Clearwell Seed Deck
Seed pitch deck
A seed round for Clearwell, an invented American company that posts you a water test kit and then sells you the filter your result actually calls for. The slide order follows the template Y Combinator publishes rather than the corporate pitch order: problem, solution, then the growth curve on slide four, a second metrics slide, and the one non obvious belief the whole business rests on.
Every slide, in order
The whole deck as it renders, one slide after another. Read it the way the audience would.
The structure
What each slide is doing, so you can reuse the order even with different content.
- Slide 1cover
- One word and one line, so the deck starts on the idea rather than on a logo.
- Slide 2intro
- States the problem as one claim with four supporting facts underneath it.
- Slide 3checklist
- Describes the whole product in three parts, in the order a customer meets them.
- Slide 4metrics
- Puts the growth curve on slide four, before the market and before the team.
- Slide 5metrics
- The second metrics slide: churn by cohort, which is what a subscription actually lives on.
- Slide 6takeaway
- The insight slide: the non-obvious thing we believe that the numbers above are evidence for.
- Slide 7metrics
- Unit economics in three numbers plus the paragraph that explains where they come from.
- Slide 8pillars
- Sizes the market from the household up, and names the gap the incumbents leave.
- Slide 9process
- Shows the acquisition engine as four stages, with the channel named at each one.
- Slide 10pillars
- Three short paragraphs on the people, kept to who does the work rather than advisors.
- Slide 11investment
- Ends on the ask, with the four things the money buys and the milestone it reaches.
What makes this deck work
Growth arrives on slide four
The subscriber curve comes before the market, before the model and before the team. A seed investor is buying evidence, and burying the evidence behind eight slides of setup is the most common way seed decks lose the room.
Two metrics slides, not one
Growth alone proves nothing about a subscription, so the second chart is churn broken out by joining cohort. Newer cohorts leave less, which is the claim the rest of the deck spends money on.
One slide carries the insight
A $49 test kit sold at cost is not a product line, it is the acquisition channel, and the deck says so in one sentence with the cost per subscriber underneath it. That is the slide a seed investor repeats to their partners.
Questions people ask
What goes in a seed pitch deck?
Problem, solution, traction, a second metrics slide, your insight, business model, market, how you acquire customers, team and the ask. Ten to twelve slides. Y Combinator publishes this order and most seed investors read decks expecting it.
How much traction do you need to raise a seed round?
Enough that the chart has a shape. This example shows 3,100 paying subscribers and about $1.08M of annualised revenue after seven quarters. What matters more than the absolute number is that the growth and the retention are moving in the same direction.
Should the deck include financial projections?
A seed deck shows unit economics rather than a five year model. This one gives cost per subscriber, payback period and gross margin on one slide, then explains in a paragraph how those three numbers turn into a lifetime value. The model belongs in the data room.
How long should a seed deck be?
Twelve slides or fewer. Visible reports that decks read all the way through average about twelve slides, while the average deck uploaded is eighteen. This example is eleven and ends on the ask rather than a thank you slide.
What is an insight slide and does a seed deck need one?
It states the non obvious thing the founders believe that the rest of the deck is evidence for. Slide six here does that in one sentence. It is the slide that separates a company with a reason to exist from a well executed idea, and it is the part an investor repeats to a partner who was not there.
How do I show churn at seed?
By cohort, on its own slide. Slide five is the second metrics slide in the deck and shows churn by cohort rather than a single monthly rate, because a subscription business lives on whether later cohorts hold better than earlier ones. One blended number hides exactly the trend an investor is looking for.
Build your own in about a minute
The button below opens the generator with this use case already described. Change the wording to match your own, generate, then edit anything you like.
Make one like thisOther presentation examples
Startup one pager deck
An eight slide startup one pager deck for Rootline, an invented soil testing subscription for broadacre farms, written to be read without a founder in the room. It puts the whole business in one paragraph on slide two, six traction numbers on slide four and an honest strengths and weaknesses read on slide five, then names the $4M Series A it is raising.
Investor pitch deck
This investor pitch deck example is a complete twelve slide seed deck for Lumen Freight, an invented company that finds return loads for mid size trucking carriers. It runs cover, agenda, problem, solution, market, how it works, traction, pricing, competition, team, the ask and a close, in the order most seed investors expect. The problem carries an industry benchmark, the traction is one chart and the $6M ask comes with a use of funds table, so you can judge a full seed deck on real content.
Demo day pitch deck
Five minutes on a stage, in front of several hundred investors, most of them standing at the back. This is a demo day pitch for Kestrel, an invented company that puts a camera above an injection moulding press and stops the machine when it starts making scrap. Eight slides, no screenshots, no video, and the revenue on slide two rather than slide seven.
Want the steps in the builder? Read Make a pitch presentation with AI, then Export a presentation to PowerPoint or PDF. For everything this generator can do, see the presentation maker.
Written and checked by the OneCraft team. Last checked .