When making a pitch for your idea be sure to describe how the business will become big and be specific in your ask.
Shark Tank is an adaption of the Japanese television show Dragon’s Den, which gives entrepreneurs the chance to pitch their plans to venture capitalists (“the sharks”) with the goal of securing investments to pursue their ideas.
The show provides useful lessons to not only aspiring entrepreneurs but to any innovator who needs to pitch a new product idea to their bosses for continued exploration.
When we conduct workshops at Innosight we have teams present their ideas in short pitches answering the following questions, much like on the show.
- What problem are you solving for consumers?
- What is your idea?
- What is the business? How will you make money?
- What specifically are you asking for?
People in our workshops and people on the show do quite well on the first two questions. They have personal stories of how they identified the needs (or Jobs) in the marketplace and have creative and compelling presentations of their ideas (songs, prototypes, samples).
The area where we have seen the biggest room for improvement is in the third area, demonstrating how they will make money and make the business big. The “Sharks” (and your bosses) want to see that there is real interest from customers in the innovation and a clear path to develop a big business. Questions you should be prepared to answer are:
- Do you have sales? How many units have you sold?
- How do you know people are interested in this product?
- Who is the customer? How much do you expect them to pay?
- How many stores are you in? Have you shown this to a retailer who said “I like this, I want to sell this”
- How do you know people will buy that?
The other shortfall is not being specific enough in “the ask”. People who ask for money to build the brand so they can then go to trade shows or retailers do not fare well. Whereas people who ask for money to fulfill production for orders they have in place already do well. Be specific. You need to show how what you’re asking for will help build the business and help make them money.
As you pitch your innovation ideas be sure to describe why the business is compelling and make a specific “ask”. To see the process in action check out the show (Sundays on ABC at 9pm EDT).
