Three Sentences That Will Catapult You to Success (Maybe)

They say every author should have an “elevator pitch” ready. The theory is that you run into your dream agent or publisher, or your all-time favorite author, on an elevator. You have just as much time as it takes to get to the lobby to pitch your book.

What do you say? How do you summarize in a few sentences the passion you’ve poured into your book over many years?

Although the elevator scenario is not very likely, it’s a useful exercise to write those few sentences—to boil your proposal down to its essence.

And as we dream of a return to in-person conferences, there are pitch opportunities via online video chat and Twitter. So, it’s worth getting ready now.

A Fastball, Not a Curve

Creating an elevator pitch forces you to throw straight, get to the point, without the curve balls and sliders of a longer presentation.

It makes you focus on what’s important about your manuscript, how unique/relevant/interesting your story is—in short, what’s important to an agent or publisher. It should have the same basic elements as your query: genre, word count, basic plot and/or characters and their challenges, a few words about yourself and why you think the target is the right agent or publisher for your book.

Creating a three-sentence version makes you strip out the long story of how you came to write the book and which authors you idolize and how much your character loves cats, along with other details that are not likely to make your book stand out in the dizzying galaxy of pitches your target hears.

And once you have your elevator pitch—the shortest, most focused presentation of your book—it’s easy to expand it, sentence by sentence, for various situations in which the elevator bell is not going to ring in fifteen seconds.

Fests, Slams, and Gongs

Conferences present a variety of structured pitching opportunities. But be forewarned, most of them cost money in addition to your registration fee.

One type, sometimes called a PitchFest, puts agents and publishers at individual tables around the perimeter of a large room for an hour or so. Writers who have purchased a ticket stand in line to have a fixed number of minutes, maybe three, at as many tables as possible within the allotted time.

As I recommended in my last post about queries, do your research. Figure out in advance which folks are most likely to connect with your story. You may decide to wait many precious minutes to pitch someone high on your list, or you may choose to hit up a larger number of low-priority folks who have shorter lines. Either way, you have to be ready to maximize the few minutes you get with each person.

Another approach is the PitchSlam, sometimes called a Gong Show. In this model, there are several agents and/or publishers at a table on a stage. Authors have a fixed amount of time to take the microphone and pitch them, in front of an audience. After each pitch, panelists may ask to read all or part of the book, or pass.

In a tougher, but usually good-natured version, there’s a gong on the table. And if two or three of the folks on stage hit the gong, the pitch is rejected. Sometimes, the audience gets a vote. Most times, the panelists will at least give feedback.

The Major Leagues

The top-level pitch, and type in which I have had some success, is the appointment.

These will cost more than a Fest or Slam, but they also give you more time with the agent or publisher, about ten minutes, in a calmer environment. The target knows you’ve paid a premium for the privilege, and they generally feel obliged to give you due consideration.

This provides the opportunity to say more about your book and yourself, and why you believe this project is right for them. You can even ask questions and get feedback.

Your mileage may vary, but in seven pitch appointments I had for my first book, Sandblast, I received six requests for the full manuscript, resulting in one offer from an independent publisher (which I ended up not accepting). That’s a much higher return on investment of time and money than I had from my one hundred sixty-five queries, although that’s where I found my publisher.

Moral of story: do both.

Perfect Pitch

Pitches can be powerful sales tools, perhaps because they’re done in-person (aside from Twitter). But that also intimidates many writers. So, like the directions for getting to Carnegie Hall, practice.

Pitch your friends, your pets, your bathroom mirror, and, importantly, your webcam. Review and critique your performance. Make it sing. (But don’t actually sing.)

And run your pitch by your critique partners and your editor. Make it as concise, focused and as compelling as possible.

If it’s not in an elevator or a slam or an appointment, the opportunity to pitch may present itself at a meal or cocktail hour, in the taxi line, after a panel or speech, or by stalking your target like a serial killer.

The main thing is to be ready to pull that trigger with a pitch that will wow them, leaving them no choice but to ask, nay, beg to read your book.