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Investor Deck Checklist

The Catapult team has seen many thousands of pitch decks between us. Most go in the actual or virtual bin.

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Why? Common mistakes or missing information.

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Providing feedback on pitch decks is a toughie – we have to call your baby ugly, most of the time – which isn’t always the best way to start a relationship. Plus, doing a slide-by-slide commentary, then listing out all the things that aren’t there at all, can lead to thousands of words of feedback.

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That’s why we’ve developed our own structured approach to review investor materials and providing feedback to founders.

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This has two big advantages to unstructured and anecdotal feedback. Firstly, it acts as a checklist or table of contents for what should be in a good deck.

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Secondly, it quantifies our feedback in a scoring system that’s easy to understand.

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We all know that quantitative metrics are way easier, and faster, to comprehend than qualitative analyses. We do both, but we use the score (good or bad) to frame the analysis.

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Item 1: Purpose and Proposition

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Is it clear, preferably almost immediately, why this business exists and what compelled the founders to start it?

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Your origin story matters. Your value proposition needs to be clear and succinct. An “Airbnb for Cars” type analogy can help.

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Item 2: Description of Problem

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It’s essential that you can describe the problem space in a simple, understandable way. The "would your Gran understand" test.

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How clear and obvious is it that there’s a real issue the company is aiming it?

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Item 3: Market Opportunity

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How obvious is it that there’s a clearly defined market, at meaningful scale, with a focused initial target segment?

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Use TAM, SAM and SOM or an equivalent. Use third party market stats and analyst detail for validation.

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Item 4: Description of Solution

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Does the deck now explain how the company’s solution solves the problem, is compelling to its target market and meets the timeliness (“why now?”) test?  

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If the investor can’t immediately see problem – opportunity – solution, they won’t read on. If they do, you’re not done yet.

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Item 5: Competitive Positioning

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Is it obvious that the types of competitor (direct and indirect) are understood, how the company is positioned against them, and how they are different/better than the other options?  

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After all, if you don’t know how you’re going to stand out from the crowd, why should anybody invest?

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Item 6: Business Model

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Is it clear who pays for what, how revenues flow, paying clients versus free/freemium users, etc?

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Is it obvious how the company will make money and build scale? Is a pricing strategy evident?

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Item 7: Detail on Product

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How well have you described how the product works and meets its solution requirements?

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Use diagrams, screenshots, callouts, explanations, process flows or appropriate means of bringing the product to life. Note that this isn’t the same as the solution section.

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Item 8: Traction and Roadmap

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Is it clear that the company has made progress to date and has a plan for the next few years?

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This depends on the maturity of the business. Demonstrate early stage market validation, initial product/market fit, sales traction, customer wins, users onboarded, or whatever. Timeline preferred.

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Item 9: Go-to-Market Plan

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Is their evidence of a GTM plan that’s going to deliver results to hit forecast?

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Is the brand, marketing, sales and product strategy clear? Are their buyer personas for target customers? Are you making market or taking market? Is there a campaign plan? Do historical actuals map to future performance and expectation?

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Item 10: Your Team

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Who is in the founding team, what board and advisors are in place, do they seem relevant and credible, does their track-record inspire confidence?

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Most importantly, tell the story of why you’re the team to back.

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Item 11: Financials

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With charts/graphs, have you summarised the five year plan for the business?

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In the detail, does historical traction and GTM plan give confidence the figures are achievable? Is cashflow well-defined and realistic? Are assumptions sensible?

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Item 12: Investment and Use of Funds

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Is it clear why you are raising and how much you’re raising?

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Is the valuation clear and sensible? Is there a breakdown on how you will spend the money that makes sense in terms of “will this money help them achieve their goals”?

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In Conclusion

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The order can vary a bit but having all this here is important. Investors like to see the same stuff in the decks they review. It’s essential for benchmarking.

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Don’t make them do unnecessary work to understand you.

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Have a go yourself. Rate each one out of 10 and see how you get on. In the decks we review, there are usually 3 to 5 of the above 12 missing entirely. Another 3 to 5 are completely inadequate.

We try to do two FOC pitch deck reviews per month. If you’d like us to have a look, say so in the responses and we’ll DM.

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12 more blogs – one for each topic – will follow in the coming weeks.

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If you'd like to discuss in more detail, we'd love to have a conversation about the challenges you're facing and how we can help.

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Investor Deck Checklist #3: Market Opportunity
Investor Deck Checklist #2: Description of Problem
Investor Deck Checklist #1: Purpose and Proposition
Investor Deck Checklist
The Advisor Traps
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Investor Deck Checklist #3: Market Opportunity
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Investor Deck Checklist #1: Purpose and Proposition
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