Where the numbers come from.
Every dwell second, weight, and rule in How to Make a Deck traces back to one of four published sources. Nothing is invented; where sources disagree, we use the more conservative number.
Per-slide dwell time
The full-deck attention budget is DocSend's headline 3:44 (~224s) average time an investor spends on a first-read seed deck. The 11 core slides How to Make a Deck teaches sum to ~2:56 of that budget. Individual numbers below come from DocSend where the study measured that slide; the two slides marked estimated (Why Now and Traction) were not broken out in that study, and are How to Make a Deck's conservative interpolation from adjacent slides.
| Slide | Dwell (s) | Source | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01Cover / Purpose | 8 | DocSend 2015 | 8 |
| 02Problem | 11 | DocSend 2015 | 12 |
| 03Solution | 8 | DocSend 2015 | 12 |
| 04Why now | 15 | How to Make a Deck est. | 8 |
| 05Market Size | 16 | DocSend 2015 | 9 |
| 06Competition | 17 | DocSend 2015 | 7 |
| 07Product | 13 | DocSend 2015 | 7 |
| 08Business Model | 22 | DocSend 2015 | 9 |
| 09Traction | 20 | How to Make a Deck est. | 9 |
| 10Team | 23 | DocSend 2015 | 13 |
| 11Financials / Ask | 23 | DocSend 2015 | 12 |
| Core-11 total | 176s | of DocSend 224s | 106 |
Audit scoring
Coverage score = sum of weights on ticked slides ÷ 106, scaled by story clarity (weak ×0.72, good ×0.9, excellent ×1.0). A length penalty applies outside the 9–15 slide sweet spot: −3 per slide below 9, −2.2 per slide above 15 (capped at −22).
The first-3 filter flag turns red if any of Cover, Problem, or Solution is missing. DocSend observed the shortest average dwell on those three slides, and Sequoia's template opens with the same three, so How to Make a Deck treats them as the go/no-go gate. That framing is How to Make a Deck's, not a direct quote from either source.
The running example (Nimbus Payroll)
"Nimbus Payroll" is a fictional company How to Make a Deck uses across every module so weak-vs-strong comparisons stay on the same numbers. Every Nimbus figure (ARR curve, USDC→NGN corridor rates, country counts, seat prices) is illustrative and chosen to be internally consistent, not a real market claim. Do not cite Nimbus numbers as evidence in your own deck.
Primary sources
- DocSend, What we learned from 200 startups who raised $360M (2015) , the source for per-slide dwell seconds.
- Sequoia Capital, Writing a Business Plan , the canonical 10-slide template and the origin of the "Why Now" slide.
- Y Combinator, How to Pitch Your Startup , Problem, Solution, Team framing for seed-stage decks.
- First Round Review, The Anatomy of a Great Series A Pitch Deck , the traction-first re-ordering used at Series A.
What How to Make a Deck is not
It is not a pitch coach and it does not read your deck. The audit is a structural checklist informed by published investor behavior, a useful second opinion, not a substitute for showing your deck to three real investors.