Secrets on Stamina and Funding
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“Building businesses takes tremendous stamina, and success isn’t achieved without it.” Margaret Heffernan Author The Bigger Prize
When you work out, you lift weights and you do a set, take a rest break and then do another set that is usually heavier, followed by another rest break. What makes us think we don’t need a rest break for our brain muscle too?
Instead of not fueling our brains with proper nutrition, many of my start up CEO clients don’t take time to eat right let alone take time to rest their brains.
Result: Burnout
Is this how professional athletes prepare for the Superbowl? No they rest, the eat right and prepare. Pitching an investor for funding is the Superbowl of meetings. One YES can change the course of your business and your life.
Productivity tip: Instead of working 4 hours straight with no break and no food, sprint for 50 minutes of complete focus and then take a 10 minute break. You will have better ideas and get more done with the rest break than with no break.
Just as running a business is a marathon and not a sprint, preparing your pitch for an investor requires the same preparation as a marathon. Let’s get you fueled with the right sales strategy and make sure you check off all the boxes investors have before they say yes to you. Contact me for a complimentary 15 minute Situational Snapshot Analysis to see how to stop burnout and get stamina for your investor pitch.
Pitch like your life depended on it!
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Imagine you were in the ocean with real sharks! It would sure make a great story and that is one of the keys to a making a great pitch to investors.
What would you feel?
I. Scared or excited? Fear is never good for giving a pitch-that just gives you stage fright. What is the solution? Become a Hall of Famer. Preparation is when you get the butterflies in your stomach to fly in formation.
What one Shark Tank winner says :
“Proper planning prevents poor performance,” he said. “Before I went on ‘Shark Tank,’ I watched every episode twice and created a flow chart of potential questions based off each Shark’s personality. There wasn’t a single question I wasn’t prepared for.”
II. Focused or distracted? Being in the moment and taking the investors on a journey where you explain your vision, your passion and why your team is the best to make the vision grow is essential to making your pitch work.
You have to show how you:
1) Make it up-what makes this idea unique and what problem does it solve?
2) Make it real -show your proof of concept
3) Make it reoccur- what is your traction?
III. Committed to surviving or surrender to defeat, aka UNDERWATER?
Here’s what Jay Acunzo is NextView’s Director of Platform says about the importance of storytelling to get funded:
“Luckily, every story from nursery rhymes to Shakespeare to stellar startup pitches can be distilled into three parts: a status quo, some conflict, and a resolution.”
To make sure you pitch with the same passion, perseverance and preparation you would need to survive a shark encounter, schedule a 15 min call with me to see if and how I can help you not just survive, but thrive!
Leeza Gibbons wins Celebrity Apprentice with Kindness
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When Leeza Gibbons interviewed me about my book, The 7 Most Powerful Selling Secrets, we talked about ABK. Always be Kind.
Kind doesn’t mean you let people walk all over you-even if they are Geraldo Rivera. Nice, SMART people are successful. You don’t have to be a shark to win one over.
Click below and scroll down to hear her interview me. She proved that her style of kindness not only got her money for her charity, but also got her declared the WINNER!
https://johnlivesay.com/#!press/c1bgt
It starts with the way you talk to yourself:
- Do you beat yourself up or do you say kind, supportive things to make your dreams of a start up become a reality?
- What do you say when you don’t get the sale or the investor to say yes?
- How can you be kind and supportive to your start up team if you are not that way to yourself?
If you want to know how to win investors over with kindness and the WOW factor so you attract supportive, respectful investors to join your team, book at 15 min call with me to see HOW to do it