The world is changing. The way readers look at a pitch deck is changing. The number one priority of a pitch deck is to save time while explaining. So, this is what you ought to do with the competition slide of your pitch deck.
In this article, we will be interviewing, AL Anany, a 12-year business consultant in Zurich, Switzerland, to have an authentic real-time understanding of the vitality of this slide. Here goes the transcript.
What Are Pitch Decks?
AL Anany: “Pitch decks! Oh, well, the idea of a pitch deck initially is to just pitch a product or a service. That’s it’s as simple as that it doesn’t get simpler than this. So if you’re selling bananas to someone on the street, then you’re doing a pitch per se. And the pitch deck could be your sign that says bananas for $1 apiece.”
AL Anany: “So, in a nutshell, when you’re thinking of a pitch deck, you have to always think it is something to pitch an idea, not more, not less. People complicate it online and say that it has a lot of deep structures that you should follow, and so on and so forth. The truth is, it’s whatever works for you to pitch to the person you’re looking to pitch for. That’s it.”
Investor Decks vs Pitch Decks
AL Anany: “Now, it doesn’t necessarily have to be for investors, as people commonly know. The truth is, there are different types of pitch decks, I will speak about each one separately. So when you say pitch deck, you’re pitching, you’re having a presentation that pitches a certain product or a service or a company.”
AL Anany: “Now, this doesn’t have to go to an investor, it could go to a company partner, a co founder, a team member, whatever it is. It doesn’t matter because you’re pitching the product. When we say investor decks, then this is more focused or investor presentations; then this is more focused on actual investors reading the documents, so they have to see some sort of some sort of product validation in terms of the market and financials. That’s why people tend to put a lot of graphs and financials when it comes to investor presentations, versus when they do a small pitch like the Airbnb deck.”
AL Anany: “So it’s more statistical and it’s more just to reassure that person that they’re gonna get their money back with a good return on investment. So that’s the main difference between pitch decks and investor decks.”
When is the perfect time to use them?
AL Anany: “Many new entrepreneurs asked me when is the perfect time to create a pitch deck? It’s a very important question because at the start of your business, you don’t know whether you want to create a business plan, a white paper, a one pager or pitch deck, there are a lot of options. So when is the perfect time to create any pitch deck?”
AL Anany: “My advice is it really depends on your product. Usually, the most recommended pitch deck is one that has traction and has something to say not just pitch, an idea of a product pitching an idea is also a good option with a pitch deck. But people will want to investigate more, because it’s just an idea out there. That’s why they usually require business plans for that; i.e. what is your plan to get this going and a pitch deck would never be able to show the plan properly how it should be.”
AL Anany: “And that’s why I always advise my clients to create pitch decks, when they have some financials and traction in place in order to actually pitch what they’ve done so far. So that will be the perfect spot to use pitch decks.”
The different pitch deck types for each round.
AL Anany: “There are different types of pitch decks for each round of investment, or fundraising rounds. For instance, if you Google something like WeWork’s investor presentation, Tesla’s investor presentations, these companies are public companies. So they know that they’re not addressing an investor for private investment, they’re investing everyone to invest in their stock, which is a totally different type of investor presentation.”
AL Anany: “That’s why it’s all fixed on charts and numbers. And if you see it, you’re gonna see that it’s maybe 50 to 80 slides and it mostly not about the idea. It’s mostly circling around the market and where it’s going in terms of direction. So this is a type of pitch deck that I like to call it, a showcase pitch deck as in, you’re not persuading them with an idea, you’re showing the world that there is more market where you can grow your product.”
AL Anany: “So that’s a type of pitch deck. And I could actually advise some clients who are in ideation to go with this because it is very similar to a business plan in terms of a structure; it has a lot of market studies. Now, the second and the most common type of pitch deck is the is the persuasive-ideation pitch deck, that’s what I call it. I have an idea of a business, I might have some users and I want to get an investment to keep this running and to actually accelerate the growth of my product. That’s the famous Airbnb pitch deck and all the other common pitch decks.”
AL Anany: “This is what most people Google and start researching the pitch deck. So this other type of pitch deck relies on graphics and short wording. It relies on a lot of factors much more than the than the first type. Because at the first type people are already convinced with Tesla as a product, and they’re just checking the market. But if you’re doing a persuasive-ideation pitch deck, odds are the person is already doubtful. They’re not sure if your product is going to work out or not. And they’re taking a risk of investing in you. And that’s why it’s a totally different type of pitch deck.”
The Perfect Length
AL Anany: “What’s the perfect length of a pitch deck? Now, there are a lot of different structures that I’ll talk on in a minute. But the perfect length of pitch deck should be extremely short, as short as you can. For instance, if you’re launching a product similar to Uber like Careem, for example, in the Middle East, you don’t really have to say that you are changing and evolving transportation or ride hailing. People already know Uber.”
AL Anany: “And it’s not a bad thing to create a company similar to another company, that’s totally alright. In the business world, it doesn’t matter. What matters is whether you execute it properly, to get enough users. So the perfect length of pitch deck should be as short as you can; if there is any slide out there that you think is not needed, ditch it immediately! Don’t think twice. If you’re going to write a business model that is a subscription based model and all your competitors are also doing subscription based models, and it’s so obvious that you’re going to do a subscription based model like Spotify or Netflix, then then you don’t really need to say that right now. You could put it in the appendix but you don’t need to say it instantly.”
Pitch Deck Slides
Which slides should you add?
AL Anany: “So there are different mentalities of thought about what pitch deck slides should be added in the pitch deck. My personal recommendation is you ought to start with the product.”
AL Anany: “Starting with Problem and Solution is overused that I would advise to actually ditch problem and solution and just put a statistic for each thing. So if there is a problem, show it by statistic, if there is a solution, show it by a demo. Don’t talk about the problem and the solution. Rather show them better than just saying it. Never follow a structure because the people before you used that structure. So optimally, you should add something about the product and the traction.”
AL Anany: “Additionally, you should also add something about your team because most pitch decks are getting invested in because of their team. I’ve seen pitch decks that went into Y Combinator and the product is extremely average. The pitch is not well designed. But they had a team that was extremely capable. They worked in Fortune 500 companies and it felt like they could do something with this company. So execution is the real challenge.”
The Different Recommended Structures by Each VC/Accelerator
Sequoia Capital & Y Combinator
AL Anany: “So I’ve looked before when I was working on a workshop at the different recommended structures by each VC. So I looked at Sequoia and Kleiner Perkins. I looked at Y Combinator and 500 co. Those are a couple of startup accelerators and a couple of VCs. I also looked at a16z. All these companies have strong track records. For example, Y Combinator funded companies like Airbnb. Sequoia, invested in apple at a very early stage. 500 co invested in Canva. A16z had invested in meta, when it was called Facebook. Kleiner Perkins invested in Amazon at a very early stage. So they know what they’re doing.”
AL Anany: “And when I started researching (I’ll show you a table), I saw what each of those VCs and accelerators recommended in terms of content or in terms of pitch deck structure. And as you can see, it’s extremely different. You’re gonna see that Sequoia for instance, advises to go without traction, but to say a little bit more about the market, the team, the business model and your vision for the future. While Y Combinator would want to see traction as a difference between them, and Sequoia.”
a16z
AL Anany: “a16z has even a better recommendation because it’s shorter. And I like it. It starts with an elevator, it shows the vision, and what are the competition doing in the market? What is your traction team and investment ask? It’s straightforward. And to the point, which is what I love about a16z’s pitch deck recommendation.
500 co
AL Anany: “500 co, on the other hand, would look for, for elevator pitch, Problem, Solution, Traction, Business model, Market, Team. They would look for competition. They also will look at how the product works because they get a lot of tech products.”
AL Anany: “Additionally, they want to see your progress, which I think is a very important slide because a lot of people get investments these days, for example, for the AI hype, and they don’t really use the investment properly. That’s why it’s extremely important to see what are you doing with your previous fundraising rounds.”
Kleiner Perkins
AL Anany: “Now, Kleiner Perkins is my absolute favourite, they recommend four slides only. The first slide has a solution. What is your solution? Don’t tell me about the problem. Just tell me what you’re putting on the market. And then I’m going to assess if it’s actually a problem or not.”
AL Anany: “Then they’re going to ask about strategy because as I mentioned before execution is the key not ideation. So they want to see what’s your strategy of launching. And then they want to combine Team, Revenue and traction in the same slide because why not.”
AL Anany: “You don’t have to say a lot. But an investor once told me that if you don’t have Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos on your team, then you most likely don’t have to mention your team. As in, only mention your team if it has a strong value to add, and most pitch decks of my clients put the team with the logos of companies that they worked in.”
AL Anany: “The final slide for Kleiner Perkins is the progress – What do you have done? Again, I agree on how very vital this slide of the pitch deck is. So these are the five different different VCs and accelerator that I follow and that I like in terms of structure.”
The Competition Slide’s Importance
AL Anany: “The competition slide in specific is extremely important. Because, just to make it so simple, You see what the others are doing and how big they are. You feel a sense of security or as I like to call it the market competition validation.“
The Market Competition Validation & Assurance
AL Anany: “Now for the market competition validation, if I am an investor looking at a document, I want to see that there are others who have a certain fundraising amount and a certain valuation, and they’re actually making money in the market. You can show me as many statistics as you want online, because it’s so easy to find a lot of online statistics that show that a certain industry will grow by 2030 or 2040. But if you show me that there is a company like Canva, for example, with a very high valuation, and that you’re creating a company that is similar to it, but with a minor difference in the product that makes yours better, then this is perfect.”
AL Anany: “Because now I would just assess myself whether your product is really better and whether your team has execution skills. The market is there, because people are using Canva, everywhere. Hence, the market is ready for the product.”
Information Derived from the Competition Slide
AL Anany: “When you do the pitch deck competition slide (and I’ll show you the different types of competition slides later) but the competition slide if pitched correctly, should show information like like total addressable market estimate in your brain. Additionally, what you could achieve in terms of valuation. These things you have to study later on in financial model, but if the competition slide is properly put, you’ll give the reader estimates.”
AL Anany: “Most importantly, the features of the product itself could be derived from the competition slide in your pitch deck. If you put Stripe in your competition chart, then the reader would know that you’re in FinTech, and that you’re similar to stripe, but you’re slightly different. That’s why there are a lot of information that is derived from such a simple slide as the pitch deck competition slide.”
Pitch Deck Competition Slide
The Types of Competition Slides
AL Anany: “The pitch deck competition slide is extremely important, because it is one of the few opportunities you have to show how you’re different. But there are different types of competition slides.”
XY Competition Graph
AL Anany: “My personal favourite is the XY graph. I mean, everyone likes the XY graph, you just show where you are in the chart of core features. But there is a lot of people who use it in a very amateur way. They would just show that they are smarter, and we’re cheaper. But you really have to exert a lot of effort in creating the perfect XY graph and be realistic, I wouldn’t put everyone on a certain quadrant and put my startup alone in a quadrant because I am better in everything. The more realistic you are, the better. So that’s the XY graph.”
Features Table
AL Anany: “Other people go and do the feature stable, which you probably saw before. You just put each company with the features that they’re offering and then yours with the features that you’re offering. This is good, but it doesn’t really give you a lot of information, it’s kind of my least favourite.”
Funding and Valuation of Competition
AL Anany: “Another trending type of the competition slide of a pitch deck is funding and valuation. You see how much funding your competitors are getting. So Canva has a funding of X amount, pitch.com has funding of X amount and so on. So now you know that the funding and the valuation of the similar companies. The only problem with this is it doesn’t really show the features or what your company does in specific, you know the industry, you know the idea, but you don’t see what it does.”
Hybrid* Competition Slide (New and Recommended)
AL Anany: “So my top notch recommendation of a competition slide is what I would call the hybrid, which is a little bit of XY graph and a little bit of funding and valuation. If you can incorporate both of those together, that’s perfect. So create an XY graph where you put the reasonable variables, and then put the companies that you think are extremely to the point and close to your product with their valuation or fundraising they have achieved. If a person looks at it, they would know what industry are working in, what valuation you could reach, and how big the market is. That’s a lot more information, which makes perfect pitch. This is how to really create a good pitch deck competition slide.”
About The Consultant Author
AL Anany: “I’m AL Anany, a 12 year business consultant in Zurich. I’ve created my company Albusi GmbH in Switzerland, with client companies that raised over 120 million, others went into Y Combinator and 500 co.
The truth is pitch decks are an art and I see all sorts of pitch decks every day. It takes a very good mind to create a beautiful pitch deck because a pitch deck is a story and you have to say your story in a right and personal way.”
FYI – Intensify is working on a top notch human-guided AI platform that benchmarks better than the common AI tools.
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