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On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

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Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#21

Post by dmarble »

akldfgj wrote: post #18
smalter wrote: post #5

Part of the power of YC is that it's in some way collective bargaining. There's a similar phenomenon at top law schools (I was a lawyer in a previous life). When law firms come to campus to interview students, the school's goal is to obscure which students are top students and which aren't. Why? To protect the middle and bottom of the class and facilitate everyone getting jobs based on the school's brand. The YC Demo…

Doesn't a law school give everyone an official rank to put on their resume?

The general idea above is certainly true for most top schools. AFAIK, several (Yale, Stanford) give no rank whatsoever. A number of the top schools will only segment by one or two major divisions. For example, many give distinction for top 10% and top 30-35%. Some will publish what the actual GPA is for cutoffs, so employers do have a good idea, but many do not post such information.

See, e.g., http://legalgeekery.com/2010/04/09/a-comparison-of-law-schoo...

Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#22

Post by kazevedo »

ibdknox wrote: post #13

interestingly, we intentionally didn't show a graph, nor did we actually say any of our numbers when we presented yesterday. Our goal was to tell a story about why what we were doing mattered and I think that resonated really well with investors. Not sure if our presentation works for everyone else, but I do believe being a bit different was immensely valuable.

I really enjoyed your presentation for that reason - you did a great job of building a narrative that wasn't exactly "We're X for Y in a $Z billion market". I did consider your HN vote count and Kickstarter numbers similar to an "up and to the right" graph, but is your distinction that you only displayed them, and didn't weave them into the pitch?

Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#23

Post by pg »

shasta wrote: post #12
cwilson wrote: post #8

As someone who pitched on stage yesterday I have mixed feelings on this subject. I understand that seeing a graph up and to the right on every single slide, 74 times in a row, might get a little repetitive. That said, you're also getting pitched by 74 companies who actually have graphs that are up and to the right. You're being pitched by companies who have been focusing on nothing but acquiring users, talking to use…

It looks like there's room to really stand out by drawing a graph that goes up and to the right, then down and to the right, and then up and to the right again.

One of the startups actually did that.

Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#24

Post by djt »

ibdknox wrote: post #17
djt wrote: post #15

I think the main problem is the time constraint. None of these solutions can lead to investors figuring out which businesses to follow up on out of 75 businesses in under 3 hours. Also why have demo booths when it's an online service? Why not try it out from a customers perspective and log onto the website. If you need someone in a booth to step you through it then I would be very surprised.

How would you try warehouse software, a wireless network, or a developer tool? A number of the companies that presented yesterday are not easily try-able and some that simply wouldn't appeal to this demographic in any meaningful way.

I think we are saying the same thing, I doubt that a Demo Booth is going to fix this problem?

Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#25

Post by djt »

pg wrote: post #19

The goal of a Demo Day presentation is not to convince the audience to invest. It's just to convince them to follow up with you. It's at that second stage where the demos happen-- as they were in fact happening all over the building during the breaks between sessions. At events like TC Disrupt, where startups demo in booths, few (perhaps no) investors ask for demos from all of them. The startups have posters and inve…

How many potential investors do you have attend these talks?

Has the type of investor changed over the past few years?

Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#26

Post by pg »

djt wrote: post #25
pg wrote: post #19

The goal of a Demo Day presentation is not to convince the audience to invest. It's just to convince them to follow up with you. It's at that second stage where the demos happen-- as they were in fact happening all over the building during the breaks between sessions. At events like TC Disrupt, where startups demo in booths, few (perhaps no) investors ask for demos from all of them. The startups have posters and inve…

How many potential investors do you have attend these talks? Has the type of investor changed over the past few years?

Just over 400. The big change in the past few years is the arrival of "super-angels."

Re: On YC Demo Day, and those graphs

#27

Post by djt »

pg wrote: post #26
djt wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many potential investors do you have attend these talks? Has the type of investor changed over the past few years?

Just over 400. The big change in the past few years is the arrival of "super-angels."

By "Super angels" do you mean they are funding higher dollars or are they investing in far more companies?

Do you think that "super-angels" are taking over from traditional VCs in that the costs of getting to scale are lower these days?

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