What should be in a seed-round pitch deck for investors?

What data do angel investors want to see in a pitch deck? Better yet, are there any public successful pitch decks that people have used to raise over $500K from angels?

I would suggest these slides with less text and more diagrams/charts:

1. Slide with a logo, tagline, and a quote from someone about the company/product or a vision statement

2. Team - highlight relevant experiences, skills, and expertise

3-4 Problem/Solution fit for your product - 1 slide describing problem and how it's solved now, next slide how your product/services solves the problem. Note why you want to tackle this problem and why now.

5. Competitors and how you are different from them or if the product is new list companies that are similar and/or those you might be getting a market share from. A venn diagram showing an overlap of markets (and companies in those markets) that create your market is great for this. This slide shows you have done your leg work and understand how/where your product fits into the marketplace.

6. Traction - any stats you have to-date, and roadmap for getting users. If pre-launch, info on MVP and vision for launch.

7. Business Model. List ways you can make money

8. Summary and Takeaways.

There are a lot of pitch decks and templates shared online, the biggest difference is the company stage and what you have to highlight (metrics, user acquisition channels, etc.). The number of slides will vary dramatically, but I was told by an experienced Angel investor (in a class setting) to keep it under 10 slides - less is more.

There's really no one answer, given that angels vary widely in their sophistication level. Some angels want to just meet and talk with you while others may want 40 page powerpoint slides that are actually word documents in disguise.

With that in mind, here are some general ideas. I'm taking the approach of several different deliverables so you can share the right level of detail with the right kind of angel (in other words, you wouldn't necessarily want to give an angel all of this information).

• For the more casual angel (as well as for the more sophisticated who want a high level overview) - an investment overview document. No more than 3 pages and keep it simple (good use of white space for the squinty eyed), that contains (a) Company overview - date founded, founders names, type of business model, city, etc. (b) company overview (c) round size and unit price (or stock price) including minimum investment amount if appropriate, (d) management team background (or founder background), (e) Ownership summary, (f) Summary of planned use of proceeds, (g) high level summary of the 5 year operating budget (graph form or some other easily understandable visual).
• For the sophisticated angel - a 5 year budget with appropriate assumptions. Be prepared for deep questions around how you will generate sales and how/when you will reach break even, as well as being able to substantiate logic/assumptions when challenged.
• For the angel who is hard to nail down on a commitment, you could consider a turnaround sheet (a basic one-page commitment document in memo format where the investor signs his intentions to participate - and at what dollar amount - in the round).
  
• For most angel types - the total addressable market size. A very common question is "How big can you get?". It's been my experience that rarely do entrepreneurs define this concretely, yet they are in the best position to answer this question. If you aren't sure, a great place to go is a researcher - preferably with an anthropology background (most CMO's have these types of backgrounds these days) - who can help you size the marketplace's potential (NOT the marketplace size, the marketplace potential - defined as the deployment of all of your products and services into the marketplace and its target customer segments). This is a really really important question for you to be able to answer.

Hope this helps!