Investor updates and board decks, designed once and reused
Overslide designs investor updates and board decks for funded startups. A one-off reporting deck is a Deck or a Story, and a template the team fills in itself is a System. Companies that have already worked with Overslide can also have it on the monthly Retainer. Max Marele does the design work himself, under NDA, in the tool the team already uses.
Why it matters
The deck you make most often
Every month or every quarter. Same structure, new numbers, and somehow it still eats a weekend. It’s the most repeated presentation a company makes, which is exactly why it’s the first thing worth turning into a template.
Your time is worth more than formatting slides.
What goes in it
Your numbers, made readable
Performance against plan, the numbers, what changed, and what you need from the board. That’s the content, and it’s yours. My part is making it readable: a KPI page the board gets in seconds, charts that look the same month after month so the changes actually show, and the ask somewhere nobody can miss it.
Overslide designs the KPI pages, plan-versus-actual charts and cash slides in board decks and investor updates, and builds them as chart templates the team reuses. Next month’s numbers go into the same chart, on the same scale, in the same place. The chart rules are the ones a pitch deck follows: charts, traction and financials, and the guide to showing traction and financials.
Email or deck
Plenty of investor updates go out as emails. When the numbers are the update, I design the visual version: the deck, plus chart templates you drop next month’s numbers into.
Three ways to work
One-off
One board or reporting deck, done properly. That’s a Deck, or a Story if the structure has to be worked out first.
A template you run yourself
Board deck, investor update, whatever else you report with, built once as templates and a slide library, then handed over so your team runs it without me. That’s a System.
Monthly, on the Retainer
For companies I’ve already worked with: investor updates, sales decks, one-pagers, whatever the month needs, at priority turnaround. Two-month minimum, then monthly.
One fixed price per project, agreed on a 30-minute call. The starting figures are on the pricing page. At a fund? Quarterly LP updates are on the VC funds page.
Questions
What is an investor update or a board deck?
An investor update and a board deck are the recurring reporting a funded company sends to the people who backed it: performance against plan, the numbers, what changed, and what is being asked of the board. They are the most repeated presentation a company makes, which is why they are usually the first thing a template or a retainer gets pointed at. Overslide designs both, under Reporting.
What is the difference between a Story and a System?
A Story is one deck for one purpose, however large. A System is what a team builds its own decks from: templates, a slide library and a handover. If the request is “a deck and a template”, or the same look across investor, sales and board decks, it is a System.
Can Overslide work with our existing brand or build us a reusable template?
Yes. Deck and Story are designed in the client’s existing brand. A reusable template is a System: templates, a slide library and a handover the team builds its own decks from.
How is the price decided?
Every project gets one fixed price, set on the 30-minute call. Two things shape it: the size of the deck, and whether anything has to be built before it can be designed, meaning the narrative or the visual direction. A standard deck is around 25 slides. Most fundraising decks run longer, and some come in two versions, a teaser and a full deck. Those are scoped as the larger projects they are.
Which tools does Overslide design in?
Overslide designs in Figma Slides, Google Slides, Keynote or PowerPoint, whichever the client's team already uses. Max prefers to build in Figma where the client can work that way, because it gives more design control. The trade-offs are laid out in Figma Slides vs Google Slides vs PowerPoint.
Will my team be able to edit the deck afterwards?
Yes, the team can edit the deck afterwards. Decks are built in the tool the team already works in, so the files stay editable in-house after handover.
Does Overslide sign NDAs?
Yes, Overslide signs NDAs, and most of its work is under one. Confidential information stays confidential, which is why client names and figures are redacted on the sample slides.
Every project starts with a call