Why? Because I know waterboarding lasts 40 seconds not 40 minutes. Plus, the psychological damage with waterboarding is only temporary. Shitty slide presentations are burned into my brain forever.

I especially like the ones where the pitch is “our software works magic in 5 minutes”. I am from Missouri. Show me.

If it really takes 5 minutes, then do a live demo.

No excuses. If you can’t do a live demo due to no internet, then do a Camtasia screen capture of it in action.

Seems simple to me.

Hell. When I used to this, I would ask the prospect to time me. If I said 5 minutes, I would usually finish in 4.

Under promise and over deliver. Hell. I would settle for just deliver.

Do it one better. Get one of your paying customers to come in and do the demo. What better testimonial is there than that? Walk in with one customer and leave with two.

No one pitches better than Steve Jobs. No one. He owns it.

Too often, I see pitches and presentations that are too detailed, too technical, and too boring.

Some PowerPoint slides have so much text, they would not pass the Twitter 140 character limit test.

One presentation by Steve Jobs that is particularly effective is the iPod Nano introduction.

In a word: brilliant.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GRv-kv5XEg

The few slides he uses that actually have text is minimal. Less is more.

And the genius 13 seconds from 1:47 to 2:00 in this clip will give even the PC crowd goosebumps.

Keep it focused, simple, and engaging. Throw in the unexpected, like pulling 1,000 songs out of the tiny pocket in the front of your Levi’s, and you have a winning pitch.

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