The Take-Home Deck

Abstract

You don’t necessarily even need a deck to deliver a great pitch. I founded my company LifeFolder with my co-founder Colin Liotta—a conversational interface (“chatbot”) company that was all about guiding people through their first conversation about death. At the beginning of a pitch, I’d ask the investors, "I have a pitch deck, but we’re about to spend an hour talking about death. Do you want to see the deck, or would you like to have a conversation?" Of course, that opening gambit was part of the pitch. With one exception, investors chose the conversation. That was precisely the point of the startup; that conversations are the best tool for the emotionally intense subject matter at hand.