How To Bake A “Delicious” Pitch For Investors Every Start-up knows the importance of a great pitch. Today we want to give you some advice on how to find out the essential ingredients to bake a delicious pitch which investors will enjoy every single bite. More importantly, leave them craving for more! “People are going to make an instant decision about your pitch. They’re not going to want to see your entire background, they’re not going to want to get to know you, they don’t want to be your friend. You are either hot or not.” – Guy Kawasaki Why is important to have a perfect (or “delicious”) pitch? The main reason why is important to have a pitch that impresses investors is with the aim to secure funding, which is what you are looking for. Your funding pitch is one of the most important presentations for achieving your business goals. You can look at your pitch as a constant work in progress. The perfect pitch is customized to fit each type of investor. Different aspects of your deck will attract different investors. Therefore, it is important to know your audience. However, all investors are looking for answers to the following key questions: 1. 2. 3. 4. What makes your product unique? What is the added value to potential customers? Can you show some real data? How will you create a profit and when are you expecting revenue? Who is behind the business idea? Show the team. The goal is to convince investors that your business idea is unique, profitable, and low risk. Therefore, be prepared to show some realistic data and prognoses. What needs to be included in a “delicious” pitch deck and how it should be presented? At the very beginning, it is important to avoid too many slides and text. The optimal length of your winning pitch deck should be around 10 slides. Imagine a cake divided into 10 proportionally delicious pieces. The most important thing is to have a structured design of your pitch deck with a coherent narrative. It needs to be easy to read with a short but well-explained story to tell. Investors are too busy to listen all the technical details. Besides, they love stories as much as kids do, so give them one very good memorable Tall Tale with the most compelling facts. To keep your audience engaged use a lot of visuals, which investors will remember more likely rather than too much text. At the end, leave them wanting to taste more of your “delicious” pitch. Prepare yourself for any potential question they may ask and be ready to deliver the best possible answers. What are the most common mistakes? Your message isn’t clear enough. The most important thing to do is to prepare your text before pitching. Focus on the most relevant points and make your text as attractive and clear as possible. One of the most common mistakes is presenting the pitch deck as a well-memorized poem in one tone without any engagement. With this approach, you will never make the right impact. Investors are looking for passion and energy. Give them a show! During your pitching add emotions, enthusiasm and show that you believe in every word you are saying. This will make a huge impact on the final impression and outcome. The pitch should be short, but that doesn’t mean that you have to present all the details as fast as possible, as this makes it very hard to follow your presentation. The purpose is to select the main information and deliver it with high quality. Make pauses after important statements and let investors think about what you just said. Equally important, keep eye contact and smile. Another common mistake is using a lot of specialized and technical language, which can be complicated to understand for the audience. Rather focus on explaining your solution in plain language, which is clear to everybody. Ideally, you should be able to cover all the important information regarding your business idea in a very short time. Therefore, practice your speech and make sure you don’t run out of time. Remember, good preparation is half of the win. And don’t forget the call to action statement! What are the most frequently asked questions from investors? What do you intend to do with the money? Know all your numbers (manufacturing costs, sales price, sales revenue, etc.) Where did your idea come from? Do you have a direct competitor? If yes, what makes your product unique? How do you pay salaries? Do you have a patent? How many shareholders are in the company? How many previous investments have you got? What skills do you have in the company? (technical, marketing, sales, etc.) At HEMEX we are committed to helping start-ups to achieve their dreams. Through Fundraising coaching and the Investment Showcase platform, we can help you to improve and expose your pitch to broad promotion, and most importantly to your potential investors. If you are interested in being featured on our platform, contact us and we will get back to you.
