In the world of venture capital investment, storytelling pitch-decks are an essential way for start-ups to win hearts, minds and funds from investors. A pitch deck is a brief but precise presentation that start-ups use to communicate their value to potential investors.

“A great strategic deck can bring in investment and win the attention of vital collaborators,” says Beppe Coleiro, co-founder of creative marketing agency, Blonde and Giant.

“Every investment is a story, and every story needs a great storyteller. That’s where we come in,” explains Beppe. “We’ve helped both local and foreign start-ups pitch for millions in investment, and in the process we’ve discovered some key factors that underpin a successful pitch. Whether we’re helping a new fund pitch themselves to investors or working with start-up companies to help them smash through their fundraising goals, the fundamentals of storytelling remain the same.”

He shares that Blonde and Giant’s work for venture capital funds like Target Global (€800m under management) and Ananda Capital (€80m under management) have helped the company to hone a pitch deck recipe that works time and time again.

To this end, Beppe speaks about three major lessons the company applies to its work in this sphere:

“Don’t waste time. Investors value their time and are quickly switched off by lengthy, meandering or poorly designed pitch decks. If you cannot capture their attention, you will never win their investment. Founders are often tempted to shoehorn too much backstory and granular detail into their decks because they fail to appreciate the limited attention that investors can afford to give to them.

“Don’t be linear. It might seem like a good idea to tell a linear story in your deck, but that’s not really how human brains work. We rarely process information in a linear way, and so a good deck anticipates the reader’s needs, questions and information gaps at every slide. For example, don’t wait till the end of your presentation to discuss your vision, instead, put your vision up front to set expectations, and then describe the path from where you are today to that future vision.

“Focus only on the most decision-critical angles. Few important decisions depend on a single factor or consideration. In fact, there could be dozens of things that influence an investors decision. BUT, knowing which factors represent the majority of the decision outcome is vital. A good deck dedicates the majority of slides to the four or five things that really move the needle on an investors decision.”