Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on Seattle 2.0, and imported to GeekWire as part of our acquisition of Seattle 2.0 and its archival content. For more background, see this post.
By Rebecca Lovell
Matt Hulett had a great post on putting together a pithy and powerful
pitch deck. Matt, you’re the wind beneath my wings. Or if Beaches
isn’t your style, how about Tombstone: I’m your huckleberry. For the
yang to that post’s yin, read on for five all too common pitfalls. In
the over 450 pitch decks I’ve reviewed in meetings with entrepreneurs
in the last few years, the below are cringe-worthy if not fatal:
“We have no competition.” Translation: you have absolutely no idea
what’s going on in your space, there is no market, or you haven’t
thought creatively enough about it. There is always a substitute,
even if it’s doing nothing. If you’re Southwest Airlines you may be
competing with rental cars or videoconferencing, not just other
airlines. Don’t be lazy, and don’t be afraid the mention the
800-pound gorillas in your space. They may become partners or
acquirers if you’re lucky.
“1% of a 6 billion dollar market is $600 million dollars” (attribution
of this quote: my favorite t-shirt at the Atlas Accelerator Fajanza).
Understand the difference between addressable market and total market.
If you’re an organic kosher low-fat snack company, your addressable
market isn’t the 99% of the US population that snacks, it’s the much
more interesting subset of that market that is into health,
sustainability and/or has dietary restrictions. Smaller market, yes,
but the low-hanging fruit that has the willingness and ability to pay
for your product or service is a much more compelling target.
“These projections are conservative.” You may as well say “ok, I’m
going to be honest with you.” As if everything we’d heard prior to
that declaration was a wild exaggeration or a bald-faced lie. Be
aggressively reasonable, make your assumptions transparent, and back
them up. Let your audience do their own mental discounting, but don’t
cut off your credibility at the knees.
“Viral marketing.” If I had a dollar for every time we heard “viral
marketing”as the go-to-market strategy, well, I could afford those
strappy snakeskin Jimmy Choo’s I’ve been ogling for months. Don’t bore
us with platitudes like “viral marketing”, and “network effect”
without some evidence. Just the facts, man/ma’am. Traffic growth.
Conversion rate (visitor to registered user). Page views. Minutes per
page. Page views per visit. Referral rates. What does it really cost
to acquire users and how much are they worth once you have them? If
you have your own statistics, share them. If you’re using industry
standards or comparables, don’t claim to be the next YouTube.
“Here’s why you should invest.” If you end your pitch with a brief
lecture on the finer points of early-stage investing, you’re likely to
offend a group of fairly smart people who knows exactly why to invest
in your business, or not to. 4 out of 5 investors surveyed will agree
on the basics: team, value proposition, market, returns. If your
business plan holds water and your presentation has a logical flow,
don’t sell beyond the close.
As for what not to wear, the author has been witnessed wearing Atlas t-shirts
and snakeskin stilettos at brunch.
