In this solo talk, Evan Carmichael explains that great communicators can take big, complex topics and condense them into short, easy‑to‑understand statements that evoke emotion and curiosity. He shares his own early failure pitching a biotech software startup, describing how long, detailed explanations wasted time and failed to attract partners. Carmichael then uses Martin Luther King’s succinct civil‑rights message as a historical illustration of the power of a clear, simple hook that can later be unpacked. He advises entrepreneurs to craft a one‑ or two‑sentence “elevator pitch” that makes listeners feel something and want to ask questions, turning that curiosity into deeper conversations. The video ends with standard YouTube calls‑to‑action.
Chapters
How to be a great communicator. Great communicators are people who can take complex, big, important topics and distill it down into simple, easy-to-understand ideas that people can grasp. That's the big difference. I get too many entrepreneurs who come in and they write to me and they say, "Let me tell you my story," and it's just pages and pages and pages on email of their story. I don't have the time to read that. People don't have the time to sit down and read all this stuff. You have to be able to quickly tell your story, explain your company through sentences that are short and that are easy to understand. This is your role as an entrepreneur. You have to be a great communicator if you want people to come on board and believe in what you're doing. You know, I'm not perfect. When I started, I was terrible. I was the worst at this. A biotech software company, and was out there trying to get partnerships and, and, and we're thinking about raising money. And we didn't have a lot of success with our elevator pitch. We would walk in and people wouldn't get quite what we did and we had to explain it. And we just thought, you know, if we had somebody just to sit down with us for an hour, we could explain everything. We really believed that we had a great idea, that it would help change the world, that it was a great way to make a lot of money for whoever was involved. We really believed in our product. This wasn't just some easy, quick way to make money. This was a great idea. And we felt like if somebody could sit down with us for an hour, we can go through everything and they would understand and they'd see how they can make a lot of money, see if they could have a big impact with us. The problem is people won't give you that time. Not upfront. They won't commit to that. What you have to do is quickly explain to them, make them feel something in a couple sentences. And then from there, they're gonna ask questions, and you may still end up spending the hour with them, but it's from them being curious and wanting to learn more and asking questions instead of you taking an hour to explain your story. That's a big difference. You look at Martin Luther King, led the equal rights movement. He had a message that you could quickly and easily understand. Black people and white people should have equal rights. Easy to understand. How you go about doing that, how you go about impacting and making change, that's complex. You have to change a lot of laws, you have to do something nationwide, you got to do something on an individual state level. There's— there was so much that had to happen to make that change happen. And if he stood up and said, "This is really complex, guys. You know what? I need an hour to sit down and talk to you about it," nobody would listen. Instead, he stood up with a powerful message that was easy to understand, and from there he could explain it, and people could ask him questions. He could drill down, but you have an engaged audience, and that's the power when you are a great communicator. For your business, you need to have the same thing. You need to have one sentence that quickly explains what you do and makes me feel something, makes me curious, makes me want to ask you more questions, and I might spend an hour with you. But it starts off because you've given me something that I am excited by, I feel something, and I'm curious to learn more. That's how you be a great communicator. You take these complex, big problems and distill it down into 1 or 2 sentences that people can understand and are curious to learn more about. Believe. For those of you watching, you like the video, please give it a thumbs up. Leave a comment below and let me know what you think. You have a question, leave it in the comment section below. And click on my face to subscribe to the channel and see more videos like this. Thank you so much, and I'll see you soon.
