Episode 75: Lessons And Benefits Of Pitching Your Toy Ideas At The TCA Virtual Toy Pitch Event
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The first ever Toy Creators Academy virtual pitch event concluded at the end of May 2021. Over a dozen toy companies, reviewed dozens of product pitches in 2 weeks of speed-dating style toy and entertainment pitch meetings. The toy companies that attended this pitch event were connected with new toy entrepreneurs and toy inventors in the toy space, and the students and alumni of Toy Creators Academy who pitched were able to jumpstart their toy network. If you are curious about the TCA Virtual Pitch event, and are considering attending the next one, listen to this episode to find out more about who the event is for and what is required to be eligible to apply for this incredible opportunity. If you are a toy entrepreneur, toy inventor, or one in the making this new virtual pitch event is one you won’t want to miss out on!
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Toy and entertainment companies interested in attending to review pitches, please contact Azhelle at info@thetoycoach.com
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Azhelle W: [00:00:00] You are listening to Making It In The Toy Industry episode number 75.
Well, hey there toy people Azhelle Wade here and welcome back to another episode of The Toy Coach Podcast, Making It In The Toy Industry. This is a weekly podcast brought to you by thetoycoach.com. Well, today's episode is a very special episode because we are going to be recapping the recent TCA virtual pitch event.
Now that stands for Toy Creators Academy virtual pitch event, which wrapped up last week. Now, what is the Toy Creators Academy virtual pitch event you might ask if you haven't been following along with me on social media. Well, it is a special application only pitch event that is exclusive for toy creators, academy, students and alumni.
What started as a passing thought from a friend of mine in the toy industry. David, thanks, David. This idea actually morphed into what became a jam packed two weeks of dozens of speed dating style pitch meetings between toy companies, distributors, publishers, and my students. And I'm telling you, you won't believe who came out for this event.
Honestly, I curated, planned, created reels about and booked this entire event. And even I am still blown away by all those who attended. And I thank you all so much. Well, we had over a dozen kids product and media companies, including well-known distributor publisher services, Inc toy manufacturers like Hasbro and as well as publishers and show developers. And all of these people were interested in hearing toy invention, pitches, toy, product pitches, meeting new entrepreneurs, or even hearing about new up and coming IPS that my students were creating. Now as an extra bonus for my Toy Creators Academy students, Dave Harris, head of investor relations at Mattel helped kick off the second week of this event with a mini master class on being a professional toy inventor during Dave's talk.
My students asked really fantastic questions like. What top three things make you say yes to a new toy invention. What should we say during our outreach to companies and how do we show up as a professional inventor in the space? And Dave answered all of these questions and so many more fabulously.
So thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Dave. If you're listening to this. Now for today's episode, I want to give you an overview of what happened during the Toy Creators Academy virtual pitch event. I love to share what the event is, you know, and what I hope it will be the benefits of attending the event from the toy company side to the student side.
I'll share why I decided to put on this event in the first place, what the application process looked like what the pitch process looks like in this event. And I'm even going to share some big takeaways and lessons that I identified. Watching my students pitch. And most importantly, we're going to end the show with how you can get involved in the very next pitch event, whether you're a toy company seeking new ideas from new inventors to the industry, or if you are a toy creator looking to expand your toy network and improve your pitching skills.
Okay. So, are you ready for all of that learning? Okay. Let's dive in now, first up, we've got to talk about what the virtual pitch event is. So the 2021 Toy Creators Academy virtual pitch event was two weeks of speed dating style pitch meetings between toy manufacturers, distributors, publishers, and developers between them and the toy inventors and entrepreneurs of Toy Creators Academy.
The event was actually meant to be the final week in may, but to accommodate ever changing schedules. In this time we had a pop-up surprise week. About two weeks before the main event. This was an opportunity not only for my students to learn. To pitch, but an opportunity to grow their networks in this industry very quickly.
And I wanted to make sure to not only give this opportunity, but make sure that they were prepared for it. And that's why this was a pitch event and not just a pitch day
and speaking of why this was not just a pitch day, why it was a whole event in my mind, that back to the main benefits of the Toy Creators Academy, virtual pitch event. And honestly, why I decided to put this event on, in the first place. Now my primary motivator for putting together this virtual pitch event was to give my star students of Toy Creators Academy. The ones that show up.
Every other week to our meetings, the ones that dive into every module or print out every lesson and are really committed to building their toy business. The goal was to give them an opportunity to deliver their toy pitch to a company that is actually looking for the solution that they've been working so hard on. Now, in my course to a Creators academy, I do teach my students how to build their own toy company. Contacts, lists how to introduce themselves and how to start pitching their ideas, which are developed more thoroughly throughout the course.
But I found myself wanting to, and having the opportunity to do more for them. And that was in the way of more formal introductions. So I designed the Toy Creators Academy pitch event to help motivate my students, to keep up with the modules of the program, to really develop their ideas and to focus on their pitch materials so that they could be ready to apply for the TCA virtual pitch event.
And hopefully ultimately pitch. So you might be thinking, what do I call a star student? How do I know if I'm going to be a star student? If I apply to the virtual pitch event, how do I know if I'll be chosen? Well, a star student, like I said, is the person who dives into every single module, every lesson, and really is looking to improve their product and improve their pitch before they put it out, there is the person that's willing to. Invest time and invest resources and willing to know that they don't know everything that there's always more to learn. And there's always more that you can apply to make your product or your pitch better. Now I know what your next question is. What did the application process look like? How hard was it? How difficult were you Azhelle on your students when they wanted to apply? Well, let me tell you this. All of the students and alumni of toy creator's academy were invited to apply and submit as many concepts as they believed would be an ideal fit for the toy companies who were scheduled to attend. So they did have some visibility as to what companies were already confirmed to be there. What companies I was still working on getting to attend the show. And I did that so that they knew what. They should be aiming for, with the items that they were submitting. And in my application process, submissions needed to include the specific materials that I teach are required to pitch inside of my course Toy Creators Academy. So that includes your sizzle video. That includes the proof of concept prototype and your PowerPoint pitch deck. Now there was, there were of course questions. I'm sure you're thinking what that sounds like a lot. Now. Of course there were questions. They had the course on their side, but we still had our group coaching calls to go through. Now once their applications were in, I sat down and took the time to review dozens of applications and decide if they were ready to pitch or still needed work. Now, the beautiful part of this process, in my opinion, is that the applications weren't cold because. Since these are my students. Having worked with them for months already inside of toy craters academy.
I knew them. So I knew their work ethic, their passion, their abilities. And so I could judge their application with consideration to who they were as toy inventors. How far they've come with their products, how far they'd come with their ideas and how far I think they could realistically go before our scheduled pitch meetings.
Now, once I said, okay, this person is accepted. I flipped their application to accepted. The beauty of the program really begins. That's when the ongoing one-on-one support really began for my students. So as they were refining their pitches for their individual items, working out the kinks, we communicated.
Four weeks. One-on-one refining messaging, clarifying copy reworking videos to make their pitches as clear and concise as possible. And if you know me at all, you know, my standards and my quality standards are pretty high. If you're a student of mine, you know this well. So we had quite a bit of back and forth, but I have to say those high standards were met with much appreciation, as many of the attendees of the TCA virtual pitch event.
The companies being pitched to really complemented my students on the preparedness. Of their pitches, the quality of their videos, which honestly made me, I feel super, super proud. I really want to dive into what that pitch process looked like, because the really cool part about the Toy Creators Academy, virtual pitch event, the most exhausting part for me, but the coolest part of your, one of my students is that I was really able to be your coach throughout the entire process. So if you're a student listening and you participated in the pitch event, you already know this, and you're probably smiling to yourself right now, or shaking your head thinking.
I don't know how she had the time to do this, but I was there. With them, helping them refine their pitches, really perfecting those sizzle videos, really refining that copy, you know, making sure that they were right, but then also in the meeting with them, keeping things on track for the toy company, but making sure they're getting the right questions answered.
Now that we're talking about the pitch, I would love to share a little bit more about what that pitch process looked like. So my students. Did all of their pitches over zoom. And I, of course encouraged sizzle videos first, wherever they were appropriate and help guide the pitch were needed. But the absolute coolest part of being in the TCA virtual pitch event for my students is that if you are attending, I really act as your coach throughout that entire pitch. So I know if my students are listening, if you're one of my students and you would did the event, you're listening, you're probably smiling right now or shaking your head, wondering how I had time to do it all.
So what I noticed a lot, and I'm sure if you've ever pitched to a toy company before this has happened to you, or if you've ever pitched for anything before. You get into this state when you're pitching, where you're just go, go, go all adrenaline. And then next thing you know, the pitches over, you're getting feedback, but you're barely holding onto it.
And what's really helpful in those times is to have somebody that's taking in that feedback for you, someone that's hearing what they're saying and formulating the questions you need to be asking, but may not think to ask because you're still in pitch mode. You're not really digesting the responses to what you've just shown them.
It was really fantastic is I was able to help them pitch and help them ask questions that you forget to ask when you're in the middle of pitching nerves are getting the best of you and you're nodding along to what the feedback is, but nothing is really sitting in your head. Right? So I'm there.
Now for the toy companies attending, I have a feeling that their favorite part of having me a part of that pitch process is just to keep things on schedule. I was tracking the clock, making sure that we moved on when we needed to.
Keeping the topic of discussion pitch focused when it went a little too far off track, making sure that we stayed focused on what our end game was and that allowed us to get through more pitches in less time and actually hold the attention of the people we're pitching to throughout the entire event.
Okay. So let's get into some takeaways. There were a lot of valuable takeaways from this event that if you are pitching your ideas right now, I'm sure you can apply these takeaways to your own pitches. Now the takeaways are really going to vary. On who you're meeting with. So some takeaways might not apply if you're meeting with a toy company versus meeting with a distributor or a show developer, but we'll specify which takeaway goes with which.
when you're meeting with a toy company, the number one thing I want you doing is researching who you're pitching to and tailoring your pitch for them. Now the reason behind this, I know you may feel like you don't want to spend too much time on any one idea, because I always say we're going for quantity of ideas so we can get one landed.
But when you're just starting to build these connections, it's important that you show up as a pro you show up as someone that's going to bring them quality ideas. So you want to show up as someone who's paying attention to what the specific person and company that you're meeting with, what their specific needs are.
So now when you do your research, don't forget that you're also going to be talking to an individual. So as much as you're going to research the specific toy company, you also should do some research on the individual. Now let's not get creepy here, but do some homework on LinkedIn and find that person that you're pitching to look at where they've worked previously to get some idea of where their head might be in the toy industry.
An example of this is if you see somebody is constantly working for retailers, Over standalone toy manufacturers. You know, they're going to be much more focused on things like price point and packaging size, right? If you see someone has a lot of experience working for toy companies that sell a lot of mass market goods, maybe much bigger toy companies, you know, that the themes.
Of product that they are going to be more drawn to are going to be themes that will be more accepted by a mass market, less niche. And now researching the company, you want to look at their best selling items. You want to look at what themes, age, grades, or categories seem to be working the best for them right now, and tailor that invention of yours or that product pitch of yours in a way that you position it. So it appears that it will be able to help them continue that growth in that category or in that age range or within that theme that they're already growing in.
Now, if you are meeting with a distributor, you want to find out where they already are getting products placed and pay attention to the retail price point and the box size of items that are similar to the category of product that you're presenting. Now, some of the best student pitches and connections that happened between distributors.
Were when my students actually showed what it would be like to have their products on shelves or students that shared images of their warehouse, palliative product to say we are ready to ship. And both of these images are authority building images, they're images that are helping instill vision. Instead of saying something saying that you should be in Walmart, or instead of saying that you can ship your goods, it's always great. If you can accent it by showing them in your pitch.
Okay. Now, what if you're meeting with a publisher or a show developer, I want you to make sure you come prepared to walk them verbally through your entire pitch with a PowerPoint. Your sizzle video, isn't going to do all the talking in this situation. So you'll really need to know your characters. You really need to know their world and be able to walk the person that you're pitching to through that world in specific detail so that they can imagine it coming to life in a book or on a screen.
Okay. So those are specific takeaways for if you're pitching to a toy company or distributor or a publisher, but there are some takeaways from this event that I know you can apply.
Overall, you can apply these regardless of who you're pitching to in almost any pitch scenario. And the first one of these takeaways that you can apply to any pitch scenario is to know when to stop selling. Now I know hearing no to your idea is the hardest moment in a pitch. And when you hear no, your instinct may be to explain all the reasons why you believe in your product.
But that is the last thing you want to do when you hear a no. Instead when you do that, you come off as someone who won't take no for an answer, a Harding salesman who just doesn't hear no and only hears not right now. So when you hear a no, instead of trying to explain why you made the design choices that you made for your toy or your game product instead, thank them for their time and use it as an opportunity to ask them what they are looking for. Throw your idea out of your mind in that moment, once they say no.
Okay. That's not it move on to the future and ask them, what are they looking for? And when could you potentially pitch something completely new to them in the future, you want a future pace, remove yourself from that idea as quickly and as far as you can and hold onto this relationship, because that is what is really important in the pitch.
But you want to know what the second hardest moment in a pitch is the second moment when you really want to stop selling. And that's when you actually hear yes. Hearing a yes. Can just as easily toss you into an unexpected frenzy of what do I do next, having your idea complimented. May not be the norm because we know in this business, you, you pitch it, you pitch it.
Everyone says no until finally you get a yes. So you get this guest and you might find yourself living in that compliment and just verbally expanding on it for a little bit too long. So I want you to try your best, not to do this just because the dairy company likes your idea. And once you to send over your sizzle video and your one sheet that does not mean that they want to hear the step-by-step process of how you came up with every rule in the game.
So just relax, thank them for their time. Tell them that you'll follow up and exit gracefully. The next takeaway from the pitch event is that proof of concept is still extremely important. What does someone mean when they say proof of concept? Proof of concept can be misconstrued to some, to prove that an idea will work once executed, but proof of concept into toy pitch really means that you have an idea.
Let's say to combine two mechanisms into a plush. That's your idea. Proof of concept is actually combining those mechanisms. Into that plush and having it function close to the way that you want it to function. Proof of concept is not showing those two mechanisms separate from the plush and showing how they both can function separately so they can easily be put together inside of the plush.
Now, there are some toy companies that differ in this regard, and that really is going to depend on how desperate the company is for innovation. How big their development team is. And how open they are to just making new deals with new inventors, but if you want to have the highest chance for success for your idea, you should really create that complete proof of concept where you've combined two mechanisms into a plush, and you're showing that it functions, even if that function isn't 100%. The next takeaway from the pitch event is, oh my goodness. Everyone. Check your internet. Speed then this one is for all of us, a slow internet connection is really going to kill the experience of your sizzle video. So be ready with a shareable link, if you need to so that you can share that link live in the meeting and have the other person on the other end, watch it on their own screen.
But aside from having that sizzle video link, ready, check your internet connection way before you get to the pitch meeting. Granted you'll still be able to see what's going on. Even if the sizzle video is coming out a little stop motion animation because of a low internet connection, but we have all got to upgrade our internet game. If we're going to continue to do virtual pitches, that is definitely a lesson learned from the virtual pitch event.
Now the final takeaway I want to share with you today is one that puts a huge smile on my face. And this was a big win for, I believe, three students who really made an effort in revamping their backgrounds that would show up on their zoom call. And I said time and time again, that I don't love virtual backgrounds. So these students really took it upon themselves to organize a nice decorative shelf or organize some photos to put in their background and guess what it paid off. During awkward moments where share screen wasn't working or hesitations of a video playing their backgrounds, jumped in to save the day and started conversation with the toy company exec on the other side, without any effort. From the inventor pitching. And I always say our backgrounds are a reflection of us professionally and personally, and they are a great opportunity to start conversation.
And I saw that happen in real time during this pitch event. So I do want to tell you, if you are planning to pitch via zoom, do not discount the power of your background to make a good impression and form a little bit of a relationship with a person that you're pitching to.
Now at this point, I know you must be wondering, when is the next virtual pitch event? Azhelle? How can I get involved? Well, the next Toy Creators Academy virtual pitch event will be in January of 2022. So if you are a toy company or if you are an aspiring toy creator, I would absolutely love to have you attend.
Now here's how you can get involved. If you are a toy company interested in joining me at the next event, just send me an email over info@thetoycoach.com, but I will be doing my own outreach to invite some of you who I've already spoken with to the next event directly. So please be patient I'm just setting up a page to intake all of your information.
Now if you are an aspiring toy inventor or toy entrepreneur, you've got to get on The Toy Creators Academy, wait list in order to be eligible to pitch at this event. Now to do that, all you have to do is head over to toycreatorsacademy.com. Join the wait list and you will be notified when it is time for the next class of toy creators to walk the 12 week course with me and develop their ideas, where you can develop your ideas, using my techniques and strategies and develop your pitch.
Using my templates and guides. And now I'm going to do something that I don't often do anymore, but I'm going to give you guys a preview into next week's episode. Next week's episode, we are going to be interviewing. Students from toy craters academy, virtual pitch event, and the students are going to share some of their stories and insights and struggles from being a part of this pitch event. I really think you're going to enjoy next week's episode, especially if you enjoyed this one, it's going to be a treat I hope to see you there.
So let's wrap up today's episode with a listener spotlight. Today's listener. Spotlight comes from Swirly Girl. Swirly girl says “Azhelle is informative and insightful about all things toy. She is so very generous to share this amazing content. She really gets inside the heads of toy industry professionals. I just finished episode number 67 and loved the insightful content on what to keep in mind when pitching new ideas to toy manufacturers. And what they're looking for.”
Thank you so much for that awesome reviews Swirly Girl. Now if you are like Swirly Girl and you love this podcast, but you haven't already left a review. What are you waiting for? Head over to apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts, leave me a review, write a review and maybe you'll end up at the end of my next episode. As always, it means so much that you've joined me here today. I know there are a ton of podcasts out there, so it means the world to me that you tune into this one until next week, I'll see you later toy people.
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🎓Learn more about how you can develop and pitch your toy idea with Toy Creators Academy® by clicking here to visit toycreatorsacademy.com and join the waitlist.