Squads Pitch Deck: All 12 Slides + Teardown

The Vision: Web3 Meets the Creator Economy

The Squads pitch deck, used to raise a $1.8M pre-seed round in 2022, is a product-forward presentation that leans heavily into the 'Social Token' thesis that dominated the early 2020s. The deck is concise, at only 12 slides, and uses a high-contrast, dark-mode aesthetic typical of consumer social and crypto startups. It focuses on the emotional and financial connection between creators and their 'squads' (fans).

Slides 1-2: The Hook and the Future

Slide 1 is a standard title slide featuring the Squads logo in a glitch-art style with the tagline 'Connect with your favorite creators.' A small disclaimer at the bottom adds a touch of personality: 'Confidential: please don't share unless you really, really want to in which case we can't stop you.'

Slide 2 sets the stage for the 'Why Now' of the business. It states, 'We are building a web3 future where creators get paid for genuine fan communities.' This slide establishes the company's alignment with the Web3 movement, positioning 'genuine community' as the primary value driver rather than just views or likes.

Slides 3-5: Product Mechanics and Utility

Slide 3 introduces the core loop of the platform: 'On squads, fans buy creator coins to get exclusive content.' The slide features three mobile mockups. The first shows a creator profile with a 'join my squad' callout. The second displays a 'my coins' portfolio view, showing coins like @daynamarie up '+150% in value' and @squads-founders down '-69% in value.' The third mockup emphasizes being an 'early adopter' and getting rewarded for supporting creators early.

Slide 4 is a meme slide. While the text provided only notes 'Squads includes a meme,' this is a common tactic in Web3 decks to demonstrate cultural alignment with the target demographic. It serves as a pattern interrupt in a professional presentation.

Slide 5 expands on the creator's side of the value proposition: 'creators get paid for building strong communities.' The mockups here show a 'portfolio' value of '$488.00' and a list of engagement options: sharing behind-the-scenes content, inviting fans to videos, dropping swag, hosting video calls, and flying fans out. This slide attempts to show that the 'coin' isn't just a speculative asset but a key to a suite of creator-led experiences.

Slides 6-7: The Transactional Value

Slide 6 explicitly addresses the monetization: 'Creators make $$ when fans buy and trade their coins.' This highlights the marketplace aspect of the app, where the creator presumably benefits from both the initial sale and the ongoing secondary trading volume of their personal tokens.

Slide 7 reinforces the fan experience with the headline 'Fans get value from creators posting exclusive access.' The mockups show a 'squad chat' where a creator (@poloboy) interacts directly with fans, a video feed, and a 'Video Call With Me' offer that is 'Exclusively for squad members with 20+ coins.' This slide is crucial for proving that the token has 'utility'—a key term in crypto to avoid being labeled as a pure security.

Slide 8: The Technical Strategy

Slide 8 contains one of the most important strategic claims in the deck: 'A fiat frontend with a blockchain backend will enable consumer virality and technical efficiency.' In 2022, the biggest barrier to Web3 adoption was the complexity of wallets and gas fees. By promising a 'fiat frontend,' Squads tells investors they are building a 'Web2.5' experience—all the benefits of the blockchain without the user-facing friction.

Slides 9-10: Market Mapping and Demand

Slide 9 uses a third-party graphic titled 'Mapping the Creator Economy' by Hugo Amsellem. The slide adds a red circle to an empty spot in the 'Monetize Your Audience Online' section, with a caption stating, 'Fans aren't altruistic, they want to be rewarded for believing.' This is the 'Insight' slide. It argues that existing tools (Patreon, Substack, etc.) rely on fan altruism, whereas Squads offers fans a financial stake in a creator's success.

Slide 10 addresses the market opportunity with a bold, if somewhat generic, claim: 'The market demand for Squads is huge and someone is going to win this space.' It doesn't provide a TAM (Total Addressable Market) calculation, instead relying on the momentum of the creator economy as a whole to justify the investment.

Slides 11-12: The Team and The Ask

Slide 11 is the 'Team' slide, titled 'We are uniquely strong founders who have worked together for years so wagmi.' (WAGMI is a crypto acronym for 'We're All Gonna Make It'). It features Kendall Tucker (CEO) and Mike Garon (CTO). The slide highlights their previous collaboration at @knoq, which was sold in December 2020. Tucker's social media stats (86k on TikTok) are included to show she understands the creator persona, while Garon's engineering background at Flare and Carbon Black provides technical credibility.

Slide 12 concludes the deck with the 'Ask': 'Raising SAFE to prove unit economics before scaling platform.' This is a standard pre-seed request, indicating that the $1.8M will be used to find product-market fit and validate that the cost of acquiring creators and fans is lower than the lifetime value generated by coin trades.

What Works in the Squads Deck

The Squads deck is highly effective at communicating a clear product vision . By using high-fidelity mockups on almost every slide, the founders make a complex concept (social tokens) feel tangible and easy to understand. An investor can immediately see what the app looks like and how a user would interact with it.

The founder-market fit is also a strong point. Highlighting a previous exit (@knoq) is the ultimate de-risking mechanism for a pre-seed investor. The fact that the CEO and CTO have worked together for years suggests a stable leadership team that can survive the 'trough of sorrow' typical of early-stage startups.

Finally, the 'Fiat Frontend' promise on Slide 8 is a sophisticated nod to the prevailing market sentiment of the time. It shows the founders aren't just crypto-enthusiasts, but product thinkers who understand that mass-market consumers won't jump through hoops to use a new app.

What is Missing from the Squads Deck

The most glaring omission is a Competitor Analysis . In 2022, the social token space was crowded with players like BitClout (Deso), Rally, and Roll. By stating 'someone is going to win this space' on Slide 10 without explaining why Squads has a structural advantage over these well-funded incumbents, the founders left a significant question unanswered.

There is also a lack of Tokenomics Detail . For a blockchain-based company, the mechanics of the 'creator coin' are vital. How is the price determined? Is it a bonding curve? What is the platform's take rate? The deck focuses on the 'what' and 'why' but stays very light on the 'how' regarding the financial engine of the marketplace.

Lastly, the Go-To-Market (GTM) strategy is vague. While 'consumer virality' is mentioned on Slide 8, there is no plan for how they will attract the first 10 or 100 creators to the platform. In a two-sided marketplace, the 'cold start problem' is the most common cause of death, and this deck doesn't address how they intend to solve it.

Founder Takeaways: What to Copy

Use high-fidelity mockups: If your product is a consumer app, don't just describe features—show them. Squads does an excellent job of visualizing the user journey through Slides 3, 5, and 7. · Leverage your history: If you have worked with your co-founder before, or if you have a previous exit, make it a headline. Slide 11 uses the phrase 'worked together for years' as a primary selling point. · Identify the 'Altruism Gap': Slide 9 is a great example of identifying a psychological shift in a market. Moving from 'fans give money to support' to 'fans buy coins to participate in upside' is a powerful narrative shift. · Keep it brief: At 12 slides, the deck doesn't overstay its welcome. It provides enough information to get a meeting without getting bogged down in technical whitepaper territory. · Address friction early: By calling out the 'fiat frontend' on Slide 8, the founders preemptively answered the most common objection to Web3 apps (user onboarding difficulty).