If you’re frustrated by the fact that nobody’s interested in your startup idea, there might be one out of two reasons: You still haven’t created a pitch deck to present it, or your pitch deck needs some work.
Okay, there is a third reason: The idea itself needs some work, but let’s focus on pitch decks in this article.
To draw attention to your company, you need to explain it understandably and interestingly. There’s nothing more straightforward in the startup world than tackling this challenge: Create a good pitch deck.
Business documents sharing platform Docsend has conducted a survey that showed that investors spend 3 minutes and 44 seconds on a deck on average. Most of this time is spent analyzing finances, team, and competition. This means that your main goal while creating an impressive pitch deck is all about taking out what’s unimportant and focusing on the ones that are.
What makes a strong pitch deck
A pitch deck is a document that explains your startup’s main idea, its achievements, goals, and potential. This is your first step towards making your idea a reality.
A pitch deck isn’t targeted only towards investors. It will also become useful when training to attract partners and employees or get yourself into an acceleration program. So, whatever your goal may be at the moment, you need a pitch deck for all of them.
One of the main characteristics of a strong deck is telling a story that evokes emotions. You have to really get inside of your audience’s heads, which isn’t an easy thing to do in three minutes. Devote each slide to a single idea and use as little text as possible, with a big font size. It’s also essential to keep a single visual style throughout the whole piece, from colors to font sizes to structure.
Start with writing down long texts. This will help you collect your thoughts and better phrase your idea. Then make every slide shorter and shorter as many times as you find necessary. You’ll have to do some research along the way, which is useful for better grasping the market and trends you’re in.
Pitch decks differ from one another, but they still share some similarities on top of which other details are created upon. Here we’ll cover the basic elements with Airbnb-s pitch deck example. In 2009 Airbnb secured half a million-dollar funding with the below deck. Today the company is worth $31 Billion and has obtained $3 million in funding.
1. Introduction
The first slide serves as an introduction to your company. Insert a brief, one-sentence-long description of your project along with the company logo. It would be a good idea to show your uniqueness here. This will be your first impression on viewers. Try to grab their attention to the fullest.
From the first slide of Airbnb, we see what differentiates it from the competitors on the market. The project description is concise, specific, and memorable.
2. Problem
Every (successful) idea is targeted towards solving a specific problem. Startup ideas are generally divided into two main categories: painkillers and vitamins. Painkillers are targeted towards solving an acute problem while vitamins serve as a means of entertainment. In both of these cases, you need a reason for which users will buy your product.
We’ve all been in the shoes of the client described here, and we can all relate to the problems mentioned. This is a good way to show the significance of the issue at hand. Another exciting aspect of this slide is that it already shows the market’s potential: Tons of people go on vacations each year, and a big part of them look for ways to spend less and explore the city better.
3. Solution
Here you’ll need to describe the solution you’re offering. It goes without saying that the solution should reflect on the problems listed in the slide before.
In solution, you are demonstrating the details that were unnecessary in the introduction. Are you an app or a web platform? How does your product work? Try to be as concise as possible.
Avoid going into technical details if it’s not necessary. If it is, go over it briefly and in plain English. There’s a big chance that the people you are presenting your idea to have little or no technical background. Don’t frustrate them with the terminology they won’t understand; it will work against you rather than in your favor.
Airbnb’s solution directly reflects the problems described in the previous slide. Pay attention to the fact that the main focus is on saving and making money. These solutions are what serve as painkillers. The ‘sharing culture’ thing is simply a vitamin, and it has the elements of storytelling in it too.
4. Market size
This slide is solely devoted to statistics. The goal is to show the potential growth of your company. This doesn’t mean that you’ll be able to reach everyone, but it’s a good hook to attract investors’ attention.
A good thing about this slide is that Airbnb is showing its market share as well. This creates a feeling of trust in the eyes of investors.
5. Product
It’s time to introduce specific details of your product. If you’ve already created a prototype, add images in this slide. Pay attention to the fact that the description should be easy to understand but also complete. There’s no need to go deep in the technical details. If someone in your audience will be interested, they ask you about it afterward.
That’s your product description right there — simple and straightforward. There’s no mention of the algorithms behind the product, nor a detailed description of the platform’s functionality. All of this additional information can be told in a sentence or two during your pitch or the Q&A session. The main appeal of a pitch deck lies in its simplicity.
6. Achievements
In this slide, you have the opportunity to demonstrate your most significant achievements so far. If you have already attracted users, created a product, or done a general survey, this is the place to show it off. If all you have is an idea so far, or if the results aren’t that interesting, it’s better to get rid of this slide altogether.
7. Business model
How is your company planning to make money? You need to have an answer to this question, even if it’s not final. You can add future projections here or create a separate slide for it. In both cases, the business model and future predictions are an essential part of your pitch deck.
Airbnb built its future projections around its market share from the slide before, which is quite a smart move. The business model is simple, goals — realistic. Additionally, 10% of payment is nothing for the user while making a good chunk of money for the company.
8. Team
The team is one of the most critical parts of the company for anyone potentially interested in your idea. This is the place where you demonstrate the qualifications of your team. What achievements do they have? Why are they the right people to be working on the product? If you’re the only one in the project, what is your background that makes you the guy to succeed with this idea?
9. Competition
List a couple of your biggest competitors. Don’t be scared by this slide; competitors’ existence serves as a validation of your idea. It means that there is a market for the product you’re offering, and attracting existing customers is easier than creating a whole new marketplace. Saying that you have no competitors indicates that either 1. Nobody needs your product (at least for now), and 2. You’re not good at assessing competition objectively. Both are red lights for the investors and won’t bring you anything good.
Despite Airbnb’s unique value proposition, there still was a competition on the market. The company used a simple graphic design to showcase its advantages over its competitors. This method also differentiates direct competition from the indirect one.
10. What are you asking for?
This might be an investment, a partnership, a request to participate in an acceleration program, or a means to attract co-workers. In any case, you’ll need a separate slide for each.
If you have no specific amount of funding in mind or no specific terms for partnership and so on, you can leave out this slide altogether. In Airbnb’s presentation, there was no mention of the requested funding amount, nor their achievements, for that matter. Even though the latter is important when talking to big investors, you don’t need to worry about it for now. The important thing is to include the team, the problem, the solution, the product, and the business model.
You can always add slides to the main structure presented here, for example, the advantages of your product, the logic behind the functionality (only briefly!), etc. This article will simply help you fill in the basic elements properly. Study Airbnb’s example closely and create the first tangible document of your idea!
How to craft an inspiring pitch deck
02 October 2020If you’re frustrated by the fact that nobody’s interested in your startup idea, there might be one out of two reasons: You still haven’t created a pitch deck to present it, or your pitch deck needs some work.
Okay, there is a third reason: The idea itself needs some work, but let’s focus on pitch decks in this article.
To draw attention to your company, you need to explain it understandably and interestingly. There’s nothing more straightforward in the startup world than tackling this challenge: Create a good pitch deck.
Business documents sharing platform Docsend has conducted a survey that showed that investors spend 3 minutes and 44 seconds on a deck on average. Most of this time is spent analyzing finances, team, and competition. This means that your main goal while creating an impressive pitch deck is all about taking out what’s unimportant and focusing on the ones that are.
What makes a strong pitch deck
A pitch deck is a document that explains your startup’s main idea, its achievements, goals, and potential. This is your first step towards making your idea a reality.
A pitch deck isn’t targeted only towards investors. It will also become useful when training to attract partners and employees or get yourself into an acceleration program. So, whatever your goal may be at the moment, you need a pitch deck for all of them.
One of the main characteristics of a strong deck is telling a story that evokes emotions. You have to really get inside of your audience’s heads, which isn’t an easy thing to do in three minutes. Devote each slide to a single idea and use as little text as possible, with a big font size. It’s also essential to keep a single visual style throughout the whole piece, from colors to font sizes to structure.
Start with writing down long texts. This will help you collect your thoughts and better phrase your idea. Then make every slide shorter and shorter as many times as you find necessary. You’ll have to do some research along the way, which is useful for better grasping the market and trends you’re in.
Pitch decks differ from one another, but they still share some similarities on top of which other details are created upon. Here we’ll cover the basic elements with Airbnb-s pitch deck example. In 2009 Airbnb secured half a million-dollar funding with the below deck. Today the company is worth $31 Billion and has obtained $3 million in funding.
1. Introduction
The first slide serves as an introduction to your company. Insert a brief, one-sentence-long description of your project along with the company logo. It would be a good idea to show your uniqueness here. This will be your first impression on viewers. Try to grab their attention to the fullest.
From the first slide of Airbnb, we see what differentiates it from the competitors on the market. The project description is concise, specific, and memorable.
2. Problem
Every (successful) idea is targeted towards solving a specific problem. Startup ideas are generally divided into two main categories: painkillers and vitamins. Painkillers are targeted towards solving an acute problem while vitamins serve as a means of entertainment. In both of these cases, you need a reason for which users will buy your product.
We’ve all been in the shoes of the client described here, and we can all relate to the problems mentioned. This is a good way to show the significance of the issue at hand. Another exciting aspect of this slide is that it already shows the market’s potential: Tons of people go on vacations each year, and a big part of them look for ways to spend less and explore the city better.
3. Solution
Here you’ll need to describe the solution you’re offering. It goes without saying that the solution should reflect on the problems listed in the slide before.
In solution, you are demonstrating the details that were unnecessary in the introduction. Are you an app or a web platform? How does your product work? Try to be as concise as possible.
Avoid going into technical details if it’s not necessary. If it is, go over it briefly and in plain English. There’s a big chance that the people you are presenting your idea to have little or no technical background. Don’t frustrate them with the terminology they won’t understand; it will work against you rather than in your favor.
Airbnb’s solution directly reflects the problems described in the previous slide. Pay attention to the fact that the main focus is on saving and making money. These solutions are what serve as painkillers. The ‘sharing culture’ thing is simply a vitamin, and it has the elements of storytelling in it too.
4. Market size
This slide is solely devoted to statistics. The goal is to show the potential growth of your company. This doesn’t mean that you’ll be able to reach everyone, but it’s a good hook to attract investors’ attention.
A good thing about this slide is that Airbnb is showing its market share as well. This creates a feeling of trust in the eyes of investors.
5. Product
It’s time to introduce specific details of your product. If you’ve already created a prototype, add images in this slide. Pay attention to the fact that the description should be easy to understand but also complete. There’s no need to go deep in the technical details. If someone in your audience will be interested, they ask you about it afterward.
That’s your product description right there — simple and straightforward. There’s no mention of the algorithms behind the product, nor a detailed description of the platform’s functionality. All of this additional information can be told in a sentence or two during your pitch or the Q&A session. The main appeal of a pitch deck lies in its simplicity.
6. Achievements
In this slide, you have the opportunity to demonstrate your most significant achievements so far. If you have already attracted users, created a product, or done a general survey, this is the place to show it off. If all you have is an idea so far, or if the results aren’t that interesting, it’s better to get rid of this slide altogether.
7. Business model
How is your company planning to make money? You need to have an answer to this question, even if it’s not final. You can add future projections here or create a separate slide for it. In both cases, the business model and future predictions are an essential part of your pitch deck.
Airbnb built its future projections around its market share from the slide before, which is quite a smart move. The business model is simple, goals — realistic. Additionally, 10% of payment is nothing for the user while making a good chunk of money for the company.
8. Team
The team is one of the most critical parts of the company for anyone potentially interested in your idea. This is the place where you demonstrate the qualifications of your team. What achievements do they have? Why are they the right people to be working on the product? If you’re the only one in the project, what is your background that makes you the guy to succeed with this idea?
9. Competition
List a couple of your biggest competitors. Don’t be scared by this slide; competitors’ existence serves as a validation of your idea. It means that there is a market for the product you’re offering, and attracting existing customers is easier than creating a whole new marketplace. Saying that you have no competitors indicates that either 1. Nobody needs your product (at least for now), and 2. You’re not good at assessing competition objectively. Both are red lights for the investors and won’t bring you anything good.
Despite Airbnb’s unique value proposition, there still was a competition on the market. The company used a simple graphic design to showcase its advantages over its competitors. This method also differentiates direct competition from the indirect one.
10. What are you asking for?
This might be an investment, a partnership, a request to participate in an acceleration program, or a means to attract co-workers. In any case, you’ll need a separate slide for each.
If you have no specific amount of funding in mind or no specific terms for partnership and so on, you can leave out this slide altogether. In Airbnb’s presentation, there was no mention of the requested funding amount, nor their achievements, for that matter. Even though the latter is important when talking to big investors, you don’t need to worry about it for now. The important thing is to include the team, the problem, the solution, the product, and the business model.
You can always add slides to the main structure presented here, for example, the advantages of your product, the logic behind the functionality (only briefly!), etc. This article will simply help you fill in the basic elements properly. Study Airbnb’s example closely and create the first tangible document of your idea!