Resource Database

This data base holds all the business links that are linked towards my company Bird Interactive and displays a list of useful resources for getting my business started.

5-Minute Pitch Evaluation

5 Minute Pitch Evaluation

What is a 5-Minute Pitch?

After a product or business plan has been written, the next stage is to pitch the idea to potential investors who might be interesting in what you have to offer. The pitch has to be a number of aspects to make it a successful one. The perfect pitch should be concise, well presented in a convincing manner and accurately planned. In some cases, pitches can often take months to plan, whether it is physically or mentally. It is also important to have an understanding of your audience, so that you can relate to the investors on a more personal level.

Pitching an idea to a group of investors can be a very nerve racking experience, because most of the time you only have one shot at presenting it. This is why it is important to plan everything in advance and perform practice presentations before hand, because practice makes perfect.

Introduction

During the Venture Culture module we had to come up with a product or a business idea that we could pursue and bring our ideas to life in the public domain. Once we had our business and product ideas, we then had to present them in a 2-minute presentation in front of the class, without using any visual aid. The 2-minute pitch was there to give us an experience and an understanding on how to present a business idea in front of a group of people. The 2-minute pitch also gave us a good opportunity to see whether our ideas would be sufficient enough to bring out into the public domain.

The next development process was to start to fine-tune our business ideas in preparation for the 5-minute pitch presentation. The pitching points were: Introduction, production, process, customer, distribution, costs and setup. The pitching points were there to guide us in terms of the different aspects we should cover during our presentations.

The Pitch

Starting from the beginning of my presentation, I found that my eye-to-eye contact with the audience was adequate, but my arms would have benefited from being uncrossed, because this shows a more open displayed posture. Some of the phrases I used within the first minute of introducing the idea could have been delivered differently. For example, instead of saying, "making learning fun and interesting, really", I should have said, "making learning fun and interactive for pupils", which fits more into the criteria I am trying to put across. The Introduction to the product also could have been complemented and simplified if I had given game examples on the slide, to help explain how the Interactive White Board game would work.

Moving onto the Process slide of my presentation, again I found that I had good composure and highlighted the necessary sections, which guided the attention of the audience to which topic I was talking about. A method of improving this however, would be to present the content on the slide in a more fluent order. On an important note, I could have improved this slide by explaining who The Department of Education actually was. Also I would have liked to avoid saying the word “it” and instead used a more descriptive word like “the product”.

On the next slide was a mind map graph of the Target audience of whom I would be out reaching my product to. During this slide, I kept good composer and highlighted the areas of the slide that I was covering. I could have gone into more details as to why children aren't so much my target audience, and could have replaced phrases such as "funnily enough", with something more suitable, like "interestingly".

After the Target audience slide came Distribution. I am now thinking that the content used on the Target audience slide, would have benefit from being on the same slide as the distribution slide, due to the similarity of the two topics. Notes were taken during the distribution section of the 5-minute pitch, I put down that I had good posture and was able to highlight the content of the slide clearly, however the slide could have benefit from having more information displayed. Certain aspects of this slide could have been shorten, practically in the overview of why books are going to be involved with the product.

Setup and Costs, this slide was probably one of the more difficult areas of my product idea to explain, due to its complexity and having to go into further details about the development costs. A lot of the content on this slide could have been simplified, but also maybe the slide could have been split into two columns, thus making the presentation move more fluently. I also muddled up some of the words I was trying to describe, however, I feel this is purely down to being nervous.

Conclusion

Reflecting back on the moment of the 5-minute pitch, I found the whole experience of presenting a business idea to a group of students exhilarating. I was still very nervous and had a slight lack of confidence when it came to explaining the more in-depth areas of my idea. However, on a positive note, the process of explaining the more in-depth areas of my presentation was complemented by the unique and captivating style of my Power point slides.

In reference to the chapter ‘What is a 5-Minute Pitch?’ and comparing it to my Bird Interactive pitch, I personally consider that I was able to pitch my idea in a convincing and accurately planned manner. In situation to knowing my target audience, I was able to relate to them on a more personal level, if needed, because most of the audience are my work and study colleagues. However positively I may feel about my pitch, there is still a lot more room for improvements. One particular example of this would be the dialect used when presenting, I had a tendency to get my words mixed-up or not pronounce them correctly, when explaining certain aspects. However, this issue can be solved, through being more prepared and constantly rehearsing the pitch, to gain an in-depth understanding of what needs to be said.

Feedback Questions

The feedback from the audience was very constructive. They particularly enjoyed the unique and colourful style of my slides. One person asked me a question as to how I would go about tailoring the game idea to individual pupils. At the time of the pitch, I believed the answer I gave was suitable for the question that was asked, however, after reviewing the question asked I think I would have rephrased the answer like this:

“This is a question that I'm sure most teachers ask themselves everyday, and to solve this, my product gives teachers the opportunity to upload their own learning material, which will then be embedded within the adventure game structure. Thus making the content of the game managed by the teacher”.

5-Minute Pitch

The 5-Minute Pitch

Final Presentation Slides

Final Presentation Slides

After noting the key points for the content of my slides and adapting a similar style to the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy book, I was then able to construct the slides for the final stages of my presentation.

Pitch Theme

Pitch Presentation Theme

In the past when I have watched teachers, clients, students and important people give pitch presentations, I have found that they all use a piece of software called Power Point. Now, there is nothing wrong with using Power Point, however, there is nothing exceedingly special about it either, it is generally down to how the person displays their content. There is another presentation software called Prezi, which enables the user to create almost 3D dynamic slides. Prezi works by the user developing a collage of images and then creating a set path for the camera to move along. Like Power Point, the Prezi software allows you to import movies and extra animations.

Style
Due to the nature of the Bird Interactive company being all about adventure and interactivity, I found the inspiration for my presentation theme on a film called Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy. In the film, there is electronic book called "The hitchhikers guide to the galaxy", which has a very simple and yet intelligent style to it. The theme within the hitch hikers guide book, has a mono tone silhouette style, which gives of a very colourful affect and is easy for users to understand.

The image below displays screen captured shots from the film "Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy":

5 Minute Pitch Presentation

Pitch Presentation Key Points

Introduction:

"Hi Good afternoon, my name is Paul Bird and I am the Director of Bird Interactive"

Product:

My company develops e-learning narrative games for Interactive White Boards for primary schools, for pupils aged 5 - 11. (IWB)

- The goal is to create a collaborative learning environment between the teachers and the pupils.

- The game will also following with the National Curriculum and be interchangeable according to the pupils scheme of work.

Process (How will you sell it):

The product will be marketed by giving pitches and seminars in schools, colleges and trade shows.

The product will also be marketed on teaching websites (tes), be presented on press releases and written in trade journals.

Fact: There are over 20,00 schools within the United Kingdom, which gives me a large target audience to present my project to. These figures can be found on The Department of Education website: http://www.education.gov.uk/

Customers (target audience):

The game will be targeted at The Department of Education and will be presented to the Head teachers and teachers of each school.

Parents will also be introduce to the game to gain an understanding and support of what their child is learning.

The children won't be the target audience so much, however, there will be plans to produce games for the I Pad and mobile devices, of which children can download and be apart of.

Distribution:

There will be a online and offline product package will be distributed and pitched to the Department of Education and be available on the web, which people can download.

Narrative books of the game will also be published, that will be available for pupils use at home or at school.

In the future we also plan to develop the game for mobile devices, this will be another method of distributing the product.

Setup and Costs:

The development team of the company, will concise of a Director, Marketing person, Designers and programmers.

On shelf products will marked at a set retail price (depends on working hours), which will concise of a premium and a deluxe package.

The game will also be available online, where teachers can sign up and download the product and inquire a 1 year license, which will be charged at a price of £200 pounds

Quick Maths: A game developer earns about £11.50 hr, he makes a product over a 6 month time span, which gives him an earning of £11,960. However, you have other members of the company to consider, so you times the £11,960 by 3, that gives you £35,880 overall.

If we were to sell the game to just 2% of UK schools, we would have to charge £89.50 per product to break even.

So overall we are already making a profit of £110 pounds on the product.

Fact: The product and the developer prices are varied, due to the flexibility of the working hours and what the going rate is for the game developer.