My business idea is an innovative new print magazine called "Chatterbox", a publication which focuses on true life stories told by interesting young adults with entertaining experiences to share. It is aimed at 18-30 year olds and will consist of interviews, vox-pops and tips. Basically, just imagine a Jeremy Kyle style magazine!
It is an original concept; the only competition would be similar products such as Chat and Take a Break - but those magazines are aimed at an older, female audience and so will differ considerably in content and style.
When it came to the pitching, it was certainly a process of progression. Let’s be honest - pitching is quite a daunting concept for most, and personally, I like to be as prepared as possible when publicly speaking.
However, my idea wasn't fully developed when the first rehearsal was sprung upon our learning group, so I struggled to bring my ideas together verbally in front of my team. Little time to plan meant my idea was undeveloped and unstructured and therefore difficult to discuss. Being unsure of my concept resulted in a speech which wasn't particularly confident, and the lack of research conducted was reflected in my hurried and disjointed approach.
My learning group told me that I need to work on my confidence whilst pitching; improving my posture and maintaining eye-contact, and fully believing in my product, so I knew I had to up my game.
They also said I needed to conduct market research to back up my points and find out what they audience want. I had to explore the competition to get a good feel of the market and draw any similarities and differences between my product and any existing similar publications. I also failed to say why there is a gap in the market for it, so these are all elements I needed to take into consideration.
In order to improve, I decided to clarify my idea, so I wrote a detailed account of what my product is: who it’s aimed at, its purpose and why it is an innovative business concept. Getting to grips with my idea enabled me to discuss it in more depth and be confident in my attempts to bring it to fruition in a carefully thought out speech.
To make my product more viable and appropriate for my target market, I proceeded in completing market research in the form of questionnaire distribution. A sample of my audience base completed a series of open and closed questions so I could gather results on what they want from a product and what they think about a modernised real life magazine.
The findings revealed that young adults prefer to read about topics such as sex, love, relationships, health and crime, and they would want to be entertained, shocked and inspired by such a publication.
My revised speech incorporated these conclusions. I structured the pitch into ten separate sections and memorised each paragraph, because I wanted to give a professional and clean pitch without having to worry about cue cards or prompts, which can draw attention to shaking hands and effectively accentuates nerves, which is definitely not desirable!
Before pitching for our assignments, our group met up early to practise. We took it in turns to voice our ideas and this was valuable because it allowed us to get peer feedback and rehearse for the real thing.
The final pitch went well - I completed it without mistakes and with minimal stumbles within the first recording, which I am proud of. The group were impressed and said I gave a confident pitch which was well-spoken and clear with a good use of vocabulary and a professional tone, so my feedback was positive and welcoming.
A constructive critique would be that I should aim to be more spontaneous in my delivery. Although it was hard work and required a lot of effort to memorise a structured pitch, it would be advantageous to become more natural whilst speaking aloud. My speech may have come across as slightly rehearsed, so this is possibly something I could work on. However, I think overall my pitch was successful and I am glad I had it well thought out because that meant I was very precise with my ideas.
My next steps would be to pull together a strong team of contributors in the form of dedicated journalists, photographers and visual designers. Funding would also be necessary so planning a budget and approaching companies for possible partnerships would be wise.
Overall, the speech went well and I received positive feedback, so I am extremely happy with how it all panned out. It was a journey of development, and although it was a bit of a rocky road in rehearsals, the path to the finish line gradually became smoother.
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