Many entrepreneurs over-complicate their presentations, leaving their audience confused or bored. This spells disaster for your chances of exciting a potential investor. A pitch deck presentation that is simple will be far more effective.
Read on to find out more, or watch the video below for more information.
Your pitch deck is a powerful tool to showcase your business idea to potential investors. It is a brief visual presentation that is created for that exact purpose. Your pitch deck can be used during face-to-face or online meetings, and also turned into an investor presentation which can then be emailed as a stand alone PDF.
Think of your pitch deck slides as pages in a captivating book. As each page is turned, a new twist in your story is uncovered, keeping your audience in suspense.
What is your sole purpose when presenting?
Investors may see hundreds or even thousands of pitch decks every year and your sole purpose will be to ensure your deck stands out from the rest, with ideas that keep your audience engaged for the full presentation.
Your pitch deck should excite your investors. They should easily understand your business concept, and feel confident that your idea will make them money.
Let’s start with the first part of that statement - they should easily understand your business concept. It has been proven time and time again, the most effective pitch decks are simple and easy to understand.
You will have undoubtedly spent endless hours thinking about your business concept. You have probably stayed up late at night and lost sleep, thinking about the fine details. Entrepreneurs who are passionate and knowledgeable about their ventures may want to tell potential investors everything at once.
Don't overwhelm investors
Unfortunately, too much information will overwhelm investors, and your key points will be lost. Your pitch deck doesn't need to tell your life story or cover every aspect of your business idea. A pitch deck is an exciting but brief introduction.
Your presentation is like an elevator pitch for your business. If you were in an elevator with a potential investor for 30 seconds, how could you quickly describe your business idea, the market need and excite them about your idea in that time?
Even if you have a one-hour meeting scheduled on pitch day, keep your pitch deck short so it only takes 20 or 30 minutes. Focus on quality over quantity, and deliver a few facts that will absolutely WOW investors.
Your presentation is just an initial teaser. You can make complex data and documents available later. Get investors excited first, and deliver the details another day. Your pitch deck does not need to convert investors immediately, but it does need to get you to the next meeting.
Business deals are rarely made on first meeting, so make the goal of your pitch deck to get you to the second meeting. Your presentation should make you memorable.how do you keep your pitch deck simple and still build confidence?
Well, you need to remember that you aren’t the only entrepreneur out there looking to score equity. So you need to find a way to inspire a backer to open their cheque book and give that cheque to you. Well, here’s the gold, you can do that by understanding what motivates an investor and overcoming their concerns.
An investor will start by looking for the potential downside in your idea. That's right, the downside. The three most important questions they’ll be asking themselves are “Will I lose my investment?” “When will I get a return on my investment?” And, “How much profit can I make?”.
Do you think your presentation is simple enough to illustrate these three key points clearly? These answers shouldn’t be buried in your plans for the future. They should be specifically addressed with a simple proof of concept or plan. Prove to investors that you are serious about making sure their investment is safe and offer an idea of when they can expect a return.
It’s crucial that you understand that investors are the polar opposite to an entrepreneur. Where an entrepreneur is optimistic about their business an investor is more cynical. So if you can go into a pitch thinking like an investor you will do a thousand times better than your competition that have gone in with blind optimism and simply end up asking for the money.
Remember your pitch deck presentation should tell a story. One way you can do that is to make sure you present the problem and your solution in a way that relates to the challenges they are personally facing. If you can build a story around that which is sincere and think carefully about the order of your topics, your presentation should flow effortlessly.
Your goal is to aim for a visually impressive pitch deck that is clear and concise. Investors need to be able to understand your business idea quickly and you need to build confidence with your investors. If you can do that, you may be the lucky minority who manages to get a “yes” from a potential investor.
Remember, keeping it simple WINS investors.
get your free pitch deck content guide
If you want a great road map to what the slides you should include in your pitch deck, download my pdf guide. It has the key points investors are looking for and some great tips on how to expand on those points.
It takes a lot of commitment and courage to make your dreams come true, so keep on pitching with passion!
You are just one pitch away from success!
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