VC Pitch “Rules”

I often get emailed requests to include content in my posts. While I can't always oblige I do look for interesting content to repurpose or link to or build a large post around.

Today I received the following links from Laura Fitton on a topic near and dear to my heart – giving effective venture presentations. One of my very first posts for VC Adventure was on this topic, and much of Laura's advice corresponds well to my thoughts on the subject.

Some of my personal favorites from her lists (I'm paraphrasing – see the links below for the full original):

• your powerpoint isn't "your presentation"
• once you've cut down your presentation to its desired length, take out a few more slides (you won't miss them and neither will the investors you're pitching)
• always keep in mind the outcome – your entire presentation should be geared toward serving your audience and the result to which you're trying to drive
• end by encouraging next steps (rather than the throw away summary "this is the greatest deal ever" slide)
• vary your tone, speed, inflection, etc.
• don't memorize your speech (I love this one! I worked with an entrepreneur once who had a photographic memory; he would literally memorize his pitch and then read it back – you could actually see him reading in his mind while he gave the presentation. It was particularly fun to interrupt him mid-slide and then watch him read through what he had already said in his mind before starting to talk again – taking it from wherever he was interrupted!)

More at the links below. I don't know Laura personally, so this isn't an endorsement of her services (that's entirely up to you), but I did enjoy reading the "rules" and thought I'd post them here for all to enjoy.

http://home.comcast.net/~pistachioconsulting/10ThingsPitch.htm

http://home.comcast.net/~pistachioconsulting/Break10Rules.htm

   

 

Comments

[Jassmaree Franchezka]

hey there! im kinda new on this venture capital thinggy but i really wanna learn about it. i found one venture capital company on wikipedia named ITU VENTURES (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITU_Ventures). Have you heard of this? Anyone have a take? I learned that Chad Browstein is the founder.

[snigdha]

hi seth,

i'm a journalist based in mumbai and read your blog very often. i like the way it is written. i work for a newspaper called mint, which is a joint venture with the wall street journal and write on venture capital. found this particular post interesting. was wondering if i could invite you to an email interview on vc 'pitch' rules for my blog -- i run this as part of my job. the reason for the interview: venture capitalists are still a fairly exotic breed of investors for indian entrepreneurs but the rules for pitching, i guess, are pretty much the same anywhere in the world. also, your thoughts on indian entrepreneurs would be very welcome -- read your post on your recent trip here. please do let me know. you could also write to me at [email protected].