You and your startup’s co-founders are looking for a new round of funding. You are hoping to hit up angels or venture capitalists who find your company compelling enough to get on board. You are extremely proud of what you’ve accomplished thus far, so you set about creating a cold deck for pitching prospective investors. Can we offer you a bit of advice? Stop.
Mezy was once a startup. We have been through the same growth process. As specialists in due diligence, we have first-hand knowledge of how venture capitalists approach new deals. We know what they are looking for. We know what they want in terms of opportunities and management teams. We also know what they don’t want, and that’s the cold deck.
Your typical investor wants an easier way to filter opportunities. That is where the Mezy Teaser comes in. The Teaser is a single-page document that gives investors all the information they need in a quick read that takes less than three minutes.
Cold Decks Are like Resumes
Venture capitalists have plenty of opportunities to read detailed due diligence reports once they start looking into opportunities more deeply. But in the initial stages of filtering the many opportunities they come across, investors aren’t all that interested in reading page after page of data. Cold decks just don’t do it for them.
In some ways, cold decks are a lot like resumes. Over the years, we’ve learned that HR departments don’t spend a lot of time going through multi-page resumes. They want to see all of a prospective hire’s information on a single page. Give them too much and a resume ends up in the circular file.
We believe the same principle applies to pitching venture capitalists. You’re better off giving them a concise, single-page document rather than a multi-document cold deck. The cold deck still has its purpose, but not as your initial pitch product. You don’t want to give investors so much information that they do not even bother looking. You don’t want your cold deck ending up in the circular file.
Concise and Easy to Read
Human nature has changed very little since the beginning of time. When it comes to absorbing information, most people do better with targeted information. Investors certainly do. They prefer concise, easy-to-read documents that give them the most important information in bite-size chunks. That’s what our Teaser does.
The Mezy Teaser is designed to highlight your company’s strengths. In doing so, we create a document that shows exactly why venture capitalists should consider investing in your opportunity. We give them just enough to pique their interest. Then it’s your turn.
We see a cold deck as an opportunity to tell half of your company’s story over far too many pages. And yet, we know that startups only have a short window to tease an opportunity. That is why it is better to approach venture capitalists with the Mezy Teaser. Leave the cold deck for another time.
Follow up with a Meeting
We advise startups to send a one-page teaser first. Then, immediately schedule a follow-up meeting for discussing the details. A well-crafted teaser will get you those meetings among investors most likely to get on board.
The cold deck still has a place at the table. But in today’s fast-paced world, it’s no longer the best option for introducing a startup to venture capitalists. A better way to go is a single-page summary document that highlights a startup’s strengths. We offer such a document in the Mezy Teaser. Now that you know, let’s talk about preparing one for your startup.