---
title: Audience Variations
summary: How to adapt one core pitch for different stakeholders, technical versus executive audiences, and investors versus customers.
est_minutes: 20
sort: 4
---

#### LESSON 1: Adapting Your Pitch for Different Stakeholders

Most B2B decisions involve multiple stakeholders.

Each stakeholder has different priorities, concerns, and decision criteria.

One pitch doesn't work for all of them.

Here's how to identify stakeholders and adapt your pitch for each.

**The Stakeholder Map**

In most B2B purchases, you'll encounter 4-6 stakeholder types:

- Stakeholder 1: The Champion/User
- Stakeholder 2: The Economic Buyer
- Stakeholder 3: The Technical Evaluator
- Stakeholder 4: The Influencer
- Stakeholder 5: The Blocker
- Stakeholder 6: The Legal/Procurement

You need buy-in from multiple stakeholders to close the deal.

**Stakeholder 1: The Champion / User**

**Who they are:** The person who will use your product/service daily and advocated for evaluating you.

**Example roles:**

- Sales Manager (for CRM)
- Marketing Director (for marketing tools)
- Operations Manager (for process tools)
- Project Manager (for PM software)

**What they care about:**

- Does it solve my daily pain?
- Is it easy to use?
- Will my team actually adopt it?
- Does it make my job easier?
- Will it make me look good?

**What they DON'T care about:**

- Deep ROI calculations
- Enterprise security compliance
- Complex integrations
- Executive-level strategy

**How to pitch to Champions:**

**Emphasis:**

- Day-to-day usability
- Specific pain points they experience
- How quickly they'll see results
- Ease of adoption by their team
- Success stories from similar users

**Example pitch (Project Management Champion):**

"You're spending 10 hours per week in status meetings trying to figure out who's working on what. With our platform, that drops to zero because everyone can see real-time status instantly. Your team can start using it today with zero training—we integrate with Slack and email, the tools they already use. Our customers typically save 15 hours per week within the first month."

**Focus:** Their pain, their day-to-day, their quick win.

**Stakeholder 2: The Economic Buyer**

**Who they are:** The person who controls the budget and has final purchasing authority.

**Example roles:**

- VP of Sales (for sales tools)
- CFO (for financial tools)
- COO (for operations tools)
- CEO (in smaller companies)

**What they care about:**

- ROI - will this pay for itself?
- Cost vs. alternatives
- Risk - what if it doesn't work?
- Strategic alignment - does this fit our priorities?
- Budget impact - can we afford this?

**What they DON'T care about:**

- Day-to-day usability details
- Feature minutiae
- Technical specifications
- How the UI looks

**How to pitch to Economic Buyers:**

**Emphasis:**

- Clear ROI with numbers
- Cost comparison to alternatives
- Risk mitigation (guarantees, trials, references)
- Strategic value, not just tactical
- Payback period

**Example pitch (Project Management to COO):**

"Your team is currently wasting $75K per year on project delays and rework due to poor coordination. Our platform eliminates that waste by keeping everyone aligned automatically. The investment is $30K annually, so you save $45K net in year one—15-month payback. We guarantee measurable improvement in 90 days or you don't pay. 87% of customers see positive ROI within 6 months."

**Focus:** Money saved, money made, risk reduced, ROI timeline.

**Stakeholder 3: The Technical Evaluator**

**Who they are:** The person who validates technical feasibility, security, and integration.

**Example roles:**

- IT Manager
- CTO
- Security Officer
- Engineering Lead
- Systems Architect

**What they care about:**

- How does it actually work?
- Does it integrate with our stack?
- Is it secure?
- Is it scalable?
- What's the technical architecture?
- What breaks if we implement this?

**What they DON'T care about:**

- Business value propositions
- Marketing messaging
- High-level strategy
- User experience details

**How to pitch to Technical Evaluators:**

**Emphasis:**

- Technical architecture
- Integration capabilities (APIs, webhooks, SSO)
- Security compliance (SOC2, GDPR, etc.)
- Scalability and performance
- Technical support and documentation

**Example pitch (Project Management to CTO):**

"We integrate with your existing stack through REST APIs—Slack, Jira, GitHub, whatever you're using. We're SOC2 Type II certified, GDPR compliant, and support SSO through Okta or Azure AD. Our infrastructure runs on AWS with 99.9% uptime SLA. The average implementation takes 48 hours because we don't require data migration—we pull from your existing tools in real-time. Full API documentation and dedicated technical support during implementation."

**Focus:** How it works, what it integrates with, security, scalability.

**Stakeholder 4: The Influencer**

**Who they are:** Someone whose opinion matters but who doesn't have direct decision authority.

**Example roles:**

- Consultant or advisor
- Board member
- Peer from another company
- Industry expert
- Internal department head

**What they care about:**

- Is this best practice?
- Have others succeeded with this?
- Does this align with industry trends?
- Is this vendor credible?
- What are the risks?

**What they DON'T care about:**

- Day-to-day details
- Specific features
- Pricing nuances

**How to pitch to Influencers:**

**Emphasis:**

- Industry credibility
- Customer success stories
- Best practices
- Third-party validation
- Trend alignment

**Example pitch (Project Management to Board Member):**

"Remote work has fundamentally changed how teams coordinate. The companies that are winning—Stripe, Shopify, GitLab—have all invested in asynchronous collaboration tools that don't rely on meetings. We're seeing this trend across high-growth SaaS companies. 300+ companies have adopted our platform in the last 18 months, with an average NPS of 72. Gartner named us a category leader in their latest report."

**Focus:** Credibility, trends, social proof, third-party validation.

**Stakeholder 5: The Blocker**

**Who they are:** Someone who can say "no" but not "yes." Often has something to lose if you win.

**Example roles:**

- Manager of current solution
- Person whose budget you're taking
- Team using competing product
- Internal IT who built similar tool

**What they care about:**

- Protecting their territory
- Not looking bad for current choice
- Job security
- Not creating more work for themselves

**What they DON'T care about:**

- Your value proposition
- Company success (if it threatens them)

**How to pitch to Blockers:**

**Don't pitch. Address concerns and neutralize.**

**Strategies:**

1. Make them part of the solution: "We'd love your input on the implementation plan—your experience with the current system will be invaluable"
2. Acknowledge their past decisions: "The system you chose three years ago was the right call then. The market has evolved, and now there are better options for where you're headed"
3. Reduce their risk: "We can run a pilot with just one team. If it doesn't work, nothing changes for you"
4. Position as evolution, not replacement: "This complements what you've built rather than replacing it"

**Focus:** De-escalation, inclusion, risk reduction.

**Stakeholder 6: Legal / Procurement**

**Who they are:** Gatekeepers who ensure contracts, compliance, and purchasing processes are followed.

**What they care about:**

- Contract terms
- Liability and indemnification
- Data privacy compliance
- Payment terms
- SLAs and commitments

**What they DON'T care about:**

- Product features
- Business value
- User experience

**How to pitch to Legal/Procurement:**

**Emphasis:**

- Standard contract terms
- Compliance certifications
- Clear SLAs
- Transparent pricing
- Reference customers for due diligence

**Example approach:**

"We have standard MSA and DPA templates that are already approved by 50+ enterprise legal teams. We're SOC2 Type II, GDPR, and CCPA compliant. Standard payment terms are Net 30. Our SLA guarantees 99.9% uptime with credits for downtime. Happy to provide references from similar companies in your industry who've completed legal review."

**Focus:** Remove friction, provide standard documents, demonstrate compliance.

**Multi-Stakeholder Pitch Strategy**

**When presenting to multiple stakeholders at once:**

**Strategy 1: Layer the pitch**

Start broad, then go specific.

- Opening (everyone): High-level problem and transformation
- Middle (segment by audience): "For the operations team, this means... For IT, this means... For finance, this means..."
- Close (everyone): Unified value and next steps

**Strategy 2: Pre-sell individually**

Before the group meeting:

1. Meet with Champion first
2. Address Technical Evaluator's concerns
3. Present ROI to Economic Buyer
4. Get Influencer buy-in

**Then in the group meeting, you're aligning, not convincing.**

**Strategy 3: Identify the decision-maker**

In the room, who has final say?

Direct your core pitch to them, but acknowledge others.

"I know [CTO] will want to understand our technical architecture, [CFO] will want to see ROI, and [VP Ops] will care about day-to-day usability. Let me cover all three..."

**Stakeholder Pitch Adaptation Checklist**

For each stakeholder, adapt:

- Opening: What pain do they feel?
- Emphasis: What do they care about most?
- Evidence: What proof matters to them?
- Language: Technical, business, or user-focused?
- CTA: What action makes sense for their role?

**One core value prop. Multiple angles.**

#### LESSON 2: Technical vs Executive Audiences

Technical and executive audiences have opposite preferences.

**Technical:** Want to understand *how* it works
**Executive:** Want to understand *business impact*

Pitching technical depth to executives loses them. Pitching high-level value to technical audiences feels superficial.

Here's how to adapt for each.

**Technical Audience Characteristics**

**Who they are:** Engineers, developers, architects, IT managers, technical leads, data scientists.

**How they think:**

- Detail-oriented
- Want to understand mechanisms
- Skeptical of marketing claims
- Value precision over persuasion
- Respect technical competence

**What they care about:**

- How does it actually work?
- What's the architecture?
- What are the limitations?
- How does it integrate?
- What's the performance?
- What happens when it breaks?

**What annoys them:**

- Marketing fluff
- Vague claims
- Buzzword bingo
- Oversimplification
- Avoiding technical questions

**How to Pitch to Technical Audiences**

**Rule 1: Be technically accurate**

Don't oversimplify or use marketing speak.

**Wrong (marketing):** "Our AI-powered platform revolutionizes data processing"

**Right (technical):** "We use a distributed processing architecture built on Apache Spark that parallelizes data transformation across multiple nodes, reducing processing time from hours to minutes for datasets over 100GB"

**Technical audiences respect precision.**

**Rule 2: Lead with architecture, not benefits**

**Wrong approach:** "You'll save time and increase productivity!" (sounds like marketing)

**Right approach:** "Here's how it works: We pull data from your APIs using webhooks, transform it server-side, and push updates to your frontend via WebSockets. This eliminates the need for polling, which was causing performance issues in existing solutions."

**Show how it works first. Benefits follow naturally.**

**Rule 3: Address limitations honestly**

Technical audiences know nothing is perfect.

**Wrong (marketing):** "Our solution handles everything!"

**Right (honest):** "Our solution works well for datasets under 1TB and batch processing. If you need real-time streaming for datasets over 1TB, you'd be better served by [alternative approach]. For your use case at 200GB batch processing, we're a strong fit."

**Honesty builds credibility with technical audiences.**

**Rule 4: Welcome tough questions**

**Wrong response to hard question:** "Let me get back to you on that"

**Better response:** "Good question. Here's the tradeoff we made and why: [explain technical decision]. The alternative would have been [other approach], but we prioritized [reason] because [technical justification]."

**Technical audiences respect depth.**

**Rule 5: Use diagrams and data**

Technical audiences think visually and quantitatively.

**Instead of saying:** "It's fast"

**Show:**

- Architecture diagram
- Performance benchmarks
- Latency charts
- Throughput metrics

**Data > claims**

**Technical Pitch Structure**

**Opening (30 seconds):** "Quick context on the problem we're solving, then I'll show you how it works"

**Architecture (60%):**

- System design
- Technical approach
- Integration points
- Performance characteristics
- Limitations and tradeoffs

**Use Cases (30%):**

- Specific technical scenarios
- Edge cases
- Scaling considerations

**Next Steps (10%):**

- Technical POC
- Documentation access
- Hands-on testing

**Lead with mechanism, not marketing.**

**Executive Audience Characteristics**

**Who they are:** C-suite, VPs, Board members, senior leadership.

**How they think:**

- Big picture, strategic
- Time-constrained
- Want bottom line fast
- Value clarity over detail
- Focused on outcomes, not mechanisms

**What they care about:**

- Business impact (revenue, cost, risk)
- Strategic alignment
- ROI and payback
- Competitive advantage
- Resource requirements

**What annoys them:**

- Technical details they don't need
- Long explanations
- Burying the lede
- No clear ask or outcome

**How to Pitch to Executive Audiences**

**Rule 1: Bottom line up front**

Executives want the answer first, details later.

**Wrong (buried lede):** "Let me walk you through our technical architecture, then explain our approach, and then I'll show you some customer examples, and after that we can discuss pricing..."

**Right (BLUF):** "Bottom line: We can reduce your customer acquisition cost by 30% within 6 months. Here's how..."

**Give them the conclusion first.**

**Rule 2: Speak in business metrics, not features**

**Wrong (feature-focused):** "We have real-time dashboards and automated workflows"

**Right (metric-focused):** "You'll ship projects 40% faster, which translates to $500K more revenue annually with your current team size"

**Everything translates to revenue, cost, or risk.**

**Rule 3: Use the "Rule of 3"**

Executives remember 3 things, not 10.

**Structure:**

"Three things matter:

1. [First key point]
2. [Second key point]
3. [Third key point]"

**Example:**

"Three reasons to move forward:

1. 30% reduction in CAC saves you $2M annually
2. Implementation in 60 days, not 6 months
3. Zero risk—we guarantee results or you don't pay"

**Three points. Maximum.**

**Rule 4: Tie to strategic priorities**

Executives think strategically. Connect your solution to their strategy.

**Wrong (tactical):** "This will make project management easier"

**Right (strategic):** "You said scaling to $50M without adding headcount is a priority. This enables that by making your current team 40% more productive—you hit growth targets without increasing overhead"

**Link to their stated goals.**

**Rule 5: Respect their time**

**Wrong:** 60-minute detailed presentation

**Right:** 15-minute executive summary with option to dive deeper

**Structure:**

- 5 minutes: Problem, solution, outcome
- 5 minutes: Proof (customer results, ROI data)
- 5 minutes: Next steps and decision

**If they want more detail, they'll ask.**

**Executive Pitch Structure**

**Opening (10%):** Bottom line: What you're proposing and key benefit

**Business Case (40%):**

- Financial impact (revenue, cost, ROI)
- Strategic value
- Risk mitigation

**Proof (30%):**

- Customer results
- Data/metrics
- Market validation

**Decision (20%):**

- Clear ask
- Next steps
- Timeline

**Lead with impact, support with proof.**

**Mixed Audience Strategy**

**When presenting to both technical and executive stakeholders:**

**Approach 1: Modular pitch**

"I'll spend 5 minutes on business impact for everyone, then dive into technical architecture for 10 minutes for the technical team. Sound good?"

This sets expectations and gives executives permission to tune out during technical deep-dive.

**Approach 2: Two-pass approach**

- Pass 1 (10 minutes): Executive summary for everyone
- Pass 2 (20 minutes): Technical deep-dive for those who want it

Executives can leave after Pass 1. Technical team stays for Pass 2.

**Approach 3: Parallel decks**

Prepare two versions:

- Executive deck: 10 slides, business-focused
- Technical deck: 30 slides, architecture-focused

Use executive deck in main meeting. Share technical deck with engineering team separately.

**Adaptation Checklist**

**For Technical Audiences:**

- Lead with architecture, not benefits
- Be technically precise
- Use diagrams and data
- Address limitations honestly
- Welcome technical questions
- Offer hands-on testing

**For Executive Audiences:**

- Bottom line up front
- Speak in business metrics
- Use "Rule of 3"
- Tie to strategic priorities
- Respect their time (15 min max)
- Clear ask and next steps

**Same value prop. Different emphasis.**

#### LESSON 3: Investor vs Customer Pitches

Investors and customers ask fundamentally different questions.

Confusing the two contexts kills both deals.

Here's how to pitch each.

**Investor vs Customer: The Key Difference**

**Customer asks:** "Does this solve MY problem?"

**Investor asks:** "Is this a BIG market opportunity?"

**These are different questions requiring different pitches.**

**Customer Pitch Focus**

**What customers care about:**

1. Their specific problem: "Do you understand my pain?"
2. Your specific solution: "Can you solve it for me?"
3. Proof it works: "Has this worked for companies like mine?"
4. Implementation: "How hard is this to implement?"
5. Risk: "What if it doesn't work?"

**Customer pitch is narrow and deep.**

**How to Pitch to Customers**

**Structure:**

**Problem (30%):** Their specific pain point with details

**Solution (40%):** How you solve it for them specifically

**Proof (20%):** Customer stories from similar companies

**Next Steps (10%):** Clear path to value (trial, POC, implementation)

**Example Customer Pitch (SaaS to VP Sales):**

"Your sales team is spending 15 hours per week on manual forecasting, and you're still missing targets by 30% because you can't see which deals are actually going to close.

We automate forecasting by analyzing your CRM data, email patterns, and deal velocity to predict close probability with 90% accuracy. Your team spends zero hours on forecasting, and you have reliable numbers for planning.

Companies like yours—50-200 person SaaS businesses—typically see forecast accuracy improve from 60% to 90% within 90 days. Here's how three of your competitors implemented this in under 60 days.

Next step: 14-day trial where you see your actual forecasts side-by-side with our predictions. If we're not more accurate, you pay nothing."

**Focus: Their problem, your solution for them, proof from peers, easy next step.**

**Investor Pitch Focus**

**What investors care about:**

1. Market size: "Is this a big opportunity?"
2. Market timing: "Why now?"
3. Competitive advantage: "Why will you win?"
4. Business model: "How do you make money?"
5. Team: "Can this team execute?"
6. Traction: "Is this working?"
7. Use of capital: "What will you do with the money?"

**Investor pitch is broad and strategic.**

**How to Pitch to Investors**

**Structure:**

**Problem/Opportunity (15%):** Big market problem affecting many companies

**Solution (15%):** Your unique approach to solving it

**Market Size (15%):** TAM, SAM, SOM—how big is this?

**Business Model (10%):** How you make money and unit economics

**Traction (20%):** What's working (customers, revenue, growth)

**Competitive Advantage (10%):** Why you win vs. alternatives

**Team (10%):** Why you're the right team to build this

**Ask (5%):** How much you're raising and use of capital

**Example Investor Pitch (Same SaaS company):**

"Sales forecasting is broken. $50B is spent annually on CRM systems, but 73% of companies still miss their forecasts by more than 20%. This creates massive operational problems—wrong hiring decisions, missed growth targets, surprised boards.

We've built AI that predicts deal close probability with 90% accuracy by analyzing CRM data, email patterns, and behavioral signals. Unlike manual forecasting or basic CRM reports, our predictions improve over time as we learn each company's unique patterns.

This is a $5B market growing at 25% annually as more companies adopt predictive analytics. Our TAM is 50,000 mid-market SaaS companies, each spending $30K-$100K annually on sales tools.

We charge $30K annually per company and have 80% gross margins. Current CAC is $8K with 3.75:1 LTV:CAC. Payback period is 8 months.

We've grown from 0 to 50 customers in 18 months, currently at $1.5M ARR growing 20% MoM. NRR is 130% showing strong retention and expansion.

We'll win because we're the only platform purpose-built for mid-market SaaS forecasting—enterprise tools are too complex, simple tools aren't accurate enough. Our data advantage compounds as we add customers.

Our team: I built and sold a sales automation company to Salesforce. My co-founder led ML at [company]. Combined we've built three products to $10M+ ARR.

We're raising $3M to scale GTM—hire 3 AEs, expand marketing, and reach $10M ARR in 24 months.

**Focus: Big market, big opportunity, why you win, traction proving it works.**

**Key Differences Summarized**

**Customer Pitch:**

- Specific problem leads to specific solution
- "Does this work for ME?"
- Narrow and deep
- Proof from similar customers
- Low-risk next step

**Investor Pitch:**

- Big problem leads to big opportunity
- "Is this a big market?"
- Broad and strategic
- Proof of market traction
- Use of capital

**Common Mistakes**

**Mistake 1: Using investor pitch with customers**

**Wrong:** "This is a $5B market opportunity growing 25% annually..."

**Customer thinks:** "I don't care about the market. Does this solve MY problem?"

**Customers don't invest in your TAM.**

**Mistake 2: Using customer pitch with investors**

**Wrong:** "We help companies like yours forecast better..."

**Investor thinks:** "How big is this opportunity? Can this be a billion-dollar company?"

**Investors don't buy your product.**

**Mistake 3: Pitching features to investors**

**Wrong:** "We have real-time dashboards, automated workflows, mobile access..."

**Investor thinks:** "So? What's the business model? How big can this get?"

**Investors care about business model, not features.**

**Mistake 4: Pitching TAM to customers**

**Wrong:** "We're going after a $5B market..."

**Customer thinks:** "Great, but does your product work?"

**Customers want proof for them, not market stats.**

**When Contexts Overlap**

**Sometimes investors are also potential customers.**

**Example:** VC who might invest AND use your product.

**How to handle:**

1. Ask which hat they're wearing: "Are you evaluating this as a potential investor or as a user for your portfolio companies?"
2. If both: Start with customer value (30 seconds), then expand to investor opportunity.

"For your portfolio companies, this solves [customer problem]. As an investor, you're seeing that this problem affects 50,000 companies in a $5B market..."

**Start narrow, then zoom out.**

**Pitch Adaptation Framework**

**For every pitch, answer:**

1. Who is the audience? Customer, investor, partner, press, recruits?
2. What do they care about? Personal pain, market opportunity, strategic fit?
3. What evidence matters to them? Customer stories, traction data, technical validation?
4. What's the decision they're making? Buy, invest, partner, join, cover?
5. What's the appropriate next step? Trial, term sheet, partnership discussion, interview?

**Adapt every dimension to the audience.**
