The number of slides in your pitch deck significantly influences your success in raising funds. After you get the slide count right, it’s crucial to ensure that your slides and content are arranged logically.
Your pitch deck should tell a compelling story that leads to the desired outcome. This involves addressing key points that investors look for in a format that appeals to them.
It’s also important to be disciplined about how much content you include on each slide. Trying to fit 40 slides’ worth of content into 16 will make your presentation too complicated, dull, and difficult to follow.
Adopt a minimalist approach by including only the essentials that investors need to see. Keep text and data to a minimum.
Remember, the goal is to get investors interested enough to want to know more. You don’t need to go into all the intricate details of your product and technology right away.
- Cover Slide
Your cover slide is the first impression of your pitch deck, so make it count. It serves as a positioning tool, quickly determining whether your audience will stay interested and if they find your proposition relevant.
Additionally, it’s a practical slide for providing your contact information. Ensure your cover slide is appealing yet simple, including your name, contact details, company name, logo, tagline, or a brief elevator pitch.
- Problem Slide
This slide is the core of your venture and investment opportunity. Investors want to see founders who clearly understand the problem they’re solving, can communicate it succinctly, and have validated it.
State the problem your venture addresses in one sentence. You can then elaborate verbally, sharing a relatable story that emphasizes the issue.
- Solution Slide
Offer a high-level overview of your solution and your strategy for solving the stated problem. Focus on the big-picture direction instead of product specifics.
If there are current trends or opportunities that investors are interested in, mention them here. Use just a sentence or two to convey this.
- Market Size
Market size is one of the most critical slides in your pitch deck and can determine funding success.
Use visuals or a few bullet points to highlight the potential market size. Consider providing an overview of a larger total market, how it is expected to grow over the next few years, and your target segment within it.
- Competition Slide
Understanding your competition is vital for a new founder. This slide positions your brand against others and benchmarks your value, funding, and potential acquisition targets.
Use a chart to compare your company to a few main competitors.
- Competitive Advantage Slide
Showcase your market position, unique value proposition, and the safety of investors’ capital. Highlight significant advantages, such as a 10x to 100x improvement over existing solutions, and ensure these advantages are sustainable and defensible.
You might include well-protected intellectual property or a substantial headstart in a challenging industry.
- Product Slide
This slide is where you highlight your product’s main benefit without getting bogged down in technical details. Use a strong image of your product, whether a prototype or a screenshot, to engage investors visually.
Indicate whether your product is just a concept or a deployed product in the market. If you have multiple product lines, mention them but avoid detailing the entire roadmap. Stay focused.
These additional details can be addressed during Q&A sessions or follow-up meetings with investors.
- Customers & Engagement Slide
Inform investors about your customers and your engagement with them. Describe your customer avatar and whether your startup is B2B or B2C.
Share any feedback or interactions you’ve had with existing or potential customers.
- Traction Slide
Demonstrate your progress and growth trajectory. This slide can be crucial, as some investors prioritize traction when deciding to invest.
Depending on your business stage, some investors may focus on growth metrics such as week-over-week, month-over-month, quarterly, or annual growth.
- Business Model Slide
Use diagrams or bullet points to explain your business model at a high level. Discuss how your business operates and your marketing strategies to attract customers.
- Financials Slides
If your business is already operational, present your current financials. If not, focus on financial forecasts for the next 1-5 years, including customer acquisition costs, sales, revenues, profits, and profit margins.
- Amount Being Raised & Other Investors Slide
Outline the investors already involved or expected to join this funding round. Specify the amount you seek to raise and identify the round’s lead or participating investors.
- The Team Slide
Include profile pictures and brief bios for each co-founding team member. Add information about key executives as well.
- Use of Funds Slide
Detail how much money you are seeking, what you’ll do with it, and the milestones it will help you achieve. Use a graphic or bullet points to show how the funds will be allocated.
- Advisors Slide
Use a format similar to the team slide to highlight your advisors and boost your credibility.
- Closing Slide
Thank investors for their time, and reiterate your contact information so they can follow up and take the next steps toward funding.
When considering the length of a pitch deck, keep these crucial factors in mind.
