Before everything takes off, there is always a preparation stage. Starting up your own business is already no easy feat in the very beginning, yet the preparation phase can be even more daunting as it is full of uncertainties and gamble.
Most people would have trouble starting in the phase of creating their own perfect startup pitch, to attract the initial investors for your startup, before the gear even starts grinding.
Direct advice would be to improve your persuasion skills, as you would need to make people entrust you with their money essentially. If you fail to attract investors via persuasion pitches, it should also be safe to assume that you will have trouble attracting customers too.
If you are having a great business idea, that seems feasible but you are struggling to gain investors, here are some tips on how to improve that.
What do you need to create a perfect startup pitch?
Creating Assertion
When a pitch is presented to potential investors, the stance and more importantly assertiveness is vital in creating confidence in the audience. It is important to also present with the right attitude, flow as well as cutting off unnecessary bits to avoid boredom.
First off, the beginning of a presentation is very important as it captures your potential investors’ attention and hopefully, grabs also their interest. Do not worry if you didn’t include every bit of detail in the beginning as there are more times afterwards to deepen your idea or answer any other questions after the presentation.
The best advice is still to study other pitches available and compare them to yours, try to improve on every attempt, even if it had to be in a trial-and-error fashion. When you are studying others’ pitches, it is also important to observe how the experts react especially in the first 30 seconds of a speech. This first 30 seconds is the ideal timeframe where they decide if your business idea is the one they are willing to invest in.
Remember, convey only the most interesting, attractive and convincing points of your idea, anything more than that can come after.
Identifying Your Target Market Accurately
Besides being assertive in your speeches, the points you convey ultimately decide if your project would work. And one of the most important components of a business is the target market it sets for itself. Having a correct and accurate market segment targeted further improves the success of your business pitch to investors.
A vast majority of the startup pitch failed due to how their perceived target market is not the ideal segment in experts’ eyes. The thing to do is to lay out clearly and describe what a product or service would do, and then the potential customers that would buy the product. Make it clear, then make it reasonable.
After that, the thing that investors would see is the return on investment. The way your idea is implemented should show signs of a good or at least reasonable return. The smaller the cost, the bigger the return is what any investors would hope for.
Overall, the target market identification in a pitch presentation is one of the most important points and should be mentioned at the very beginning. Although not in-depth at first, do add on more details in the content part of said presentation.
Show the Teamwork
There is always a great team behind every successful business, and a startup is fundamental to building a business. To create a more convincing proposal to the investors, one cannot simply do everything by themselves, you must consult the professionals in your team and get the best info out of them before presenting it in a pitch.
It is a matter of taking advantage of your team’s knowledge in their specific roles and positions. Optimizing your presentation this way can help in reducing the unnecessary questions and confusion that you might have among investors.
Besides, it is also a good idea to mention your team in the presentation. By showing the prominence of your team, it also shows that you are working with trust and professionally among your team. This, in investors’ eyes, is a good foundation for a successful and long-running business and it will act as a good confidence boost for them.
Finally, showing that you have a good team also promises a good return to the investors as a company’s stability can be shown and longevity often means success in a business.
Work on Your Presentation
Presentation skills are something not everybody has, especially in preparing a good and comfortable slideshow. The point is, things are supposed to be interesting and professional both visually and verbally, missing the shot on either of those could lead to a drop in confidence or worse, miscommunication. So, this is what you should do to avoid a disastrous presentation.
You should always do research, and learn from the best presentations available, from the good examples. Observe and study the flow of a presentation, the way each point are presented as well as the supplementing visuals and audio. It is also important to rehearse and prepare backups to avoid or lower the chances of any interruptions and technical errors that might occur.
An example would be including a website in your presentation that might or might not work properly, it is better to either use the screenshot or preload the website beforehand and make sure it stays open during preparation.
To avoid technical complications, there is also the classic way of presenting simply with texts and pictures. The slides should be presented in a simple and clean manner, with only important main points instead of flooding them with texts. Any additional notes or explanations can be done verbally or with additional printouts should there be a need.
The final thing to note is that the investors had listened to a lot of presentations, do not stress about showing off how good you are. Instead, focusing on the points u want to present and doing it well is enough.
Choose a right place
A good place should be easily accessible, have enough space, be well designed to keep the audience focused on the stage, and have enough equipment to keep the presentation going smoothly.
Make sure the space reflects the image you want to showcase in your pitch competition. For example, as a company, if you want to be closer to the tech community, you’d prefer a coworking space event room instead of an old-fashioned hotel meeting room.
You can also work with coworking spaces to organize your pitch sessions, which will give you more visibility in the startup community.
ThinkHub Event Space is the perfect space for a startup and organisation to host a pitching competition or corporate event in Malaysia. Book A Tour Here.
Be Mindful of the Asking Money
The idea of asking for money is to have a successful launch of the product, which means that in any pitching presentation there would be a negotiating segment where you ask for the amount you need in investment.
Having an amount in mind is important, however, there will always be uncertainties in a negotiation. This is why you should not ask for only double the amount required in operation. Do consider other expenses that are not as obvious and the amount you need to cover as well.
Conclusion
In conclusion, starting a business is not easy and pitching plays a big role in any startup company. If you are really good with what you do, with a prominent idea, products and a great, professional team behind your back, there is still a need in having someone with good presentation skills. Should there be no choice, it is not a bad idea in outsourcing this part to the respective expert.
Remember, set everything up according to your preference and profession and as long as you are adhering to some of the basic rules above. Aside from that, take a good amount of time in preparing your pitch, do it carefully and professionally. As there is no one correct answer to creating the perfect startup pitch, take as much time and polish it as best as you could and you are good to go.