What Do VCs Look For In A Pitch?

Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn and VC at Greylock, has a great post on pitching What I Wish I Knew Before Pitching LinkedIn to VCs.

My own two cents based on my experience is:

A.  Think visually. VC's like graphics, not text, so don't overload your presentation with text.

B.  Grab your audience in the first slide. You need to explain quickly why you are unique and why you are going to win.

You don't need to lead with the team slide. You can save that for later in the pitch.

C.  Keep your presentation short and to the point. Attention spans are short. Think: Get in, get out, and get done.

D.  Have a simple, pro-forma income statement at the end of the presentation. Have the pro-forma by quarter for the first 4 quarters and by year for the next 4 years.

E.  Think of yourself like a color commentator in sports. The pitch will have the basic information, and you will fill in the blanks. You don't need to have every question answered in the pitch.

A few things to think about when answering questions during the presentation:

A.  Be to the point. Give the answer and move on.

B.  Don't be afraid to talk about the competition. There is always competition in any business. Knowing your competitors better than the investors will ease your investors fears.

C.  You shouldn't tell a VC who else you are pitching to. They will ask, but you don't need to tell them.

D.  Send the pitch if asked. Make sure it is labeled "Company Confidential" and it has today's date. Make sure the file is labeled with the current date (I like using year/month/day format, so I would date it 170326 company presentation if I was sending it today), not version xx.

The higher the version number, the more "shopped" the deal will look.

Good luck!

For more read: http://ec2-18-220-111-249.us-east-2.compute.amazonaws.com/how-you-can-make-a-great-first-impression-in-less-than-seven-seconds/

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View original answer on Quora.