You have already sent the Private Placement Memorandum (PPM) or an executive summary of your business plan to a potential investor.  The investor has agreed to meet with you.  You have 10 to 15 minutes.  What do you say and how do you say it in the allotted time and with a limited number of slides?

First, it is important to be passionate about what you will be presenting.  Believe in your plan and your solution.  Do not look at the slides when you are presenting.  Practice your presentation in front of colleagues to get good honest feedback on what needs to be improved.  You should also rehearse how much time you spend on each slide by using the “Rehearse Timings” feature.  You do not want to spend 10 minutes on your first slide if you only have 15 minutes to give the entire presentation.   Keep the slides “thin” and use them as a discussion guide.  Do not read the text on the slides.  What is on the slides should be a guide to what you are saying, not a script.

Remember to turn off your screen saver, instant messaging, email and appointment alerts so they do not pop-up during your presentation.

So what should be included in an investors presentation?  I would suggest the following:

Slide 1. Your Hook:  Your first slide needs to state what problem your solution solves and how you make money doing it.  What pain in the marketplace do you address and how deep and compelling is the pain?  You need to answer the question, “so what”.  This is the most important slide.  If you do not hook the investor in this slide they will lose interest or end the meeting.  Please remember that investors review multiple business opportunities each week and are often looking for reasons not to invest. 

Slide 2.  The Management Team:  Who are you, why should I care, what is your domain expertise, and how have you shown you can execute before?  If you paid for an expensive education it should be included, but remember that investors are usually more interested in a proven track record.  You may want to list your outside advisors to add credibility.  If you have holes in the team, then you need to be prepared to explain how you are going to fill the holes.  Remember that most investors are more  interested in the jockey than the horse.   A strong management team is critical.

Slide 3.  Market Opportunity:  How big is this market opportunity?  Make sure you have the ability to be very specific on the individual segments that make up the market and how the segments are mapped to your solutions.  Is the market growing?  What is the CAGR?

Slide 4.  Sample Market Scenario:  Give an example of how customers are currently solving the problem without your solution.  Help the investor understand the inefficiencies of the current  solution.

Slide 5.  Detailed Solution:  How does your business solve the problem and how is revenue generated?  Help the investor understand how your solution will solve the inefficiencies or inadequacies and how it will replace the current market scenario.  What are the barriers to entry?  Do you own all of the intellectual property associated with your solution?  Do you have patents?   What will stop a larger company from building the same solution?

Slide 6.  Customer Successes:  Validate that your solution works and is better than the incumbent  product or the current way customers are solving this problem.

Slide 7.  Key Customers:  Provide a listing of current customers.  It would be helpful if your product was not tied to a specific vertical market.  If the customer opportunity is too narrow, then there is more risk.

Slide 8.  Strategic Alliances:  What is your sales and marketing strategy?  Do you have leveraged routes-to-market that will meet global customer needs?  Do you have strategic alliances that will meet local customer needs while at the same time providing good margins and profitability for shareholders?

Slide 9.  Competitive Landscape:  Who is the market leader(s)?  What are their strengths and weaknesses?  Explain your sustainable competitive advantage and how you differentiate yourself from the competitors.  Make sure you have the ability to talk about both technology and business issues:  IP, routes-to-market, customer segmentation, pricing, geographic coverage, what industry analysts are saying…

Slide 10.  Company Milestones:  What have you accomplished so far?  How much time and money have you invested?  How do you define success?  What are your top metrics?  You need to prove your ability to execute.

Slide 11.  Financial Projections and Operating Model:  Beyond the hockey stick projections, what is your basic financial strategy in terms of revenue and margins?  What is your path to profitability?  When will you be cash flow positive?  Why do your revenues increase year over year?  How predictable is the revenue, how much visibility do you have into the sales funnel?  What does your linearity look like?  Most important, you need to show that you have exceeded the historical financial projections.

Slide 12.  Funds Needed and Use of Proceeds:  State how much and what you will use the money for.  Discuss future rounds of capital needed and what the investor’s exit strategy will most likely be.  It is also helpful for the investors to understand that the management team is invested and that the proceeds are going to be used for future activities rather than to repay old debt or employees.

Slide 13.  Next Steps and Conclusion:  Make sure you highlight the key messages in the prior slides.

Make sure that you are prepared to address the following questions that may come up in the dialog:

What is the biggest risk to the company?