Pitch deck copy

What pitch deck copy is

Pitch deck copy is the written content of a slide presentation used to sell: the headline on each slide, the few lines under it, and the order the slides come in. The service settles the argument first, then writes it so that a reader who only sees the headlines gets the whole case. Design comes after, and works better for having something clear to design.

It is not presentation copy and speaker notes, which covers a longer talk, a conference session or a training deck, where most of the content is spoken. A pitch deck is shorter, it is often read without a presenter, and every slide has to earn its place in a meeting that may be cut to ten minutes. It is also not design; I write for your designer, or for the template you already have.

When you need one

You need this when the deck has grown to 40 slides by accretion and nobody can say what it argues. You need it when a salesperson skips half of it in every meeting, or when the deck is forwarded after a meeting and the person who receives it cannot follow it without the presenter. You also need it before a round of investor meetings, where the deck is read cold before anyone agrees to talk.

You do not need it if the argument itself is not settled. If three people in the business would give three answers to "why should a buyer choose us", a value proposition comes first, and the deck is written from it. And if the deck is fine and the design is the problem, a designer is what you need, not a writer.

What it contains

A sales deck of ten to fifteen slides follows a shape buyers recognise. The order matters more than any single slide.

1. The buyer's situation. One slide that describes their problem in their words. If they nod here, the rest works.
2. Why it costs what it costs. What the problem is doing to them, concretely. Numbers only where you can source them.
3. What you propose. The offer in one sentence, then how it works in three or four steps.
4. Why you. The two or three things that are true of you and not of the alternative, stated plainly and without adjectives.
5. Proof. One case study told in one slide: who, what changed, in their words.
6. What it costs and what happens next. The price or the range, the timeline, and the single next step with a date.

Every slide gets a headline that is a full sentence with a claim in it, not a label. "Our approach" tells the reader nothing. "Three visits, one invoice, no surprises" tells them what the slide says before they read it. For each slide I also write a short speaker note: what to say, in one or two sentences, so a new salesperson can present it on day one.

What you get

The deck copy. Ten to fifteen slides written in a document, one slide per section: headline, body lines, the speaker note, and a one-line brief to the designer on what the slide should show. If you use an existing template I put the copy straight into it.

The short deck. A five-slide version for a meeting that gets cut short or a first conversation. Same argument, fewer stops.

The leave-behind brief. Half a page on what a one-pager built from this deck should contain, so the two documents tell the same story.

A worked example

An illustration, not a client. A regional payroll bureau with 12 staff has a 38-slide deck. It opens with the company history, has six slides on software features, and puts the price on slide 34. Salespeople report that meetings with owners of small manufacturing firms end at slide 15 with "send it over", and nothing follows.

The rewrite starts from the buyer: a manufacturer running payroll in-house who has been fined once for a late remittance. Slide one says so. Slide two states what a late remittance costs in penalties and in the owner's Thursday evenings, with the penalty schedule cited to its published source. Slides three to five describe the service in three steps. Slide six gives the three real differences from the two larger bureaus. Slide seven is one client, a 30-person metal fabricator, in the client's own approved words. Slide eight has the monthly price and the date the first payroll could run. Eight slides, twelve minutes, and the deck can be forwarded to a business partner who was not in the room. The history slide goes into the appendix, where a buyer who cares about it can find it.

How it runs

1. A half-hour call. Who the deck is for, what it has to achieve, and what happens in meetings now. No charge.
2. A fixed price in writing. Number of slides and versions agreed before anything starts.
3. Listening. I read the current deck, any proposals and case studies, and sit in on one sales call or watch a recording of one if you have it.
4. The argument on one page. The slide headlines only, in order. You approve the story before any slide is written.
5. The draft deck. Full copy with speaker notes within ten working days of approval. One round of changes after you have presented it once, even to a colleague.
6. Handover. The final copy, the short version and the designer's brief, with a 45-minute session for whoever presents it.

Two to three weeks from first call to final copy is typical, plus your designer's time.

What it costs

Pitch deck copy is not a published band on the pricing page, so it is quoted as a fixed price in CAD after the half-hour call. The price depends on the number of slides, whether an investor version and a sales version are both needed, and whether proof and pricing already exist in usable form or have to be gathered first. A single sales deck built from an existing proposal is the simplest version.

What happens next

A deck needs a proof slide that holds up, so a case study is the most common companion. The one-pager is what gets left behind after the meeting. If a salesperson is going to be asked why not the competitor, an objection handling document means the answer is already written.