How to Write a Winning Elevator Pitch (December 2020)
Editors and agents are on the lookout for succinct synopses. Writing a great elevator pitch is essential for getting your manuscript noticed. In this Online Workshop session, you’ll learn:
- What all good elevator pitches have in common
- Three things to leave out of a pitch
- And much more
I’ll answer the following questions:
(1:20) Fewer than one in 10 writers will ever run into an agent or acquisitions editor on an elevator, so what’s the point?
(3:41) Suggesting that our main character must face innumerable odds and conquer his own demons in his attempt to save the world from spinning out of control doesn’t do it. Does it?
(4:50) Should an elevator pitch include the ending?
(9:21) Is there an easy way to remember what to include in a pitch?
(26:03) Is it safe to say that if I’m having difficulty with my elevator pitch, that my story needs work?
(42:44) If my story is based on fact, do I need to mention that in the actual pitch?
(53:58) For pantsers, what’s the best approach for writing an elevator pitch? Do you have to know your ending or just the character arc?
I’ll also analyze the following elevator pitches:
(13:30) Due to his mistrustful family history, a young physician with a blossoming career and a devoted wife loses one and almost the other before experiencing an ethereal encounter that changes his life.
(18:20) In 659 a Maya boy becomes a warrior to save his family and Tikal City from the aggressive Snake Lords of Calakmul.
(20:23) My mother disappeared when I was 13, leaving my sisters and me to live with our father, the police’s prime suspect. It would take 17 years to bring him to trial, a trial with no body, weapon or eyewitness.
(22:30) Scott’s parents died in an accident on the mission field this past year. To get away and work through his questions, he’s joining his uncle to help on a summer sabbatical trip to Greenland, but someone doesn’t want them to go. They will discover new creatures thought to be extinct and Scott will discover new courage he didn’t know he had.
(28:41) My book is about a weekend when I was nearly raped visiting friends and how a relationship with Jesus took away my shame and restored my sense of safety and power.
(30:18) Two princes clash—a usurper’s heir and a peasant who discovers he’s the son of the previous king. Both learn what it truly means to be a prince, and how to respect their rival—even though their families’ feud orders them to destroy each other.
(32:23) An American expat in the Philippines during World War II lost her home, health, husband, father, son and freedom, but she didn’t lose her faith in God.
(36:48) Set in the 1960s in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, two white ministers oppose Jim Crow laws and the KKK, and embark on a mission to integrate the town.
(38:23) A tattoo artist for the third Reich SS took pictures of those tattoos. After the war, the SS are hunted for war crimes as the artist is hunted by the SS for those photos.
(40:42) A boy raised in isolation is forced into the world when his parents are arrested and discovers that, due to his unique ability to convert the sun’s rays into electricity, he has become the rallying point for both sides in a bitter Civil War. When he cannot come to terms with the cruelty on either side, he, his brother and an old schoolteacher use their wits to wrangle a resolution that will allow both the gifted and those that fear and hate them to live in peace.
(46:25) Medusa is raped by Poseidon, then transformed into a monster by Athena, who blames Medusa for being defiled. Athena unintentionally endows Medusa with divine powers, setting up a war in which Medusa destroys both Poseidon and Athena, and shatters the power of Olympus.
(48:11) What if you passed your soulmate but didn’t know? That’s the question that haunts a young man on a hiking trail. With little to go on, he tries to track down a woman after a brief encounter, unaware that she had the same question and is tracking someone too … his brother. As their respective searches lead to each other, he overcomes his disbelief in love, and she learns to open her heart again.
(50:52) A police chase goes wrong, killing a child, but this story is about the mother’s fight for justice and for legislative changes to prevent this from happening to other innocent bystanders.
(51:58) A daughter of immigrant parents succeeds in becoming a nurse-midwife despite experiencing sexual abuse, limited funds and insecurity. By trusting in God and surrendering to His will, she becomes an effective missionary meeting the physical and spiritual needs of people from many nations.
(56:22) Two teens in comas are overtly used to test an unapproved serum to revive them. Instead, their souls are separated from their bodies leaving one to question their faith and the other to reconsider what happens after death.
(57:58) A successful businesswoman blindsided by the end of her 25-year marriage breaking her open to a forgotten past of childhood sexual trauma and her journey of healing.