“The Demo Coach” Nathan Gold didn’t have anything new to share at Big Omaha.

“It’s all been said before. It’s all in the books, it’s all in videos,” he said. In particular, Gold praised the free online resources at the Kauffman Founders School.

But in just 15 minutes, Gold distilled the secret to captivating any audience down to nine tools. Well, ten if you count this one: “It’s all about the audience, right?” Gold said. “You have to know who the audience is,” and in the age of the Internet, there’s no excuse for breaking this golden rule.

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Here are Gold’s nine “red tool box method” tips. Remember them with the formula VP + (SAME)²

• Value Proposition (Simply put: “We help X do Y by doing Z.”)

• +

• Simile
• Analogy (If you tell people literally what you do, you’re boring them)
• Metaphor
• Example (Even better, take your example and add a simile, analogy or metaphor to give it new life.)
• Story (But be sure to get to the point.)
• Adjective (Don’t just say, “I am an entrepreneur.” Gold’s favorite example is, “I am an entrepreneur with the soul of a dancer.”)
• Magic
• Enthusiasm (“Bring your enthusiasm out because that’s what people love, and without it, you sound like everybody else.”)

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