Do you like my granola?

So, you have this amazing idea or product or service or event or whatever you desperately need get out to the masses, but you’re not sure how to get it out there. What are your options? What’s the best avenue to take? It’s hard to say.   You could go running down a busy street streaking in the nude yelling at the top of your lungs, but come on, do you really want to be arrested for indecent exposure?  So, what are you to do?  How do you get out there?

Welcome to the wonderful world of pitching your idea and building relationships!

I SUCK!

First off, 99% percent of people are not brilliant right out of the gate. Before you learn to crawl, you have to scrap along on the floor as a baby (hopefully not catching some crazy disease), and then after the crawling you eventually make it to the walking stage. It’s all a step-by-step process. Literally.   Before you become great at riding a bike, you have to fall off it half a million times or accidentally ride it into a fat tree or square into a street lamp pole. Yes, I’ve been there with a street lamp.  And it hurts!

Either way, in my opinion, it doesn’t hurt to work from a growth mindset (meaning you suck at it now, but you’ll get better), opposed to a fixed mindset (either you have it or you don’t). Bad fixed mindset, bad! With enough practice you’ll get there or at least somewhere 🙂

YOU’RE MY NEW BFF!

We’re a social species; well I assume most of us are. We like to sit down over a cup of coffee, or a bottle of booze and chitchat, find out what’s new. It takes time to build a half decent relationship with someone.   And it might not hurt to aim a little higher then the half decent relationship level.

Get to know the person a little. Say “hi”, ask how their day is going, ask about them in general, put them at ease and in a comfort zone. Don’t’ talk about yourself all day. Be real, not fake.

The point is, I’d wager a pretty good guess that many people aren’t a big fan of simply being used for someone else’s personal gain. When the person who has some clout knows you and actually doesn’t mind being around you, it could be a little easier to get your foot in the door and have them give you a few minutes of their time for you to pitch your next big idea.

MIND NUMBING!

Not everything you do or encounter in life will get your jollies going, making you jump up for joy and shout out to the world. We all have had moments in life bored out of our gorge thinking “damn, I’d rather throw myself down a flight of stairs”.  Not that I recommend it, because unless you have a high pain tolerance, there’s a good chance it will hurt like a son of a b&%#!

Sometimes we walk through life like a weird zombie that actually has a beating heart. But, sometimes an idea will explode in your head like a stick of dynamite going off and before you can take another breath your jollies are jumping for joy. Welcome to the world of passion baby!

Now feed off that passion, take your idea and go pitch it to the world (or at least to anyone who is willing to listen beyond your grandma).  You’ll probably need more then grandma on your side to get your idea out there.

DAMN, I HIT REPEAT!

Finally, be a little creative with your pitch, put some effort into things and be a bit of a wordsmith with your writing. If your big game plan is to send a pitch to ten different individuals in the media, at least try to put some thought into it. Evidently, sending the exact same written pitch, word for word, verbatim for verbatim, to various media people doesn’t hit the ball out of the park many times. Someone won’t be your BFF anytime soon.

No, make it a touch more personal. Throw a little extra effort into each pitch, give it a little bit of flavor, a touch of pizazz. Let that creative mind flow.

And one last thing, if you pitch to the media, at least give them a bit of a hint of what you’d like from them. Do you want them to cover your story; do you want them to mention you in the news and what for? Give the media some direction.

Giving a big tub of granola to a media contact and saying nothing else can leave the contact asking, “What do you want me to do with the dang granola?  What do you really want?”  Well, I guess he or she could eat it.  Oh, and then maybe he or she could digest it. Yeah, that sounds kind of cool.

PITCH ME!

So, now I’ll ask you folks out there to take on a quick challenge.  In one or two sentences give me your best creative sales pitch.  Give someone a reason to pay attention.  Be creative and have some fun!