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Case study: Elevate Your Pitch

Did you know that Microsoft—one of the world’s richest companies—gets the majority of its revenue from its network of partner companies? As in 95% of its commercial income? When we’re talking in the tens of billions, that’s a lot of opportunity for small and medium-sized companies to gain a foothold. So it would make sense that Microsoft would celebrate its partner network, which it does at a conference every year in Las Vegas.

While a conference is nice, giving partners something they can take home with them is far better. That’s where Elevate Your Pitch came in. The Refined Story’s principal Joel Magalnick joined a small team as one of two pitch coaches to work with more than 100 partners on a program called Elevate Your Pitch.

Here’s the premise: People want the brands they know and trust to pitch to them using video. And those numbers are growing, according to HubSpot’s research arm. So we worked with executives, small business owners, and product managers to give their pitch on-screen.

For many of us, getting in front of a camera is a daunting task.

What we did: We spent 20-30 minutes with each person, getting a (very) quick synopsis of their lives and business’ value proposition, then turned that passion into one-minute stories for them to record in the soundproof booth on my right. Once we co-wrote the script, I worked with them on their delivery, helping with inflection and emphasis, and calmed nerves if anyone felt reticent about getting in front of the camera. Each person could read their script from our teleprompter, so they had no need to memorize. When they were done, our production team edited the best take, integrated closed captioning for accessibility, and a hundred people walked away with a new video asset that they could post and share.

We worked with people from India, Thailand, Iceland, New Zealand, the UK, Israel, Brazil, South Africa, China, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Australia, Canada and the U.S. It truly was a global experience!