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Pitching Angels 12: The Fictional 5-Year Revenue Projection (And Why It’s the Most Important Slide in Your Deck)
For a pre-revenue or early revenue company, even 1-year revenue projections are pure fantasy. Demanding to see 5-year revenue projections seems perverse. No company in the entire history of the universe has ever come within telescope view their 5-year projections. They’re completely useless, and yet, absolutely necessary.
When someone sends me a pitch deck, I turn straight to the 5-year revenue projections. When we’re in the Q&A session at the end of a pitch to an angel group, it’s not the product slide or the team slide or even the critical traction slide that ends up on the screen but the revenue projections. This slide is where your plans and assumptions for the future of your business get distilled down to their essence with a few numbers that tell me everything I need to know.
First, your revenues after 5 years tell me if you’re in the right room or not. If you expect to get to $5 million in revenues after 5 years, you may have a profitable business, but it won’t work for venture funding. Public companies generally don’t acquire startups until they’re over $25…
