Many investors read your deck before they ever meet you, without you there to explain it. A good deck lets them understand your business on their own and makes them want the meeting. This guide gives you a 10-slide structure, what goes on each slide, and the mistakes that make a reader stop early.
Two decks, not one
You need two versions:
- The send-ahead deck. Read without you. It needs complete sentences, clear numbers and a file that opens easily on a phone, usually a PDF.
- The presentation deck. Shown while you speak. Fewer words and bigger visuals, because you supply the explanation.
Write the send-ahead version first. If it works on its own, the presentation version is easy.
The 10 slides
1. Title and one-line summary
Company name, logo and one sentence that says what you do and for whom. Add your city and a contact email.
Hypothetical example: “We help independent pharmacies in Karachi and Hyderabad order stock from distributors in one app.”
2. Problem
Describe a specific customer and the pain they face today. Show how they solve it now and what that costs them in money or time. One real, well-understood customer story beats a page of general claims.
3. Solution
Show the product: a screenshot, a short flow or a photo. Explain how it removes the pain from slide 2. Skip the feature list and show the one or two things that matter most.
4. Why now
What has changed that makes this possible or urgent today? It could be a regulatory change, wider use of smartphones or digital payments among your customers, or a shift in costs. Cite a credible source for every claim.
5. Market
Size the market from the bottom up: the number of customers you can realistically reach multiplied by what each pays per year. Show your first segment, then the wider market. Name your data sources on the slide. A careful, sourced estimate is more convincing than a large, vague number.
6. Business model
Explain how you make money: who pays, how much and how often. Include your key unit economics where you have them, such as average revenue per customer, contribution margin, customer acquisition cost and payback period. If revenue is in PKR and some costs are in dollars, say so and state the exchange rate you assumed.
7. Traction
Show your strongest evidence as a chart over time: revenue, paying customers, retention, pilots or signed letters of intent. Label units and dates.
Hypothetical example: “Monthly revenue of PKR 1.2 million in March, up from PKR 400,000 in September.”
Never round up or blur numbers. Investors will check them during due diligence.
8. Competition
Show the real alternatives, including spreadsheets, WhatsApp groups and doing nothing. Explain why customers choose you. Avoid a two-by-two chart that places you alone in the top-right corner, unless the axes are what customers genuinely care about.
9. Team
Explain why this team will win: relevant experience, what each founder owns, and key hires or advisers. State who is full-time. If a co-founder is part-time, say so.
10. The ask and use of funds
State how much you are raising, through which instrument, and the milestones the money will reach. Split the use of funds into a few categories, such as product, sales and working capital, and state how many months of runway it buys.
Hypothetical example: “Raising USD 300,000 to reach 1,000 paying pharmacies in two cities within 18 months.”
How the slides fit together
The order is an argument. Slides 1 to 3 establish who has the problem and how you solve it. Slides 4 to 6 explain why the opportunity is large and how it makes money. Slides 7 to 9 provide proof: evidence that customers want the product, an honest view of the alternatives and a team that can deliver. Slide 10 asks for what you need to reach the next stage.
Test the argument by reading only the slide titles in order. If the titles alone tell the story, the structure works. Write titles as statements, not labels. For the hypothetical pharmacy app above, “Pharmacies lose hours every week reordering stock by phone” says far more than “Problem”.
Appendix slides
Keep these ready, but out of the main deck:
- A summary of your financial model.
- Cohort retention charts.
- A product roadmap.
- Regulatory and legal notes, such as your SECP incorporation, PSEB registration or any licence your sector requires.
- A cap table summary.
Common mistakes
- Too much text. If a slide needs a long paragraph, split it or cut it.
- Vague market claims. Unsourced numbers damage trust in everything else.
- Traction without numbers. “Strong demand” means nothing without data.
- A hidden ask. Investors want to know what you need and why.
- Inconsistent figures. Revenue on the traction slide must match the model in the appendix.
- Design over substance. Clean and readable beats flashy.
Adapting the deck for Pakistani investors and programmes
- Show figures in PKR, with a USD equivalent if you are pitching foreign investors, and state the exchange rate and its date.
- Explain local distribution and payment realities, such as cash on delivery or bank transfers, and what they mean for your margins and working capital.
- State your legal entity and where it is registered.
- Practise with programmes that train founders to pitch. LUMS has described NIC Lahore’s programme as including boot camps on presentation skills and an investor summit, and NIC Quetta’s page describes help finalising pitch decks and connections to potential investors.
Checklist before you send
- Can a stranger understand what you do from slide 1 alone?
- Does every number have a unit, a date and a source?
- Do the traction slide and the financial model match?
- Is the ask specific, with clear milestones?
- Is the PDF small enough to email and easy to read on a phone?
- Has someone outside your team read it and explained your business back to you?
Sources and further reading
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