Every two weeks, we host an online breakfast with a single investor, and a small, self-selecting group of entrepreneurs. Other investors – angels and VCs – sometimes attend as well. We keep them small to make sure everyone has a chance to participate, ask questions, and learn. You’d be amazed at how many founders have found investment – just by showing up and participating.

And hearing first-hand, precisely what investors are looking for – and we don’t simply mean the verticals in which they invest – but what they look for in a pitch deck, and how they read it.

We know you’ve heard it all before. As we’ve said over and over, in our opinion, the #1 reason why startups fail is that founders don’t listen.

And sometimes, you can’t spot the forest through the trees. In other words, every two weeks we host an investor who volunteers ninety minutes of his or her time to listen to you – and give you feedback. For free. That’s gold – and sometimes even money in the bank. You may not realize the opportunity you’re missing, so we’ll spell it out for you.

Lisa Morris spoke at our late February investor breakfast and bottom lined the most important points investors consider in a deck:

• Who needs it? (meaning, why is your product necessary)
• Who’s going to buy it?
• How do I make my money?
• How much are you raising and what are the terms

Another way of looking at it, to spell out in the simplest terms possible: investors are not your customers. They’re buying into your business. Got it now?

Being a deck doctor who works with founders, we can’t tell you how many times when we’re reviewing a deck, that most of the focus is on the product. If you don’t get to the nuts and bolts: problem, solution, market size, how the investor will make his/her money back (preferably, and then some) in the first two or three slides, next. You’re histoire. In other words, you are the product.

Each investor also has a unique piece of advice. Lisa was a founder with a very successful exit. She bootstrapped. And got creative. Lisa was a massage therapist in her former life, and we say former life for a reason. As many a founder knows, the newco takes over your life, so oftimes whatever you had been doing becomes a thing of the past. But should it? Lisa traded massage therapy for legal help. Do you have graphic design skills? A CPA or MBA degree? Barter, baby.

You often hear that investors invest in teams. Trace Cohen of New York Venture Partners recently tweeted, specifically to “Pre/seed founders – when an investor says “we invest in teams” what does that mean? – are you an expert? – what is your unfair advantage? – who do you know? – why can you execute this better? – can you raise capital? – can you hire? – can you sell? Being a founder is hard.”

Re who do you know? That depends on how well you network, especially when it comes to investor.  As Lisa pointed out, “investors like to invest in people they know. Become who they know. NETWORK. It’s another reason why we host the breakfasts. It’s a small room, all attendees have the chance to introduce themselves, and suddenly – you’re someone the investor knows. Following up is important, too, by the way. While you may not be appropriate for that particular investor, he or she may know of a particular fund who’s looking for a product like yours and is happy to make the introduction. Which did happen at our last breakfast. Investors network for each other, too.

Lisa also pointed out that you don’t need to be perfect when you enter the room to pitch. You simply need to be confident. In fact, men do get more funding, as we well know, and she noted that men ask for what they want, while women ask for what they need. All well and good, and while you can certainly live on water, sometimes you and the team might want that shot of whiskey or glass of wine. And truth be told, there are times when you’ll need it.

Speaking of what you need, don’t forget to include the ask and the terms. You’re there for the funding, no? So, how much? And how much does the investor get for the money? At the end of the pitch, and the end of the day, it’s all about business.

Bonus! This tool calculates how much funding your startup needs

We know as well as you do that your product is so spectacularly spectacular that the rules of the pitch deck don’t apply to you, because your product is so spectacularly spectacular, it’s more important than anything so mundane as market size, etc, so it’s fine, in your case, to get to the nuts and bolts at say, slide 13. Which being a deck doctor, we can tell you many founders do.  Wrong.

Or do it your way and the proof of whether or not it works is easy: did you get the next meeting? The term sheet? Did you close the round?

Einstein’s very famous definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Want to close the round? May be time to open your mind.
Onward and forward.