Looking to refine your company pitch in 2023? This Tampa-based SaaS company can help

If you’ve ever stayed up late reformatting slides, emailed back-and-forth to get approved logos to add to a deck, or tried to track down your boss to get the most up-to-date sales numbers before a pitch, you understand exactly why Tampa-based Shufflrr was created. 

Employees that rely heavily on powerpoint presentations for their jobs have likely uttered some iteration of “I can’t find the slide. That’s old information. Or that slide looks like crap,” said James Ontra, Shufflrr’s CEO. Shufflrr looks to combat those frustrations with a presentation-focused SaaS solution. 

Companies using Shufflrr build out a “structured library” of slide content to ensure team members have all the information they need to build out the best presentations possible.

This can be a huge timesaver for employees who work a lot within Powerpoint or Google Slides. But it can also save companies from potentially costly headaches down the road. Marketing, compliance, and sales teams can quickly swap out any outdated information and ensure all presentations are ready with the most accurate stats, logos, and key company data points.

Ontra has certainly seen the presentation space change over his career. In the 90s he helped media and financial companies build out important presentations on CD-ROMs. As graphics, media embedding, and file sharing technology got more sophisticated, Ontra and his team shifted focus to the presentation management and strategy space. 

While working with giants like Warner Brothers, Paramount, NBC, ABC, and Disney, he realized that presentation management is crucial to any effective corporate communication strategy. He ultimately launched Shufflrr with his sister, AlexAnndra Ontra, back in 2014. 

 

Why presentation management matters 

Companies of all sizes can benefit from Shufflrr’s presentation management system, but Ontra said its technology is particularly powerful for those who have several employees pitching on their behalf. 

“Let’s say you have 50 sales people around the globe and you [have] a new product. The marketing department will put five slides up on the new product and all 50 people around the globe instantly have those slides and can tell the message,” he added. 

That can be particularly important to ensure employees are up-to-date with company-wide changes that a client might ask about during a presentation or meeting. 

While the team got off the ground in New York, Shufflrr moved to Tampa two years ago and calls Embarc Collective, the city’s startup hub, home. 

“I’ve more than fallen in love with Tampa,” Ontra said when asked how the move went. “[People here] come to you with open arms and ask: how can we help you?” 

Shufflrr has specifically leaned into the universities around Tampa to increase hiring efforts for their new HQ. 

 

Building a better pitch 

We’ve all heard the phrase “to err is human.” But for Ontra, it is also true that “to present is human.” 

From church’s stained glass windows to university lecture halls to the modern corporate boardroom, structured and slide-centric presentations are key ways we get information to others.

Startups, of course, live and die by their pitch.

Founders are constantly refining their pitch to customers and investors, making a cohesive slide deck an essential tool. 

The Ontra duo wrote the book on presentation management (literally, check it out here), and James also has some startup-specific advice for any founder who is looking to perfect their pitch in 2023. 

“Lead with emotion,” he told Hypepotamus. “Put it up there, make it visceral…then every bit of logic and data you follow up with, the person will be sitting there making their own case to support their emotional decision. You don’t have to sell them anymore. You don’t have to convince them anymore. That’s structured storytelling.”