This pitch deck slide guide is by Inner Circle in partnership with Gelt.
Your cover slide is your introduction, as well as a quick reference for investors to open when they want to get back in touch with you to take the next step in funding your venture.
It should include your company name, logo, and concise tagline. As well as your own name, email address, and phone number.
This is the basis of your entire venture and business.
Lay out the problem you are going on a mission to solve. Keep it as simple as possible.
You can use your verbal pitch to tell a story around this. Explaining how you encountered it, how urgent it is, and conveying it in a way your audience can relate to.
What is your big idea for solving this big and urgent problem?
You can be more ambiguous and general here. There is a separate slide and section for your individual product or services later. This is especially important for brand-new ventures where you haven’t really developed and finalized the details of your product yet.
Market size is one of the most important metrics for investors. This data point alone can make or break your fundraising aspirations.
Zoom out to the largest relevant market if needed. Remember that today, many venture capital investors need only to be dancing in markets worth many hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars to make their necessary returns. Even more so as the size of funding rounds has grown in terms of dollars as well.
You can break this down by the total market size, which percentage of that is relevant to your business, and which niche will be your initial target market.
Who are the significant competitors in this space? That’s a critical aspect of the best format to use in pitch decks.
You don’t have room to list or display them all. This is a strategic slide. One where you are transparent and honest about the presence of competition. While also selecting the competitors you choose to highlight to best position your company as well.
You can use a visual to display your competition here. One that will help in distinguishing how you are different, and where you are in comparison in the market.
On this slide, you will be more specific about the competitive advantage your startup has in this market, both over existing incumbents, as well as against large corporations or new entrepreneurs who decide to copy you and move in as they see your success.
Here is where you give investors a glimpse of your amazing product.
Include an image of it. Ideally, in a real setting, that evokes emotion.
Then include a one-line description, and up to three bullet points. Focus on the one key benefit and advantage that your product offers.
How much progress have you made so far?
Have you completed your MVP? Are you actively selling your product or service for money?
What milestones have you achieved? How many customers do you have? What about recurring revenues?
What are your growth rates? How you present this may differ depending on the stage of your startup. It may range from week over week to quarterly or annually.
This metric alone can really help you nail an investment.
Who exactly are your customers? What is your engagement with them like?
A brief avatar of your target customers can be added here. Or mention notable contracts and partnerships that you’ve signed with recognizable firms.
Then describe your engagement. If you are pre-startup, what is the feedback you’ve compiled from prospective customers so far? If you’ve been selling products, what are the reviews like? How is your customer retention versus churn rates?
What is your business model? How do you make money? When picking out the best format to use in pitch decks, you’ll include detailed information about it.
This can either be laid out as a few bullet points or an image of your business cycle.
If you have already been operating, then you will have at least two slides here. One for your historical and current financial situation. Another for your financial projections going forward.
Keep it clean and focused. Hone in on the key metrics. Those which are most important for your investors to make a decision. As well as the one main data point in which you are absolutely confident that you can continue to drive growth through your next fundraising campaign.
How much are you asking to raise in this round?
Some investors may put their desired terms, which they are offering here as well.
Be sure to note any notable and credible investors that you have already signed up for. Everyone loves following a strong lead investor. No one wants to be first.
How will you use and invest the funds investors put in this round?
List the major categories you will be applying it to. Whether that is marketing, recruiting, product development, or acquisitions of other companies.
Showcase the executive team. Use headshots, and strong one-line bios highlighting the value they bring to the company and mission.
Showcase the advisor team. Use headshots, and strong one-line bios highlighting the value they bring to the company and mission.
Use this space to thank them for their time, and reiterate the next step to take in funding you, along with your contact information. It’s the final but most crucial slide you’ll include when working out the best format to use in pitch decks.