PerfectBusiness.com and the Perfect Pitch

I received an email from Entrepreneur magazine one Wednesday morning that told me I had "One Week to Submit Your Pitch to Richard Branson‏". Obviously their marketing department had done a good job because I became intrigued, thoroughly read the email and proceeded to sign up for PerfectBusiness.com It was then that I decided that I was going to do it. Even though there was a $60 fee for submitting a pitch, I felt that it was worth the monetary risk because the potential of great success was there. There were just some hurdles involved because I had already committed to a 3 day labor day getaway to Lake Tahoe, and I was just getting the symptoms of cold and allergies. The video pitch was due on the Tuesday after labor day.

We came home from our travels mid day on Monday so I could start working on my speech. On Tuesday I treated my raspy voice by drinking straight up coconut milk, not the most appetizing, but it did help to make my cold stricken hoarse voice sound better. I set up my video camera to capture my pitch. It turns out that I'm just great communicating with people and talking off the cuff, but an elevator pitch in front of a camera where you need to get every word right is much more intimidating. After hours of talking in front of the camera for a minute and a half speech, I finally got a run that I didn't freeze up like a deer in headlights. It's difficult to come to terms that even when you have the opportunity to do your pitch many times over that it's nearly impossible to reach perfection.

I submitted my entry, typed in my payment information, and accept button. This was it, I was submitting the pitch for my 'baby' online for investors to see. It took a couple of weeks, but then we received word on our submissions. I did it, Top 50! They even sent me a little badge to put on my website, so here is it:

It links to the page that announces the Top 50 submissions. There it is, a picture of me and a listing for my company, Juci Inc, "The future of beverages". They'll be announcing the Top 10 on Monday, followed by an announcement of the Top 3 the next week. The Top 3 get to go to the conference for free and pitch to a room full of investors, including Richard Branson. Now, how awesome would that be? Hi, Sir Richard Branson, would you like to invest in my company? An entrepreneur can dream!