Startup Viagra: How to Pitch A VC, Dave McClure Style!
Dave McClure surely needs no introduction. Former entrepreneur turned investor has been in the startup and technology industry for over 30 years and some even call him Quentin Tarantino of the startup world. As most of you might already know, Dave is also one of the keynote speakers for echelon 2010 and will be one of the panelists for the startup pitching session.
Now, with his vast experience as an entrepreneur and investor, he has definitely sat through enough product pitches to last him a lifetime. He is even famous or rather, infamous for interrupting the pitches during startup weekend event, and in his own words being a d*** to the pitching entrepreneurs.
Well, if you are one of the pitching startups for echelon 2010, then you could definitely use some advice from his presentation below on how to pitch a VC.
In these presentation, Dave covers his perspectives on how entrepreneurs should pitch A VC to get them ‘excited’, if not hand out money. This ranges from, how to give an elevator pitch to categorizing your financial requirements.
The important point that I found valuable from the presentation, is to keep your message simple, always! Unless, you are a rocket scientist, Dave makes a great case on how by highlighting 3 key phrases in two sentences sends your message across very clearly.
With regards to the team, the three key words that get VC’s attention are Geeks, Entrepreneurs and Sales/Marketing folks. While, getting a good combination of all three is difficult, it’s useful to identify the skills sets that you don’t have currently in your team and how you plan to use the VC money to hire. These points were of course just the tip of the iceberg. To get to the bottom of it, I would suggest browsing through the presentation below and attend echelon 2010!
PS: If you are below 18 years of age, I would advise you to excuse the colorful language used in these slides.
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