What makes an idea feel expensive?

We are all know, we end up judging the book by its cover. 🤨📖

Why cheap slides kill expensive ideas 

A couple of weeks ago I talked about how some things just feel expensive. The weight of a metal credit card, the smell of a five-star hotel lobby (my favourite), a glass bottle of Coca-Cola. None of it is about the product actually being better. It's about every small signal telling you it is. 

Presentations work the exact same way. A founder can have the smartest go-to-market strategy in the room, and if the deck looks like a last-minute thing, everyone will unconsciously dismiss the idea. But not on purpose. Nobody sits there thinking, "this slide is ugly, so probably the strategy is weak." It happens in the back of the brain, and it changes how people will listen to what comes next.

Amazing ideas can die because of bad presentations

I received a pitch deck from a company that came to Pappum a while back with a presentation they’d built for a new idea they had. They sell an AMAZING service and have so much potential. But the presentation wasn’t doing it justice and wasn’t even close to having the impact it needed to actually sell the idea. And people probably wouldn't really pay attention to them with their old presentation, which is really bad.

And I thought: how many companies died because of bad presentations? 👀

That's the thing nobody tells you about presentations: the audience decides how much attention your idea deserves before you've said a single word about it. And honestly, that's one of the most common things we see at Pappum. The people behind these decks are brilliant, have great services and products, and know their business inside out, but they just aren't presentation experts. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. It's exactly why we're here.

What "expensive" actually looks like on a slide

In my opinion, there are four main things that separate a deck that feels rushed from one that feels intentional: 

1. Space: A slide with room to breathe feels clear and confident. When there’s too much going on, the message can easily get lost. 

2. Consistency: Same font, same color logic, same alignment, slide after slide. This might sound too simple, but consistency is what makes a deck feel professional. 

3. Curation: This is the hardest one, because it means cutting things you worked hard on. Every extra bullet point you add "just in case" is competing for attention with the one thing you actually need the room to remember. Here, less is actually more. 

4. Images: The same old stock photos don't add credibility. Take some time and choose good images that will help you transmit your message with fewer words. There are so many good free stock photo sources, such as Unsplash, Pexels, Pinterest, AI... 

Dressing well doesn’t get you the job, but it changes how the interviewer listens to you

Nobody gets hired because of what they're wearing. But someone who enters an interview with wrinkled clothes and messy hair will make a very bad impression, and all their experience might not be as well perceived.Presentations work on that same psychological level. A deck that looks premium doesn't make a bad idea good. It tells the room, "pay attention, this is worth your time." and that changes how people will listen to you. 

It's not decoration, it's information

The biggest mistake I see is when people treat design as the last 10% of the work. But a slide's visual hierarchy is itself content and tells the audience what matters most. A well designed slide is doing the thinking for the audience before they even start reading. 

So, what we should ask ourselves isn't "does my deck look nice", but rather, "does my deck actually say what I'm trying to say?". Because at the end of the day, looking expensive isn't about showing off, it's actually about proving, visually, that your work has exactly the quality you say it has. 

If your ideas are already there but your slides haven't caught up yet, that's where Pappum can come in! 💙