It is really, REALLY difficult to make a good pitch deck for your startup. It might seem easy because it's short, but don't be fooled. An investor spends on average 3 minutes on a pitch deck. In other words, you have 3 minutes to get an investor from skeptical to excited.
It's truly a challenge to condense your life's project to 15 slides that will excite an investor in 3 min while you're not even in the room with them.
It is not impossible, however. After helping hundreds of founders raise hundreds of millions of euros from investors, we've created this extensive guide to get you to a successful pitch deck.
Intro to The Pitch Deck Template
For years, we've studied thousands of pitch decks during our experience as investors.
We know what catches the investor's eye and makes you stand out in a pile of decks.
We've also helped hundreds of founders completely transform their pitch decks. We know how to take a pitch deck from Huh? to Wow!.
This deck template is a teaser that you send out to investors to introduce your company and ask for a meeting.
The number 1 goal for this deck is that you tease the investors so they become interested and want to meet you.
This teaser deck answers the first questions that the investors are asking themselves as they open a deck for the first time:
What are you doing and why is it unique?
Why should I believe you, are you credible?
How big could this be?
There will be a lot more information the investor asks for that doesn't fit in this teaser pitch deck. That information should be shared in a data room or appendix slides which you share after a first meeting.
A seed investment has NEVER been done based on a deck, it’s always based on how excited you make the investor feel and the relationship that you develop during the investment process. That relationship can only develop when spending time together. This deck is the stepping stone to get into meetings with more investors!
Overview of The Pitch Deck Template
1. One Liner
2. Problem
3. Solution
4. Traction
5. Market
6. Business Model
7. Roadmap
8. Vision
9. Team
10. The Ask
11. Contact Details
A teaser deck should be preferably 11 slides, maximum of 15 (including the first and last slide).
In this template, you will find all the mandatory slides, but it might be that your startup requires more explanations on certain points so you might add a few slides.
Keep in mind, that on average, an investor spends only 3 min on your deck. DO NOT include long texts or explanations. Maximum 30 words per slide.
Visual elements are always better than text since they let your message come across faster and more efficiently.
In this template, there are plenty of examples of how to visually present your information.
Please note the headlines, we're not using "Problem" as a headline. Rather use the headline to help tell the story you want to convey in each slide.
You should be able to read only the headlines and understand the investment opportunity.
In terms of design, the following slide templates are just an example.
I decided on 1 type of font and 2 colors that work together, and then I stuck to that theme throughout the deck.
You should do the same; stay consistent in your design with your brand colors and font. If you don’t have an eye for design, ask a friend who is good at that to redesign the deck for you.
No matter your brand profile, the number 1 rule is to keep your deck very airy. NO cramped slides, please!
1. One-Liner
This is the first thing the investors see when they open your deck. The goal here is to get the investor to lean in.
The Dos
On the first slide, you should already help the investor understand what you’re doing and answer the first question they have in their heads by including your sexy one-liner.
The one-liner explains which market you operate in and how you disrupt that market. Hyped words such as “AI, deep tech, web3, data”, etc. are very welcome here.
The Donts
Don't focus too much on what you're doing right now, but rather focus on the vision and what your company will be 5 years from now.
Don't confuse the slogan in your sales deck with this investor one-liner. They are never the same thing! Never use the word "you" in the pitch deck, especially for the first slide.
Examples
“Better Climate Data. Better Climate Financing”
“Replacing real estate agents with algorithms”
“Equipping HR with smart AI”
2. Problem
Before explaining what your product does, you want to set the scene and explain why there is a need for your product.
Why should the investor care about your product?
The Dos
This slide is especially important if you are solving a problem that might not be well-known to the investor. Think about the profile of the typical investors you meet, how familiar is the investor with this problem?
The best here is if you can refer to a global problem that your product will help solve. Investors like to help solve problems for humanity and large industries from a macro perspective. If that doesn't apply to you, you can also explain the pain that your customers experience if they don’t have your product.
The Donts
Don't make unsupported claims, like for example "Our clients waste time". You always want to use data to make the problem convincing. This helps you build credibility. For example "Our clients waste on average 15 hours/week" is much more awe-inspiring.
The data that you share can either come from market reports or interviews/surveys that you’ve done with potential customers. Link or explain how you discovered the findings in a small note at the bottom of the slide.
3. Solution
You want to make the first impression of your product impactful. That's why you must continue the story from the problem slide by having your product reflect the opposite of the problems.
The Dos
When you present your product you want to give the investor the feeling that it’s live and currently in use, that’s why it’s terrific to use screenshots from your product.
You need to make the explanation of your product extremely straightforward in this phase of the investment process so the investors can feel like they “get it”. Your product is probably more complicated and has lots of fancy features, but this is not the place to explain those.
Best-in-class is if you can use the template from option 1 below. If you now have a simple MVP that doesn’t represent what you want the platform to do in the future, you can do what template option 2 shows here.
When you explain your product, the rule is simple: Show is always better than tell. Use pictures, arrows, and symbols to your advantage.
The Donts
Think about language, and avoid using industry-specific words that are not common knowledge.
Don't link to advanced demos or videos. Investors spend 10 seconds per slide, and they don't want to be forced through a 1 min video to get a basic understanding of your product.
4. Traction
When the investor gets what your startup does, it’s time to share that you have signs of traction in the market. This will help you build credibility to earn the investor's trust.
The Dos
For angel and pre-seed rounds when you're still in beta or pre-launch, use bubbles to convey numbers as totals or quotes.
When you're raising a seed round or more, the best is if you can put a growth chart here — a chart that is pointing upwards to the right. Make sure it's not cumulative numbers.
If your line is not as straight as in the following examples, it’s ok. That is not necessary when you’re raising a seed round. However, your growth per month needs to be 10 % or more on average.
Good metrics to include, if you're benchmarking well:
MRR or ARR (monthly or annual recurring revenue)
GMV (turnover for marketplaces)
Retention (typically at 8 weeks)
Churn (for B2B)
MAU (monthly active users)
Pipeline value
Feel free to be creative in terms of metrics. Whatever numbers prove that customers or users come easily and stick around.
The Donts
Vanity metrics are metrics that feel good but don't say anything. Avoid them. This is usually social media followers or website impressions.
Don't put previous fundraising, grants, partners, or prizes you've won. All those are vanity metrics that don't prove you're any closer to product-market fit.
5. Market
There is a framework that all VC investors use, and you should apply that here. It’s called the TAM, SAM, SOM. We recommend doing a top-down market calculation here. Bonus points if the market is also growing.
TAM - Total Addressable Market
This is the market that you’re operating within. So for example that could be the retail market, the healthcare market, or the hospitality market. You want it to be worth at least €10 billion. But if you discover that it is hundreds of billions, that’s really good!
SAM - Serviceable Addressable Market
Find this by cutting out the first segment of your market; for example, the retail market becomes the e-commerce market. We think of the SAM as the market you will be operating in in a long-term perspective, 5-10 years. This should be between €500M-10B.
SOM - Serviceable Obtainable Market
Do a second segmentation so that you have the estimate of the current market that you focus on first. For example, the global e-commerce market becomes the European e-commerce market. We think of the SOM as the market you will be operating in in a mid-term perspective, 3-5 years. Aim for this number to be between €100M-1B.
This is not at all supposed to be the future revenue of the company. It's just to show that there is plenty of money being spent in your market. Everyone assumes you will not capture all of that market share. How much your company captures will be decided by your skill of execution and resources.
Either you can present your TAM, SAM, and SOM in value ($/€, the most common) or you can put it in the number of transactions or customers on your market.
6. Business Model
In this slide, you explain how you earn money.
The Dos
Explain your pricing model. It might be a subscription, commission, product sales, or something else.
If you're selling physical products or hardware, include your gross margin or direct costs for every product sold.
The Donts
If you're selling software, don't include direct costs or any gross margin. It is already known that software businesses have almost no direct costs.
Even if we're talking numbers on this slide, don't overwhelm us with too many numbers. Limit to a maximum of 5 numbers. Calculate averages to simplify this slide if you have a complicated pricing and cost structure.
7. Roadmap
This is an extremely important slide, especially if you have not yet launched or are currently in beta phase. The investors will want to know when your product will be market-ready.
The Dos
Put your upcoming important milestones on a timeline.
Since most investors have limited technical background, focus instead on business milestones:
Launch date
Users
Customers
Revenue
Partnerships
International expansion
Key hires
The Donts
Don't talk about your historic timeline, of previous milestones that you've reached. Investors get excited about future plans, not last year's checklist.
8. Vision
In this slide, we want to show the investor that you're aiming high. It is especially important to include this slide if your current market "feels" very niche or small.
The Dos
This is a very simple slide, that can be overcomplicated. The best is if you can put just a single sentence that explains what the future will be when your solution has taken over the market. How will you change your industry in ways others might not first consider?
The investor wants to get a clear picture of the impact that you will have and the value you will create because that will increase the value of their investment by a lot in the future!
The Donts
This should not be mixed up with a mission statement that you would do to motivate your team or sell to customers.
9. Team
The most common error by founders for their team slide is not bragging enough. The investors have no clue who you are, you need to tell them!
This is the most important slide in your pitch deck to build credibility in the eyes of the investor. Why should they trust that you can do this? If you know the industry and/or have done something similar before, the chance is higher that you will succeed with your startup!
The Dos
For every founder you need to include:
Picture
Role and name
Any achievements as previous founders or employees. Any logos that the investor might recognize
Founders often underestimate the advantages of their experiences. Try and find any of these from your previous experience: career in the same industry, previous startup (both successful and unsuccessful), team size you've managed, sales you've generated, usage of products you've built.
You can include selected team members, any people who have valuable experience will help your case. You can exclude all types of interns.
You can include advisors if they help build credibility. Be very clear in calling them advisors and not anything else, so it doesn't appear like they are full-time team members.
The Donts
Don’t just put the name and the picture of everyone on your team. An investor has no idea if a team is good or bad based on a name and a pretty face…
10. The Ask
In this slide, you want to inform the investor of how much you will be raising so they can judge if what you're seeking is within their scope.
The Dos
In this slide you tell the investor how much you want to raise and very briefly what milestone you will achieve with the capital.
The Donts
At this stage in the process, you don’t need to explain too many details. Avoid mentioning your valuation and captable.
When you meet, you will talk in greater detail about how you will deploy the capital and reach the goal. Remember that this is a teaser, this is only to make them interested in talking to you.
This is going straight to my list of favourites!