Creating A 5-Minute Kickass Hackathon Pitch
How to wow the judging panel with a winning hackathon idea under 5 minutes
Written by: Megan Yulga, Senior Marketing Manager — Brand & Campaigns
Hackathons are a whirlwind of emotions. The first few times I participated, my teams went through an unnecessary rollercoaster of doom and gloom.
Many of you who’ve hacked it out before can probably relate to the following:
Excitement
The hackathon date is set and we are picking teams, imagining the prize money in our bank accounts and playfully bantering with other teams. We are pumped!
Nerves
It’s the week of the hackathon and all the team has accomplished was shit-talking to other teams. We haven’t met up beforehand and actually don’t have a project idea planned yet.
Panic
It’s the first day and we’re doing a crappy job of making sure everyone’s ideas are being heard in our brainstorm. The arguments are starting as we realize we don’t actually have our shit together. People are getting offended. We are going around in circles and not moving forward with an idea.
Frustration
It’s deep in day two. We begrudgingly selected an idea that not everybody believes in and are now stuck in an argument loop regarding tiny details that we won’t end up presenting on.
Surrender
We’ve finally resigned from our passionate debates and moved onto the presentation, which we are cramming into the last 10% of the time we have left.
Relief
Our presentation ended and we are just happy to get through it without completely embarrassing ourselves.
None of the above is necessary.
I’ve created a magic checklist over the years to streamline the creative process with a great presentation for an output. This of course doesn’t stop the rollercoaster ride, but it greatly reduces the panic by putting the process through a framework which moves your team forward with a lot more fun.
You’ll also wow the judges with a kickass presentation!
Spend 80% of your time on your presentation deck.
The entire hackathon should be spent on the slide deck. You are judged only on the 5 or so minutes that you present.
Anything that is not in the presentation is pointless to think about or consider. This will save your team hours in debates.
Here’s my magic checklist to help you structure your team activities in creating a winning presentation.
ꗃ Deciding your idea (10% of prep time):
Meet once before the hackathon starts. Use this time to select your idea ahead of time. Pick 2 ideas that your team would be comfortable iterating out further.
ꗃ Bounce your ideas off a stakeholder:
Judges or company leaders usually make rounds during the hackathon to speak with teams. Use this time to bounce your 2 ideas off them. They have a lot of context after speaking with other teams. You will get a lot of information regarding how they think based on the types of questions they ask you regarding the idea.
You don’t need to know the answers right then, but you’ll be able to respond to them in your presentation.
ꗃ Presentation Slides & Demo (80% of prep time):
DON’T waste time talking about idea feasibility and executional details.
DO detail your presentation outline first, then delegate the different tasks such as demo creation and each slide’s talking points to team members.
This is what you should zero in on — in 6 slides.
#1 Intro (presented in 30 seconds):
Use this time to introduce your team members and welcome the audience. You’ll always get kudos for focusing on each member individually, especially if you have some sitting in another country.
#2 Problem statement (presented in 30 seconds) :
What problem did you identify that is ripe for solving? How big is the problem?
#3 Impact (presented in 30 seconds):
How could solving the problem add to the business? What company objectives are you going to address and achieve?
#4 Product (presented in 1 minute):
Introduce your product. What unique selling point (USP) does it address?
Boil it down to a simple statement and highlight 3 key features or less.
#5 Demo (presented in 2 minutes):
In the interest of time, use visualization tools like Invision to mock up the design, user journey, USP and 1–3 key features for the presentation.
Of course, if a hackathon (such as ours) calls for a working prototype, then make sure you work closely with your developers on this.
Since you only have 2 minutes to show off your product and idea, don’t sweat the small stuff. There is no need to stress over the details that nobody sees when you don’t need to. This also reduces the likelihood of technical difficulties, which eats up your valuable presentation time on pitch day.
#6 Wrap up (presented in 30 seconds):
Use this slide to re-emphasize impact to company, product market fit and key USP of your product.
That’s it! You only need 6 slides. When you break it down this way, you can see how fast creating takes —giving you more time to channel your efforts towards the presentation and demo creation.
ꗃ Presenter:
Select 1 person in the team to deliver the presentation. As wonderful as it sounds to get all people involved in presenting your idea, you’re not doing yourself any favors.
Find 1 confident person who dedicates their time to learning the idea and practicing the pitch while the rest of you create the presentation deck and demo. Your presentation will be more streamlined and seamless.
ꗃ Q&A prep (10% of prep time):
There is going to be SO much that you can’t squeeze into the slide deck.
That’s okay.
You’ll notice above that I don’t have a slide on feasibility or tech implementation. Those are things that you 100% should think about, have answers for and prepare to respond to in the Q&A portion after your presentation.
My magic tip here is to list out all the questions you aren’t addressing in the presentation and create backup slides. You can whiz to these slides if asked in the Q&A to show that you’re prepared and have done your homework.
This is the time when everybody gets to jump in. Break up categories of questions and divvy them up amongst your team’s experts. Have each person think through answers to their topics and create backup slides to address the key topics.
Spend an hour or two doing a round table spitfire practice with everybody throwing out questions and working through responses as a unified team. That way, everybody can jump in if things are missed during the pitch.
Some questions to prepare for:
- Feasibility of implementing your idea within legacy infrastructure
- Costs & Timelines
- Metrics to gauge success
- Competitor research
- Product Market Fit Analysis
- Partner integrations if required
…And so much more, depending on your idea’s context!
Creating your idea and presentation doesn’t have to be a battlefield of drama and emotions. Organize your thoughts, stay structured and focus only on the areas people will see.
It will open your team up to a lot more fun and spread participation to everyone in the group.
Happy hacking!
About the author: Megan, Senior Marketing Manager — Brand & Campaigns, is a super hackathon enthusiast. Most recently, her team clinched the TOP PRIZE in our 2019 internal hackathon against 20 other teams! Coming up tops against so many groups is no mean feat — if we were you, we’d be following her golden rules to ensure a stress-free (virtual) presentation.
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