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Chapter 11. The Nonstandard Pitch Deck

Congratulations on finishing your standard pitch deck! Now I have bad news for you. You should never use your standard pitch deck.

There are two schools of thought about fundraising. The first is that you should research the hell out of the investment landscape and identify the five to seven investors who are the perfect match for your company. You should prepare like crazy and focus all your energy on pitching them as effectively as possible. The pitch itself should be hyper-optimized for the interests and perspective of the audience you’re pitching to.

The second school of thought is politely called “spray and pray.” It says that you should pitch anything that moves. You should take every intro, attend every associate meeting, hit every networking event, and generally take every opportunity given for you to make your case, no matter how slim the odds of success.

Unfortunately, first-time entrepreneurs need to take both paths. You’ve got to work hard and play the numbers. If this is your first rodeo and you’re not totally confident of your fundraising abilities, the right approach is both breadth and depth at the same time. It’s brutal, it’s time consuming, but it’s the surest way to get the job done. (That said, if you’re fortunate enough to be in a position where you’re confident that you’ll have your choice of investors, by dint of pedigree or experience, by all means pick option 1. It’s a lot less effort, and ...