F069 What else is there to learn about pitching digital health solutions? (Beth Susanne)
“Each investor sees about 1200 pitch decks per year, meets 500 founders, and invests in 10 companies. So when preparing for your pitch, you need to be aware that investors are looking for reasons to say NO to you,” says Beth Susanne.
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Beth Susanne is an international pitch coach from the US, based in Spain, who coached over 3000 teams so far, over 200 in digital health. No matter if you are a startup or a corporation, team communication is key to success — either for company growth or fundraising.
The key thing to consider when preparing presentations, says Beth, is what investors could say YES to. In healthcare, that is: traction, clearly identified payor and partners that show the scalability of your product.
Before moving to Europe eight years ago, Beth Susanne worked as a graphic facilitator and presentation coach, helping large organisation communicate more effectively. Either for internal development or in preparations for large projects. Beth later reshaped her knowledge to suit the needs of startups, since she detected a huge need for more training of teams for their presentations in front of investors.
In terms of the structure of a presentation, it should clearly show:
Why is a solution better from the competition?
How does it differ?
How are you going to scale?
To avoid preparing a too technical presentation, the story should be simplified enough for anyone outside the industry to understand, advises Beth, who also warns personal stories should be used with caution: “Investors are interested in traction. They might get interested in a personal story, but it might also make you seem emotionally biased. Personal stories should be used lightly and delicately.”
Facts matter, but…
Presentation style and appearance also matter. “Research shows that if you show up overconfident you have 58% better chance of getting hired. Your demeanour really matters it needs to support the verbal message. Voice, tone and body language present 93% of information absorbed by the listeners, only 7% are words. If voice, the tone is not aligned with the message, you are in trouble,” says Beth.
“If you’re not good at presentation, perhaps someone else should do it. You need 90–100 hours for a five-minute pitch,” is another advice offered by Beth.
How does all this help on a company level?
You need to be clear about your product and your vision, have meetings to build clarity on the roles in the team. “Ask about dissatisfactions and adapt, otherwise, things get out of control, people become unhappy and unproductive,” says Beth Susanne.
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