Last updated October 14, 2022 1:40 PM (EDT) · Estimated Read Time: 20m 30s
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When people hurt themselves lifting heavy things, it's usually because they try to lift with their back. The right way to lift heavy things is to let your legs do the work. Inexperienced founders make the same mistake when trying to convince investors. They try to convince with their pitch.
Most would be better off if they let their startup do the work — if they started by understanding why their startup is worth investing in, then simply explained this well to investors.
—”How to Convince Investors” by Paul Graham
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Your slides need to do double the work. In a traditional pitch, you get to use your voice, body language, and personality to pitch. On Wefunder, you don’t. Your slides need to tell the full story. Your graphs or images may need more contextual captions. You might consider additional body copy to support a headline.
You’re pitching two different audiences looking to feel different things.
Professional investors on Wefunder want to feel confident that you have a great plan and that you can execute. They’ll be focusing on your business model, traction, unfair advantages, and the overall opportunity.
Non-professional investors on Wefunder are everyday people investing in ideas and founders that they want to see win. Everything that you would prepare for a professional investor is still important for this audience, but you’ll also want to connect with them on an emotional level.
For example, weave in your personal story as a founder, why you started your company, and your company’s impact on real humans and businesses. Make people feel something by bringing your story down to earth—from abstract graphs and lofty ideas down to the real world that we live in.
Upload an existing pitch deck to our campaign editor. Each page of your deck will render as an image going down the length of your campaign page.
Optional: After uploading your deck, you can also insert additional text, images, or videos in between slides. Great slides should speak for themselves, but you’re free to insert extra media or commentary if it’s meaningful.
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If you skip the step of uploading your pitch deck, you’ll see a traditional text and image editor. Here, you can type freely and upload media (images and video) to build out your campaign.
Using this method, you should still be structuring your story with clear hierarchy and storytelling. You can think of it like slides, just borderless.
