take a chance on the company. We need people who are willing to be early adopters of new technology.”
The pitch perfectly sums up the company’s solution (sustainable transport), offering (electric cars), what makes it unique (electric cars that are fun, sexy, fast and long-range) and what Tesla needs to make it happen (early adopters of new technology.)
This elevator pitch from DoorDash is a bit on the longer side, but it perfectly sums up all the key points — the problem they’re trying to solve, the solution they’re offering, how exactly their product works and why their idea is worth investing in.
We love how DoorDash has cleverly weaved in solid statistics and numbers into their elevator pitch to drive their point home. It shows they’ve done their research and are confident about their product’s potential.
Also, note the call-to-action at the end is not pushy. In fact, they invite anyone who’s interested in learning more to approach them and leave it at that.
GitLab’s Y Combinator demo from 2015 is an inspiring example of a succinct, no-nonsense elevator pitch.
Wasting no time, GitLab’s CEO hooks the audience with social proof — naming well-known customers like Apple and Disney. He goes on to highlight the benefits of the product and what makes it unique (faster, open-source, more affordable, more contributors, etc.)
An elevator pitch is typically delivered orally, but you can also put together an elevator presentation or “pitch deck.”
Unlike regular pitch decks, an elevator pitch presentation is shorter and to-the-point. It’s meant to act as a visual aid to your speech, but can also be shared online.
Here are two ways to create an elevator pitch presentation in Visme:
This is the easiest way to present your elevator pitch in front of an audience. Simply put together a short presentation with a few slides.
You can use this opportunity to enhance or support your elevator pitch with visuals like charts, graphs, images, videos, animation and more.
1. Start with a template. Browse our professional pitch deck templates and edit the one you like using our free AI PowerPoint generator.
2. Customize your presentation. Replace the placeholder content and access millions of free, built-in graphics, stock images, video clips, icons, charts and data widgets from inside the editor. You can also upload your own brand assets like logos, fonts and colors.
3. Download and share. Once you’re done, download your pitch deck in PPTX, HTML5 or PDF format. You can also save your presentation as an MP4 video. Want to share online? Generate a live link or embed your slide deck anywhere using a code.
Another way to present your elevator pitch is to record an audio or video version of it and then embed it in your presentation or share it on its own.
Visme makes it easy to go this route as well. Easily record a narration within the presentation maker, or upload a video and embed it in one of your slides.
You can also upload your video, make some edits, and download or share it quickly using Visme’s video editing features.
Crafting an effective elevator pitch is key to selling anything, even yourself.
The ability to sum up your pitch and present it within a few seconds shows clarity and confidence, inspiring potential investors and customers to do business with you.
Make your pitch even better by creating an engaging presentation in Visme. You can create a short presentation for your elevator pitch, a longer pitch deck to provide context and even a video presentation where you can record and embed your elevator pitch.
Use our ready-made sales templates, built-in graphic assets, data visualization tools and more to deliver an unforgettable elevator pitch for your brand.
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