How to Improve Your Pitch Deck's Design [A Simple Guide]
- Ink Narrates | The Presentation Design Agency
- 8 hours ago
- 7 min read
Our client Eddie came to us with a pitch deck that looked flat and uninspiring. He asked us an interesting question while we were working on redesigning it. He said,
“What’s the fastest way to make a pitch deck design look professional without overcomplicating it?”
Our Creative Director answered right away:
“Consistency in design across the deck.”
As a presentation design agency, we work on many pitch decks throughout the year, and in the process, we’ve observed one common challenge: founders and teams often try to add too much flair without getting the basics right.
So, in this blog, we’ll talk about 5 practical ways you can improve pitch deck design without getting lost in unnecessary details.
In case you didn't know, we specialize in only one thing: making presentations. We can help you by designing your slides and writing your content too.
How to Improve Your Pitch Deck's Design
1. Get the Story Straight Before You Touch Design
Here’s the truth: no amount of fancy fonts or slick animations will save a pitch deck if the story is weak. We’ve seen decks where the slides looked like a design agency’s portfolio piece, but the actual narrative was scattered. Investors don’t have time to guess what you’re trying to say. If your story doesn’t hold together, they stop paying attention, even if the design looks like it came out of a design award showcase.
Think of your deck like a movie script. If the story doesn’t make sense, no amount of cinematography will help. Before you start fiddling with colors and layouts, ask yourself these questions:
What problem am I solving?
Why is this the right time to solve it?
Why are we the right team?
What’s the big opportunity?
Write the answers down in plain English. Then arrange them in the order an investor would naturally want to hear them. That’s your skeleton. Only when this structure feels clear should you start thinking about design. Otherwise, you’ll just be decorating confusion.
We’ve noticed this pattern with many clients: once the story is nailed, design becomes easier. You know exactly what needs emphasis, what can stay minimal, and where visuals will make the story stronger. In Eddie’s case, his original deck had strong numbers but they were buried on slide 12. Once we reorganized the narrative, the numbers moved up, and suddenly the design choices made sense.
The best-designed pitch decks are always story-first, design-second.
2. Keep Design Consistent, Not Complicated
If you want your deck to look professional, the single most important design principle is consistency. Fonts, colors, spacing, alignment — these details sound small, but when they’re off, the whole deck feels amateur. When they’re right, the deck feels seamless.
Consistency doesn’t mean boring. It means discipline. Here’s how we approach it:
Fonts: Stick to two fonts maximum. One for headings, one for body text. If your brand has official fonts, use them. If not, go with safe, professional typefaces like Helvetica Neue, Lato, or Calibri. Nobody in the investor world is waiting to be impressed by a decorative font.
Colors: Use your brand palette, but limit how you apply it. If your primary color is blue, use it for headings or accents, not as a full-slide background on every page. Keep backgrounds mostly white or light. Contrast matters more than color variety.
Layouts: Decide on a grid and stick to it. Text and visuals should align in the same way across slides. It gives the deck rhythm, which makes it easier to read.
When Eddie’s deck first came in, it had four different font styles and no alignment system. Every slide felt like it was made on a different day. Once we streamlined the fonts and set a clean grid, the deck immediately felt sharper, even before we added any creative visuals.
Consistency shows discipline, and discipline builds trust. If your design looks sloppy, investors subconsciously assume your business might be sloppy too.
3. Use Visuals to Support, Not Distract
A big mistake we see is people thinking visuals are there to decorate. They’re not. Visuals should clarify the message, not compete with it. That means using charts, diagrams, and images strategically.
Here’s what we recommend:
Charts: Keep them clean. If you’re showing financials, avoid overstuffed Excel screenshots. Redraw them in a simple, minimal style that highlights the key number. Investors are scanning, not auditing.
Diagrams: Use diagrams to simplify complex ideas. For example, if your product integrates with five different systems, a clean diagram beats three bullet points.
Images: Use high-quality, relevant images. A blurry stock photo screams careless. If you can’t find a photo that adds value, leave it out. White space is better than irrelevant visuals.
We worked with Eddie to redesign his traction slide. Originally, it had a paragraph of text explaining monthly active users. We replaced it with a single bold chart showing growth over time. No fancy gradients, just a sharp line graph with clear labeling. That one change got his point across faster than the entire paragraph ever could.
Remember: visuals should speed up understanding. If an investor has to squint to figure it out, you’ve already lost them.
4. Respect White Space
This one makes many founders nervous. They think if a slide looks “too empty,” it means they haven’t added enough information. The opposite is true. White space is breathing room, and it makes your content easier to absorb.
Here’s the test: if everything on your slide feels cramped, your audience will feel cramped too. If each element has space to stand on its own, the audience sees confidence. It’s like walking into a clean, minimal office versus one with papers stacked on every surface. The clean space communicates order and focus.
The biggest culprit we see is the team slide. Founders tend to throw in headshots, bios, degrees, and long titles, all squeezed together. Instead, pick the 2–3 most impressive details for each person and space them out. Show confidence by letting the design breathe.
Eddie’s original deck had one slide with nine bullet points squeezed into tiny text. He thought it made the case stronger. What it really did was make the slide unreadable. We spread those points across three slides, each with fewer words and more white space. The reaction from investors was immediate — they could finally digest the information without effort.
White space isn’t wasted space. It’s clarity.
5. Cut Ruthlessly, Then Cut Again
A bloated deck is a dead deck. Founders love to include every possible detail about their product, market, and strategy. The logic is “the more information, the stronger the case.” But that’s not how investors process information. They want the essentials, not the encyclopedia.
Your pitch deck is not a product manual. It’s a teaser that earns you the right to have a deeper conversation. Every extra slide, every long sentence, every redundant graph adds friction. If your deck takes too long to read, investors will skim, and when they skim, they miss the points that matter most.
Here’s our rule of thumb:
10–12 slides max for the core story.
One idea per slide.
No paragraph longer than three lines.
Every slide should pass the “one glance” test — can the main point be understood in under 5 seconds?
When we worked on Eddie’s deck, we cut it from 28 slides down to 14. He was nervous at first, thinking we were cutting out critical information. But once he pitched with the tighter deck, he told us the conversations with investors flowed better. They asked questions instead of glazing over.
That’s the goal — spark curiosity, not drown people in detail.
Editing is where good decks become great. Be ruthless. Cut what doesn’t directly move the story forward. Then look again and cut even more.
What Improving a Pitch Deck Design Can and Cannot Do
The methods we’ve shared so far are great for quick wins. If you’re staring at an investor meeting on the calendar and your deck feels messy, these fixes will help you clean it up fast. They’re like tailoring an off-the-rack suit — the fit improves, the presentation looks sharper, and you walk into the room with more confidence. But just like that suit, it’s still not the same as something made for you from the ground up.
Here’s the distinction you should keep in mind:
What patchwork methods achieve
They improve the look and flow of your existing slides.
They buy you short-term credibility when time is tight.
They help you avoid the common design mistakes that instantly turn investors off.
Where patchwork hits a ceiling
It can’t fully integrate your story and design into one seamless narrative.
It won’t fix deeper issues like weak messaging or unclear strategy.
Investors can usually sense when a deck has been “touched up” versus carefully crafted.
Why a full rebuild matters
A deck designed from scratch aligns narrative, visuals, and structure from the very beginning.
It doesn’t just make slides look good — it turns them into a persuasive tool that works across multiple investor conversations.
Founders who invest in a full rebuild often save time later, because they’re not stuck re-explaining or re-designing after every round of feedback.
So yes, use the quick fixes when you’re pressed for time. They work. But if you’re serious about fundraising, treat them as a bridge — not the destination.
Why Hire Us to Build your Presentation?
If you're reading this, you're probably working on a presentation right now. You could do it all yourself. But the reality is - that’s not going to give you the high-impact presentation you need. It’s a lot of guesswork, a lot of trial and error. And at the end of the day, you’ll be left with a presentation that’s “good enough,” not one that gets results. On the other hand, we’ve spent years crafting thousands of presentations, mastering both storytelling and design. Let us handle this for you, so you can focus on what you do best.