leAD Sports Accelerator: VC Day
When we first received the calendar for the leAD Sports Accelerator programme in Berlin, I was pleased to see that before the big Demo Day in November we would actually get a chance to meet some of the VCs, do our pitches and get feedback at what they were calling “VC Day” which was smart because polished pitches are always better and some of the founders would have never met a VC before.
Every week to date has included pitch training with leAD’s pitch consultant which has been very beneficial to all the teams. There is also an in-house graphic designer who spruced up the look of the presentations.
It’s Your Pitch
Practicing a pitch each week in front of fellow founders and staff is good for feedback. The additional one on one pitch training is also very beneficial, but you also risk trying to please too many people with different feedback and can end up with a pitch that doesn’t feel natural to you, or worse, doesn’t take your target audience into consideration.
It’s easy for a founder to make the mistake of thinking that they need to appease every potential investor in the room but the reality is that you are interviewing potential long-term partners just as much as they are interviewing you. You want smart money which means:
Patient capital that understands the growth needs of the company and can provide relevant contacts to help achieve scale and desired outcomes
leAD’s pitch coach and I have an interesting relationship because she knows that I’ve done public speaking for more than 15 years. One discussion found its way to the expected “Since you have clear ideas of what you want to do then is it really worth it for me to provide feedback?”
My response was simply that I welcome all feedback and take it under consideration. However, I am not obligated to follow every single opinion because this has to be our pitch and we know the kind of partners we want.
The call continued and went much better, with some of her suggested changes incorporated.
Despite always practicing with me doing the entire pitch, Mike and I decided that our original approach to Selection Days and all VC meetings — him opening with the story of why he started RunLive and then the product demo, with me diving into the market size, unique selling proposition, etc. — was the way to go and show our team dynamic.
We also made sure to have three pocket slides (appendix slides after the presentation is over) for the questions we inevitably get but cannot answer in a 5-minute presentation (great presentations anticipate key questions and should answer them but a five minute pitch can only cover so much).
It’s Not A Stageshow
Some people believe that pitching on stage is more like putting on a show or play. You have your lines, you tell a story and you play your part. I totally disagree with that because passion can’t be an act.
You don’t memorize a script, you must know the story you want to tell throughout the pitch, know what you want to say about each slide and just by seeing the slide it will flow.
If you focus on memorizing a script then it is easy to get flustered when you flub or miss a line. A more natural approach, the way most presentations actually work, will always flow better.
Show Your Personality
We were told that it was five minutes to present and five minutes of questions but after finishing our pitch in four minutes and fifty seconds, we didn’t leave the stage until more than eighteen minutes.
As long as I wasn’t stopped I was going to keep taking questions and listening to the comments. When one VC asked about our competitors adding similar features, another replied that one of them would likely buy us before trying to compete but he didn’t say it loudly so I cupped my hand to my ear and asked him to say it a little louder then repeated it. When another VC commented that this could be applied beyond running to other things like cycling, I told him thank you for actually getting it and that we could sign the term sheet today, which drew lots of laughs.
VC Day landed us three major meetings so far and reinforced that we are on the right track. It’s only a matter of time for us to find the right investors that we want to work with.
Final Analysis
Public speaking does not come naturally so practice, get comfortable, use that nervous feeling in your stomach as fuel for your presentation. It will never go away.
Seeing the transformation of the decks and pitches since Sep 10th to now reinforced how important guidance and practice is but it also reminded me of why we chose to apply to leAD and then accept the spot: They are serious about supporting the founders in the programme.
Now we are ready for Demo Day on November 12th which will be recorded and posted online. I can’t wait for you to be able to actually see us pitch!
Mike Thompson and David Mullings are founders of RunLive, a mobile running app with real-time matching. RunLive was the only US-based startup selected for the 2018 cohort at the leAD Sports Accelerator in Berlin, Germany, founded by the three oldest grandsons of Adi Dassler, founder of Adidas.
