Say what you do in one plain sentence a stranger would understand, then answer an investor's doubts in the order they arrive: the problem and who has it, what you built and how people use it, traction so far, why the market is big and why now, how you make money, why your team, and how much you are raising and what it buys. Michael Seibel's YC template is the version most investors recognise. Rehearse until the first two minutes need no slides, treat the deck as a backdrop, and answer questions directly with numbers you know cold, saying you will find out when you do not know. Get the meeting through a warm introduction where you can, aim the first meeting at earning the second, and never leave without a clear next step. Follow up the same day with the deck and any answers you owe.
Kevin Hale distills a pitch into seven questions investors need answered, and 'why this team' is one of them. Use it to place your 'why you' story inside a clear, concise pitch instead of leaving it to chance. It shows how founders often bury their strongest personal signal.
Kevin Hale (YC partner, Wufoo co-founder) walks through how to package your idea so an investor believes it can grow fast, and a big part of that is telling the founder story so 'why you' lands instead of sounding like a boast. It is practical and script-level: how to open, what to lead with, and how to make your unfair edge legible in the first minute. Watch it once before you write a single pitch line.
A pitch is really a hypothesis about why this company can grow quickly, so your 'why you' has to feed directly into that growth story, not sit as a separate bio slide.
Investors weigh how well you can sell and tell the story, so evidence you understand your customer beats abstract claims about your background.
Lead with clarity: make the problem, your insight, and why you are the one to solve it understandable in a sentence or two.
The canonical, no-nonsense overview of how seed fundraising works, written by a former YC president who has seen thousands of rounds. It's the single best starting point before you talk to a single investor.
A short India-focused primer on what a first pitch should cover, including where market size fits and how it shapes how much you raise. It is practical for founders pitching Indian VCs for the first time. Read it to place your market slide inside a pitch that Indian investors expect.
A behind-the-curtain playbook for the partner meeting, from a First Round partner and former founder. It explains the internal dynamics most founders never see, so you can arm your champion.
This is the most direct answer to the question: it argues you should ditch the intro and open like a movie cold open, and it shows the exact before/after. The weak version ('Hi, I'm Lance, CEO of Feel the Boot, thanks for taking the time') versus the strong version ('Fundraising is the moment that breaks most founders. It's when they realize they're completely out of their depth and need help'). You can copy that structure onto your own problem in an afternoon.
