This video, aimed at startup founders, explains how to pitch a startup idea effectively to investors, drawing insights from the Y Combinator application process. It emphasizes that a strong pitch focuses on clarity and conciseness, allowing investors to quickly understand the core idea. The speaker also highlights the importance of presenting the problem, solution, and unique insight, avoiding jargon, and making the pitch conversational and reproducible.
Key Takeaways
1
A startup idea is a hypothesis for rapid company growth, composed of a big problem, a problem-focused solution, and a unique insight or unfair advantage.
2
The primary goal of a startup pitch is clarity; investors are looking to understand the idea, be excited by it, and like the team, not to be sold aggressively.
3
A clear idea is crucial for organic growth through word-of-mouth, which spreads easily when people understand and can enthusiastically talk about your company.
4
To be understood by a wide audience, your idea needs to be legible, meaning it can be grasped by those who know nothing about your business, similar to designing presentation slides for people with bad eyesight.
5
Avoid ambiguity, complexity, mystery (jargon, vague language), and ignorable marketing or buzzwords in your pitch to ensure clarity.
6
A great pitch is conversational, like explaining it to your mom, and reproducible, allowing investors to visualize what your company does and builds.
7
Your pitch should clearly identify three key nouns: what you are making, what problem you are solving, and who your customer is.
8
Successful pitches, like those for Airbnb and Dropbox, are concise and descriptive, allowing investors to quickly grasp the core concept and become curious.
9
Using an 'X for Y' analogy can be effective if X is a household name, everyone agrees it's successful, Y genuinely wants X, and Y represents a huge market.
10
Lead your pitch with 'what' your company does, not 'why' or 'how,' and be concise to demonstrate deep thought about your idea and efficiency as a founder.
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0:00
This is going to be part two of a talk I
0:02
gave at the very beginning of startup
0:04
school on evaluating startup ideas. And
0:08
the thing to know about both of these
0:10
talks is we've been talking about them
0:13
from the point of view of the investor.
0:15
Basically um it was helpful I thought to
0:20
explain to founders how investors
0:22
evaluate startup ideas and looking at
0:25
that structure so that they can better
0:27
understand their own ideas opportunities
0:30
and then in this presentation present
0:33
them better to the people that they want
0:36
to get excited. So a quick recap in the
0:39
first part I basically say a startup
0:41
idea is a hypothesis for why your
0:43
company is going to grow really quickly.
0:45
That hypothesis must compose of three
0:48
different parts. The problem, the
0:50
solution, and the insight. And the basic
0:52
parts is your problem should be pretty
0:55
big, pretty pervasive, have a lot of
0:57
these characteristics to make it feel
0:58
like there's a very big market that a
1:00
lot of people have the problem. The only
1:02
thing you need to know about the
1:03
solution is that you should not start
1:05
with a technology. you should start with
1:07
a problem. And lastly, you're looking to
1:11
have something that's going to make your
1:12
company unique and have some kind of
1:15
unfair advantage that we call an insight
1:19
that will show why your company will
1:21
grow faster than other companies. I
1:23
talked about five different types of
1:26
unfair advantages that your company can
1:28
have and kind of what are the benchmarks
1:30
for meeting them. Now,
1:33
the thing to keep in mind about
1:36
understanding and creating this startup
1:38
idea is that I don't need you to do all
1:42
the work to lay all of that out in
1:46
detail. That's stuff that you'll kind of
1:47
want to know or keep in mind, but a
1:49
really good investor will do that on
1:51
their own. They'll hear what you're
1:53
talking about and extrapolate. And so,
1:56
what I'm going to cover in this
1:57
presentation is how do you package up
1:59
that hypothesis? How do you take all the
2:00
things that you understand about your
2:02
company and your startup idea and how I
2:04
present it to an investor so that they
2:06
can make an decision that's in your
2:07
favor? This is the YC startup
2:10
application and basically this is the
2:14
application all the questions that we
2:16
ask that YC partners will use to
2:17
evaluate your startup. So down here when
2:21
you're filling out the YC application we
2:23
actually link to a couple of things and
2:26
one of them is how to apply
2:27
successfully.
2:29
I can't tell because I read so many
2:32
applications, but it feels like founders
2:35
are not reading that essay. Uh, it's was
2:39
written by Paul Graham in 2009 and
2:42
almost everything in there still holds
2:44
to this day and people still make
2:46
mistakes from it. So, I'm just going to
2:47
like point out some stuff and really
2:49
like punch it in here while I have your
2:52
attention. So, here's a quote from that
2:54
essay. Basically, we believe for every
2:57
company that we will interview at YC, we
3:01
bet there's probably another company
3:03
that's just as good as them out there,
3:05
but they messed up on the application
3:08
and we didn't realize it. We didn't
3:09
invite them. And basically,
3:13
the reason is because they didn't
3:15
express their idea clearly. That's it.
3:19
Like you might think, oh, I didn't show
3:21
off all that complex stuff about my
3:23
startup idea and that's why they didn't
3:25
pick pick me. And I want you to know
3:27
that's not true. And so the first thing
3:29
I want you to keep in mind is I do not
3:32
need you to sell me as a YC partner,
3:36
right? A good investor, so average
3:38
investor, what they do is they talk to
3:39
you when you tell them about your idea
3:41
and it feels like they're poking holes
3:43
all the questions asked about what's all
3:44
the reasons why this could go wrong. A
3:47
good investor does it the other way
3:48
around. They hear what you say and they
3:50
imagine and they use their optimism and
3:54
they use knowing that some kind of rare
3:57
event has to happen for you to become a
3:58
billion dollar company and they try to
3:59
imagine all those rare events that could
4:01
possibly happen to you. And then they
4:04
pitch that path back to you. And so we
4:08
are really good at selling ourselves. So
4:11
you don't need to do that. And the thing
4:13
is you guys are kind of bad at selling
4:15
things in the beginning, right? And what
4:18
I need you to understand is that I'm
4:20
trying to evaluate these three
4:22
statements when I'm hearing your idea.
4:25
Do I understand it? Am I excited by it?
4:27
Do I like the team? And do I want to
4:29
work with them? Surprise.
4:32
In your weekly updates, when you do your
4:34
group sessions, these are the questions
4:36
that we ask you to ask one another. It's
4:38
basically the questions that we're
4:39
trying to figure out for ourselves. And
4:41
we're hoping that every week when you
4:43
talk with other companies, you were
4:44
practicing getting feedback and
4:47
understanding whether you're able to
4:48
instill this in other people. So your
4:52
goal is just to be clear. I will do
4:55
everything else. So
4:57
back to the application, these are the
5:00
only two things we're going to focus on
5:01
today. What do I put in the what's my
5:04
company going to make? How do I describe
5:06
my company in a very efficient manner?
5:09
The first way to do this is to be clear.
5:12
The reason we focus on this is because a
5:14
clear idea is a foundation for growth.
5:17
And what I mean by that is that the best
5:19
companies in YC or around the world grow
5:24
organically. They grow by word of mouth.
5:27
What does word of mouth look like? It
5:28
looks like this. It's basically I talk
5:31
about your company, what you're doing,
5:32
making, etc., and I'm the most
5:34
interesting person at the dinner table.
5:37
and I tell it to other people and those
5:38
people want to tell other people. That's
5:41
it. Word of mouth is something where I
5:43
remember what you do. I talk about it
5:45
enthusiastic and it spreads on its own.
5:48
Marketing and advertising, it's a tax I
5:51
believe companies pay because they did
5:53
not make something remarkable. Now,
5:55
before anyone can remember at the dinner
5:57
table what you do, they have to
5:59
understand. And so, I have very simple
6:02
rules for how to make things easy to
6:04
understand.
6:06
This will sound familiar if you're
6:08
familiar with an essay I wrote on how to
6:10
design a better pitch deck. And I'm
6:13
gonna focus on basically saying that the
6:17
way I talk about designing a pitch deck
6:19
actually works for ideas and lots of
6:21
other things. And so the way I make
6:22
things easy to understand on a pitch
6:24
deck or a slide is to make it legible. I
6:26
make it simple and I make it obvious. In
6:29
today's presentation, we're just going
6:30
to focus on making your idea legible,
6:34
which is going to sound interesting,
6:36
right, for clarity. Now, in my essay, I
6:39
talked about how at demo day when our
6:43
startups are presenting to a room full
6:45
of a thousand investors. It's kind of an
6:48
interesting audience. Number one, the
6:50
audience is filled with really old
6:51
people.
6:53
They tend to not have very good
6:55
eyesight. As a result, they all can't
6:58
sit in the front row like you lovely
7:00
people. Some of them have to sit in the
7:02
way back and stand up. And that means if
7:05
you create a legible slide, they have to
7:07
be ones that even old people in the back
7:09
row with bad eyesight can read.
7:12
Now, how does that apply to a legible
7:15
idea? Well, basically you are designing
7:18
a slide that democratizes the idea,
7:21
right? And so people who are blind or
7:24
people who are ignorant, you're
7:25
basically designing something for
7:26
everyone in the room, not just the ones
7:29
in the first row. So a legible idea can
7:32
be understood by people who know nothing
7:34
about your business. That will make
7:37
things very clear to the widest possible
7:39
audience. Now this is super important
7:42
because you will talk about your company
7:45
more than anything else. It is actually
7:47
the thing that we are really great at at
7:50
Y Cominator. We have our companies
7:52
constantly practice talking about their
7:55
startup. Startup school curriculum is
7:58
designed around helping you constantly
8:00
practice talking about your startup. And
8:02
this is because you are going to need a
8:05
lot of people if you're going to become
8:07
a billion-dollar company. So you are
8:11
trying to find a co-founder. You have to
8:12
have a way of talking about your company
8:14
clearly.
8:15
Whether you're getting users or
8:17
investors or employees or shareholders,
8:20
you have to get really good at this and
8:22
you have to be able to do it quickly and
8:24
efficiently.
8:25
Here are things to avoid
8:28
that makes things not clear. That makes
8:30
your idea muddy. The first is ambiguity,
8:34
right? So that's like obviously the
8:37
opposite of clear or straightforward.
8:40
Something's a little abstract. Something
8:41
can be interpreted in two ways and
8:43
therefore it might take a question to
8:45
understand what you do. Complexity.
8:49
So I have a very specific definition of
8:51
complexity. And so if you look at the
8:53
root word simple and complex come from
8:57
the same root and having to do with
8:58
twist or braids. Things that are simple
9:01
are ones that are have one braid and
9:03
things that are complex have multiple
9:05
braids. They're intertwined with one
9:07
another. A simple idea is one idea that
9:10
does not fold. A complex idea are ideas
9:13
that are intertwined. So simplicity
9:16
means you are not trying to mix a bunch
9:18
of things in your description.
9:21
Mystery. Um, so this is an odd one, but
9:24
what I mean is anything where it's like
9:27
I'm not going to understand what is
9:29
going on when you're talking about your
9:31
company. Jargon is one obviously. Any
9:34
words that I don't understand. anything
9:35
that's vague like indefinite pronouns.
9:37
So if you just use this, it etc. and you
9:40
don't describe what those nouns are. And
9:42
then things that you just suggest but
9:44
aren't explicit about.
9:46
And the last is ignorable. And so what I
9:49
mean by that is there is some language
9:52
that we will just ignore.
9:54
So in UX design, people will create a
9:58
sort of blindness to things that they
10:00
don't want to look at or they don't find
10:02
to be of important value. So for
10:03
example, ad blindness is a big one that
10:06
people sort of understand. And the thing
10:08
is when you're talking about ideas,
10:10
there's a way of using language that is
10:12
also easily ignorable. Things that just
10:14
won't stick in your head. Things like
10:16
marketing speak, there's probably lots
10:18
of stuff that you heard about that. MBA
10:20
speak, weird kind of like puff yourself
10:23
up talk that doesn't give any extra
10:26
information. And then buzzwords.
10:29
And so when you say certain types of
10:31
words that as an investor I've heard
10:33
over and over again or I will equate
10:35
with zero information or value, then I
10:38
will ignore them. And the result is
10:40
parts of your pitch will end up being
10:43
not even heard by me and therefore I
10:45
will not remember them. What you want to
10:48
do is be conversational.
10:51
A great pitch is one where you can tell
10:52
it to your mom and she gets it. She's
10:54
proud of you,
10:56
right? She's not going to shake her
10:58
head. And that means it's got to be
11:01
conversational. And that's really good
11:03
for word of mouth because we talk in
11:06
normal conversational speak. We don't
11:08
talk like an MBA. We don't talk like
11:10
CEOs all the time. So, it's best to talk
11:13
conversationally.
11:15
Again, avoid jargon, words that are only
11:18
you understood or used by your industry.
11:21
No preamble. We'll have some examples of
11:24
this, but if you want to be clear, let's
11:27
go straight to what you want to talk
11:29
about. Let's not have a winding path to
11:31
eventually getting there. And the last
11:33
one, this one's a big one, is being
11:35
reproducible.
11:36
So, when I hear your idea, can I imagine
11:40
it in my mind? Can I
11:44
see what I would have to build to create
11:46
your company? If I don't have that, then
11:49
I have no picture in my head about what
11:50
your company does. And until I have that
11:53
picture, I can't ask any of the
11:54
questions that helps me understand if
11:56
I'm excited about you or understand
11:59
other nuances of your business.
12:02
To make things reproducible, I need to
12:04
know nouns.
12:06
I need to have objects that I'm going to
12:08
imagine in my head. And there's three
12:10
types of nouns that I should understand
12:12
from your
12:14
startup idea. First one is what are you
12:16
making?
12:18
That should be really clear. what is the
12:20
problem and then who is the customer the
12:24
two are kind of related to the market
12:26
right but I should have these kind of
12:28
three nouns
12:30
in my head so let's go through some
12:34
examples this is
12:37
says we are going to transform the
12:40
relationship between individuals and
12:42
information
12:44
that sucks the thing is we see this all
12:47
the time number one all the nouns that
12:49
you have seated down here are abstract.
12:51
They're ideas. I can't reproduce based
12:54
off of this. Has zeroformational value.
12:58
I still have to ask questions to answer
13:00
the three nouns that I need to have.
13:02
This is a bad description for a company.
13:06
We will see stuff that starts like this
13:08
when we ask describe what your company's
13:09
going to make. I don't even want to read
13:11
it, but basically it starts talking
13:14
about the story of the company or
13:16
basically like in the beginning there
13:19
was this problem and we're going to go
13:21
through this issue, right? And then
13:22
there's these bad guys and they showed
13:24
up, but then who's going to save us?
13:26
We're finally here to save and you're
13:28
like, I have to read another thousand
13:30
applications.
13:31
That's not going to work for me.
13:36
This is the description on the actual
13:37
application that Airbnb put to YC.
13:41
Airbnb is the first online marketplace
13:43
that lets travelers book rooms with
13:45
locals instead of hotels. It's concise.
13:48
It's descriptive. I understand what
13:51
they're building. I have a sense for
13:52
what they're making. And then I can
13:54
start thinking about my other two ideas
13:55
of whether I'm excited about it. And
13:57
then am I going to like this team?
14:00
Here's Dropbox. synchronizes files
14:03
across your or your team's computers.
14:08
The thing about this is it's refreshing,
14:10
but also there's no pretense.
14:13
They don't they aren't playing defense.
14:16
I see a lot of company descriptions
14:18
where they're like, I'm worried about
14:20
this or I've gotten this kind of
14:22
feedback and so they give up clarity to
14:24
make themselves look bigger and blow
14:26
themselves up or make themelves try to
14:28
look more interesting. They're trying to
14:31
protect themselves against something a
14:33
way ahead of time. And the whole problem
14:34
is usually what it ends up doing is it
14:36
brings me farther away from you. All
14:38
that padding that you've put on
14:40
yourself. Here's a description from a
14:42
company in the current batch. Lumini is
14:44
building X-ray vision for soldiers and
14:47
first responders.
14:49
We don't have to go deep into the
14:51
details. I don't need to understand how
14:53
they exactly do this, etc. This
14:58
creates a foundation for my curiosity.
15:01
Now I will start from here to try to
15:03
figure out, oh, how do they do this? Is
15:06
this the right team to do this? How far
15:08
along are they? Do they have traction?
15:11
Do they have customers? I start going
15:12
down the route of asking all the right
15:14
questions based off this one
15:16
description. This is a good one.
15:19
Here's another one. So Vajan in the
15:21
current patch is building LinkedIn for
15:23
the next billion internet users.
15:27
So
15:29
doesn't perfectly connect me to what
15:32
they're sort of making, but I'm
15:34
intrigued. I'm excited about someone
15:36
building into LinkedIn and I know it's
15:38
some kind of social network for business
15:40
people. And so now I'm curious about
15:42
how. I don't need you to answer how in
15:45
the description, but I understand what
15:47
you're doing. And then now I can start
15:49
making questions in my head about like
15:51
how would I evaluate whether this is
15:53
working or successful or promising or
15:55
not? Are this is the right team? Do they
15:57
have a certain amount of traction etc.
15:59
It gets me on the right track. Now
16:01
reason I've used this example is because
16:03
we have a lot of companies who try to
16:05
use the X for Y. And what I mean by that
16:10
is like LinkedIn for whatever or Uber
16:12
for blank or Airbnb for blank. And so
16:15
that X for Y is super useful because it
16:18
allows you to shortcut business model
16:21
and some kind of complex behavior,
16:23
right? And then attach it to some other
16:25
vertical or something that you're trying
16:26
to make work.
16:29
X or Y is okay, but most people abuse it
16:34
or do it incorrectly. So I'm going to
16:35
give you some tips. First, should you
16:38
use X for Y? Uh sorry for the
16:40
legibility. Uh number one, is X a
16:43
household name? This should be like a
16:45
billion-dollar company, right? You can't
16:48
use uh your uncle's like pet shoe store
16:52
as the X for this because people don't
16:55
know your uncle's pet shoe store and
16:56
they don't know if it's successful or
16:57
not, right? So, everyone as many people
17:01
should know about this as possible and
17:02
for an investor, it should be clear that
17:04
it's a billion-doll company or
17:06
opportunity.
17:08
Everyone has to agree that it is
17:10
successful. So, you could have a really
17:12
big X. Everyone knows about it, but it's
17:14
infamous, right? So, like people don't
17:17
think it's successful. So, be careful of
17:19
that. Does Y want X? So, is it really
17:24
clear
17:26
why the target that you're going after
17:29
wants this kind of model applied to it,
17:32
this kind of solution applied to it,
17:34
whether it's Airbnb 4 or Airbnb or Uber
17:38
for, etc., It should be really clear
17:40
that that's a segment that's either
17:41
missing it, it's not being served well
17:44
by the other one and also that those
17:46
people want to have that kind of model.
17:50
And then the third one is why should be
17:52
a huge market. So if you're building
17:56
uh X for Y and then the last part
18:00
doesn't sound like a really big
18:02
business, that's not going to work well
18:03
for you, right? Because what we want
18:06
because you're essentially saying that
18:08
you are something but it's a subset and
18:11
what we want to make sure is that subset
18:13
feels like it could be really really
18:15
big. If you choose a subset that sounds
18:17
like it's going to be really really
18:18
small investors won't be as interested.
18:20
It doesn't me it means that I'm worried
18:22
that you will not have enough potential
18:26
headroom to grow to become a billion
18:28
dollar company. So here's an example
18:30
that doesn't work. So, we had a company
18:33
in the batch that started off by
18:34
describing themselves as Buffer for
18:36
Snapchat. Buffer is a nice company, but
18:40
definitely smaller than Snapchat.
18:44
So, don't want to do that. All right.
18:47
So, basic summary for this section, lead
18:50
with what,
18:52
not, why, or how. You don't need all
18:54
that other stuff. That stuff gets in the
18:57
way of your clarity for the most part.
19:00
I'll read like a thousand applications
19:02
every single batch and it's a really
19:05
hard thing to do. Basically, even though
19:07
it's my job, it's really really
19:10
difficult to have that much focus and
19:12
attention across all these different
19:14
applications.
19:16
So, I need some empathy. I need you to
19:19
help me out. And what we want is that
19:22
when I bring up your application and I'm
19:23
looking at it, let's make our intimate
19:25
time really pleasurable, right? Let's
19:28
make the time that I spend on an idea
19:30
very efficient. I'll look at it. I'll
19:32
understand really clearly. I'll move
19:34
around your application and be like,
19:36
"Oh, I'm kind of excited. Maybe there's
19:37
going to have this." And I'll look at
19:38
that part and like, "Oh, they do have
19:40
it. That sounds awesome." Oh, what about
19:42
this? Oh, that sounds awesome, too. What
19:45
we don't want is me to go like, "I don't
19:47
know what what are they talking about."
19:50
Then I have to like go to your website.
19:52
I'm like, don't know what they're
19:54
talking about. I don't know how this
19:56
sort of works. I go back to it. I try to
19:58
figure something else out. I try to see
19:59
if like some other partner might
20:01
understand what you're doing, etc. Super
20:03
inefficient.
20:06
Where is there going to be room for me
20:07
to get excited as a result? So to be
20:10
efficient, we need to be concise.
20:12
Concise. The best way
20:16
I want to keep this in mind is to use
20:18
some examples. And so uh here's some
20:21
things I need you to keep in mind. Yes,
20:23
I want you to be concise. Use as few
20:25
words as possible. And what I want you
20:28
to understand is the concision is
20:31
actually gives me secondary information
20:35
about you as a team. It lets me one know
20:39
that you have thought deeply about your
20:41
idea. Because you've thought so deeply
20:43
about it and because you've practiced
20:45
talking about it so much and you've
20:47
gotten really good at getting people
20:48
excited and understanding your thing
20:49
really quickly, you probably have
20:51
figured out how to do it in a short
20:52
amount of time.
20:54
So, it lets me know that this is a
20:56
founder that has thought deeply about
20:57
the idea. The other thing about being
21:00
concise, it shows me that you are
21:02
efficient. And if you're efficient with
21:04
your words, then you're probably
21:06
efficient with your thoughts. And that
21:07
means you're probably also efficient
21:09
with your actions. And what that means
21:11
is that I will start to believe that you
21:14
understand what is most important about
21:15
your business. You understand
21:17
communicate it clearly. and you might
21:18
actually know how to always figure out
21:22
the most important part of what to do
21:24
about your company to make it grow, to
21:26
make it work, etc.
21:28
So, there's a minimum stuff that we want
21:31
to have even though we're trying to be
21:32
as concise as possible. Again, I want to
21:34
understand the nouns. So, if we're so
21:36
concise that I can't understand these,
21:39
then your concision is too much. The
21:42
other is I want to get to this point
21:46
when I read the decision or this short
21:49
version of whatever it is you're talking
21:51
about because again I know there's like
21:53
a hundred,000 reasons why your company
21:55
is great but when I'm reading your
21:57
application I'm only going to maybe
21:59
remember two to three of them and so we
22:02
have to try to make sure those most
22:04
important ones come up to the top. This
22:07
is a real startup school company
22:09
description.
22:11
It's an online e-commerce store.
22:14
I can picture what it is, but again,
22:16
it's not a description that helps me get
22:18
excited about it. It doesn't help me
22:20
lead to all the other things. I have to
22:22
do now more work to understand why this
22:24
is fast growing and it potential. I also
22:28
don't know based on this some nouns. I
22:30
don't know exactly who the customer is.
22:33
Is it people that they're selling stuff
22:34
to or are they making an e-commerce
22:36
store for other shop owners? Just
22:38
ambiguity.
22:40
IT security services.
22:42
This is most of the descriptions that we
22:44
see on startup school. It makes it
22:47
really really hard for us to understand
22:48
it.
22:50
A meritocratic decision support system.
22:53
The thing is I want to know for what?
22:56
For whom? I don't even understand what
22:58
the problem is that they're solving
22:59
based off of this. And so
23:02
is it for is it because a lot of people
23:04
have non-mar basically I have to ask so
23:06
many questions in my head to figure out
23:08
why did they get to this sort of
23:09
description
23:11
learn and sharing knowledge about data
23:13
science and artificial intelligence
23:15
sounds more like a mission I can't tell
23:17
what the product is
23:19
and how they're going to go about it
23:21
like I couldn't reproduce this if I had
23:23
10 companies
23:25
build based off this description you'd
23:26
have 10 very different products the
23:29
other thing that's odd about company
23:30
descriptions is you guys tend to
23:33
capitalize and make proper nouns very
23:36
weird words and phrases. You should not
23:38
do that. It's not like a magazine title.
23:41
Um, and it makes me think sometimes
23:43
you're emphasizing the wrong things like
23:45
you're thinking the data science and
23:46
artificial intelligence is a thing
23:48
that's going to make me excited. And the
23:49
thing is like those are the buzzwords.
23:51
Those are the solutions and it makes me
23:53
worried that you haven't started with a
23:54
problem.
23:57
Let's go an example of like how to
23:59
adjust a description. So here's a much
24:02
longer one. So our company will make
24:04
lowcost and low power consumption
24:06
medical devices based on artificial
24:08
intelligent and IoT suitable for
24:11
subsaharan communities. Now relatively
24:15
clear I could understand it reading it
24:17
but it's not the most concise form of
24:20
this and I feel like there's a lot of
24:21
things get in the way. And so when I
24:23
work with companies to help shrink and
24:25
reduce and improve their descriptions so
24:28
that I will get the most out of it, um I
24:32
want to talk through the process. The
24:33
first thing I want to do is just figure
24:35
out what are the nouns in the
24:37
description. Here we go. Our company
24:40
medical devices for subsum communities.
24:42
Oh we're almost done.
24:45
Right.
24:48
everything else that gets added on here,
24:50
whatever verb, adjectives or adverbs you
24:52
want, you want to be really careful. You
24:54
want to know like is it giving maximum
24:56
punch for this, right? And so
25:00
really the verb is going to be usually
25:03
just you're making something, etc. Um,
25:07
but usually it's going to be whatever
25:09
the product like the verb is like the
25:10
thing that we're making. If we're
25:12
thinking about this in an active voice
25:14
structure, the subject, the verb, and
25:17
then the object, the customer, the
25:19
market, the people we're going after,
25:21
everything else, if we add anything back
25:23
to this, I really want to be really
25:24
careful about why we're going to add
25:26
back to it. Is that going to be the
25:28
stuff that makes it me excited? So, the
25:30
artificial intelligence IoT suitable
25:32
stuff, that's like how they're wanting
25:35
it, the technology, and I'm more worried
25:37
that they're wanting to use buzzwords to
25:39
describe it, right? Hopefully that's
25:41
like a secret weapon that you have, but
25:42
I bet it's not the defining
25:44
characteristics of whether this company
25:45
is successful or not. And then up here,
25:47
I see two modifiers for medical devices.
25:50
Low cost, low power consumption. So low
25:53
cost, I can definitely see that's super
25:55
interesting. If you make a lowcost
25:57
device in subsaharan community then I'm
26:00
like oh that's interest that's really
26:01
interesting because that's like it's
26:02
hard just to make something you know for
26:05
developing countries but to make it so
26:07
it's actually affordable for them that'd
26:09
be interesting the low power consumption
26:12
I can give or take there I'd have to
26:14
know more about the company to know
26:15
whether that's actually crucial to
26:17
understanding whether this company has
26:18
an unfair advantage or not so if I was
26:21
to redo this come out to recreate
26:24
affordable medical devices for
26:25
subsaharan Africa. Some people are going
26:28
to be very squeamish about this. A lot
26:30
of founders are worried. It's like,
26:32
you're putting me in a box, man. It's
26:34
too reductive.
26:37
My business is complex.
26:39
I do a lot of things and a lot of things
26:43
make me great. I want to tell you all of
26:45
them. And the thing is like you don't
26:47
have time. And I know it as an investor.
26:50
There's no investor that thinks any
26:52
business is like simple and easy. I just
26:55
don't think that from the default. So,
26:57
you shouldn't be worried that I'm going
26:59
to think something small of it. And
27:01
again, you want to be careful of the
27:03
defense on here. Once I get to this,
27:05
then I'll start asking the other
27:07
questions. It creates that foundation
27:08
for curiosity.
27:11
All right, we're pretty much here at the
27:12
end. The best way to help me, and I
27:15
would love for you to help me,
27:18
is to be clear and concise.
27:22
Thank you very much.
27:27
[Music]
27:29
[Applause]
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Kevin Hale - How to Pitch Your Startup
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