General Tips
1.
This is your final presentation, so we are expecting more effort than
usual in creating a quality presentation. Basecamp offers examples of
slide decks used by other I-Corps Sites teams in the past.
2.
While we recommend the following slides, this is just a template. You
absolutely must change and adapt the slides and flow to feel
comfortable in telling your own story. You should also change
backgrounds, fonts and graphics to suit your team’s story.
3.
You will be telling your story when presenting in person. Don’t write
everything on the slides, or your presenter role will be useless. Use the
slides as support for your passionate conversation.
4.
A professional and coherent design is a must, but don’t go overboard.
People should not get distracted by the style – that is not the goal.
5.
Use relatively large fonts. The audience might be viewing from far
away. Make an effort to write shorter focused statements with what’s
really important.
Team Number & Name
Tagline if you have one
While it isn’t traditional for a pitch deck, please insert the
pictures of your team.
Catch the audience’s attention: You can have a great,
imaginative and catchy image or full-size background image.
(See Sample PowerPoint Slides 3 and 4 for good examples.)
Problem to Solve
One simple and clear statement to explain what you do. Explain the
problem (pain) you solve or the gain you create.
We help [customer group]
achieve better [benefit],
thanks to [key ingredient of our solution].
or
Every year [some terrible waste happens].
With [our smart idea],
[customer group] can [reap a benefit].
Common mistakes:
• Write a long paragraph, or even worse several paragraphs.
• Spend 5 minutes on this slide. This is just an appetizer to set the stage.
Market Size & Potential
This slide should quantify the magnitude of the problem, which
should be stated in some combination of number of potential
customers, dollars spent on competitive products, procedures or
tasks performed, economic value lost through lack of solution, or
number of products sold that would incorporate or be replaced by
your technology.
Use one or two clearly readable charts if they help make your point,
but not more than two charts. Reference credible third party sources
(market research, annual reports, or serious news sources).
Add any important strategic pattern about this market:
emerging/mature, consolidated/fragmented, local/global, or growth
rate.
Common mistake: Invent a huge global market size that is not one addressable
market, but the sum of many. If you’re selling children’s car seats, your market is not
car owners, but parents who own cars.
Lessons Learned
Total Interviews Completed: ___
Look at your interviews in aggregate. What have you learned about your
customer segment? What key features do your customers have in
common?
What did your customers tell you about their problems? Draw out the
overarching points and feedback you heard over and over. If it fits your
needs include a chart or quantified data, i.e. 70% of customers said they
have this specific problem or need this feature. Include a direct
customer quote if it is illustrative of what you learned.
Make sure to highlight any unexpected feedback or any customers
whose feedback greatly differed from others.
Our Solution
This is your slide for a picture, CAD drawing or graphic showing what
your Minimum Viable Product it likely to look like. As an alternative,
you can prepare a graphic chart showing how the different users
interact with the solution. You can explain verbally the different
interaction flows and how it works.
Also, list no more than 3 main items competitive advantages based on
the customer needs you documented. Why 3? Because of the « Rule of
Three » (Google it). 3 sticks. 4 is too much. If you have one « unfair » or
« sustainable » competitive advantage, better to focus on this one
than diluting its value with 3-4 weaker claims.
Common mistake: Show technical architecture details. We need to understand what
your users can do with your solution, not what’s inside the box.
Business model canvas
Explain what you learned in the program. What customers did you
talk to? How did your value proposition change?
Value Proposition
Customer Segments
Next Steps
List 2-5 steps you plan to take within the next 6 months to advance your
product, process or service. Will you continue customer interviews,
pursue a particular source of funding, go to a conference to meet
customers, or run customer-specific tests on your prototype? Let us
know what’s next and how the I-Corps administrators and network can
help.
And… the best tip ever
Once done, go back and change all of your slides titles.
Instead of what the slide is about, write WHAT IS THE KEY MESSAGE
you want to get across. Some examples:
• Competition > « Fragmented non-tech incumbents »
• Market size > « An addressable market of $3B »
• Execution so far > « Strong growth demonstrated »
• Business model > « 84% gross margin »
The new title should make the key messages clearly stand out.
Try copying just your slide titles on a separate document. You should
still get the story from the titles, and the key messages people should
remember when walking out.
Other Resources
1. www.pitchenvy.com - large gallery of presumably real decks
2. Slideshare - tons of shared decks
3. Get inspired with Facebook’s first sales deck… not bad but
you can do better! http://www.digiday.com/platforms/howeduardo-saverin-sold-facebook-ads-in-2004/
4. See slide decks from previous I-Corps Sites teams in
Basecamp