Pitch Masters

In this episode of the Pitch Masters podcast, I speak to yet another one of my all-time pitching heroes, the legendary Peter Coughter, founder and CEO of Coughter & Company, Professor at VCU Brandcenter, and author of one of my favourite books - The Art of the Pitch: Persuasion and Presentation Skills that Win Business. In this episode, we discuss a lot of pitch material - the fear we all have...

You've probably heard of the power of storytelling in business, but how do we actually go about doing it - and do we need to be a natural-born storyteller? Enter, Hilary Salzman, the Business Storyteller.    Hilary is the founder of 22-stories.com and she's on a mission to get more people telling stories to grow their business. In this episode of Pitch Masters, we talk about why we should tell sto...

You've probably heard of the power of storytelling in business, but how do we actually go about doing it - and do we need to be a natural-born storyteller? Enter, Hilary Salzman, the Business Storyteller.    Hilary is the founder of 22-stories.com and she's on a mission to get more people telling stories to grow their business. In this episode of Pitch Masters, we talk about why we should tell sto...

Welcome to a truly inspiring and motivating episode of Pitch Masters with Carl Hewitt, a young CEO of a digital marketing agency who founded the company when he was just 17 years old. He tells me the struggles he’s overcome with age bias, how he’s grown a business from door-to-door selling, how we can all use personas properly to win over an audience, how small tests always win the day, how he han...

Welcome to a truly inspiring and motivating episode of Pitch Masters with Carl Hewitt, a young CEO of a digital marketing agency who founded the company when he was just 17 years old. He tells me the struggles he’s overcome with age bias, how he’s grown a business from door-to-door selling, how we can all use personas properly to win over an audience, how small tests always win the day, how he han...

In February 2001, 17 anarchists assembled in the Snowbird ski resort in Utah, USA. They had no fixed agenda and spent two days in lively conversation, creating what we all now know as the Agile Manifesto. A new mindset and movement were born that would change the face of software development, but they could never have guessed just how far-reaching, famous, and infamous their work would become. One...

In February 2001, 17 anarchists assembled in the Snowbird ski resort in Utah, USA. They had no fixed agenda and spent two days in lively conversation, creating what we all now know as the Agile Manifesto. A new mindset and movement were born that would change the face of software development, but they could never have guessed just how far-reaching, famous, and infamous their work would become. One...

This week on Pitch Masters: Nancy Duarte. Listening is essential for anyone who wants to improve their pitches, presentations and storytelling. Nancy is another one of my all-time pitching heroes. Her work on ‘sparklines' has had a huge impact on my career and the way that work, and I use her methods every single day at IBM to create the most compelling pitches and presentations. In this hour, you...

Video version available on Apple Podcasts and Youtube .  This week on Pitch Masters: Nancy Duarte. Listening is essential for anyone who wants to improve their pitches, presentations and storytelling. Nancy is another one of my all-time pitching heroes. Her work on ‘sparklines' has had a huge impact on my career and the way that work, and I use her methods every single day at IBM to create the mos...

Jeb Blount is sales royalty. He's published 15 books on selling, including Sales EQ, Fanatical Prospecting, and Objections, and he's been top of my Pitch Masters hit list since the show began.  In this episode we cover a huge amount of ground: qualifying deals, closing deals, relationships, stories, 'the ledge', 'murder boarding' the chessboard of sales, how to withhold information for leverage, a...

Jeb Blount is sales royalty. He's published 15 books on selling, including Sales EQ, Fanatical Prospecting, and Objections, and he's been top of my Pitch Masters hit list since the show began.  In this episode we cover a huge amount of ground: qualifying deals, closing deals, relationships, stories, 'the ledge', 'murder boarding' the chessboard of sales, how to withhold information for leverage, a...

Episode 17 of Pitch Masters features the incredible Neil Mullarkey, star of Austin Powers, author of Seven Steps to Improve Your People Skills, and In The Moment, actor and improv comedy maestro. We talk about how to use improv in business, how to cast the perfect team for your pitch, debunking the myth of “Yes, and…”, mirror neurons and monkeys, and, of course, Swedish-made penis enlargers. I was...

In episode 16 of Pitch Masters, I speak to inspirational leader and former CEO, J Schwan. We have an incredibly candid talk about what being a CEO really involves. We discuss red and blue oceans, pitching to investors, choosing the right clients for your business, the importance of having a great mentor, and using the story from the movie 300 to motivate a team to success. Grab a coffee (or someth...

Matt Batten is an Executive Creative Director in advertising who’s won over 150 awards internationally. In this episode he talks me through his ten-point-plan for pitching, shares how a flawed loyalty programme landed him the Coca-Cola account, and plies me with multiple anecdotes about brilliant, emotional, and hilarious pitches from his career. If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone...

Ben Williams is a values-driven, authentic, and vulnerable person. He also happens to be an ex-marine, the author of Commando Mindset: Find Your Motivation, Realize Your Potential, Achieve Your Goals, and the co-founder of the team-wellness app, Loopin. In this episode of the Pitch Masters podcast, we talk about self-confidence and belief, humility, psychological safety at work, and the time that...

This week on Pitch Masters: Simon Sinek. I’ve read Simon’s books and watched the Ted Talks as I’m sure many of you have, but what I really wanted to know was: how does he pitch? In this episode, we go on a journey together through the end-to-end lifecycle of a pitch: ideation, structures, pitch decks, presenting, nerves, relationships, and all of those other stages that we have to go through for a...

Thomas Erikson, the author of international best-seller Surrounded By Idiots (and many more books), talks about personality tests, the DISC profile, and how we can use it in a pitching scenario to serve our audience. We also discuss leadership styles, how to make people like you, and why we all need to be ourselves If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it, a...

Viv Groskop talks about channelling the right energy when we communicate, flight or flight, the challenges that women face that men often don’t, why we should commit to a speaking event before we are ready, her journey from corporate-world to freelance, dealing with nerves, and how we all need to remember to be HUMAN. If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it...

Jeff Gothelf talks about the power of Lean UX and how it’s evolved over the last 10 years, how he creates compelling stories, the importance of preparation, how we all need to ‘plant our flag’ for success, and the tale of the human cannonball. If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it, and if you can, leave a review. Follow me on social media for video clips...

This week I speak to psychologist Dr Kimber Shelton who talks about the differences and considerations that people of colour face when they are pitching, as well as cognitive distortion, all-or-nothing thinking, mirror neurons, eye contact and a whole lot more. If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it, and if you can, leave a review. Follow me on social medi...

TRIGGER WARNING: This episode contains some disturbing and occasionally graphic stories of the events of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the subsequent events that unfolded. Robin is an ex-FBI Agent and his career was focused on the hardest pitch of them all – recruiting Russian spies to work for the US government. His work has taught him many life lessons and he is a master of eliciting trust from...

Bill Clinton’s Thumb Of Power, Barack Obama’s Pinch Of Salt - just two tips from episode 7 of the Pitch Masters Podcast with body language expert, Martin Brooks. When we pitch, present, or speak in public, we often focus on the content of what we’re saying, and in reality, a HUGE amount of our success lies in non-verbal communication, ie, BODY LANGUAGE. Martin is a Communication Performance Coach...

Doug Hall talks about his unique system for coming up with ideas, why he gets senior people to say dumb things, the blueprint for a winning pitch, how to tap into your subconscious, judging some of the best and worst pitches on TV, and creating custom bourbon in under 5 minutes.   If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it, and if you can, leave a review. Foll...

Helle Williams, Senior Sales Executive at Sogeti, talks about the importance of research before a pitch, the power of asking questions to gain winning insights, how to sell in Sweden, and being a woman in the male-dominated industry of IT consulting.   If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it, and if you can, leave a review. Follow me on social media for vid...

Adam Morgan talks about the battle between emotional-driven creative and data-based selling, dealing with a hostile audience, the formula for creating memories, the (correct) length of headlines, hooking up people to fMRIs to measure their emotions, and doing a front flip off a table in the middle of a pitch. If you enjoy the show, please share it with someone else who might appreciate it, and if...