Effective Communication for Entrepreneurs: Don’t make the audience work to get the message

I’ve seen and made a lot of terrible pitches. I’ve seen and made a lot of terrible pitch decks and one-pagers. I’ve failed in quick interactions to get to the point fast enough and get the listener to lean in, care, and want to learn more.

At TIA Ventures, we focus a disproportionate amount of energy, time and creative thinking with our founders on the ‘pitch’. It may feel overkill and superficial at times, like a distraction from the primary mission of building a product or service that customers love… but it’s not. If you can’t pitch clearly, confidently, with passion, and conviction, you won’t be successful at influencing prospective customers, partners, employees and investors to join your mission. And you NEED all of these key individuals, and many others, to nurture your venture into a successful enterprise.

Why is it so hard to communicate effectively? One main issue is our deep desire to sound smart. We add complexity to our communications to look sophisticated, intelligent and impressive. We use big words, acronyms, abstract concepts, non-intuitive explanations, and all sorts of other trickery, which only results in forcing the listener to do extra work and ask follow-up questions to get the point. Nobody likes to do extra work and if you find your audience saying ‘I guess I’m not smart enough to get it’, you’re the one at fault.

Meanwhile, when we are sitting with friends and family, our partners and our kids, how do you speak? Take ‘showing off’ and ego out of the equation, and we use simple, clear, unassuming, targeted and effective communication. DO THIS EVERYWHERE, NOT JUST AT HOME.

Below is a non-exhaustive list of our recommendations to make sure what you communicate has listeners feeling the importance immediately and leaning in with visceral interest…not confusion, head scratching, and needing to do extra work to get the point:

‘TIAV Laws of Communication’

• Do the hard work and deep thinking necessary to tease out the essence of the problem and your solution — and make it simple, so your audience doesn’t have to work to feel the power and relevance of your venture.
• Assume that your audience knows nothing about your category, which will force you to explain things in such a way that anyone gets it.
• Focus on benefits, not features. Don’t get into the weeds and geek out on the stuff you think is cool.
• Use the ‘so what’ and ‘why should I care?” screen for every page in the deck and every part of your pitch. If a reader could respond at any time with “so what?” or “why should i care?” then go back to the drawing board.
• Every point and every slide must be crafted through the eyes of your audience (employee, investor, partner, customer), and address what is important to them — not you.
• Begin with a clear and important problem, because without an important problem to solve, you’ve got nothing to engage people with.
• Don’t build to your conclusion, start with it. Paint a picture of what will happen if you get it right with your company.
• Use relatable analogies where possible to explain difficult concepts.
• Speak in plain language and avoid jargon.

Do all of this and you will be more successful, period.

-Wills Hapworth, TIA Ventures