Your Elevator Pitch: Hay There INsiders Meet with Jennifer Mathieu
Ahhh, the elevator pitch. Don’t underestimate its power! Just because something is short, doesn’t mean it’s simple. Sometimes, a few seconds is all you need to change the course of your career, or life in general. First impressions of “who you are” matter, and generally people want to put their best foot forward upon meeting someone new, whether is a business or social setting. But have you ever considered if the first impression you give regarding the eternal question-“WHAT do you do?” is consistent with how you are carefully and thoughtfully presenting WHO you are?
Recently, we dedicated a Hay There Social Media professional development session for members of our INsiders community to this very question. There is an art to reducing your “WHAT” into a succinct, moments long collection of carefully crafted words that relay a myriad of messages from understanding, to your mission, to creating intrigue.
We were so honored to be joined by Jennifer Mathieu of University of Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation. As Executive Director, Jennifer has every business to be leading a deep dive into both high level and tactical approaches to developing an elevator pitch that is both authentic and effective. Jennifer has dedicated her career to entrepreneurship, as an individual, and as a leader on many fronts at UConn. She has helped launch and grow hundreds of companies, coach entrepreneurs, and serves on several related boards.
We are thrilled to have Jennifer speak with our community of social media managers about this critical component of building a business. Her story resonates with our female entrepreneurs, and her accomplishments are beyond inspiring. There was a tremendous amount of activity behind the scenes on chat as we discussed the high level context surrounding the elevator pitch. It was a live example of how something so seemingly simple led us to deeper, honest conversations about knowing your worth, and having a foundation of pride and confidence in your value that is essential to complete a successful response to “what do you do?”
We addressed some other demons, including discomfort particularly around the “selling” undertone that sometimes can be perceived to overpower the other messages we are hoping to deliver in an elevator pitch. Normalizing and encouraging each other as peers to shift our mindset, and that like the various other roles we play as women, no one is going to “do it” for us, so we have to tell people what we do and pay it the respect it (and you) deserves.
Jennifer reinforced this “from strength” approach by reminding us that we are providing a unique service that grants access to a new, unique and fresh perspective to help them grow their business. She also recommended some wonderful books on this topic for our crew of lifelong learners. One of the biggest takeaways was really working hard to make your elevator pitch authentic, and natural. She shared her personal experience of trial and error, and finding her authentic voice in her elevator pitch, her bio, and other first impression touch points online.
Of course, the firsthand experience attending this professional development session is irreplaceable, and many other essential tactical wisdom was exchanged. A very close second to experiencing this live learning would be to join the Hay There INsiders community of social media managers and access this session in our upskilling library — as well as other content– to help you continue to grow professionally today.
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