Prep for Demo Day

How to get ready for Demo Day?

You need two presentations.

  1. Investor Pitch: This is the presentation that you will present to investors at the roundtable.
  1. Marketing Pitch: This is the presentation that you will make into a video and present to a larger public audience.  

If you don’t already have this, here is a place to start putting together your presentation and pitch deck.

Do these things before Demo Day:

Practice a lot 

Decided who is going to present and then practice, at least 5 full times prior to your actual presentation at Demo Day. The goal is to make it smooth, engaging, and comfortable for you and/or your team and the audience.  

Each startup must do a “dry run” with the program manager before the event, where they will run through the presentation as if they were presenting it at Demo Day. We will be looking for each startup to have incorporated the timing and feedback provided. Remember to present as if you were talking to an audience that you don’t know.

 Prepare a video pitch

Each startup will put together a 5-minute video of their pitch. This video will be shown instead of live pitch at the celebration presentations. It will also be used as a backup for the investor roundtable and be uploaded to the ActivateNM Demo Day website.

There are several ways to make a video recording of your pitch. There are several free and paid applications that can help you record, edit, and export a video. Here are some resources to help you get started. Please note that we have not vetted or tried all of the suggestions below. 

Windows (Web Apps) 

macOS/OS X (Web Apps) 

Android 

iOS 

Do a Tech Check 

Before your presentation you will conduct a “tech check” with the devices (laptop, phone, etc) that you plan to use for the presentation. Teams regularly have technical issues during their actual presentation – don’t be one of these teams! Have backup plans in place for the likely event that something won’t work exactly as you had planned.  For example, cofounder has a copy of the video and pitch deck ready to go on their laptop.

Please use best practice when on the webinar such as using a headset and microphone to prevent feedback. Mute when you are not talking.

Reflect on your entrepreneur journey

After your video presentation at Celebration Presentations, you will be asked about your entrepreneur journey. It is important that you have reflected over the last few months of working on your venture and how you and your company have grown. Here are a couple of points to consider: