The 10 Slide Pitch Deck Template

I wanted to share the template I’ve been using for many years helping various startups craft an effective first pitch. This has evolved after helping hundreds of founders in Sydney and around Australia, which I think is usually a pretty good indicator for other global startup cities. There is a lot of material out there already about how to create your first pitch deck. Not a lot of it based in an Australian or non-USA context.

This is for you if you’re creating your first pitch deck for potential investors, you’re a first-time founder or you’re just interested in how to pitch your startup clearly and concisely.

Importantly, this isn’t purely about convincing people to invest in your startup straight away but explaining what you do while also getting them excited. It can be both a monetary pitch, i.e. pitch for money, or non-monetary i.e. pitch for advice, customer-introductions or the like.

But first, what is your core story?

Before you begin crafting your pitch and and pitch deck have a good think about what is your core story. People love stories. We thrive off them. In fact, our whole society is based on narrative history and so is your startup. A good founder always has a good story.

Your core story is a narrative of who are you you and what do you believe.

Importantly, do you have a formative incident as to why you’re doing this startup, right now ? Sometimes this is very obvious, e.g. you were in accident, you experienced this pain point or you discovered this thing and want to bring it to the world, and sometimes its not obvious.

Importantly, when writing your core story keep in mind that experts don’t need to be show ponies, just be authentic.

10 Slide Pitch Deck Template

1. Introduction (Title slide)
2. Problem
3. Solution (Demo)
4. Why Now? 
5. Business/Revenue Model 
6. Unfair Advantage (Competition)
7. Team
8. Traction to date (Go-to-market)
9. The Ask
10. Vision aka close with a bang 

You’ll want to create two versions of the same presentation as you go along. One for presenting and one for emailing. Presentation-decks are typically longer, designed to present in-person and you can include an appendix for very specific questions. Read-decks are typically very similar but you add the bullets or sentences to the design so the reader can follow along as if you were in the room.

Don’t bury the lede! (of your startup)

In every core story there is a lede, don’t bury your lede! The lede is a term from newspaper publishing where you want to say the more important facts upfront and not bury them in the 20th paragraph. Same with your pitch deck. For example:

• You’ve got 10,000 paying customers already? Don’t bury that in the end of the deck. Say it first. (customer lede)
• You’re the number one engineer in this field and won a recognised award in academia or industry? Don’t bury the lede! (team lede)
• You’re in an industry that is growing crazy fast and you’re in prime position because you developed a solution years ahead of everyone but didn’t realise? Don’t bury the lede! (market lede)

How long should I spend on this?

Many angel investors in other startup centres of the world, including cities like Sydney, Melbourne, Singapore and London, won’t invest off the back of a pitch deck or Demo Day – they will want to meet and consider with you and this is just the first bit of information you send them.

Creating your first pitch takes a bit of time so don’t rush it. This is because communicating the ‘essence’ of what you mean clearly and in a way that is exciting is difficult. You want to sell your ‘best possible self and version of the company’ without overselling or talking up the market too much.

I would give yourself at least a few days if you can but if you can’t just follow the template and you’ll get a decent outcome.

Side note: The reason it takes so long is precisely because copy writing is creative process that needs lots of iterations to refine – so view pitch deck version 1 as work in progress and just get going. This reminds me of the quote:

“If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter”

Keep in mind for your first pitch deck:

• Anything can be communicated in a simple and understandable way  – Don’t be lazy, cut buzzwords and use simple and clear language
• Presume you’re taking to a non-technical audience, sell them on the opportunity first and let them follow up with technical and investor questions themselves
• Remember it’s a business pitch, not a product or technology pitch!
• Optional: Have an appendix of very specific questions you get asked
• The design of your pitch deck is important as it signals your brand and professionalism

Extra: Keep in mind for your first fundraise

• Angel and pre-seed/seed investors will typically invest based primarily on you, the founder, and team – present yourselves and background well!
• Fundraising is a relationship game – if you have a prior existing relationship with investors that is a big advantage but if you don’t expect to have to build one before they invest
• Build a good investor-startup relationship through monthly update emails (more on this in a later post but Google is also your friend for this topic)
• Trust your instincts about people – if you don’t get along with an investor from a personality perspective or you feel something is off, walk away (you’re going to be spending a lot of time with this people if you’re business is successful and if it fails)
• Keep in mind your goal is to get one investor to say yes – after that point

Are you Going to Win?

Keep in mind angel investors will typically be investing in you, the founder. Importantly they’re asking to themselves “are you going to win in this space?” or “do you have a better chance at winning than others?”.

It’s a great question to ask yourself and you should be able to answer this. The other way, i.e. more formal, of putting this is what is your competitive advantage relative other upstarts and incumbents? For many startups they don’t have a good answer which is bad.

Get a ‘maybe’ or a ‘no’?

90% of the time you’ll get a “no” or “maybe” which is also means no. That’s fine! Prepare yourself mentally for this outcome.

Your job at this point is to better understand why and move on. Some investors are very good at writing thoughtful responses as to why they won’t invest right now. Others are bad at communicating this.

In the end all ‘no’s’ are based on the fact they’re unsure or don’t believe you’ll be able to achieve something core to your plan. A good way to surface this feedback is to simply ask “what areas do believe we won’t be able to achieve successfully?”

Disclaimers

• Some founders are much better at just having a conversation and never use pitch decks – this is great if you’re confident with speaking about your company in detail but for first-time founders I recommend sticking to some structure.
• Should you email the pitch deck or go through it person? This is trickier and depends on context. If the investor wants to ask upfront to see the deck I think just send them this version but keep a longer presenter-version for the 1 to 1 meetings.
• However, it is always better to pitch in-person/over a conference call.