What is a startup pitch?

A startup pitch is like an application letter, a manifesto, a proposal, or some other presentation. It is composed to deliver the working idea or strategy of a business, especially as a way to attract or convince potential investors. 

A typical startup pitch encompasses everything from the vision and value proposition of a founder, to their business model, their target market, their preferred marketing strategy, their team, the problem they want to solve, and the solution they have come up with.

Why is a startup pitch important?

Why would an entrepreneur want to create a startup pitch? Well, it’s because in business, a startup pitch is their best shot at attracting the right set of partners and investors. 

Writing a startup pitch puts an entrepreneur’s plans out on paper. This provides an opportunity for the entrepreneur to personally revise their strategy and business direction over a period of time. It also directs them to ask the right questions about their potential investors in a bid to understand them. 

On the other hand, a pitch gives co-founders, staff or other employees a look at the company’s operation and growth plans. These contributors can then better understand their present roles in the business and also get an idea of how they will function in the future. 

However, the main importance of a startup pitch is to help entrepreneurs earn trust and commitment from investors. It is a bold, clear and exact statement that presents important digits such as monthly expense, the cost of customer acquisition, and the lifetime value of clients. 

What are investors looking for in a startup pitch?

Another way to ask this question is “how to judge a startup pitch?” Of course, understanding how investors judge a startup pitch would help us see things from their perspective and know what exactly it is they are looking for. Here’s are some things every investor is hoping to see;

1. The entrepreneur's passion for their business.
2. Proof that there is a huge opportunity in the chosen market. 
3. A chance to test the startup’s product or service in-person.

Long or short pitches, which is better? 

We’ll tell you for free that there are other things to worry about aside from the actual content of your pitch desk. One of such things is how long or short your pitch should be. 

Too long and investors might get bored and become uninterested in your pitch, and too short and investors might not get enough information to trust or commit to your startup. So what exactly should it be? 

The answer depends on what method you will be using to present your pitch, how long you believe your investor’s attention span will be, and in some sense, it also depends on what your gut tells you. 

If you feel that your audience will only spare seconds of their time, then you should stick to short pitches presented orally in a speech. This should be 1 or, at most, 2 minutes long. 

Alternatively, you can provide your pitch in one-page of a typed document for investors who have a medium attention span. This should be in a bold and clear font, and it should be written in a manner that is easy to understand. 

Finally, a long pitch should take the form of a PowerPoint presentation. The delivery is used only where investors have a long attention span, and are ready to offer a good amount of their time. However, it is ideal to keep the PowerPoint presentation between 10 and 15 slides. 

5 steps to creating the perfect startup pitch

Whether you’re delivering a one-minute pitch to investors who are short on time and need to be somewhere else, or you’re delivering a 15-slide presentation to investors who want to hear you out, here are 4 steps to make sure that you nail it. 

1. Avoid Having Spoken and Written Errors in Your Pitch:

As in most other presentations, spoken and written errors are a turn-off. They project a bad image on whoever is presenting the pitch and the company they represent. 

Also, aside from the fact that an error in your pitch would make you look unprofessional and unprepared, typos, wrongly spelled or pronounced words, and poor grammar could provide misleading information. 

This is demeaning and it could also attract legal consequences for instance, where the information damages the reputation of an individual or company, or leads to an infringement of their rights. 

2. Be Brief But Cover All The Major Details:

A startup pitch should be robust because you never know which aspect of it would attract an investor. Getting this kind of pitch that covers all the major details includes:

1. Describing your vision and value proposition as a founder, 
2. Defining your business model, 
3. Identifying the target market and your competition, 
4. Expressing your marketing strategy, 
5. Revealing your team, 
6. While also explaining the problem and your solution. 

3. Avoid Digressing, Stay Within Your Points:

Investors are busy people so sometimes, they have a lot of pitches to read or listen to at once. In addition, they spend time making investment decisions and following up with the legalities of such decisions. 

This means two things. One is that a pitch must be brief and concise even as it covers all the important areas we mentioned. Secondly, you must be sure that your pitch focuses on your core points without digressing. 

The idea of presenting a brief and concise pitch should not make you leave out major details about your startup. In the same vain, the idea of including major details should not make you speak on irrelevant or far-fetched topics. Keeping the balance between these two points will get you a perfect pitch. 

4. Maintain a Formal and Corporate Essence In-Person: 

Delivering your pitch through a PowerPoint presentation or a live speech will mean addressing an investor or a crowd of investors in-person. In this case, the quality of your pitch will also be influenced by your expressions, your appearance, and your essence in general. 

Of course, you already know that you will be addressed the way you are dressed. But it goes far beyond that. The way you express your ideas, respond to questions, and appeal to the investors will also determine whether you are given a listening ear and whether you succeed at convincing investors to support your startup or not. 

This makes it mandatory for you to maintain a smart, bold, and formal composure all through your pitching. 

5. Create a Memorable Experience:

Investors should be able to remember your pitch for something good. It could be the fun experience they had while testing your product, the pleasure of listening to the perfect pitch you presented, your captivating trademark phrase, or even having to meet a personality like you. 

You should strive to create these kinds of memories. By doing so, you will be giving investors a reason to commit to your startup. For instance, one could believe that your trademark phrase is catchy enough to catch the attention of new users, or that the user experience with your product is simply amazing. 

Conclusion

It may only take a few minutes to pitch your startup to investors, but how you use those few minutes will determine a lot. To get the best impression, we have ascertained that you will have to avoid having spoken or written errors in your pitch, be brief but still cover all the major details, avoid digressing off your points, maintain a formal composure, and strive to create a memorable experience. 

You may have to practise your speech over and over and review your writing to deliver a sterling pitch. This is worth every stress. It is what would help you win the trust of potential investors and get the funding you need to launch or scale your business.