How much does a pitch deck cost and how long does it take?

Apr 18

Pitch decks don’t raise money.

Founders do.

But pitch decks are still a necessary standard when early-stage companies are gearing up to fundraise:

It checks the box for the investor that you’ve done your homework. Some investors I know won’t even consider investing in a company without first looking at a pitch deck.
It enables you to go through the process of sharpening your story. People have short attention spans – especially when it comes to pitch decks. It’s important that you’re only including the most important information in your deck to spark the investor’s interest.

Over the past 3 years, I’ve worked with over 70 early-stage founders on effective pitch deck storytelling and design. Sometimes founders will come to me at the idea stage when they’re putting their story to paper for the first time. Other times founders come to me with a fairly tight story and they just need help making it look presentable, ie., designing their story in the most effective way for VCs.

Whether you’re raising your Pre-Seed, Seed, or Series A, cost and timing are two factors that matter.

Factors that Affect Pitch Deck Cost and Timing

When I get asked “How much does a pitch deck cost and how long does it take”, I don’t have a cookie-cutter answer. I don’t wish I did, either, because then I wouldn’t be taking into consideration the company’s unique entry point. The most common factors that affect pitch deck cost and timing include:

Scope of work (SOW). What is the SOW? Do you need help with just storytelling and messaging, or do you also need help with design?
Starting point. How much work has already been done on your story and your deck? Do you have the bones of the deck created, or are we starting from scratch?
Brand guidelines. If you’re looking for help with pitch deck design, do you have a visual identity or brand guidelines already, or do we need to figure out your deck’s look and feel?
Content volume. Is your deck over 20 slides? Does it need to be over 20 slides? (short answer: no, it does not!)
Content complexity. Do you have a ton of unique charts, graphs, and other illustrations that are necessary to demonstrate your product or solution?

How long do Pitch Decks take?

→ For Pre-Seed companies:

Let’s assume NewCo is a Pre-Seed company and needs help telling their story for the first time, and putting this story into deck form. For the Pre-Seed stage, I like to structure pitch deck projects into a ~three-week sprint. Spreading out projects any further than that and you’re losing momentum. You only have so much data and traction to go off of at the Pre-Seed stage, which puts even more importance on nailing your story. Here’s what a three-week sprint may look like:

Week 1: we can focus on the company download and begin the pitch voice-over (storyline)
Week 2: refine the storyline and begin putting the messaging in the slides
Week 3: refine the messaging for the slides and bring the deck to life with effective design

Note: most Pre-Seed companies I work with don’t have visual identity fleshed out yet, so we determine visual direction upfront with a company questionnaire that I send over prior to kickoff.

→ For Seed and Series A companies:

For the most part, timelines for Seed and Series A companies look fairly similar to Pre-Seed companies, if not a little shorter. Two things may reduce the timing for Seed and Series A: (1) already having visual guidelines, and (2) having more practice sharing your story:

At the Seed and Series A stages, you likely already have a visual identity (logo, color palette, etc.), in other words, you have an overall look and feel. This helps expedite the process when it comes to design because I can apply your existing guidelines across your deck for a cohesive look and feel.
At these stages, you’ve likely had more practice articulating and sharing your story, and we’re not starting so much from scratch.

What could possibly take more time is on the company’s end – gathering all of the data and traction you have to date that we’ll want to include in the deck.

Note: for design-only projects, decks can take 1-2 weeks.

Things you can do to stay on deadline

There are some things you can do on your end to begin preparing yourself for a pitch deck project and help make the process more seamless:

Make the time. During the weeks we’ve blocked off for the project, ensure you have some time and space to provide input and feedback. I respect your deadline and will promise to adhere to it, so whenever a project is thrown off track it’s because things came up on the company side (that’s startup life!).
Consolidate your feedback. If there are multiple people on your team weighing in on the pitch deck, be sure to consolidate your feedback prior to sharing. It’s not uncommon for co-founders to have strongly differing views, so it’s important you align first internally before sharing your feedback with me or with your pitch deck person.
Compile your assets. If your company already has a visual identity and brand guidelines, it’s helpful to go ahead and share those with your deck designer so they can begin to visualize how they’ll bring your story to life using your existing guidelines for consistency.

Working on your pitch deck should be a highly iterative process. We set deadlines to stay on track and ensure that we’re putting focus and energy where we need to, and not obsessing over something for too long. It’s kind of like if you schedule a 30-minute meeting, that’s how much time you’ll take in the meeting; but if you schedule that same meeting for 15 minutes, you may be able to accomplish the same objective in half the time. I feel similarly for pitch decks. Without a target, you’ll miss every time.