About
Course Overview
What you’ll learn
- Identify why your company exists, who your audience is and how to effectively communicate with it.
- Understand the importance of storytelling, learn the different components of your story and develop your storyboard.
- Convert your storyboard to a pitch deck and craft a memorable opening that captures your audience’s attention.
- Understand the best practices when engaging with investors.
- Learn the design essentials needed to create a professional presentation.
What you’ll get
- Total of 40 hours: 10 hours per week of self-paced learning
- Weekly hands-on exercises that directly relate to building your pitch deck
- Certificate of Completion
Course Modules
Module 1 – Intro to Pitching
- Identify why your company exists, who your audience is and how to effectively communicate with it.
Module 2 – Crafting Your Story
- Understand the importance of storytelling, learn the different components of your story and develop your storyboard.
Module 3 – Building Your Pitch Deck
- Convert your storyboard to a pitch deck, and craft a strong pitch opening.
Module 4 – Delivering Your Pitch
- Practise effectively delivering your pitch, understand best practices when engaging with investors and learn the design essentials needed to create a professional presentation.
You’ll make real progress in four weeks.
Our course is practical. We focus on tactics that (if done right) will accelerate the growth of your company.
We move fast.
This isn’t your average course on pitching. Each module is designed to ensure you are well prepared to pitch your business to investors. We’ll help you work toward creating a powerful and memorable pitch.
Let’s advance the world together.
Since 2005, MaRS has accelerated the growth of thousands of young companies whose technologies and solutions meaningfully improve lives every day. Are you ready to join them?
We love questions. Get in touch.
Meet your instructors
Kevin Smith, Founder, The Story Architect & Venture Facilitator, MaRS Discovery District
Kevin Smith is a story architect. In his 20-plus career, he has done over 10,000 pitches. He spent 14-plus years at Dell in consumer, B2B and enterprise sales, and enterprise marketing. After helping develop go-to-market strategies for the company’s acquired startups, he reconnected with his passion for entrepreneurship and began helping startups full time. Kevin’s expertise includes branding, messaging, marketing strategy, SEO, content and social media marketing, presentation and pitch design, web design, lead generation, sales coaching and business development.
David Bowden, Senior Cleantech Advisor & Venture Facilitator, MaRS Discovery District
David divides his time between MaRS, where he is an entrepreneurship educator and senior business advisor for cleantech ventures, and the Osborne Group, where he is a principal specializing in strategic growth management. David has held various executive roles, including as president of Sprint Canada, SVP at Direct Energy and founding president of Empori.com. He is a governor of the University of Toronto and a director of the Bata Museum. In 2013, David completed the NFP program at the Institute for Corporate Directors (ICD). Catch up with David on LinkedIn.
Chris Giantsopoulos, COO & Founder, PayUp Jack & Venture Facilitator, MaRS Discovery District
Passionate and energetic, Chris works as a venture facilitator at MaRS and has taught thousands of entrepreneurs across Ontario and the east coast, in universities, colleges and regional innovation centres. Earlier in his career, Chris was a leader at the BMO Institute for Learning, heading up several international training teams. Chris later co-founded and was CEO of QuickEnrollment Inc., a successful fintech online registration company targeted at amateur sports across Canada. He is currently in the process of launching his next fintech venture, PayUp Jack. Catch up with Chris on LinkedIn.
FAQs
This course is entirely online, it consists of four modules and you can go at your own pace. Each week, you’ll complete a set of lessons and exercises that guide you toward achieving the objectives for that week.
Enrolling in the course includes access to the material for as long as you need it!
That depends! This course is most suited for companies that are preparing to raise their next round of funding. No prior experience pitching is required, we’ll walk you through the critical elements to share with investors, how to develop your storyboard, and effectively converting that storyboard to a winning pitch deck.
Yes! This course is available to anyone, anywhere—the core concepts are useful for all entrepreneurs. That said, the course was designed in particular with technology entrepreneurs in mind, and therefore some of the material may not be applicable to non-tech businesses. Please refer to the course overview before registering to ensure that the course is a good fit for you.
Yes. Each learner who successfully completes 100% of the online materials will receive a non-accredited Certificate of Completion issued by MaRS Discovery District.