Alan Donegan's Blog

The big pitch - 25 words or less

28/3/2019

 
It is all in the pitch!  At PopUp Business School from day 1 on our course we talk about pitching your idea, your product or service and selling it!  Turns out it is exactly the same in the movie industry!  Before I even got to LA to write my movie I had been asked "pitch your movie to me"!
Alan Donegan writing his screenplay
Writing the screenplay at The Victorian on Main Street, Santa Monica
Just like you do for any business I have started to write and refine a pitch for my movie and I was wondering if you could help?

25 words or less.  GO!

When you are pitching you have a few seconds to capture someone's attention and get them interested enough to want to hear more from you. It turns out in movies and TV the executives learnt pretty early on that if you wanted people to watch your movie you needed to be able to sell it to someone pretty quickly.  But where did 25 words or less come from? In printed TV guides there was only space for 25 words under the title of the movie or TV show; that became the standard length with which you had to pitch your idea.

This morning I have been writing different versions of my pitch and I wondered if you could help me refine it?   Please have a read of the 4 versions below and tell me which one you like the most and why by voting below!

I tell everyone at PopUp that the only way to know if your pitch is any good or not is to test it on real life people.  So this is me swallowing my own advice and testing it on you to see what you think!  Don't be shy, you can't hurt my feelings!  Tell me exactly what you think of my pitches and whether you would watch the movie or not!! 

Version 1

David, a single, chubby twenty something, trapped in a job he hates, living at home and trying to escape corporate purgatory to create a life he actually wants to live and get the girl of his dreams

Version 2

23 year old, chubby, single British man tries to escape a corporate job he hates, start his own business and win the girl of his dreams

Version 3

Trapped in a grey soul sucking corporate job, our young chubby Englishman tries to escape, start his own business and get the girl of his dreams all in one move

Version 4

The greyness of corporate life, the council and banking try to trap our chubby young Englishman in a life he hates.  He struggles and fights to become an entrepreneur build a business and win the girl of his dreams

    Which pitch did you like the most?

    Anything you can give me to help me improve my work and improve my pitch would be really appreciate!
Submit

The only way to learn 

You can read all the books you want, you can write all you want in your own notebook but the only real way to learn is to get your idea out into the world, pitch it and get feedback!  

It is nerve wracking (what if they don't like it?), it is scary (what if I am not good enough?) and it can be fun at the same time seeing your idea released into the world!

If you have an idea in your head then get it out into the world and start pitching and selling it and see what happens!  

Thank you for reading and thank you for helping me and being part of my journey to becoming a screen writer.  I really appreciate your support and help!

I am excited to share with you this week's update in a few days time and I have so many lessons and ideas that I have learned along the way that I am excited to share with you as I write more in the future.  

If you want to catch up on the adventure so far here are the main articles:
  • The screen writing adventure begins
  • The BIG commitment
  • Week 1 Screen play update
  • Week 2 Update - including word count graphs!

Thanks for your help
Sending you happiness from Los Angeles 

​Alan
Comments

    Author

    Alan Donegan: PopUp Business School Co-Founder, Entrepreneur, Financially Independent Pizza Lover, Marvel Movie fan and soon to be Script Writer

    Picture

    Archives

    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    August 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018

    Categories

    All
    Entrepreneurship
    FIRE
    Follow Your Dreams
    Fun
    Project Hollywood
    Self Development
    Self-Development
    Seo-experiment

    RSS Feed

Home
Start Here
The Blog
I built this website to share the life lessons I learn along the way, the cool stories, the adventures, the amazing people and everything I learn from all the stupid mistakes I make!  If you want to keep up to date then stick your email in below.  I promise to never share your email address or spam you!  Alan

Sign up for Blog updates and to follow Alan on his journey

* indicates required
Photos used under Creative Commons from Tone'o, bryan...
  • Home
  • Start Here
    • Financial Independence
  • Take Control of your Finances
  • Blog
  • Contact
    • Press
    • Press Coverage
  • Disclaimer
  • Home
  • Start Here
    • Financial Independence
  • Take Control of your Finances
  • Blog
  • Contact
    • Press
    • Press Coverage
  • Disclaimer