Fintech presentation: put down the free template.

11 minute read

As a Fintech company, innovation and disruption are at your core. So, why would you want a free Fintech presentation template that makes you blend into the crowd?

Human beings hate change. Just look at how people reacted when lockdown rules first came into effect. These restrictions were put in place to literally save their lives, and all they had to do was stay in their own homes. Could people follow these simple instructions when so much was at stake? A few did, sure. But many of those who did still made one hell of a racket about it. As a species, we like to be comfortable, we like routine, and we like to feel in control of our own lives. Change disrupts all of that.

But – and we’re not trying to sound like an Instagram fitness influencer – without change, there is no progress. The financial services industry has historically been one of the business sectors more resistant to disruption by technology. Since the first mortgage was issued in the 11th century, they built their stronghold and they protected those ways of operating, even when there was a better way. Tradition and heritage have a lot to answer for.

This is your moment

Eventually, innovation is always going to win; no industry can stand still and survive. With younger generations entering the industry and working their way into positions of power, they’re going to bring new ideas and new technology with them. While the old-school banks managed to cling on longer than most, the tides have certainly changed. Fintech companies are undoubtedly having a moment.

Even in the midst of a global pandemic, Fintech start-ups Lunar and Yapily both closed multi-million-dollar funding rounds in March. While the early adopters seem primed and ready to take on the banking revolution with you, there is certainly an art to persuading the rest of the market to change the habit of a lifetime and take a chance on an unknown brand. Luckily, you’ve got a secret weapon when it comes to creating your Fintech sales presentation: hello, it’s Buffalo 7. 

However, if you came here looking for a free Fintech presentation template…

Let’s cut to the chase. You’re better than that. Your company is reimagining an industry and fighting centuries of tradition to challenge how things are done. You’re giving modern people modern solutions, when they previously had to make do with how some old boys decided it should be done before the first computer was invented. You are a thought leader, a visionary, and you’re paving the way for others to follow. So why would you consider housing your world-changing ideas in some free template that you uncovered during a two-second Google search?

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Free templates limit how you shape your Fintech presentation

Templates that are designed for ‘every need’ meet nobody’s needs. A free template will limit how you tell your story, forcing you to fit your messaging into their layouts. You’re a market disruptor, for goodness’ sakes, are you going to let someone tell you how to present? 

Your story is revolutionary, and you need a presentation that is designed to get your audience’s pulses racing, support your message, and bring your product to life. 

Your Fintech presentation should tell your audience who you are

When you’re laying your own tracks in an established industry, you need to build a brand. You need to make a name for yourself, get into people’s heads, and stay there. Having your brand accurately represented at every touchpoint – from your website through all your marketing materials – is the only way to get new customers to buy into your purpose. No stone can be left unturned, and that includes your presentation assets. 

Presentations need to perform at the most critical of moments, and can be the difference between landing that massive client and going home empty-handed. So why would you present slides that aren’t tailored to your brand? You’re going to fail before you begin. 

You need to stand out from the crowd

This one is a no brainer. If you download a free template to build your Fintech presentation, chances are thousands of other people have done the same thing. And if you present enough times, eventually someone in your audience is going to recognise the template. Not only are you going to blend in with all the other bland, rushed presentations – showing you didn’t care enough to craft something original – you might actually end up making the previous presentation more memorable for that audience member than your own. Unless you’re moonlighting for them, let’s not start promoting the competition.

You need a template that makes building your Fintech presentation easier

If you’ve searched for a free Fintech presentation template, chances are you’re low on two things: cash and time. It’s easy to think a free template is the answer to both of these problems. 

However, I can guarantee many corners have been cut in the making of that template. What this means for you, at best, is a template that is clunky to use, time consuming and damn frustrating. At worst, it will corrupt your file and embarrass you in front of potential new clients on the big day. Either way, it may end up costing you more than you thought, and it will certainly drain your time, and your energy.

Free templates are ugly

This one doesn’t really need any more explanation. If a designer is churning out templates for free, they’re not doing their best work. You can tell, I can tell, and your audience can certainly tell.

What do you do instead?

If you searched for a free template and have made it this far into an article that both berates your moment of weakness and ruins your plan for an easy day, congratulations. This is the persistence and curiosity I would expect from someone who’s making a career out of laughing in the face of tradition. I knew you were better than a free template.

I’m sure you wouldn’t search for a template without having your story down, but, on the other hand, you do have a mark against your name due to the above-mentioned moment of weakness. With this in mind, I’ll quickly take a step back and touch on storytelling. Indulge me.

Strip it right back

If there are two separate industries that love to overcomplicate their presentations, it’s financial services and technology. If you’re bringing those two together, and your products are no doubt driven by data, I’m imagining the urge to cram your presentation full of numbers, complicated technical diagrams, abbreviations that no one understands, and slides and slides of charts is overwhelming. 

But nobody wants that.

Remember to ask yourself “why should my audience care?” and strip out all the fluff. The numbers don’t magically prove your credibility if your audience can’t see through the digits, matrix-style, and find the message hidden within. The complicated technical diagrams don’t show how super smart you are. Your industry is too young for everyone to be caught up on the lingo. And your charts give people a headache. Edit, edit, and edit some more until every word has a purpose.

Hit all the pillars of persuasion in your Fintech presentation

If you need some more help with structuring your Fintech presentation content, this blog will walk you through it from start to finish. For the purpose of this post, we’re just talking about Aristotle’s pillars: pathos, logos and ethos. If you make sure your story hits all three, you’re onto a presentation winner.

Pathos: emotion

There are many ways you can start a successful Fintech presentation, but whichever method you choose, you need to start strong and unapologetic. You may be the new kid on the block, but progress has to start somewhere. Don’t be afraid to be called out for your lack of heritage. That kind of response is typical of the system you’re trying to smash. Instead, focus on all the opportunities they’re missing out on, that their competitors are not. These opportunities come from innovation alone, not from holding onto the glory days.

Know your place

You understand your customers, their frustrations and your place in the market. You needed all that information to be able to identify a need for your product and design the solution. Don’t leave that valuable information out of your sales pitch. Make sure you address the current market situation, the devastating effects that’s having on your audience, and a simple solution: your product.

Look at how Yapily succinctly set up the problem and pitched the solution, in just three slides:

Yapily fintech title slide
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Yapily fintech presentation intro
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Yapily vision slide fintech presentation
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Remember your purpose

All too often technology pitches leave their audience cold. They focus on the product features, how it works, and why the code is superior, but they forget to talk about the real humans whose lives will be improved by the solution. If you tell a human story, you will evoke a human reaction from your audience.

This could not be more important than with a Fintech presentation. Remember: humans hate change and you’re asking an industry to replace processes traditionally carried out by real people with technology. They’re scared that the human connection will be lost. You need to not only show them how your solution will save them time and money, reduce complexities, and improve customer experience, but how it will free those real people up to work on building relationships, creativity, and innovation: things that only people can do. You need to lead them gently through their concerns and show them a better option, where all their frustrations are gone.

Logos: logic

Once you’ve hooked them by humanising your tech, you can give the logical part of the brain something to chew on. This is where you bring out the data. 

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Not all of it. 

You need to pull out the power stats. Think back to that key question and only choose the numbers that your audience should care about. The numbers that tell your story. That support your message. 

Put your back end away

Most people won’t care how your solution works, just what it will do for them. However, it’s a good idea to keep an explanatory slide hidden in your deck, just for the more technical amongst your audience. Even for those few nit-pickers, you still need to make it beautiful and make it simple to understand, like Lunar did:

Lunar fintech presentation slide
Slide not created by Buffalo 7

Ethos: credibility

When the market crashed, traditional banks and financial institutions lost the trust of the people. This opened up an opportunity for a new solution: your solution. You need to show your audience that you have not only reinvented how they work, but how you will work together. You need to be transparent about everything. If you do, you’ll get their trust and you’ll beat the banks every time.

Playground rules apply

Make sure to include case studies and testimonials from happy customers, and tailor the examples you use to reflect who’s sitting in front of you. Peer pressure doesn’t just work on teenagers. If your audience is on the fence after your emotional hook, you’ll nudge them onto your side if you show that your solution has worked for a business just like theirs. And if it’s worked for a direct competitor: even better.

Sell your people

As a relative newbie, you may not have a wealth of growth data, customer satisfaction scores, or company successes, but everyone has a past, and you can use yours to your advantage. So what if the business as a whole is fresh out the box, you put your team together because of their relevant experience, so make sure your audience knows that they’re in safe hands with the greatest minds in the industry running the show.

Everywhere to go

Remember this is new and exciting. Once you’ve appealed to logic and proven your credibility, you’ll be in the perfect position to bring it full circle, back to emotion, and pitch the endless possibilities that the future will bring. This exciting world can take you and your clients anywhere, so finish by drawing on the psychology of awe to get their minds open to new possibilities, imagining a future they never thought possible before you showed them it was. 

Yapily went with the old “Today, London. Tomorrow, the world” approach, and it certainly worked for them:

Yapily countries slide Fintech presentation
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Yapliy expansion plan slide
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Your Fintech presentation experience

As any one of our team of Presentation Experience Experts will tell you, building a persuasive deck isn’t simply about which images you choose, how you transition from one slide to another, or the speed of your animations: it’s about how every single detail comes together to create an experience that’s tailored to your audience.

If deeper dives are your thing, we have plenty of information on presentation designbuilding templates, and animation for you to soak up, but for your Fintech presentation, here are some essential learnings to improve your presentation experience:

Data visualisation

You’ve already followed our advice and picked out your power stats, so now what? We’ve forbidden you – sorry – strongly suggested you step away from the charts and tables, but we’re not about to leave you hanging with no alternative. Take a look at these examples of how you can turn data into easy-to-understand, powerful messages:

data visualisation sport slide
Slide designed and created by Buffalo 7
data visualisation football
Slide designed and created by Buffalo 7
data visualisation yorkshire slide
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data visualisation walnuts slide
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data visualisation chilli slide
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Interactivity

Show, don’t tell. With any tech presentation, we always advise our clients to give the audience time to play around. You’ve spent so much time and money developing your product, so why do you spend all your presentation time talking about dry numbers and customer quotes? Let them get hands on with your technology and experience the intuitive design and gorgeous interface for themselves. You don’t need to task them with imagining how your solution can improve their lives, you can give them the chance to see it for themselves. Then rip it away and send them crashing back to reality. Always leave your audience wanting more.

Get handsy

You can do this in a number of ways, the obvious being to hand out devices with a dummy profile already set up. Go that extra mile and create the profile to mirror what you know about their brand, giving them the most realistic experience possible. However, buying devices can be expensive and carting them around to every meeting might be impossible for you. There are other options.  

Fake it

PowerPoint 3D is an evolving tool in PowerPoint’s toolbox, and the applications for it grow in correlation with its effectiveness. For your tech demo, you could think about creating a 3D device, which houses layers of short screen recordings of your technology in action. Using a few choice hyperlinks, you could make your audience feel like they’re interacting with your technology from within PowerPoint. Click an invisible shape over an image of your menu to launch a video of that feature, showing off the benefits in motion.

Of course, if that all sounds like Ancient Greek to you, you could use screen recording software to quickly and easily record a demo from your device, and then place it in your Fintech presentation. This removes the interactive element and you’ll have to work harder to convince them, but your tech is so good it speaks for itself, right?

Don’t cut corners at the final hurdle

What a whirlwind. You went from an easy day just adding content to a free template to being gently scolded and washed with a tidal wave of information. Feel free to take a seat and catch your breath. If all of this seems like a lot to take in, that’s because it is. We’ve spent over a decade becoming experts in all things presentation and one piece of advice we can give to anyone who presents as part of their job is to never cut corners, it will catch up with you in the end.

Outsourcing your Fintech presentation might be sounding more and more like a great idea, and of course we’d agree. But if you’re still on the fence, feel free to read more about the benefits in this straight-to-the-point article. And whether we end up working together to disrupt your industry and change the minds of the old boys or not, please please please just don’t download that free Fintech presentation template.

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