Business pitch and presentation tips for startup enterprises

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Are you running a startup, or perhaps you're responsible for raising funding for a startup enterprise?

Getting involved in a startup can be the ticket to massive wealth if your product or service offering is unique, solves a pain point and is well-designed and user-friendly.

Funding rounds for successful startups can be in tens of millions of dollars; after that, public listings can value companies in the billions.

Yet it all starts somewhere, and part of ensuring a startup's success is seeking seed funding from potential investors or netting high-value clients.

And this requires pitching the business via presentations.

A successful pitch can mean the difference between your startup getting a much-needed injection of capital or continuing to run on the smell of an oily rag - or worse, failing altogether.

If you're a bit stressed about making a pitch or presentation and are unsure of the right approach, this article is for you.

We'll discuss how small startup teams can present themselves to potential clients or investors and some of the tips required to pitch well, sound confident, be successful, and be worth investing in.

Read on to discover more.

You'll want to use the best A3 printers to print large scale handouts on your unique selling point.

If you're currently running on a shoestring, you don't need a full-fledged office printer for this, either.

Some home printers on the market can print in vibrant colours and to a standard to rival expensive office printers.

For a few reasons, you'll want physical collateral to hand out to potential investors and clients.

For one, it demonstrates that you're professional, prepared and organised.

Handouts with charts showing expected profits, profit margins, expenses and projected revenue are all excellent collateral to accompany the rest of your pitch or presentation.

A handout will help your audience keep track of your presentation and highlight the key points you are making.

It will also give them something to study after the presentation or go over with the other investors or stakeholders, for instance, in an internal follow-up meeting where they decide if they want to invest or appoint you to work for them.

Part of a winning pitch or presentation is how you present yourself to your audience.

Many tech startups have loose or relaxed dress codes, with shorts, tees and casual shirts being typical.

When presenting your business to potential investors or clients, you may want to dress up a touch.

For instance, you may want to dress more formally if you're approaching a professional services or accounting firm to pitch your problem-solving software tool or a financial services company with your cloud-based payment gateway.

A good pair of slacks, a collared shirt and a suit jacket, is the way to go, or a full suit and tie for a more formal approach.

Most pitches fail due to a lack of preparation, practice and planning.

If you arrive at the investor or client's offices and you seem unprepared or are winging it, you're creating a negative perception of yourself and your company, and remember that first impressions last.

You want to ensure that you are prepared and practised.

Don't be late for a pitch presentation ever.

Leave with time to spare to account for traffic or public transit delays.

Preparation means ensuring copies of your slide show are ready and copied across multiple devices and USB drives in case one file gets corrupted or there are technical issues on the day.

You'll also ensure you have printed copies of other collateral ready to hand out, as mentioned earlier in this article.

The next step is to practise your pitch.

Do this internally, and do it a lot.

You want to have almost memorised your key points and their delivery.

You could even write a script and practise it daily until you're confident you can deliver your pitch to the audience.

Seek feedback from your team on how you can improve, and practise it at home in the mirror as well. You want to appear confident, in control and as a subject matter expert.

Remember that most startups succeed if they solve a problem or pain point for a customer.

If you can demonstrate this in your pitch, you're well on your way to success.

Imagine you're a cowboy in the wild west.

Your pitch deck is your trust revolver, and you've got to be quick and practise with your draw if you want to win the shootout.

Your Pitch Deck should contain no more than 19 slides, less if possible.

The last thing you want to do is bore your audience and inflict death with PowerPoint.

Your slides should be spacious, free from clutter and too much text, and should be easy to digest at a glance.

To succeed, you want your Pitch Deck to be clear, simple, compelling and easy to act on.

It should give a broad overview of your startup, the problem or paint point you aim to solve, how you operate, and what you require regarding funding from an investor or costs from a client.

You should also include details of your product, for example, your software or tool and how it will solve a problem for the customer or client.

Believe it or not, but body language is a super important part of any presentation.

You want to appear open, warm, and connect with your audience.

If you stand with your arms folded across your chest or look down when speaking, you're not precisely exuding confidence and charisma.

This can, in turn, impact just how influential you can be, and how effective your presentation is in the long term.

Thankfully, maintaining strong body language during your presentations is easier than you may think.

Just be sure to use your arms and hands to gesture when you speak, look your audience in the eye, and ensure you equally address each client or investor in the room.

Stand firmly, with your legs squared beneath you, and don't shrink into yourself or make yourself smaller. Big, bold and confident is what you want to demonstrate.

This helpful article has shared some top business pitch and presentation tips for startup enterprises.

Use these tips when preparing a pitch or presentation, and increase your chance of success.