As you begin your startup journey, you’ll hear lots of chatter regarding pitch decks. People will constantly be asking for your pitch deck and just as often, if not more, you should be asking if you can share yours.

What is a pitch deck? How can a pitch deck make or break investment opportunities?

A pitch deck is a vital document for your company. It describes the problem you’re solving, your product and solution, and your company’s operations. Often, the purpose of these decks is to raise money from investors. However, there is a misconception that a pitch deck is only necessary when pitching to investors or raising funds. I argue that founders should also think of pitch decks as a concise, shared document that can be used to understand the fundamentals of a business, while also appealing to investors. A pitch deck is akin to the blueprint of your business and should be treated as a sacred document. While every person seems to have their own opinion on these decks, there are a few fundamental pieces to account for to improve your chances of creating a document that investors and others alike can use to understand your product, and see the value in you and your business.

What are the essential slides for a successful pitch deck?

A typical pitch deck has between 12 to 15 slides. Different VCs, pitch competitions, and accelerators might have different requirements but below are 13 slides that you should have, and three optional slides to include to strengthen your narrative. I've included some details and tips and tricks to help you create a quality deck.

Title

• Include your company name, logo, and slogan

• This would also be a good place to add mockups of your product, if you have them

Problem

• Describe the problem your company/product is solving

• Start with the general, high-level problem that your customer is facing

• Include how customers are currently solving the problem and why it is not a sufficient solution

• Include the magnitude and scale of the problem

• If you are creating a new category in the market or creating a product in a space where customers don't know that they have a problem, it is imperative to convey the message in a manner that shows how current solutions are outdated and that there needs to be a better way of doing something

• This is a great place to add stats to highlight and validate the problem you are describing

Solution

• This is where you need to show the novel solution you've created to address the problem from the previous slide

• Have a catchy and clear tagline that describes what the optimal solution is

• Have a few words describing what your product is and how it solves the problem you outlined

• Describe the solution/product's unique value proposition and describe its impact on the consumer

  • For example, how much time or money will your product/company save the customer

• Try to indirectly answer these following questions in your solution slide:

  • Will the customer rest better at night after using this solution (B2C)?

  • Will the customer's quality of life improve after using this solution (B2C)?

  • Will a business increase their revenue after using your product (B2B)?

  • How will a business become more efficient after using your product (B2B)?

• Don’t spend too much time describing your product here, that’s what your product slide will be for

Product

• Describe what your product is and what it does

• Include descriptions about product lines and their main features

• Mention any IP you have and any unique technology or processes you and your company possess

• This is the perfect place to emphasize your USP (unique selling point)

• This can also be a great time to highlight the user journey, especially in cases when the journey is complicated

• Do include pictures of your product, if you have them

Market Size/Opportunity

• This is where you should calculate and showcase how large the market you're operating in is

• To highlight the market size you'll show the TAM, SAM, and SOM (how to calculate these will be covered in-depth in a future blog post)

• TAM

  • Total addressable market, also called total available market, is a term that is typically used to reference the revenue opportunity available for a product or service

• SAM

  • This represents a portion of the TAM that can be served by your company's products and services

• SOM

  • Serviceable Obtainable Market - represents the actual amount of the market that is being served by your company's products and services

• In terms of dollar amount, the TAM should be the largest, followed by the SAM and SOM

• Include information, preferably a graph or chart, on the industry’s overall growth and describes what piece of the larger market a company can address

• Often the TAM, SAM, and SOM are shown in concentric circles as seen below

  

• Many people will state that the market size slide is subjective because many people can calculate it using different assumptions. When creating the market size slide, the calculations you make and the assumptions you choose to use for calculating the market, might be different than others. However, remember that:

  You need to be able to strongly defend the numbers, calculations, and assumptions you make throughout the deck and market size slide that you need to convince the investors that there is a large market, and that you and your startup have what it takes to capture that market.

Business Model

• This slide needs to describe how your startup is actually making money

• Talk about the type of revenue model you've chosen to use

• Discuss how much money you’ll generate per user

• If you have multiple revenue streams, make sure to clearly outline each one

• This slide is best served through a visual that describes your business and pricing model. Take a look below to see a good example

Go-To-Market

• This slide describes how you will scale your business. However, sometimes just saying buzz words or general ideas like digital marketing or influencer marketing isn’t enough. Try to be more unique and intentional with your GTM strategies.

• Talk about a campaign or a strategy that will really set you apart. In this section, I usually like to break things up into four key topics:

  • Growth Strategy

    • Discuss what marketing and customer acquisition strategies you’ll leverage to continuously grow and scale

  • Marketing

    • Talk about things along the lines of your niche campaigns, innovative email marketing, your brand ambassadorship program, etc

  • Partnerships/Distribution

    • Address how your product will be distributed and how customers will be able to access your products

    • If you’ve secured any interesting and revenue boosting partnerships include it here

  • Target Customer

    • Discuss who your primary customer is and what makes them the best audience for your product

    • All the content related to partnerships/distribution, marketing, and growth need to be in alignment with your target customer

Traction

• The traction slide is used to address key achievements and milestones along with things you and your company are looking forward to in the future

• I usually like to divide this into three sections all within a single timeline:

  • Where you were

    • Prior to you raising money, what did your company look like?

    • What were some key achievements and foundational steps you took to reach those very points?

  • Where you currently are

    • What are key goals have you recently achieved as you've been fundraising?

    • What are some steps you've been taking during the time of fundraising?

  • Where you’ll be

    • What are some things you're looking forward to in the future?

    • Do you have any partnerships you're excited for?

    • Are you about to launch soon?

    • Will you be hitting any key turning points soon?

  • This entire slide can be formatted as a timeline where you talk about notable successes, key metrics, milestones you’ve achieved, and goals you’ve set for the future. It’s important to show some kind of traction, even if you’re early stage. For example, even if you're an early stage startup, saying something like "we have 200 email subscribers" can be a positive metric/milestone to include

Competition

• This slide’s purpose is to make your product/company stand out even when compared to other options in the market

• It may seem counterintuitive to talk about your competition in a deck whose sole purpose is to highlight your company, but talking about your competition is a good way to highlight your unique selling point, relative to others

• Investors and customers are going to ask how your company/product is different from other solutions out there in the market

  • While you need to describe the competitors in the space accurately, you also need to highlight how your company/product is better

• These are two ways I like to compare a startup's value against competitors in a pitch deck:

  • Four-quadrant graph

    • Add four key traits along both sides of the x and y axis that align with the major players in the market.

    • Then plot where all the solutions (companies/products) including yours, fit in the graph

    

    • This route can be subject to some scrutiny, because plotting these startups isn’t an exact science, it can be subjective and less quantifiable

  • Feature table

    • In this table talk about 4-5 traits that all companies should have in your market in order to successfully solve the customer's unique problem.

    • Then describe how each competitor and your startup align with these traits

    • You can have the values of the rows be yes/no’s or be more detailed

      

    • Keep your company as the first row or column of the table

    • Find a way to highlight your company whether through imagery or highlighted/bolded text

    • While your company does not need to satisfy all the traits you’ve laid out, it does need to satisfy more traits than the competition

Financials

• The purpose of the financial slide is to give you a place to discuss your startup's financial health

• The financials slide is a must, even if you’re early stage and haven’t made a lot of sales

• If your startup is in its earliest of stages, then focus on just working on your showcasing your revenue projections

• If you are presenting during a pitch competition and are short on time or slides, focus on your financial projections (revenue + profit)

• If time or space on slides is not of the essence and you have more details on your startup's financial outlook, make sure to include your balance sheet, cash flow statement, and revenue and profit projections

Team

• This is where you talk about your founding/c-suite team

• Highlight a few key points about each person’s background that makes them best suited to help your company succeed

• For each person, include their title, headshot, and full name

• You can also add in some optional info, like hyperlinks that take viewers to each team member's Twitter and/or LinkedIn profiles

• You can also choose to include advisors or people who are crucial to your team even if they aren’t c-suite members

• Feel free to include logos and icons that indicate your team member’s background. For example, if someone graduated from Stanford, add in the Stanford logo next to their headshot to clear up space to write other important things in their bio

• This slide doesn’t need to be very long or wordy

• The team slide is also a good place to show some personality. Often, I personally highlight a fun fact about a team member or founder that is unique and interesting, and relates to the product but also deserves to stand on its own and be highlighted

The Ask

• Here you can let investors know exactly how much money you're looking for

• Clearly state the amount you are raising and what stage you are in

• Often, people just mention the fundraising stage they're in and the amount they're looking to raise, but in reality, you should be describing your capital allocation i.e. what percentage of funds will go towards what aspect of operations

  • Breaking down your capital allocation is helpful to align presentation viewers on the direction you and your company are headed post raise

Closing

• Wrap up your presentation here by including your company’s website and information as well as your own personal information

• Include links to your demo or other pieces you think will further enhance your presentation

Optional Slides

When accelerators, funds, and different groups have a limit on the number of slides, or you're pressed for time at a pitch competition, consider omitting the slides below. While they will help strengthen your narrative, they are not mission critical and their info can be included in other slides.

• Company Purpose

  • Set the viewers up with some context about the larger and more pressing problem your company is hoping to solve

  • Use higher level concepts when describing your purpose.

  • Think of the company purpose slide as a quick slide that is highlighting the biggest points of your mission statement

  • I would place this slide right after your title slide

• Why Now?

  • Think of this slide as almost the opposite of your problem slide

  • In your problem slide, you lay out reasons how and why this problem exists. However, in the why now slide, you need to highlight why certain changes in the market, industry, or amongst customer behavior makes now the most optimal time for your startup to succeed

  • In this slide, build out a few sub-headers regarding major themes in the current climate followed by some stats

• The Vision

  • Talk about what the broader goals for your company are

  • Include information such as:

    • Where you see the company in five, ten, or even twenty years

    • The legacy of this company/brand

  • Place this this before your ask slide

Design and aesthetic tips

Design and aesthetics should not be your biggest priority when creating your deck. However, there is a level of credibility and value that emerges from putting in effort towards creating a branded and fairly aesthetic deck. Additionally, aesthetic doesn’t always mean your deck has to be visually stunning. At the baseline, an aesthetic deck can mean that it has photos, tables, and charts, and no typos or text-heavy slides.

• Headings

  • To make things easy to follow, make sure each slide is labeled with the slide name

  • Each slide should have some type of header conveying the slide’s overall message, and optionally followed by a subtitle

  • If there are ideas that go together, make it easy to follow by creating subheadings to summarize what a group of text is about

  • Use less text and make sure that the text you do include makes things easy to follow

• Brand design

  • If your startup has developed brand guidelines try and use those guidelines in your deck

  • Easy ways to achieve this is to keep the background of your slides the lightest of the colors in your pallet

  • Keep your logo at the corner of every slide

  • Fonts should be consistent for headers, sub-headers, and paragraph text

  • Make sure that the text is visible and easy to read

  • If you don’t have brand guidelines but have a logo, try and base your deck's color schemes off of that logo

  • If you don’t have brand guidelines but have a prototype or a landing page, leverage the same font styles and graphics from the mvp/landing page in your deck

• Text versus visuals

  • If things can be conveyed through a simple image, pick the image over the text

  • Instead of describing a feature, see if you can show it through mockups and images

  • If users are frustrated, don’t just say users are frustrated, show images visualizing their level of frustration

Tailoring the pitch to the audience

Telling your story becomes even more impactful when you can find ways to fine tune it and have it resonate with the audience. For this reason, sometimes it makes sense to tweak your deck depending on who you are presenting to. Below are some reasons to update your narrative as you fundraise:

Pitching to different VCs

• You might have a leg up on other startups when pitching to certain investors if you can find ways to show alignment between your startup and the investor

• Find ways in which product relates to the company’s portfolio, background, or even mission statement

• Try and do the analysis and linking work for the investor

VCs versus angels

• Angels are sometimes willing to take more risk than VCs

• When pitching to VCs you might might benefit from tweaking your narrative to make the investment seem less risk averse, or highlight features and metrics that address risk mitigation

New fundraising round or new metrics

• Don't use the same deck from a previous fundraising round

• If you've hit a new fundraising round make sure to update the problem, product, and traction slide

• With each stage you should have more insight into the market, and thus a better and more nuanced understanding of the market problem and your product

• As you start to make big moves, make sure those metrics and KPIs are reflected and updated in your deck

Global Considerations

If you’re pitching to investors across the globe or discussing global expansion, make sure to highlight region specific considerations you and your startup/product are making. This can be an update to legal structures, tweaking marketing techniques to match a diverse and global audience, or expansion strategies that warrant international funding.

Storytelling Techniques

How to structure your narrative for maximum engagement

Julian from BaseTemplates, made a great point when he said:

Your pitch deck should have all the same elements of a good book, action, excitement, success, and failure.

• Telling a story

  • While facts and figures are important, they are not what viewers are going to remember, they will be remembering big picture ideas and topics

  • Use facts and figures as a way to shape your narrative which should start from as early as your title slide

  • Throughout the slide try to weave in a story or a personal anecdote

    • If you were personally impacted by the problem that you are trying to solve, try to plot your journey across all slides

    • Your journey needs to be relatable and easily understood by investors and the audience. On the flip side, make sure your pitch isn’t all emotion and storytelling

  • Investors also want to see that you have a practical and logical grasp of the business and industry

  • This is also another good place where you can tweak your story according to the audience you are sharing your deck with

You can shape your narrative in five ways:

• Talk about your story from the customer journey perspective

• Leverage a personal anecdote

• Utilize the common trope of the hero’s journey

• Walk through the deck with an industry perspective

• Build a story through the lens of an investor

• Share what the large vision is and work backwards on how you will achieve it

Pitfalls to avoid

Your startup is your baby. It's incredibly normal to succumb to pitfalls regarding how to shape your narrative and share your story. So many amazing founders are heavily focused on their startup that they are unable to either dedicate the time to creating a great deck or are unable to look at their startup from a 1000 ft ladder. Below I've included some common pitfalls I've seen founders fall trap to when creating their deck. Additionally, I've been fortunate enough to be sent many decks as well as attend various pitch competitions. I've included what I believe are the top things startups with bad decks do and the top 10 things starts with great decks do.

Common Pitfalls

• Grammar, clarity, conciseness

  • Make sure there are no typos and that the slides aren’t too text heavy

  • If you cannot clearly explain your product then you need to focus more on updating the narrative and product strategy in general

• Focusing too much on the product

  • This is not a deck just describing your product, your goal is to also show the value that lies within you and the market

  • Additionally, a product can be great and have amazing features, but the job of your deck is to also show why no one else can build the same thing and that consumers actually need the product/are willing to pay for it

• Not showing product market fit

  • Try and show product market fit (PMF)

  • While PMF can take awhile to develop, try and discuss customer interviews, behavioral assessments, and testimonials to show that you understand the market and that customers are actually getting value from your product

  • A true test of PMF is that your customers become your biggest champions

    • If your customers are sharing your product with their community, make sure to show that in your deck

    • If you haven't reached that stage

• Not showing a problem

  • There needs to be a clear problem you and your company are trying to solve. Without a clear problem, there is no real need for your product, and/or the consumer isn’t desperate enough for a solution. Without a pressing need for your product, investors might have a hard time giving you money

  • If you do have a clear problem, you still need to highlight what current solutions are and why they are not enough

  • Also keep in mind, a problem is not severe enough if customers are not willing to put money behind the solution

    • It is okay if the problem is not severe enough, you might be creating a brand new category. If that is the case, then you need to spend time outlining how you will overcome this obstacle and build consumer and brand awareness

• A lack of connection between problem and solution

  • You might have created a great problem slide, and you might have a great solution for that problem. However, if you don’t make a clear 1-1 connection between the product/solution and the problem at hand, then it will look like you do not truly have a grasp on the industry and that your narrative is missing the mark

• Not enough value proposition

  • You need to highlight your unique value proposition or unique selling point

  • Think about it this way, it is not enough for you to convey that there is a problem and your product solves it. There could be plenty of solutions in the market, customers might not be willing to pay for your solution, or someone else can enter the market and do what you’re doing, but better. It is imperative you highlight why you are the only solution that can do it right.

  • Try to answer these questions:

    • What advantages do you have?

    • What impact do you have on the customer?

    • What strategies have you implemented to help you stay ahead of everyone else?

• Doing too much

  • When your startup is just starting or you're still working on an MVP don’t focus on global dominance just yet

  • Focus on a target market and a specific goal

  • It is not a good sign for investors if you have multiple revenue models and channels and neither of them are working

    • Too many tracks and pathways might indicate that you as a founder and as a company lack vision, focus, and discipline

  • Start small and then scale upwards and outwards

    • Begin to scale when you start to see the fruits of your labor

    • It is not ideal to scale when you don’t have the money or customer loyalty and/or brand recognition to facilitate your growth

• Complicated business model

  • Your business model should be easy to understand and digestible

  • Complicated business models will make it harder for VCs and investors to understand how they will get their money back and will make it harder for you to ensure you keep getting money from your customers

What not so great decks had in common

• Decks were missing crucial slides like the business model or the go-to-market slide

• Not enough time was spent on deck refinement as indicated through the visuals were cut off and typos

• The presentation lacked a clear and defined problem

• The competition slide was omitted because of fears that it would highlight other products/competitors

• Saying there was no competition when in reality there were many competitors in said space

• There wasn't an adequate vision or clear direction

• There was no narrative or story to follow along to

• Slides were text heavy

• Limited stats to validate the problem and consumer behavior

• The language on the slides were too fluffy and vague causing validity concerns

• A lack of a clear and strategic plan, making people cautious about what will happen with their investment

What great decks had in common

• Slides were not text heavy

• There was a clear and enticing story

• Presenters focused on traction and actionable items

• There was clear indication that the founders researched the market and their target customer

• The team’s background and how it will aid in the growth of the company was well highlighted

• The startup showcased a clear and easy to follow business model

• Headers at the top of slides to indicate the slide’s overall message

• Put significant effort into creating a unique and successful go-to-market strategy

• The ask slide included information about capital allocation

• A consistent story was weaved through a majority of the slides

How to share your deck

When sending your deck you don’t want any technical difficulties. It is best to send your deck as a pdf. You can also use external tools to collect data on who has viewed your deck. Consider tools like Docusend to make sure you are keeping your information private, but also keeping track of who is viewing your deck. Additionally, as you grow, you’ll have more documentation like 1-pagers, cap tables, financial statements, and more that investors would like to see. When that moment arrives, think about creating a data room account and sharing that with potential investors. There you can keep all your information safe and easily sharable, including your deck.

Resources

Creating a pitch deck can be a lot of work, but it is one of the most important things you can do to help your business thrive, especially in its most early stages. Again, this deck will help everyone on your team stay aligned with the company’s visions and goals, while helping you access funding that will take your startup to the next level. Each founder and investor will have their own take on a great pitch deck, but following these tips will help you create the most optimal deck for most investors and occasions. If you’re looking for additional resources to help you with your startup, below are some great materials to start with. Also, don’t forget that Indico Consulting is always there to help you craft your deck and help you put your best foot forward in front of investors!

Helpful links:

• Pitch deck tear down

• Dropbox pitch deck

• Sequoia capital pitch deck template

• Founders Institute