Pickle Pitch Deck Teardown: Gamifying the Selfie Trend

Pickle Pitch Deck Analysis

The Pickle pitch deck from May 2015 is a classic example of a 'traction-first' social app deck. At a time when selfie culture was peaking, Pickle sought to gamify the experience. The deck is concise, totaling 10 slides, and focuses heavily on user engagement metrics from a prototype phase to justify a $600,000 seed round.

Slide 1: Title Slide

The cover slide is minimalist, featuring the Pickle logo in a friendly, rounded script font against a green background. The subtitle, "The App for Competitive Selfies," immediately defines the product category. The right side of the slide shows a high-fidelity mockup of the app on an iPhone 5-era device, displaying a 'Most Crossed Eyes' challenge. This is an effective start as it shows the product in action immediately.

Slide 2: What is Pickle?

This slide breaks down the user journey into three simple steps: 1) Users challenge friends , 2) They're assigned a photo challenge , and 3) Other users vote for the winner . The use of three phone mockups showing different screens—friend selection, the 'spin for challenge' wheel, and the voting interface—makes the mechanics clear. It positions the app as a social game rather than just a photo-sharing tool.

Slide 3: Traction and Engagement

Slide 3 addresses the question, "Does anyone even like selfies?" with hard data. The founders report that 24 hours after launch, the prototype had 12.7k registered users and 1 million votes cast . One month later, the numbers scaled to 26k downloads and 5.2 million votes cast . A line graph shows a sharp spike in growth around December 12th. This is the strongest slide in the deck, demonstrating that the core loop (voting) is highly addictive.

Slide 4: Current Status and Strategy

Under the heading "So far..." , the deck notes that prototypes have launched on both iOS and Android and that the company has already raised $135k in funding . An interesting metric included is a "massive following on imgur.com (50,000+ upvotes)," which suggests a successful organic marketing test. The slide explicitly states the goal is to build 'Pickle 2.0' by mirroring the viral strategies of "Trivia Crack" and "Words with Friends."

Slide 5: Monetization Potential

This slide introduces the business model. It projects that with 500,000 monthly active users , the app would generate $200k in revenue per month . It lists an Average Monthly Revenue/User of $0.40 , a Lifetime Value (LTV) of $2.39 , and a Cost of Acquisition (CAC) of $1.80 . Crucially, a footnote states these are "Based on industry averages of similar apps," meaning these are not yet proven by Pickle's own operations.

Slide 6: Long-Term Revenue

Beyond in-app purchases, the deck proposes Brand Sponsorships . The concept is 'Branded Pickle selfie contests,' which would offer brands visibility and engagement. An example mockup shows a 'Kleenex' branded challenge for 'Just about to Sneeze.' This demonstrates a secondary, B2B revenue stream that leverages the app's high engagement for advertising.

Slide 7: The Team

The team slide features four members. Evan Katz (CEO) is noted for being in his 3rd CEO position with a copywriting background. Morgan Steffy (CTO) has 4 years of development and design experience. Chris Anderson (iOS Development) is described as a database expert with 8 years of experience, and Adam Jones (Lead Designer) is cited as a game theory expert with 10 years of experience. The team appears balanced between product, engineering, and design.

Slide 8: Advisors

The advisor list adds significant credibility. Dan Kurani (CEO of Thumb) is highlighted for growing a similar app to 1.5 million users. Joel Seligstein is listed as an early Facebook engineer and an existing investor in Pickle. Jay Zalowitz is credited as a technical expert in viral growth. Having an early Facebook engineer as an investor is a strong signal for a social app.

Slide 9: The Ask and Roadmap

Pickle is "Raising Round of $600,000." The slide provides a timeline for the remainder of 2015: launching 'Pickle 2.0' in June, reaching 100,000 monthly users and implementing in-app purchases by August, and hitting $200k monthly revenue and two brand pilots by December. The milestones are ambitious but clearly defined.

Slide 10: Contact and Social Proof

The final slide provides contact information and social media handles. It includes a series of user-generated 'ugly' selfies to reinforce the fun nature of the app. It also features a quote from KillerStartups: "It's like Snapchat, but better." This is the only mention of a competitor in the entire deck.

What Pickle Does Well

The deck is exceptionally strong at demonstrating engagement density . By highlighting that 26,000 users cast 5.2 million votes, the founders prove that their users aren't just downloading the app—they are actively participating. The ratio of 200 votes per user per month is a compelling metric for a social gaming platform. Additionally, the clear three-step explanation of the product (Slide 2) ensures that any investor, regardless of their familiarity with selfie culture, understands the mechanics immediately.

What is Missing from the Pickle Deck

The most glaring omission is a competitive landscape analysis . In 2015, the social photo space was incredibly crowded with Instagram, Snapchat, and various 'challenge' apps. Pickle mentions Snapchat only in a quote on the final slide, failing to explain how they will defend their niche against these giants. Furthermore, the financial projections are purely hypothetical . Using 'industry averages' for CAC and LTV is a common pitfall; investors would prefer to see how the $135k already raised was used to test these specific unit economics for Pickle itself. Finally, there is no mention of Market Size (TAM) , leaving investors to guess the total addressable audience for 'competitive selfies.'

Founder Takeaways: What to Copy

Focus on Engagement Ratios: Don't just show downloads. Show the ratio of actions to users (e.g., votes per user). This proves the product is 'sticky.' · Visual Product Walkthrough: Use Slide 2's approach of mapping the user journey to specific app screens. It eliminates confusion about how the product works. · Strategic Advisor Selection: Pickle chose advisors who had specifically built or scaled similar social products (Thumb, Facebook). This suggests the founders know exactly what expertise they lack. · Branded Content Mockups: If you plan to sell to brands, show a mockup of what that looks like (Slide 6). It makes a theoretical revenue stream feel tangible.