Vendor fair in Austin made me rewrite my whole pitch in one afternoon

I was at a small business expo in Austin last month and watched a candle maker pack her booth with people while mine sat dead. She wasn't selling candles, she was telling a story about her grandmother's recipe. I counted 14 people stop for her in the time it took me to hand out 3 flyers. So I went home and ripped up my feature list. My pitch now leads with the problem I solve, not the specs. It's a 30 second story versus a 45 second feature dump. Cold call close rate went from roughly 1 in 20 to 1 in 8 this week. Anyone else try ditching the product tour for a narrative hook at a live event?

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david7012mo ago

Narrative hooks work when the crowd wants a show, but most buyers at expos are there to compare specs, not hear a family story. The candle lady's win probably came from the demo itself, not the pitch, and copycats will drown in that space by next season. If your product solves a real problem, a clear feature list will still beat a story for the serious buyers who actually write checks.

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