She Analyzes

Category: Resources

  • Before the First Meeting: 15 Questions for Reviewing a Pitch Deck

    A pitch deck does not need to answer every diligence question. It should, however, show that the company understands which questions matter and provide enough evidence to justify the next conversation.

    This checklist is a simple starting point for founders preparing a deck and investors reviewing one.

    The checklist

    1. Problem: Is the problem specific, important and costly enough to change customer behavior?
    2. Customer: Is it clear who experiences the problem and who ultimately pays for the solution?
    3. Product: Can the company explain what it sells in plain language?
    4. Demand: What evidence shows that customers actively want the product?
    5. Traction: Does the deck distinguish paying customers from users, pilots, partnerships and letters of intent?
    6. Revenue: Is the revenue model understandable, repeatable and connected to customer value?
    7. Economics: What do margins, acquisition costs, retention and sales cycles suggest about the business?
    8. Market: Is the market estimate based on reachable customers rather than only a large headline number?
    9. Competition: Does the company address substitutes and existing behavior—not just direct competitors?
    10. Defensibility: What becomes more difficult to replicate as the company grows?
    11. Team: Does the team have relevant experience, access or insight for the problem being solved?
    12. Dependencies: Does the business rely heavily on one customer, supplier, platform, approval or future financing round?
    13. Use of capital: Is the amount being raised connected to specific milestones?
    14. Projections: Are forecasts linked to measurable operating assumptions?
    15. Central risk: What unanswered question could most materially change the investment conclusion?

    What the deck should accomplish

    A strong deck creates clarity. It separates demonstrated progress from future ambition, makes important assumptions visible and gives the reader a reason to continue the conversation.

    The objective is not to remove every uncertainty. It is to show that the company understands its business well enough to discuss uncertainty directly.

    This checklist is a starting point for discussion and does not replace financial, legal or technical diligence.

  • Before the Data Room: 12 Free Tools for Evaluating a Company

    Good diligence does not always begin with an expensive database. Many of the most useful signals—corporate filings, fundraising disclosures, patents, government contracts, market data and digital activity—are publicly available if you know where to look.

    These twelve resources provide a practical starting point for evaluating a company before the data room, management meeting or investment memo.

    Company and fundraising records

    1. SEC EDGAR

    Start with primary documents. EDGAR provides searchable access to public-company filings, financial statements, risk disclosures, executive compensation and material events. Search by company, ticker, individual or keyword rather than relying only on summaries elsewhere.

    2. SEC Form D filings

    Filter EDGAR by Form D to find notices of certain exempt securities offerings. These filings can help confirm an issuer’s legal name, offering date, amount offered, related persons and stated industry. A filing is a disclosure—not proof that the entire amount was raised—but it can provide an important factual anchor.

    Market size and economic context

    3. U.S. Census Data

    Useful for grounding market claims in population, household, business and geographic data. It is particularly valuable when a pitch depends on demographic growth, regional expansion or the number of potential establishments in a category.

    4. Bureau of Labor Statistics

    BLS data can test assumptions involving employment, wages, labor availability, inflation and industry growth. It is often more useful to examine the underlying series than to repeat a headline statistic.

    5. FRED

    The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis organizes hundreds of thousands of economic time series. Use it to place company performance against interest rates, credit conditions, consumer behavior, construction, industrial production and other macroeconomic variables.

    Technology and intellectual property

    6. Google Patents

    A fast way to search patent documents by company, inventor, technology or phrase. It can help clarify what has actually been filed, who is named and how crowded a claimed technical category may be.

    7. USPTO Patent Public Search

    Use the official USPTO search system when patent status and document history require closer review. A patent claim in a deck should be separated into applications, issued patents, ownership and the commercial importance of the protected claims.

    Government exposure and contracts

    8. SAM.gov

    SAM.gov is a central source for federal contracting opportunities, entity information and award-related records. It is useful when a company describes the government as a customer or an important route to market.

    9. USAspending.gov

    Search federal spending by recipient, agency, award type and geography. This can help distinguish a funded contract from a partnership announcement, subcontracting relationship or prospective opportunity.

    Demand and digital signals

    10. Google Trends

    Google Trends does not measure revenue or total market size, but it can reveal changes in search interest, seasonality and regional concentration. Treat it as a directional signal rather than conclusive evidence of demand.

    11. BuiltWith

    BuiltWith identifies technologies used on websites. It can provide clues about a company’s product stack, integrations and potential customers, although results should be corroborated before drawing conclusions.

    12. Similarweb

    Similarweb offers directional estimates of website traffic, geography and acquisition channels. The free view is limited, and estimates can be less reliable for small sites, but it can still help frame follow-up questions about digital reach.

    The tool is not the conclusion

    No single database establishes an investment thesis. Public records can be incomplete, delayed or easy to misinterpret. Their value is in triangulation: compare what the company says with what filings, customers, contracts, patents, market data and observable behavior indicate.

    The goal is not to collect the largest possible volume of information. It is to identify the evidence that could confirm—or materially challenge—the story.

    Availability and free-access limits may change. These resources are starting points for research and do not replace legal, financial or technical diligence.