5 Principles of Successfully Pitching Startup Investors

Ryan Law

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Published in

The SaaS Growth Blog

4 min readAug 31, 2017

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This is part four of my reaaaally big nine-part series, exploring every imaginable aspect of startup funding. From funding rounds to valuation methodologies, get ready for a complete crash-course in funding.

Click to read all nine parts as a complete post, or download as a PDF.

Your startup needs funding.

To secure it, you need to stand-out from the hundreds of other startups that also need funding, and convince investors that you aren’t destined to fall into the 90% of newly-founded companies that eventually fail.

But big-name angels and VCs find themselves overwhelmed with investment opportunities. You’ll need to convince associates and analysts before you reach the decision makers. Even then, you’ll have a matter of minutes to make them fall in love with your company and open their chequebook.

To help separate the donkeys from the unicorns, most investors rely on a simple tool: the pitch deck. This short slide presentation is designed to convince potential investors that your startup represents an unmissable opportunity.

PRINCIPLES OF PITCHING

It’s important to remember the driving force behind your presentation: you’re not telling your life’s story, or providing a blow-by-blow account of every customer you’ve ever closed. Instead, your only objective is to stimulate enough interest to secure a second meeting.

The principles of great presentations are pretty universal, but there are a few fundraising-specific best practices that should be incorporated into your pitch:

1) KEEP IT SHORT, SWEET AND SIMPLE

Data from DocSend found that investors spend an average of just 3 minutes and 44 seconds viewing your perfectly crafted pitch deck. That means brevity is critical: stick to one idea per slide, and between 10 and 30 slides in total (the average deck in DocSend’s study was 19.2 pages long).

2) LESS TELLING, MORE SHOWING

This means using less wordy copy, and more diagrams and visualisation; less conjecture and more data. Stick to big font sizes and simple concepts, and be prepared to add context and clarity when asked.

3) BE HONEST

Your startup isn’t perfect, and investors know that. Instead of whitewashing your success, be honest about your strengths and weaknesses. Steer into areas that need work and frame them in your own terms, and double-down on the areas where you excel.

4) IF YOU FOCUS ON FINANCES, MAKE THEM INSCRUTABLE

Only 57% of the decks studied actually included a finances slide, but for those that did, it was their most scrutinised slide. If you’re going to brave it, make sure your numbers make sense (and don’t talk about exponential growth rates with only a few months of data).

5) SELL YOUR PEOPLE, NOT JUST AN IDEA

Angels and VCs invest in people: they want to know they’ll be funding highly-skilled, deeply-committed founders, and your presentation needs to sell your team as much as it does your product. With that in mind, it’s a great idea to have 2–3 people in attendance, and involve them equally in the pitch.

10 SLIDES TO INCLUDE IN YOUR PITCH DECK

True to the spirit of creating a pitch deck, we’re going to wrap up the writing in favour of some showing.

I’ve analysed the best pitch decks available, from companies like Buffer and Mixpanel, and pulled out a simple, universal framework that crops-up again and again. Using these 10 slides as a starting point for your own pitch deck will help you learn from the multi-million dollar successes of the world’s brightest startups, and maximise your chances of securing that much-needed second meeting.

(It’s also a great idea to check out those successful pitch decks in full: they’re linked to below).

Get the deck: 10 Essential Slides to Include in Your Startup Pitch Deck