InvestorConnected Pitch Deck Teardown: A Two-Sided

Executive Summary: The Bridge Between Capital and Small Business

InvestorConnected positions itself as a critical infrastructure layer for the small business funding ecosystem. The deck, structured across 22 slides, follows a logical progression from problem identification to a specific investment ask. It targets the inefficiency in how small businesses present their financials and how investors discover high-quality deals. By offering a standardized 'Financial Profile,' the company aims to move beyond simple networking to data-driven matching.

Slides 1-2: Introduction and Vision

The deck opens with a clear mission statement: "Connecting capital with small businesses." Slide 2 uses a bridge metaphor to illustrate the company's role as a web platform that spans the gap between a bag of capital and a factory representing small business. The branding is consistent, using a red and dark blue color palette that persists throughout the presentation.

Slides 3-6: The Entrepreneur's Problem and Solution

Slides 3 and 4 define the entrepreneur's struggle: the dream of growth is often met with frustration due to a lack of resources. Slide 5 introduces the solution, broken down into three pillars: Create (pitches), Calculate (financial projections and valuation), and Find (investors and partners). Slide 6 concludes this section with a visual of an entrepreneur successfully raising funding, emphasizing the outcome rather than the process.

Slides 7-9: The Investor's Problem and Solution

The deck then flips the perspective to the other side of the marketplace. Slide 7 notes that investors are "overloaded with choice." Slide 8 mirrors the entrepreneur's solution slide, stating that the platform helps investors Define criteria, Match with businesses, and Find co-investors. Slide 9 uses a funnel graphic to show how the platform filters a large volume of businesses into a manageable stream for the investor, allowing them to "relax" (visualized by an icon of a person with their feet up).

Slides 10-11: Market Size and Validation

Slide 10 focuses on the UK market in 2015. It cites 0.6 million startup launches, 5.3 million small businesses, and £39 billion in funding. The company sets a five-year target of 120,000 users and 5,000 small businesses. Slide 11 provides market validation by citing the success of other platforms: AngelList (2 million users), F6S (500k+ startups), and Crowdcube (£192m funded). This slide serves to prove that the category is viable, even if InvestorConnected is a newer entrant.

Slides 12-14: Product Deep Dive

These slides provide UI mockups of the platform. Slide 12 shows investor features like investment criteria definition and offer negotiation (showing a sample offer of £25,000 for 20% equity). Slide 13 shows entrepreneur features, including pitch tracking and community activity. Slide 14, titled "The Financial Profile," is perhaps the most important, showing the tools for projecting future growth, analyzing numbers (profitability, safety, liquidity), and valuing a business. It shows an enterprise value example of £763,374.

Slide 15: The Business Model

The revenue strategy is laid out on a roadmap graphic. It includes:

One-off Payments: Financial Profiles at an average fee of £16, targeting 1,700 transactions per month. · Subscription: A freemium model with a 10% conversion rate to paid. · Commission: A percentage of funds raised over the site.

The stated goal is to generate £7.5m of revenue p.a. at the 120,000-user mark.

Slides 16-18: Strategy and Competition

Slide 16 outlines the adoption strategy: Partnerships (industry organizations, co-working spaces), Events (IC events, external events), and Viral (user-driven content, PPC). Slide 17 is a standard competitive matrix. InvestorConnected claims to have every feature (Networking, Social Integration, Full Pitches, Intelligent Matching, Financial Profiling, Global Reach) except for Peer-to-Peer Funding, which is marked with an ellipsis. Slide 18 lists six reasons for success, highlighting "Financial Profiling" as the primary unique technology.

Slides 19-22: Team, Future, and The Ask

Slide 19 introduces the team: Thierry Clarke (CEO), Jeremy Hunt (CFO), Yashar Soltanzadeh (CTO), Thomas Mason (Lead Developer), and Tsvetelina Zapryanova (CCO). Slide 20 illustrates the future vision of enabling funding from multiple sources, including Angels, VCs, and Banks. Slide 21 contains the hard ask: £700,000 for 18% equity , valuing the company at £4.1m. The funds are intended to cover two years of costs, with 80% of the budget going to the team and platform, and 20% to marketing. The deck closes on Slide 22 with contact information for Thierry Clarke.

What InvestorConnected Does Well

The deck is exceptionally clear about its two-sided value proposition. By addressing both the entrepreneur and the investor in separate, mirrored sections, the founders demonstrate an understanding of marketplace dynamics. The inclusion of specific UI mockups (Slides 12-14) helps ground the abstract concepts of "matching" and "profiling" in actual product functionality. Furthermore, the business model slide (Slide 15) is refreshingly specific, providing average transaction fees and conversion rate assumptions rather than just naming revenue categories.

What Is Missing from the Deck

The most significant omission is historical traction. While the deck provides ambitious five-year targets and cites the market size of competitors, it does not state how many users, businesses, or pounds have already moved through the InvestorConnected platform. Without a "Traction so far" slide, the £4.1m valuation is difficult to justify for a seed round. Additionally, the team slide (Slide 19) lacks professional biographies or logos of previous companies, making it hard for an investor to assess the team's execution capability in fintech. There is also no mention of unit economics beyond a single average fee—specifically, the cost to acquire a user (CAC) versus the lifetime value (LTV) is absent.

Founder's Guide: What to Copy and What to Avoid

Copy the clarity of the 'Ask': Slide 21 is a model for how to present an investment request. It clearly states the amount, the equity offered, the resulting valuation, the duration the funds will last, and a high-level breakdown of how the money will be spent. Many founders are too vague in this section; InvestorConnected is precise.

Avoid the 'Checkmark' Competition Slide: Slide 17 is a classic "we have everything, they have nothing" matrix. Investors generally find these unconvincing because they are inherently biased. A better approach is to acknowledge where competitors are strong and explain the specific strategic choice that makes your product different, rather than just claiming to have more features.

Copy the mirrored problem/solution structure: If you are building a marketplace, using Slides 3-6 for one side and 7-9 for the other is a very effective way to ensure the reader understands the pain points of both user groups. It shows you have thought through the incentives for both buyers and sellers (or in this case, founders and funders).

Avoid the lack of team context: Never just put a photo and a title on a team slide. At the seed stage, investors are betting on the people. Include 2-3 bullet points per person highlighting relevant exits, industry experience, or specific technical achievements. Without this, the team slide is just a collection of headshots.