How to Make Your Product Shine When Pitching to Investors

Pitching to investors is something many business owners have to do at some point, but it can be nerve-racking if you’re not used to persuasive speaking.

Side note: I was captain of my high school speech team, and one of my events was persuasive speaking. So I get giddy when a client needs help perfecting a presentation!

You might need to pitch your business and your product to investors if you’re a new startup looking for money to get your business off the ground and begin manufacturing your first products. Or you could be an established business looking for funds to grow your business in the coming year.

Investors are interested in the financial aspect of your business, and you must sell them on the product. And a short meeting window could add pressure to stand out from the crowd.

Here are the best ways to make your product shine when pitching to investors. 

Focus on the Problems It Solves 

You’ll lose the investors’ attention if you dive in talking about all of the different features that your product has.

They’re not looking for bells and whistles, and they don’t want to hear the small details until they have a clear understanding of what your product is and what it does.

Focus on the problems your product solves because this is how people will relate to it. What’s in it for them?

If your product offers a solution to a problem the investor has personally experienced, then they’re almost certainly going to be interested in the rest of your pitch.

Tell a story and show how your product can improve their lives rather than listing off the technical specifications. 

Let Them Use It 

You can spend as long as you like telling them how amazing your product is, but why not just let it speak for itself?

It’s far more convincing if you let the investors try the product so they can experience the benefits first hand. Everyone like to try before you buy!

This is why prototypes are especially important during the product design process. Even if you don’t have a finished product to show them, you can still present them with a prototype of what to expect from the finished product.

Allowing the investors to get hands-on with your product is much clearer and more exciting than showing pictures and videos. 

Run Focus Groups Beforehand 

You might love your product and the investors might agree, but it’s the opinion of potential customers that really matters.

Investors will only part with their money if they’re convinced the product will sell, which is why you need to test it on the kinds of people that are likely to buy it.

If possible, run focus groups with a range of different people and see how they respond. If they all have positive things to say, then you can relay this to investors and show them that the product has potential.

Focus groups are also a great opportunity to identify issues with the product and tweak it so it’s as good as it can possibly be before you show it to an investor. 

Take the time and effort to really make your product shine and get the investors hooked so you can move your business forward. 

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