|#521 MWAVC| — Know How to Pitch
Hi,
Welcome to MWAVC, a newsletter about finance, investing, venture capital and all that jazz. My name is Ato (more about me here and here) and I try to write every single day. Most of it is stuff I find interesting that I’d like to share and hear your thoughts on. If you’d like to sign up, you can do so here. Or just read on.
PS. Open rates are up to 45% these days. Appreciate y’all 🤞🏾. This is a particularly important post—please share with anyone you know that’s readying to pitch an investor, especially folks seeing pre-seed investments.
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My chairwoman, Eloho, sharing the gospel on what you need to know before you pitch your company to any investors. Find her thread below:
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I received a pitch a day in 2021.
Trust me -- if you're lucky, investors will spend about 3 minutes reading your pre-seed deck the first time.
You need to make it count.
A plain-English thread for first-time founders on how.
1. Know your audience.
Investors are quick to judge.
Weak decks get 90 seconds or less. A pitch deck must catch their interest in the first couple of slides.
If you can afford to, use a designer.
2. Understand the goal.
You're not trying to put every last bit of information about your startup in your deck.
You're trying to get a meeting.
Don't try to force-feed the investor information. Leave out the minutiae.
Your pre-seed deck should be ~12 slides.
3. Ditch the table of contents.
It signals "there's too much information in here".
Cut any slide that does not advance the narrative, like detailed financial projections. Your numbers are probably wrong anyway.
4. Invest your energies where it counts the most.
Investors will spend the most time on these 6 slides:
- Product
- Business model
- Go to market strategy
- Traction
- Competition
- Team
5. Highlight your product near the beginning of the deck.
Build a narrative flow, starting with a slide about a problem to a solution to the product.
Use visuals. Illustrate important product features using wireframes, screenshots, embedded videos, or Figma mockups.
6. Lay out a clear monetisation strategy that’s repeatable over time.
Use simple (correct!) analogies to explain the business model:
"Uber for X" or "Like Y but with better economics"
Be data-driven and explicit:
"We are targeting a Z% gross margin."
7. Pitch an organic, executable go-to-market strategy.
How will you acquire your first 1,000 customers?
You are your startup's first sales & marketing lead. Organic growth, not paid ads is how you'll prove to an investor that you can find product-market fit.
8. Write a great traction slide.
A 100-person survey isn't impressive.
You're pre-seed, so you don't need much (or any) revenues. But you do need commitment & grit.
Show traction appropriate to your stage, e.g. letters of intent, waitlists, customer pipeline, beta feedback.
9. Don't say "we have no competition".
That's superficial. If the problem you're addressing matters, your customers are already solving it somehow.
Think broadly. Include incumbents & hacks, tech or non-tech. And say what's special about your product compared to competitors.
10. Brag about the founders.
Include links to LinkedIn profiles. Focus on accomplishments, not titles.
Use logos: top-tier schools, blue-chip companies, popular startups if you can. Don't lie.
Don't use words like "guru" or "rockstar". You won't sound objective or credible.
P.S. My general tips for writing well:
- Use a spelling and grammar checker.
- Use bullet points.
- Write short sentences.
- Share 1 idea per sentence.
- Leave lots of "white space".
Good luck!
Sign up to my cousin Yasbo’s newsletter, ChopLife Express btw AND listen to her podcast, Savings or Current. She’s already been dropping some serious gems, including this one on time management and this one on how the economy works.
Also, Afrobility Podcast is exactly what you need to be listening to for the deep-dives into Africa’s most note-worthy companies.
Recommended Substacks: Afridigest by Emeka; African Entrepreneurship Series by Jeph; Getthebrief by Loye and Fola.
📱📱Quote of the day
“Your personal experiences make up maybe 0.00000001% of what’s happened in the world but maybe 80% of how you think the world works. We’re all biased to our own personal history.”
Remember: “Until the lion learns to write, every story will glorify the hunter.”
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