The Secret Life of your Elevator Pitch

My wife and I are leaving our street block party, and our neighbor chases us around the cul-de-sac to ask us a question:

“Is your daughter the babysitter?”

Yes, my daughters are now old enough to babysit, and are interested enough in making money that they sat through a certification course. Add to that the seven families on our dead end street with kids in the 2 to 10 age range, it seems like a good place to start.

To that end, two weeks ago, my wife sent a text to these seven families saying that our daughters are available for babysitting.

She got back complete and utter silence.

Nothing.

Not a word.

Today, in the middle of shuttling between sports and theater activities, we decide to stop by the block party in the few minutes before my wife has to prepare for a trip to DC.

We chat for a while with the other parents, then the need to pack overwhelms my wife’s impulse to be social, so we start walking around the cul-de-sac back to our house.

And as our neighbor chases us, it get me thinking about your Elevator Pitch.

Because your Elevator Pitch is working even when you think it isn’t.

The secret is that you still have to show up.

It turns out that people on our street are interested in babysitters.

Maybe they didn’t respond to the text because they were busy (they have young kids, after all).

Maybe they didn’t respond to the text because it was awkward to make the request in public on the group text.

Maybe they didn’t respond to the text because, … well, does it really matter?

No.

What matters is that we sent out the message, and then showed up.

By showing up we jogged her memory, which inspired her to jog after us.

The same is true of emails, and LinkedIn posts, in person events.

It seems like it’s not working, but secretly it is.

And the way to activate it is to keep showing up.

I’m happy to report that both daughters have now landed their first babysitting gigs on our street, and I can only imagine there will be more to come.

And about your next networking event – show up.

That’s the easiest way to get the most out of your Elevator Pitch.