An Easy Answer to: “What do you do?”

Have you ever been asked the very simple questions “What do you do?”, and….completely frozen up? Guess what, you are certainly not alone. In fact, most of my elevator pitch coaching clients say that’s the FIRST problem they have when introducing themselves to new people.

There are a lot of common reasons why people freeze up when asked that question – which one(s) resonate with you?:

• the inability to articulate quickly and simply what you do
• the worry that you’ll end up going “on and on”, resulting in the other person losing interest
• the worry that they won’t understand what you do
• the worry that the other person won’t want to know more
• the worry that people will make a pre-conceived judgement about the industry you are in

As you can see, most of these are worries, and that just adds pressure to answering the question. No need for that!

Instead of worrying, I’m going to give you a simple way to determine how to answer that question – it’s a “formula” that works for me every single time, and it can work for you too, if you put a little thought into it.

When asked, “What do you do?”, simply respond with:

“Well, you know how some people have [inserrt a common problem here]?

(pause for them to agree/say yes)

“Well, what I do is [insert solution here].”

Let’s look at an example of how I use this formla for what I do:

“Well, you know how some business professionals spend a lot of time networking and will have to sometimes give a networking commercial or “elevator pitch” to an entire roomful of people….and they sometimes don’t know what to say?”

(pause for them to agree/say yes)

“Well, what I do is provide a coaching service in which I teach them how to do an effective networking commercial.”

The key is to be short and sweet…and best of all, simple. Because I only answered their question and didn’t give them a big list of my various services or HOW I do it….this naturally opens the conversation up more by them usually asking, “how do you do that?” – and they almost ALWAYS do.

Try working out this formula for yourself and using it the next time someone asks you what you do. I’m pretty sure you’ll find it to be MUCH easier to keep a conversation going. If you need some extra help or still have any of the above worries, I’d recommend taking a one hour elevator pitch coaching session with me. It’s quick and easy, and you’ll hit the field polished and professional.
(c) 2008 Barbara Beal-Lopez, “The Elevator Pitch Coach” with Brightfarm Productions helps business professionals introduce themselves with high impact. Everything in business starts with an introduction. If you’re ready to learn how to introduce yourself and your business professionally and comfortably, visit Barbara at www.brightfarm.com and sign up for free weekly tips.