All Elevator Pitch Ideas must be persuasive – your conversation must inspire action. The action you want to inspire with your opening is rapt attention.

You want to capture the imagination of your listener; see if you can get two or more minds thinking about the same subject.

Recognition is the key to capturing an audience.

Each of us has the ability to reflect and consider the person (or people) we are speaking to – yet we rarely use it. While some have higher abilities to empathize than others (also called an “EQ” or emotional intelligence), we all have the ability to recognize our surroundings. My question for you is: how often do you use your instinctual powers of human perception? Do you take a moment (they’re free, by the way, so take as many as you need) to consider the “who” in front of you? Do you recognize their moods, their interests, and their concerns?

Elevator Pitch Ideas: Start with your surroundings, before you sell an product, a service…or yourself.

Thinking about the “who” in front of you doesn’t have to be an elaborate process. Remember that person that you saw at breakfast, or your friend that you met for lunch yesterday. What was their mood? How did they seem to be doing? Rarely does anyone answer, “I have no idea!” You do remember – but, do you recognize?

We are all dominated by other thoughts, issues, concerns and a self-absorbed nature (“What’s in it for me?” is a universal affliction), so we don’t often stop to acknowledge others or our surroundings. Still, everyone is wired to observe and report – we can always tune in to other folks, if we choose to.

Most of the time we are so focused on what’s next that we forget about who’s here.

Recognition is the first step, in stepping outside of yourself. You have to really see the person in front of you. Acknowledgement happens naturally if you let it, when meeting with people. What’s typically missing from a great opening statement is our awareness of our surroundings.

Only as we remember the “event” (a past conversation, a chance encounter, a ride on a plane) do we really seem to see what was going on with our listener. Why not bring that awareness into your next conversation? Your elevator pitch ideas don’t have to cure cancer – after all, you’ve only got a minute or two to make your point. Better make it about your listener, if you want to be heard.

Elevator Pitch Ideas: To captivate someone’s attention, you have to first place yours on them.

Would you like to learn more? Here’s a video from a recent workshop:

Photo courtesy of Danielle Muscetta. Used under creative commons license, some rights reserved.