Presenting does not come naturally to many people. Here's few key tips for pitching your startup to investors with a simple template to follow.

1. How to Deliver a Pitch Investors Simply
Can't Turn Down
Sointu Karjalainen
sointu.karjalainen@businesstampere.com
+358 40 823 5371

2. WHY?

3. Benefits of (just) entering
a pitching competition
Build your confidence
Expand your network
Gain exposure
Refine your idea

4. GETTING TO
SECOND BASE

5. Golden rules of investor dating
1. Be specific and laser focused
2. Pitch the deal, not the business
3. Be authentic and tell a story

6. Presentation skills
Practice beforehand
Know your audience
PowerPoint is a visual aid, not the story
Get excited about what you pitch
Be genuine

8. 1.date pitch deck 2.date pitch deck
3-5 minutes
1. Hook
2. Problem
3. Solution
4. Markets (GTM)
5. Business Model
6. Competition
7. Traction
8. Founding team
9. Closing
10-30 minutes
1. Company Overview
2. Mission/Vision of the Company
3. Team
4. Problem
5. Solution
6. Market Opportunity, GTM
7. Product
8. Customers
9. Technology
10. Competition
11. Traction
12. Business Model
13. The Marketing Plan
14. Financials
15. The Ask

9. 1. Hook – begin your story
“Imagine…” - tell a story.
Question…get a “yes”.
Appeal to emotions.
One Liner - big vision statement — not
What you do — WHY you do!

10. 2.Problem
The ”villain” of your story – painful problem worth
solving with stats showing this is an issue worth lots
of money and hint that current solutions aren’t
cutting it…

11. 3. Solution – the ”hero” that slays the villain
• We’re doing X (solving a problem) for Y (for a specific audience)
by Z (in a nutshell, what are you? A Platform /app /solution/tool/ etc.)
and as a bonus, your unique secret sauce that is enabling you to do it better
than competition
• Focus on the outcome for customers and clients. Marketing begins with
investors, who might themselves be prospective users of a new product or
service
• Where others do X, our solution excels because we do Y cheaper/ faster/ saving
money or resources/ making more money. Highlight the important benefits to
your users/ customers
• Plan for a demo - identify 3 best things about your solution and focus on making
sure your audience understands them clearly

12. “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t
understand it well enough.”

13. 4. Market opportunity
• Briefly explain exactly who your target audience is and how you intend to
acquire these customers. ...GTM separately in longer pitches ( What are the
strategies that will help you penetrate the market and gain users?)
Show statistics:
• TAM (Total Addressable Market)
• SAM (Segmented Addressable Market)
• SOM (Share of Market) so they get an idea of the size.
• Value of the markets— what was the spend on similar solutions last year?

14. 5. Business model
How do you make money? Basic revenue
model, additional revenue streams

15. 6. Competition
It’s GREAT that you have competition — now just prove that you have a clear
advantage over them.
Group them into 3 or 4 types and then create a magic quadrant, a petal
diagram or a marketscape showing how you measure up to them. Most
important — add in your true differation statement: “What truly sets us
apart is…”

18. 7. Traction
The major milestones you’ve hit in funding,
product,
users,
downloads,
revenue,
growth,
endorsements,
partnerships, etc.

19. Instead of using words like traction,
revenue, signups, etc. say:
• 40% growth in user MoM, for 8
months
• 212% growth in revenue YoY,
at $500K
• $150K revenue, 97% Margins,
40% growth in users MoM

20. 8. Founding team
• Most important slide but easily overlooked
• Ideas matter, but execution rules. Investors are looking for a strong and diverse
team with relevant domain expertise
• Pics, titles and a few important facts. Add logos of outstanding organizations
you’ve worked for, been affiliated with or studied at. If you have an Advisory
Board, add them too — it might need a separate slide
• A good way for investors to predict potential success is by looking at the speed of
progress the startup has made as a team. Highlight those personal achievements
and learnings
• Be honest even when your team consists of only two students and a dog

22. 9. Closing – the ask
Money for milestones!
What are your major milestones to be hit (product, marketing, revenues) over the
course of time this funding round will last for — 12/18/24 months?
Seeking $XXM for: (List the main allocations such as: R&D, Sales and Marketing,
Team Expansion Etc. Round Objective: This will take us to XX months, XXXK
users/revenue/downloads etc., break even/cash flow positive — wherever you will
be when you are ready for the next round.
“Why us, why now?” This is the place to really show movement in trends and
opportunities — have there been major fundings or acquisitions among your
competitors?

23. Which pages matter the most?
23,2
22,8
16,3
14,5
13,3
11,3
10,2
0 5 10 15 20 25
Financials
Team
Competition
Business Model
Market
Problem
Solution
Average seconds spend on page

24. Practise
Practise
Practise
Startup Tampere Meetup
https://www.meetup.com/Startup-Tampere-Meetup/

25. https://businesstampere.com/entrepreneurs/startup-tampere/

26. nordicstartupschool.com

27. OPEN FOR BUSINESS.
sointu.karjalainen@businesstampere.com
+358 40 823 5371
Startup Tampere Slack
http://bit.ly/startuptampereslack