July 16, 2020
9/10 Investors More Likely to Invest with a Tella Pitch
Koby
Out with the deck and in with the video
Do you want to raise more money at a better valuation?
I did some research on a group of 67 investors who collectively manage billions in early stage funds. This included top angel Investors, venture capitalists, and founders in Silicon Valley. Here's what I found.
61 out of 67 investors said they were more likely to invest with a Tella pitch
I asked these investors a very simple question: which pitch deck are you more likely to invest in?
To be honest, for a while I was worried that nobody preferred the traditional pitch deck. I expected that the Tella pitch would perform stronger, but not to this extent.
The almost unanimous response received was that the Tella pitch deck was stronger, more engaging, and for a number of investors a game changer, compared with the traditional deck.
It's worth noting that this was a pitch for a mock startup, of which the participants in the study were aware.
A picture says 1,000 words, but a video says 1.8 million
"Without question the video version of the pitch (via Tella) is significantly more compelling than a classic PPT. It's more compelling and allows investors to get a better feel for the founders ahead of the first meeting."
— Adam Bao, Founder - The Harbinger
Tella lets you to create a video pitch deck which provides infinitely more context and creativity than a traditional deck ever can.
Words are only 7% of communication. 38% is your tone of voice, and 55% is body language.
I'm not a great presenter. So even with my sub-par performance, by simply giving investors the chance to hear my voice and watch my body language, I was able to dramatically increase the strength of the pitch.
Video is the superior medium, but slides aren't completely dead
"The Tella deck is superior in every way except the time it takes to digest it"
— Jared Heyman, Managing Partner - Rebel Fund
While the vast majority of the feedback indicated that they were more likely to invest with a Tella pitch, there were a handful of investors who wanted the traditional deck. The main critique against the video pitch was the inability to quickly skim through a deck. Investors receive and watch countless pitches so it's important that they can navigate the content efficiently.
The best of both worlds?
After sharing the insights of the case study with the team at Tella they told me about a new feature they were working on called Scenes. With Scenes you can split your video or pitch into different topics or sections. This also gives viewers a way to navigate the content—in the same way viewers can click through slides of a deck.
Pitching your startup is never easy, and so much of it is about you as a founder. Using a tool like Tella helps you communicate the most important aspects of your startup as well as your own personality. The better you can do this the more likely you are to reach your fundraising goals.
Happy fundraising!
A big thanks to everyone who contributed to our case study!
Jared Heyman, Managing Partner @ Rebel Fund
Parthi Loganathan, Partner @ Graduate Fund
Aneel Ranadive, Managing Partner @ SOMA Capital
Hyung Kim, US Investment @ LINE Ventures
Rob Ness, General Partner @ Asymmetry Ventures
Kevin Lin, Co-Founder @ Twitch
Darian Shirazi, General Partner @ Gradient Ventures
Rishab Hegde, Founder @ Comradery
Ryan Bednar, Founder @ RankScience
Jacob Eiting, Founder @ RevenueCat
Neil Arora, Angel Investor
Adam Bao, Founder @ The Harbinger
Tim Godzich, Co-Founder @ Liazon, QB Health
Adam Besvinick, Partner @ Looking Glass Capital
Cindy Bi, Angel Investor
Matt Bogrand, Investor @ Y Combinator
David Phillips, Founder @ Fondo
Victoria Zuo, Investor @ Gradient Ventures
David Wu, Partner @ Maveron
Sunny Kumar, Investor
Thomson Nguyen, Founder @ Hatch Credit
Jeppe Christiansen, CEO @ Maj Invest Holding
Stuart Gardner, Angel Investor
Hemant Verma, Co-Founder @ Goodly
Justin Gage, Angel Investor
Jonny Price, Director of Fundraising @ Wefunder
Thomas Neckel, Co-Founder @ Cove.io
Mike Dombrowski, Leading Capital Markets @ InterPrime
Josh Manchester, Partner @ Champion Hill Labs
Daniel Borowski, Founder @ Coderbyte
Mikhail Taver, Managing Partner @ Gagarin Capital Partners
Clemens Koos, Investment Manager @ Signals VC
Antony Evans, Angel Investor
Brian Straka, Director of Portfolio Recruitment & Selection @ 43North
...and another 33 VCs, angel investors, and founders who wished to remain anonymous.
Koby Conrad is the cofounder of Room Service and author of kobyconrad.com
