What Every Investor Looks For In A Pitch?Deck

Whether you’re an entrepreneur raising your first round or an investor looking at deals, it’s essential to know what exactly a good pitch deck should look like. A ‘pitch deck’ is a presentation that investors expect startups to share with them when first interacting with founders who are fundraising. The expectations may differ my country or region of the world, but in the U.S. the expectation for an early stage venture is not a business plan, but a set of 10–15 slides capturing and conveying the core information about your venture.

A great pitch deck is not about how clean or beautiful it looks (although that helps!)– it’s all about the information you present and how you present it. The last thing you want is to have a pitch deck that is confusing and leaves people wondering what your company does.

Your pitch deck should be a look into a startup and should answer essential questions, such as what problem the company is addressing and how it’s solving it, and should serve as a conversation opener with investors. For instance, pitch decks should include information on traction and financials, but should be supplemented with documents on a full financial breakdown later on.

Here are the key slides you need to make sure your presentation is solid:

1. Cover — Logo and name of company, purpose of presentation (pitch to investor/accelerator demo day/conference)
2. Problem — What is the pain are you solving? Why are you solving this problem?
3. Solution — What does your company do? What is the the primary product / service (how you solve the problem you mentioned in the previous slide). Optional, but preferable: include product demo
4. Business model — How do you make money? What is your primary revenue stream? Who is your customer? Who pays for your product or service? How much do they pay for your product?
5. Market size — How large is your market? Is it growing? What is your total addressable market (TAM)? Serviceable addressable market (SAM)? Beachhead market?
6. Go to market — How do you acquire customers? How much does it cost you to acquire customers?
7. Competition — Who are your major competitors? How are you different/better?
8. Finances — How much money are you making and what is your projected revenue for the next 2–5 years? What is your path to profitability? What are your primary expenses? Visually show this information (graphs, charts, etc.)
9. Traction — What progress have you made to date? How many active users to you have? How many paying customers? How much revenue have you made? Other relevant accolades include: partnerships, contracts, awards, relevant investors, accelerators/incubators you’ve participated in. Show relevant logos.
10. *Outcomes — [Only for for-profit impact ventures] What are the positive outcomes associated with your product or service? 
11. Team — Who is on the team and what is their experience? Also include advisors and board members.
12. Next steps & Ask — What are your milestones in the next 6/12/24 months and beyond? Why are you making this presentation in the first place? Example asks: introductions to strategic players, introductions to potential customers, raising money, etc.

Here is a sample pitch deck as an example of what one looks like. Every pitch deck is different– sometimes they need to be shortened, and other pitch decks have 30+ slides especially those that are used for fundraising. Use this list as a baseline for what you should include and create different versions to suit different audiences:

Feel free to reach out if you have any questions! Keep going…

By Sergio Marrero & Alana Matos