Think about your upcoming biotech investor presentation. Chances are you have pored over the slide deck but spent little time thinking about how you will share the content. Few issues are more important to preclinical–stage biotech companies than maintaining a continuous flow of capital.
If you plan to advance the development of your product with capital, you need to attract and maintain investor interest, which involves continuously pitching venture capitalists and investors. The best biotech presentations possess this combination of speaking skills:
Integrate a succinct themed presentation with punctuated gestures.
Before you dismiss the idea of gestures as being unnecessary for investor presentations, we will share the latest research on how to create persuasive messaging combined with gestures to help secure the capital you need for continued growth.
Themed Presentations:
As an organization prepares for an investor presentation, little time is typically allocated to analysis and creation of the primary theme. Biotech CEOs can get caught in the weeds, providing too much detail. As a result, investors begin to lose interest in the presentation. Biotech CEOs must craft a presentation that has a memorable theme that is different from the competition.
In our research at The Speech Improvement Company, with hundreds of our Biotech and Life Sciences clients, we were struck by our observations that Biotech CEO’s have difficulty drilling down to a single theme for their product during an investor pitch. What became clear was the difficulty in distilling data into one core theme. If you can condense your entire presentation into one sentence with a strong primary theme, you are on the right track.
Once a theme is developed, the continued connection to this theme during investor presentations creates familiarly. As a result, the rest of the presentation emphasizes and reinforces the theme. Bonus: it is the single theme that the investors will recall two weeks later.
Gestures as Punctuation:
Great presenters tend to use gestures to emphasize the point they are making. Consider the extremes of gestures: arms are either locked against the body or they are flailing wildly with nervous energy. How do you find the right balance? Most experts say a strategic application of gestures is key.
Biotech presenters tend to overlook nonverbal communication, yet it is one of the more advanced ways we can persuade a listener. Gestures can convey excitement and reinforce to investors that the company has passion behind their product.
When gestures are used unconsciously and with wild abandon, instead of as punctuation, the investor pitch becomes off-putting. The investors are then put in the position of questioning the credentials of the presenter.
The answer to the gesture dilemma is to strategically practice placement of gestures to emphasize the point being made at that moment. When you are not gesturing, your hands need a home base. Arms straight by your side look uncomfortable and awkward. Instead, place arms loosely in front of your abdomen when you are not gesturing. This allows you to move freely into a gesture at the specific times you have practiced in advance.
Maintaining a continuous and steady stream of capital is critical for all development-stage biotech companies. Since capital comes from investors, the biotech investor pitch isn’t going anywhere. To pitch successfully, Biotech presenters must know the pertinent issues for investors and must be confident the content demonstrates passion, credibility, and intricate working knowledge of the business, product, and market.
Biotech presenters who combine themed content with interspersed gestures may be rare, but it is attainable. By practicing all gestures in conjunction with the slide deck content, presenters will be able to convince investors to say yes and get the capital they need to thrive and survive.
