The ten-slide deck (Millionrounds)

1. Cover: [Company]: [what you do] for [whom]
   e.g. "Acme: fills the appointments clinics lose to no-shows"
   - The name and one line a stranger could repeat
   - The round and the date
   Leave off: A tagline that sounds like a brand and explains nothing.
2. Problem: [Who] lose [what] every [period]
   e.g. "Clinics lose 18% of appointments to no-shows"
   - Who has the problem, in one line
   - What it costs them, in money or time, with a number
   - How they cope today
   Leave off: A problem only you have noticed, or one sized in adjectives.
3. Solution: [Product] [does what] so [result]
   e.g. "Acme predicts no-shows and refills the slot two days ahead"
   - What you do about the problem, in one sentence
   - The result for the customer, as a number if you have one
   Leave off: A feature list. Features belong on the product slide.
4. Market: [n] [customers] pay [amount]: a $[size] market
   e.g. "230,000 clinics at $4,200 a year: a $1B market in the US"
   - The market bottom up: customers you can reach times what each pays
   - Where you start and where it leads
   Leave off: A top-down TAM from an analyst report with no route to it.
5. Product: [How it works] in [n] steps
   e.g. "Connect, predict, refill: live in an afternoon"
   - One screenshot or the flow in three steps
   - What the customer does and what the product does
   Leave off: Every screen you have built.
6. Business model: [Price] per [unit], paid back in [time]
   e.g. "$350 a clinic a month, paid back in under two months"
   - Who pays, how much and how often
   - Margin, and payback on acquiring a customer if you know it
   Leave off: Five revenue streams. Show the one that matters.
7. Traction: [Metric] up [x] in [period]
   e.g. "ARR up 8x in a year, to $168k"
   - One chart of the metric that matters, over time
   - Retention or repeat use beside it
   Leave off: Cumulative charts, vanity numbers, and no dates on the axis.
8. Competition: Why [customers] choose us over [alternative]
   e.g. "Reminders tell patients; Acme refills the slot"
   - What customers use today, including doing nothing
   - The one or two things you do that they cannot
   Leave off: A 2×2 where you are alone in the top right, or "no competitors".
9. Team: [Why this team] wins this market
   e.g. "Ran a 60-clinic group; built scheduling at scale"
   - The founders, and the one thing each has done that matters here
   - Key hires and advisers only if they change the odds
   Leave off: Logos of every employer and degree.
10. The ask: Raising [amount] to reach [milestone] in [months]
   e.g. "Raising $2.5M to reach 150 clinics and $1.2M ARR in 20 months"
   - The amount, and the runway it buys
   - The milestones it reaches, which set up the next round
   - Use of funds in three lines at most
   Leave off: An amount with no milestone, or "$1M to $3M".