Both users and investors are going to ask if it saves time. In today’s society, both investors and consumers wish for everything, and they want it now, with the fast-paced society having everything ready for them in an instant at the touch of a button.

With so many distractions, attention span has shortened, which has left people with a need to have everything they need right then and there, leaving them more time to do the things they enjoy in life.

If your product is not efficient, then chances are people won’t want it, and investors won’t invest in it, ultimately causing your product to fail because you didn’t evaluate the critical question, does it save time?

If It Saves Time, It Adds Value

Ultimately, you want to add value when creating a new service or product. If it does not add value or build on existing creations, there is no need for your product or service. The quickest way to add value that your investor and consumer can appreciate is saving the user time.

Does it save time? If it does, then excellent; you instantly create value around your product or service. Consumers will appreciate your product or services more, leading to either more sales or sales retention.

Unfortunately, many growth-focused companies will overlook value creation. They will avert their focus by meeting sales targets and rapidly growing their business, service, or product instead of focusing on critical values, such as saving time for your customers.

By rapidly adding value and saving your customer time, this shows quick results making the customer more likely to be a return customer. It also reassures investors as it indicates a need for your product or service, and the fact it saves time highlights the fact that there is a gap in the market for your service or product that saves time for your end-user.

Learn more about Greenlit Ideas here.

Why Do Investors See Value in A Product or Service That Saves Time?

Investors see value in products or services, which saves time for the end-user due to the simple fact it shows there is a market gap to fill, and they know people will jump at the opportunity to claw back some time in their day, however short.

This empathy for users’ time will show investors that they can feel safe by investing in your business, service, or product. The more reassured and safer an investor feels, the more likely they will support a much more significant amount of capital in your business, service offering, or product.

By asking yourself if it saves time, you can quickly establish whether your product will be worthwhile for investors. If not, you can protect yourself from the time and bother by wasting your attempts at luring in investors. Equally, it can be a crucial focus to try and obtain more investments by gearing your product or service towards saving time for the end-user.

What are other competitors doing, and can you save your end-user more time than them? Saving time can then become a key selling and talking point to investors.

Source 1: https://www.pipedrive.com/en/blog/value-creation-sales-success
Source 2: https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/strategy-and-corporate-finance/our-insights/the-value-of-value-creation

Reading time 1 min 54 sec

When developing a new product or service, it is vital to provide a clear solution for your customer or intended end user. Describing a clear solution is crucial not only for your customer and end-users but also for potential investors.
Investors will see value in a clear solution presented to them in one or two short sentences that quickly sum up and describe what your product or service is and what purpose it serves.

Time Is Money

As the saying goes, time is money. If you have secured a meeting with a potential investor, it is best not to waste any of your time or, more importantly, any of theirs. Investors are often very busy people. If you’re going to pitch to an investor for funding, you need to ensure that your product or service has a straightforward solution that can be easily explained and is simple to understand.
This makes life easier for both you and your investor. If your product or service has a clear solution in your pitch, it means you will probably get put on the spotless, avoiding all of the difficult questions. It also shows investors that your product or service is well thought out and fills a gap in the market. You avoid over-explaining it and the risk of confusing your investor.
Investors are less likely to provide you with capital if your idea, product, or service is overly complex and confusing. Therefore, having a clear, easy-to-understand, and digestible solution is crucial.

A Clear Solution Leads to Success

Defining a clear solution shows that you have undertaken adequate research to find a hole in the market that is not being filled. This indicates that your service or product serves a purpose that nothing else on the market is currently doing and makes your potential investor have more trust in both you and the product or service you are offing.
By defining a clear solution, you can easily communicate the key most important aspects of your service or product in the shortest amount of time. Doing this shows investors that you appreciate their time and can communicate effectively.

Click here to learn more about Greenlit Ideas.

The Elevator Pitch

You likely already know this, a short pitch to investors that generally lasts no longer than about two minutes. It is vital that you can be ready to give this pitch at any given moment when an investment opportunity arises.
It is a way to sell your product or services and lure in more investment capital by giving the potential investor the rundown of who you are and what you do. If you can master the elevator pitch, the chances are that potential investors will give you the time of day, and by having a clear solution, you might land yourself a meeting that could secure capital for your business, product, or service.

https://www.toptal.com/finance/pitch-deck-consultants/best-pitch-deck-examples-and-tips
https://articles.bplans.com/the-7-key-components-of-a-perfect-elevator-pitch/

Whether you’re a start-up company offering a new service or a well-established business rolling out a new product, you will more than likely need some investment capital to get your service or product off the ground and into the development stage. To do this, you will need to secure investors, which is not always easy.
Investors will want to know all the details about you, your business, your product or service, and everything in between. It would be best if you prepared what is known as a pitch deck. So, to answer in short, are pitch decks for investors essential? Yes, they are crucial.

The Key to Securing Investment

If you’re trying to secure investment, your pitch deck needs to be incredibly detailed to give investors as much information about your product or service and business as possible. You might be wondering many things, such as why pitch decks are essential for investors? What do I include in a pitch deck?
Generally, you want to make all of the information in your pitch deck to the point and neatly laid out. Nobody wants to sit and read a wall of text. Chances are your investors will get bored and not even finish reading through it.
Keep your pitch deck short and sweet while remaining informative if you want to secure investment.

Learn more about how Greenlit can help you pitch your idea.

8 Things Investors Want To See In A Pitch Deck

We have learned why pitch decks are essential for investors and how you can use them to secure funding. But what is the most crucial information that investors expect to see in a pitch deck?
Investors want straight to the point information about your business, including:

The Team – Who is part of your business? What roles do they undertake?
Business Information – What does your business do? How long have you been in business? What are your plans for the future?
Financial Projections – How is your business doing financially? Are you in profit? Do you expect to be in profit within a certain amount of time?
Problem and Solution – What is the gap in the market you are trying to fill? What is your product or service, and how is this a solution to the hole in the market?
Who uses it with market validation? – Is there anyone currently using your product or service or a prototype with great success in a live environment?
Market adoption – What is your market adoption process? Do you have one? What stages must a customer go through to buy your product or service?
Competitors and competitive advantages – Do you have any competitors? What benefits does your product or service bring over that of your competitors?
Business model financials – Do you have a forecast of financials that investors can see based on different financial models?

So, are pitch decks for investors essential? Yes, they are instrumental for investors to get a good picture of your business and product or service. They are a great way of helping to secure investment.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/allbusiness/2020/06/20/guide-to-investor-pitch-decks-for-startup-fundraising/?sh=5a7d098b5a5a
https://neilpatel.com/blog/create-pitch-deck-investors/

If you are trying to get your business or your new and exciting product off the ground and seek to spark the attention of some potential investors, then there are a few things about your founder experience you need to know. 

Investors aren’t just going to give their money away, they will probably give you a rigorous grilling session to get as much information about not only just your product or your business, but all about you and your past experiences of running businesses or releasing new products. 

Do you have a proven track record of success? Do you have experience releasing a new product service? First time? These are all the important things a potential investor will want to know.

Why is Your Founder Experience Important To Investors?

It is common practice for investors to want to learn about their past experiences. Investors want hard evidence that you have the ability to deliver a world-class product. A big must for many investors is that the founder of the product service actually has relevant experience in their niche. 

This is important as it helps to show that the founder knows how their product works, making it not only easier to explain to investors but also helps to show that the founder has confidence and passion for their product. This also leads to having past experiences of successfully delivering products in a particular area. 

If you have done this before and seen a great return, then investors are more likely to have faith in the product and offer up some cash for investment. 

Investors want to invest in founders who have a proven track record of having a successful entrepreneurial mindset. Qualities such as the ability to remain persistent and being able to handle constructive criticism as well as having the ability and creativeness to produce a product with very little resources or seed money at the founder’s disposal.

Why Are Startup Investors Important?

For many small businesses or entrepreneurs trying to get their product services on the market, they will require some seed money from startup investors. This is usually a small, initial portion of money allocated to help get the product off the ground. 

Funding from startup investors is often crucial for many founders trying to develop and release a product service. Many founders don’t have very many resources at their disposal to begin with, making it hard to initially invest in the product in terms manpower and early development. 

Startup investors are important to help give a founder’s product service a fighting chance on the market, and to part with their investment, they will want proven evidence that the founder is passionate about the product. Having some form of evidence that the concept is valuable is vital. Founders will also need to show that there is a gap in the market for their product service.

Founders who have previously successfully released a product service or have experience creating a product service will look much more attractive and safer to many startup investors.  

Source: https://hbr.org/2017/06/what-does-an-aspiring-founder-need-to-know

Source: https://hbr.org/2017/11/are-you-suited-for-a-start-upn 

Why is your Product or Service’s Ability to Grow Sales Is Important To Startup Investors?

Our #3 question in Greenlit Ideas is the ability to grow sales.

Having a great product idea can be a key way to boost your sales. The importance, relevance or usability of the product you plan to sell is one of the first things that will help to drive sales. This is what is known as product led growth, or PLG for short. 
(see an example of the Greenlit Ideas 7 Questions here)

What Is Product Led Growth?

Product led growth is a form of marketing in which the end user becomes the focus for growth. This type of product growth heavily relies on the product being sold as it becomes the key driver in boosting user retention, conversion, acquisition and expansion. 

Product led growth can help create an alignment across multiple different departments within a business or organisation around a particular product or set of products which ultimately become the largest source of scalable and highly sustainable growth for a business or organisation.

Ultimately, product led growth is about all departments within a business or organisation harnessing their combined efforts to create a better product in which the end user experience is the forefront of their efforts, helping to create a product which sticks and promotes growth for the company. 

How Can It Help?

Product led growth requires a lot of effort and alignment within a business, however is very rewarding. Product led growth offers many benefits but at its heart, is a very capital efficient way to quickly scale a business.

Lower Acquisition Costs – By implementing a product led growth strategy, this allows a business to reduce the amount of internal revenue spent on things such as marketing as the customer acquisition mediums are already incorporated into the product, which ultimately will cause a reduction in acquisitions costs overall within the business.

Faster Growth – One of the main reasons businesses implement a product led growth strategy is that it can greatly increase the rate at which a business is able to expand. 

Increased Scalability – Naturally, scaling a business can be long and difficult. Product led growth can allow businesses to grow at a much more rapid pace by diverting their resources to serving their customers effectively.

Why Is Growing Sales Important for Investors?

The growth of a sales focused business depends on its ability to keep sales flowing. Growth is crucial for the survival of an organisation in the long term. By having a proven ability to rapidly grow a business, or sales which positively impact the growth of a business looks very attractive for both potential investors and existing investors.

Investors want to see their money being put to work and will expect to quickly see some type of return on their initial investment. By growing sales, this allows investors to see that the particular business is worth investing more into. 

By having more investment, a business can quickly obtain more assets, drive further profit and help with boosting the overall performance of the business. 

By demonstrating a solid track record for sales growth, a business can demonstrate the market demand for a particular product to its investors in the hopes of receiving more capital investments.

Source 1: https://openviewpartners.com/product-led-growth/#.YbEtaS2l1R4Source 2: https://productled.com/blog/product-led-growth-definition/