Free guide
Your pitch deck is 12 questions.
Investors do not read slides, they look for answers. Give them twelve questions, one slide each, and the story tells itself.
- One question per slide
- One idea per slide
- Legible from the back row
- It starts the conversation
At a glance
Twelve slides, one story
In the order investors expect: cover, ambition, problem, customer, solution and why now, market, competition, distribution, evidence, economics, team, ask. Tap a slide to jump to it.
Slide by slide
What each slide must do
The question it answers, what to put on it, what to leave off, and a test to check it passes.
The first thing an investor reads. Within seconds they should know the company name and what it does, in words a stranger would use.
Put on it
- Company name and logo
- One plain sentence: what you do, and for whom
- A product visual, if you have one
- Founder name and contact details
Leave off
- A slogan that fits any company
- An agenda slide
- A wall of logos or a paragraph of text
Pass test: A stranger reads only this slide and can tell a friend what you do.
The ambition one level above the first product. It tells an investor the opportunity is bigger than what ships this year. Sequoia opens its outline the same way: the company in one declarative sentence.
Put on it
- One strong vision sentence
- The future state you want to create
- One image or line that makes that future tangible
Leave off
- A list of features
- Three vision statements
- Buzzwords with no picture behind them
Pass test: Bigger than the solution on slide 5, and still believable.
The pain you are solving, on its own, before any product appears. If the investor does not feel the problem, nothing after this slide lands.
Put on it
- The core problem in one sentence
- How severe it is, and how often it happens
- How people cope today, and where that breaks
- Evidence: data, quotes, or what you saw yourself
Leave off
- Introducing the product early
- A problem nobody pays to solve
- Ten problems on one slide. Pick one.
Pass test: The investor nods before they see a single screen.
Exactly who you serve, and who pays. Marketplaces and B2B2C products have more than one group, so name each one before the solution appears.
Put on it
- The primary customer, described so you could find them tomorrow
- Other groups: the buyer and the user, both sides of a marketplace
- Who pays and who uses, when they differ
- The one need that matters most to each group
Leave off
- “Everyone” or “SMEs”
- Demographics with no job to be done
- Mixing the first customer with the long-term market
Pass test: You can name ten real people or companies that match the description.
How the product removes the pain from slide 3, and the change in the world that makes it possible today. Why now lives here, so the solution and its timing are one story.
Put on it
- The solution in one sentence
- How it works, in three steps at most
- What becomes dramatically easier, cheaper, faster or better
- A screenshot or mockup
- Why now: the technology, behaviour, regulation or market shift that makes this possible today. For AI-native companies, the capability that did not exist before.
Leave off
- A feature list
- The technology before the outcome
- A why now that was just as true five years ago
Pass test: Maps line by line to the problem, and the why now names a specific change.
Reorder rule: Timing is the story, whether a new capability, a rule change, or a shift in behaviour. Split why now out of Solution into its own slide, directly after it.
Proof that solving the problem supports a large business. Build the number from the bottom up: customers times what they pay.
Put on it
- TAM, SAM, and the beachhead you start in
- A bottom-up calculation: number of customers times price per year
- Growth, and the trends driving it
- Where you expand once the beachhead is won
Leave off
- One giant number from an industry report
- “1% of a $50B market”
- A market that is big but out of your reach
Pass test: The bottom-up number and the top-down number roughly agree.
The alternatives a customer has today, including doing nothing, and the two or three dimensions where you are different and hard to copy.
Put on it
- Direct competitors
- Indirect alternatives: a spreadsheet, an agency, doing nothing
- Two or three dimensions where you differ
- Your structural advantage or defensibility
Leave off
- “We have no competitors”
- A 2x2 where you sit alone in the top right
- Trashing the competition
Pass test: You can say what a customer does today without you, and why they would switch.
How you get the first customers, then scale distribution. At an early stage this is a credible hypothesis, not a proven engine.
Put on it
- The first channel, and why it fits this customer
- The launch plan
- Partnerships, the sales motion if B2B, community and referrals
- The rollout by segment or geography, and how it evolves as you grow
Leave off
- Every channel on one slide
- “Viral growth” as the plan
- Hiding the cost of acquisition when you know it
Pass test: The first 10 customers by name, the next 100 by channel.
The strongest evidence you actually have. At pre-seed, traction does not have to mean revenue. Pilots, a waitlist, customer interviews and shipped product all count.
Put on it
- Users, revenue or growth, when you have them
- Waitlist, pilots, letters of intent, partnerships
- Retention and engagement
- Customer interviews, MVP progress, experiments and their results
- One chart or three numbers, each with a date
Leave off
- Vanity metrics: sign-ups with no usage
- Weak metrics manufactured to fill the slide
- Cumulative charts that hide flat growth
Pass test: Every number has a date and a definition.
Reorder rule: Your numbers are the strongest card you hold. Put Traction right after Solution, so the evidence lands before the market maths.
The economic engine, simply: who pays, what they pay for, and how it repeats. Early on, parts of this are hypotheses. Say which.
Put on it
- Who pays
- What they pay for
- Pricing, and the model: subscription, commission, transaction
- The recurring revenue you expect
- Unit economics, when they are real and meaningful
Leave off
- Three revenue models at once
- Projections with no assumptions behind them
- Hiding that the pricing is still a hypothesis
Pass test: An investor can work out the revenue from one customer using this slide alone.
Founder-market fit and the ability to execute. Not a CV for each person, but why this particular group has an edge on this particular problem.
Put on it
- Founders and key people, with the experience that matters here
- Domain expertise: what you know or have done that others have not
- Technical, product and commercial strengths, and who covers each
- Achievements directly relevant to this company
- Advisors who are genuinely involved
Leave off
- Full CVs
- Logos with no link to the problem
- Advisors who took one call
Pass test: Each founder's line answers: why this person, for this problem.
Reorder rule: There is no product yet and the bet is on the founders. Put Team right after Solution. At pre-seed, investors back people first.
The amount, and what it buys. The number matters less than the milestones it reaches before the next round.
Put on it
- The amount you are raising
- Broad use of funds
- Expected runway, usually 12 to 18 months
- The milestones this round is meant to reach
- Where the company stands before the next financing
Leave off
- A range instead of a number
- A pie chart of percentages with no milestone attached
- An ask that stops short of the next fundable milestone
Pass test: The investor can see exactly what their money buys.
Example
Raising £750K. 18 months of runway. Launch, first 10,000 customers, £X ARR, then a second market.
Make it yours
When to change the order
The default order works from a £0 idea to a company with early traction. Three cases earn a change, and a few slides are optional.
Traction moves up
When: Your numbers are the strongest card you hold.
Move: Put Traction right after Solution, so the evidence lands before the market maths.
Team moves up
When: There is no product yet and the bet is on the founders.
Move: Put Team right after Solution. At pre-seed, investors back people first.
Why now gets its own slide
When: Timing is the story, whether a new capability, a rule change, or a shift in behaviour.
Move: Split why now out of Solution into its own slide, directly after it.
Optional slides
- Product demo. The product is visual and one screen says more than a paragraph.
- Why now. Timing is the story. See the reorder rules.
- Financial plan. You have revenue and a model an investor can check.
- Roadmap. The next 18 months have clear, dated milestones.
- Appendix. Detail an investor may ask for: unit economics, pipeline, architecture.
Build it with AI
Hand this framework to your AI
Using ChatGPT, Claude or any AI to draft your deck? Point it at this guide so it follows the framework instead of generic filler. The whole method is published as two files, built from the same data as this page.
Or paste this prompt into your AI and add what you know about your company:
Act as a startup pitch coach and follow the MrAdib pitch deck framework at https://mradib.com/pitch-deck/llms.txt. Ask me for the facts you need, then draft my 12-slide deck one slide at a time: the slide title, one headline sentence, at most four bullets, speaker notes, and the evidence still missing. One idea per slide, no buzzwords, no invented numbers.
Sources
Where this comes from
The framework distils what the investors who see the most decks say they want. Read them.
- Sequoia CapitalWriting a Business PlanRead it
- Y CombinatorA Guide to Seed FundraisingRead it
- AntlerWhat a VC Wants to See in Your Pitch DeckRead it
- Y CombinatorHow to Build Your Seed Round Pitch DeckRead it
- Y CombinatorHow to Design a Better Pitch DeckRead it
- Y CombinatorHow to Pitch Your CompanyRead it
- Paul GrahamHow to Convince InvestorsRead it
- Guy KawasakiThe Only 10 Slides You Need in Your PitchRead it
- DocSendPitch Deck MetricsRead it
Questions founders ask
How many slides should a pitch deck have?
Twelve is enough for a full story: one investor question per slide. Ten to fifteen is the normal range. If a slide does not answer a question, cut it.
Do I need revenue to raise a pre-seed round?
No. At pre-seed the bet is on the founders, the problem, and the early evidence. Pilots, a waitlist, customer interviews and a working product all count as traction.
Should I send the deck before the meeting?
Yes, a version that reads on its own. Investors skim a deck in minutes, so every slide must make its point without you in the room. Keep the detail for the conversation.
How much should go on one slide?
One idea, one question answered. Big type, few words, one visual. If a slide takes more than a minute to explain, it is two slides or an appendix.
The deck opens the door.
Twelve answers get you the meeting. The story you tell in the room does the rest. Questions about your deck? Say hello.