What could be more intimidating than giving a Power Point presentation? That would be giving a 60 second elevator pitch. Gone are the days where you utilize slides to guide you through your presentation. Composing an elevator pitch entails many things; knowledge, preparation, practice and confidence. Anyone can give a presentation, but an elevator pitch is so much more. As described on Slidebean's website, an elevator pitch is "a succinct 20-30 second speech geared to convince someone about a product or company." If you're going to present an idea or concept to a person or group of people you better have done the research and know everything there is about your potential product or company. Slidebean describes ways to perfect your elevator pitch while giving you tips along the way. The website details Kurian Tharakan's suggestions on what your elevator pitch should include like your name, company, product, target consumers, unique selling proposition or difference from competition and a call to action. This seems simple enough, but you have to do your research. You have to know your product, and above all you have to know your customer because your product ceases to exist without a customer. A call to action is a unique and pertinent way for elevator pitchers to make a connection with whomever they are speaking with; a special way to make a connection that will leave the person you're speaking with a reason to keep your product or company in mind. An elevator pitch should describe all of the most important information (as described above), capture the audience's attention, avoid jargon, start with a question, focus on your listener and provide proof, among many other tips. My biggest challenge will probably be avoiding jargon. Sometimes I can get lost in what I'm saying, but from what I can tell is I need to keep it simple. I need to keep it simple and fact based in order to make the most of my 60 seconds. Something else I will have to work on is focusing on the listener. You have to be able to connect with your audience in order to pitch and sell your product or company. By practicing my speech in front of friends I will be able to see what is working and what isn't; if I connected with them or if my message was lost in the jargon.
What resonated with me the most in this article read, "The pitch is not an end in itself, it is just the beginning." This references to the call to action. In the real world, the end of an elevator pitch truly is the beginning of a potential relationship with a consumer. You have to leave them with a reason to come back; leave them wanting more information or wanting the product itself. This article left me more inspired than anything. While we are only in the beginning stages, and far from making our elevator pitches, I am excited to finalize my idea and begin my market analysis because that means I am that much closer to composing my elevator pitch and leaving my audience with my call to action.
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The semester went by way too fast; that would probably be the only thing I didn’t like pertaining to this class specifically. August came and went and so did Halloween, followed by Thanksgiving and then, boom, it’s the last couple of weeks before finals. The semester went by fast, but I enjoyed every class period. This course was enjoyable for many different reasons; the topics covered, the course structure and most importantly, the professor. The topics covered in Mass Communication Technology intrigued me because I am living through a whole new digital age that is evolving every day. The topics in this class closely related to me because I use the technology we learned about, all the time. From social media outlets like Twitter and Snapchat to being able to use the social media outlets on different Apple devices such as the iPad, iPhone, Macbook, etc., almost everything related to my life. There was just enough out of class assignments, I think, with the course being a two hour credit class. I really enjoyed writing the blogs and I hope that my future journalism teachers require this. I don’t know if I could keep my blog going without a prompt, but maybe that will be my new years resolution. I thought the PowerPoint’s were very useful and helpful. For the first half of the semester I didn’t have the book so I relied on the PowerPoint’s and my notes for my blogs. I really enjoyed the visuals and examples given on the slides. All of them seemed to be relatable in some way. It’s refreshing when you have a teacher that is so passionate about his or her work. You can tell journalism is apart of who Carol is and that made taking this class much more enjoyable. I find it is easier to learn from a teacher who sincerely enjoys the subject and who can clearly teach the topics being presented in the course because of personal experience.
I don't think my ideas about journalism, media and computing changed, but I was definitely made more aware about how the three of those connect on a larger scale. Every day I learned something new in this class, and I think that is my biggest take away. Learning something new in class. From the PowerPoints to lessons from Carol's personal life I have knowledge that I can use personally and professionally that I probably wouldn't have received if I hadn't been in this class. Overall, I am very pleased with this course. I hope to take more of Carol's classes in the future and look forward to furthering my studies in the journalism department at Creighton. |
PaigeCreighton University Archives
December 2017
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