Educational only — not investment, legal or tax advice.

A deck sent before a meeting gets skimmed, often in a few minutes, often on a phone. Its job is not to explain everything. Its job is to get you the meeting. That changes what belongs in it.

The questions a first read is trying to answer

1. What do you do? In one sentence, on the first or second slide. If an investor can’t repeat it, they can’t champion you to their partners.
2. Why now? What changed (technology, regulation, behaviour) that makes this possible or necessary today?
3. How big can it get? A bottom-up market estimate (customers × price) is more convincing than a top-down “1% of a huge market”.
4. Is it working? Traction: revenue, growth, retention, pilots, waitlists. Real numbers with dates.
5. Why you? What about this team makes you likely to win?
6. What do you need? How much you are raising, and what milestones it gets you to.

The slide order that works

Y Combinator’s guidance for seed decks favours a simple, clear structure, and most strong decks follow a similar flow:

1. Title and one-line description
2. Problem
3. Solution and product
4. Traction
5. Market
6. Business model
7. Competition and why you win
8. Team
9. The raise and use of funds

Put traction as early as you honestly can. It is the slide that most changes how the rest of the deck is read.

Mistakes that end the read early

• No clear one-liner. Three slides of context before saying what the company does.
• Unlabelled charts. Up-and-to-the-right with no axis, no dates and no units reads as hiding something.
• Market size without logic. A big number with no derivation.
• “We have no competitors.” Every investor reads this as “we haven’t looked”.
• Too long. Aim for 10 to 15 slides. Put detail in an appendix or data room.
• Inconsistent numbers. Revenue on slide 4 that doesn’t match slide 9.

Before you send it

• Read it on a phone. Is every slide legible?
• Give it to someone outside your industry. Can they explain your company back to you?
• Check every number against your financials. See what VCs check in due diligence.

From the investor’s side of the table

I have screened many decks while sourcing and evaluating deals. The ones that got a meeting were rarely the most designed. They made it effortless to understand what the company does, show proof it is working, and see why this team.

The short version

Your deck has one job: earn the meeting. Lead with a clear one-liner and real traction, keep it short, and make every number consistent.

Sources

• Y Combinator: How to build your seed round pitch deck

Written by Fabian Cisneros. Educational only — not investment, legal or tax advice. See the full disclaimer.