As advisors to companies raising venture funds, we often review pitch decks. The pitch deck represents your compelling story attracting investors to a deeper conversation. Below, we describe best practices and provide a template for what we see in successful decks.

Best Practices

Developing an effective pitch deck is challenging for all entrepreneurs, as you must convey the right information to attract investors without overwhelming them. Most entrepreneurs don’t consider how investors will receive their stories. Venture investors review hundreds of pitch decks and do not have significant time to spend with any single one. While we detail a potential structure below, the content within the slides must be concise and accessible. Be direct and judicious in your language, only using enough words to ensure the key message. Avoid using industry acronyms or jargon that requires additional research. And be transparent with your revenue, traction, and cash burn information.

When possible, show rather than tell. Screenshots of your products, charts, and graphs are more effective than bullets on a slide.

Topics to Cover

1. Title Slide / Vision: Boil your company vision into a single sentence with your unique value proposition. This statement is your introduction to the investors and needs to explain your vision clearly. 
2. The Problem: Introduce the problem your business will solve. Why did you start the company to solve the problem? Your personal experience and pain points will resonate with the investors. 
3. Solution: Show screenshots of your product and how it is the solution to the problem detailed in Slide 2. Reiterate the value proposition from slide one and your uniqueness.
4. Why now: In addition to being the right solution, detail why your product is the right solution now and in the future. What industry trends are you at the forefront of solving?
5. Market: What are your TAM, SAM, and SOM, ensuring the market is large enough to produce venture scale gains? Use this slide to describe your ideal customer.
6. Competitive Landscape: Identify your target market’s established competitors and other startups. How do you differentiate yourself from those competitors, and does that match your value proposition?
7. Team: Why is your team the right group to solve the problem? Highlight only relevant team members and their experiences. 
8. Traction: Show your progress, focusing on metrics/financial results. If you are pre-revenue or have impressive clients, customer testimonials are valuable if they are succinct. 
9. Business Model: Describe your revenue plan and include key metrics applicable to your industry. If your industry needs to be better known to venture investors, use this chance to educate them on the metrics that show your potential success. 
10. Financials: Simple charts/graphs of revenue, net income, and cash projections. This slide may be optional depending on how repetitive it is with the Traction slide.
11. Sales Plan: This may be combined with the Business Model slide, but investors must understand that you know how to identify your target market and sell to them.
12. Fundraising Details: Describe how much you want to raise, the terms, and any funds committed to the round. Also, quickly describe how your company will deploy its funds.
13. Questions: Provide contact details, including name, title, phone, and email so that investors can get back in touch with your team.

Appendix: If you have additional information, include it in the appendix but be aware of the slide count. We often open pitch decks and see 40+ slides. Simply seeing a large number of slides, even with most in the appendix, may cause an investor to spend less time on your deck.

Summary

While the best practices should be consistent across pitch decks, the depth of the slides will vary greatly based on industry, company size, and company maturity. If you are in the earlier stages, spend more time describing your solution and how you plan to target that market, as your traction and financial statements will have less history. If you are more established, focus on the traction gained to date and how the investors’ funds will accelerate your growth.

Ready to make your pitch deck unforgettable but would like guidance? We’re just a conversation away from helping you refine your story and strategy to captivate investors. Let’s talk.