VC Pitch Trick – Back Pocket Slides

Giving a VC pitch to angel investors or VCs can be nerve wracking for many startups, but one technique that can help startups regain control and confidence is to have a full suite of Back Pocket Slides.

Back pocket slides are slides after your final slide in your deck that contain details about items you might not have had time to cover in your vc pitch, or that you anticipate might come up during Q&A. Examples of these things might include a competitive matrix, an outline of your IP strategy, or some detail on your go to market strategy and key metrics. These are all optional items in the typical pitch, but could be of interest to investors and are things that often come up during Q&A.

Imagine that you’ve just given your VC pitch, and you’ve got a great final slide that summarizes all your high points, but you still don’t have any questions. The audience is totally dead – what do you do?

A good presenter will wait about 10-12 seconds and if there are no questions, then they’ll say “one thing a lot of people ask me about is … Our competitive matrix. You’ll then shift to your competitive matrix slide and continue presenting with the same cadence and timing you used during your pitch. I.e. If your average slide time is 20-30 seconds, then you should maintain that same cadence with the back pocket slides. After you’re done with the slide, then pause to ask if there are any questions. Wait for up to five or six seconds and then start in with “another thing a lot of people ask about is…..” And start on another slide. I’ve never seen anyone need to use more than two slides in this way before the questions start rolling in.

Of course if there are questions, then you can also use the back pocket slides to reinforce your answers. It will make you appear much more in control if you have anticipated many of the questions and have pre-prepared detailed answers for them.

A good number of back pocket slides is five. Two or three can work, but you’re not as likely to get a hit during Q&A as if you have five. Some people have ten or more slides, but I find that they often have difficulty fumbling through them on stage in order to find them quickly, that this can sometimes backfire.

Finally, one more benefit of the back pocket slides is that if you’re invited to another venue that offers a ten minute pitch format, then you’ve already got your extra slides all put together and they become your primary slides instead of your back pocket slides!

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