Leap of Faith Community - Where to watch pitch videos, plus some practice exercises.
Startup Pitch Videos
Listening to other people pitch is the ideal way to develop a feel for what works and what doesn’t—learnings you can apply to your own pitch.
Here are the top 4 sources I use when I’m coaching or want to study a large number of pitches in one place. I chose these because they provide a cross-section of pitches for different types of startups: deeptech, life science, consumer apps, B2B, hardware etc. You’ll find products similar to yours or ways of storytelling you can adopt.
Antler - look for the Demo Day playlists, over 60 video pitches from 5-12 minutes each
Techstars - 40 entire demo days (each with 8-10 pitches) from around the world
500 Startups - look for the Demo Day videos
Founder Institute - 72 entire demo days (each with 8-10 pitches) from around the world
Practice Exercises
Most founders only practice pitching when they’re rehearsing their own pitch. That’s like learning to play music by practicing only one song. What you want to do is hone your general pitching skills. Then apply to your specific pitch.
Whether you are in a group, like we do at Pitch Lab, or solo, here are some tips for how to practice in a structured way.
Watch a pitch video once, close it and answer these questions.
What do they do and who do they sell to?
What is unique about this company?
How far along are they? What have they achieved so far?
Does this seem like a big market?
Do you have confidence in the team?
Doing this will help you get a feel for what pitches are memorable. Start by being critical of others. Then do your own pitch and ask an audience to answer those same 5 questions. You might be surprised what is clear to you but doesn’t come across to others.
Remix the pitches you watch for practice (and fun).
We did this recently on Pitch Lab and it was a lot of fun. Take any pitch and practice making changes to the story to make it better, eg:
Come up with a better elevator pitch for this startup.
Pitch this company, but for a different target market.
If it’s a marketplace, create a pitch that emphasizes only one side, then flip to the other side.
Since you will end up iterating your story many, many times, start by practicing on someone else’s startup. Often this is exactly what you need to get out of your own head and get some perspective!