Presentation Guidelines
Slideshows with under 20 slides are generally most effective. Use the limited time you have for your presentation to emphasize the compelling factors about your investment opportunity and save unnecessary technology details for future meetings. The following guidelines are provided to you as a suggested format, based on our observations of the successful attributes of the hundreds of pitches that have been made to us over the last five years. You will have 15 minutes to present and 5 minutes for Q & A.
Your goal is to offer a high-level, summarized view of the company, to excite investors and convince them to attend a follow-up due diligence session. Keep the following points in mind:
We strongly suggest putting your slides in the following order (although this is not mandatory, you should have a really, really good reason for doing it some other way, and should expect to have your presentation completely re-worked if your angel training coach doesn't agree that your reason is really, really good):
  1. Company Title Page with the name and logo of the company, the name and title of your presenter, and a one-line description or tag line about the company
  2. Business Overview boiling down your elevator pitch to one or two short sentences or bullet points. Tell us what you sell or do in very concrete language, as this sets the context for the rest of your presentation
  3. Management Team- talent & experience, with one line background on each member
  4. Market - what is the environment, how big are the segments, what are the pain points
  5. Product - How do you solve the pain, and what exactly do you do. This can be illustrated with a clear product or screen shot, or a simple process diagram, but if we don't know what you do, we won't know why we should fund you. (But don't spend too much time on this, since you're pitching the company here, not the product.)
  6. Business Model - who pays, how much and from where, annualized revenue streams
  7. Customers - how many, who are they, distribution process, attracted, retained
  8. Strategic Relationships - if you have any, make sure we know about them
  9. Competition - who and how threatening, what are differentiation factors. Remember that everyone has competition, even if it is just 'the old way' of doing something, and if you tell us that there isn't any, you are unlikely to get funded. Include both direct and indirect competitors.
  10. Barriers to Entry - how will other competitors be kept at bay
  11. Financial Overview - top line revenues and expenses, EBITDA, two years back and four years out
  12. Potential for Business/Use of Proceeds - where will our money take you
  13. Capital Structure & Valuation - how much have you raised previously, who are your current investors, what are you looking for in this round, and how do you come to your suggested valuation
  14. Summary - a review of your strongest features, narrowed to the five or six most important points, ending on a high note.
  15. [Due Diligence Session info (we'll give you), and your Contact information] This should be included in the handout, but not necessarily in your presentation