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Pitching Your Startup

163 points| gk1 | 8 years ago |stripe.com | reply

27 comments

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[+] allthenews|8 years ago|reply
I feel like this only applies to a very specific kind of tech investor demographic.

I'm working on my own idea, and pitching directly to members of the industry that I've chosen to apply programming to. Surely this isn't a rare thing? It seems much less stressful, and given that you are speaking to the very people who are likely to use your software, I feel like it is substantially easier to communicate your value. You're much less subject to the Brownian motion of a two minute speech in a massive candidate pool.

I don't think I've ever come across a guide for startups in such a situation.

[+] contingencies|8 years ago|reply
I don't think I've ever come across a guide for startups in such a situation.

Yep. I'm self funding a startup here in China. It's hardware but not a kickstarter-widget, it's necessarily relatively capital intensive to prove market-fit, the opportunity is large, it's not in the US, it's already multi-jurisdiction, it's not growing via an accelerator, and it's absolutely not an SaaS or similar. Getting any kind of current advice is really difficult! I feel your pain. Those of us who are outliers just have to learn to filter a lot of this stuff and keep what's relevant. On the plus side, being outliers we probably have greater scope for execution without early competition, and if we play our cards right potential investors are more likely to notice us.

[+] Swizec|8 years ago|reply
> I'm working on my own idea, and pitching directly to members of the industry that I've chosen to apply programming to.

Isn’t this just called sales/bizdev/gettingcustomers? Ideally you can fund your business from sales to adventurous customers who are willing to put up with you still developing the software. This I think is sttictly better than selling to investors and then your customers.

Customers both provide more valid feedback and sttonger validation of your idea than investors ever could. They also have more skin in the game.

[+] domparise|8 years ago|reply
Sounds like you’re pitching to customers rather than investors.
[+] patio11|8 years ago|reply
I wrote much of this (in collaboration with YC partners and alumni for the YC-specific bits), and am happy to answer questions if you have them.
[+] atlas_q|8 years ago|reply
(Slightly off topic) Please add LLC support in Stripe Atlas! It's a much better fit for most businesses and if companies decide to raise money from investors, converting to a C-corp is easy. Not sure if you can answer, but what's taking Stripe so long to add LLC support? LLC support was planned from launch day and it's been 2 years since then.

LLCs also have better privacy than C-corps. No information is in the public domain if everything is done through an agent. For C-corps, name and address of the owners are part of the public domain and can be obtained by anyone by contacting the relevant authorities.

Also looking forward to the "Payouts only" feature in Stripe connect.

Another question : how many members are in the private Atlas community forum?

In the mean time is there something like Stripe Atlas for LLCs?

[+] keithwhor|8 years ago|reply
Hey Patrick, I have one for ya. What are the biggest mistakes you've seen early, seemingly unimpressive founders (and teams) make during a pitch or through running their company that turned you off - only to discover later that they were able to build impressive businesses? Conversely, what signals do you think you've perhaps over indexed on (positively) in the past that have potentially been "yellow" flags in a founding team you've invested in (or recommended) and led to a failure to thrive? Are there things new startup founders can learn from either scenario?
[+] ikeboy|8 years ago|reply
I've already incorporated and have revenue; can you unbundle incorporation from the other services in Atlas? I would probably be happy to pay $500 for templates, bank account, aws credits, access to legal and tax professionals, and personalized pitching advice. The landing page makes it sound that it's only if you use Atlas to incorporate.
[+] jph|8 years ago|reply
Pitch deck notes I use with clients: https://github.com/joelparkerhenderson/pitch_deck

IMHO the Stripe notes and YC perspectives are especially useful when the pitch deck has a first draft. Founders and teams write the first draft faster (and better) when they use the notes above.

[+] gupir|8 years ago|reply
It's interesting that the 6-slide pitch deck doesn't have a "team" slide. Maybe was it used in the idea phase? PS: Thank you. I was looking for something like this.
[+] siquick|8 years ago|reply
this is great, thanks for posting
[+] dogas|8 years ago|reply
Sidenote: The "Heroku for PowerPoint decks" bit is exactly what I am working on as a side project, and I'm very close to launching a private beta. Patio11 - has someone else launched that already? It's scarily close to my idea and value prop!
[+] patio11|8 years ago|reply
Suppose, hypothetically, that this product existed in the world, but that it was so poorly distributed that even a person who wanted this product so much they went out and built it hadn't even heard of it.

What would that set of facts change about how you executed on your idea and value prop? My guess is that the correct answer is "That should change my plans not one iota."

[+] blitzo|8 years ago|reply
I'm interested about this bit:

If you are too early-stage to have functioning software, mockups will at least let you show that you have good design and product sense.

I want to know if this is really the case here. I have a feeling that YC only accept established working prototype, not just mere interactive mockup that look plausible.

Can somebody vouch in a mere mockup application that has been accepted?

[+] ngokevin|8 years ago|reply
If you are asking about YC program acceptance, then many, many startups are accepted pre-product, pre-prototype, sometimes even pre-idea. If you only have mockups, then there will be weight on your team background and history.
[+] barry-cotter|8 years ago|reply
Harjeet (Taggar?) known as Harj on this board was accepted to YC with a cofounder. Neither of them knew how to program at the time. I think he went on to be a YC partner before he left to found Triplebyte.