Presentation Review: George Tziralis & Miro Solanka

George Tziralis of Openfund and Miro Solanka of Sportmeets gave a joint presentation at WebExpo 2010. I hadn't initially planned to review their presentation, but I met them while we were waiting for a different presentation to start and they immediately showed interest in getting feedback on their presentation. I'm really glad it turned out this way because they delivered an excellent presentation. As good as it was, however, they were particularly interested in how they could improve so this review might seem overly critical in light of the fact that it was such a good presentation, but it's meant to be that way.

I have to say that George and Miro are a great example of how two people can do a presentation together. George supplied the general information and advice about getting funding and help with a start-up and then Miro was a concrete example of a start-up that got help from Openfund. It's not easy to do, but they managed to deliver two presentations as one in message, consistency and style. Great work! You can view their slides here.

Rating system: 1 = outstanding 5 = sucks

You can see a detailed description of my review criteria here

Message - 3

The title of their presentation is, Seed Capital in Practice, A Guide for You to Start Up. At the beginning I was a bit confused about what the core message was. Is this an introduction to Openfund and what they are all about or is this a guide for people who want to get funding this way for their start-up? The messages were mixed and sticking with one of these would have made it clearer. It was obvious that Miro's part was an example of what can happen if you do things right, but I would have made the Openfund part stick to a single message - this is what you need to do if you want to successfully get funding and advice from a seed capital firm.

Content - 3

Most of the content was clear and gave a lot of information about what you should do if you want to get help with your start up. The part I found confusing was the 'What You See' and 'What You Get' section. I think I would have called it 'What you think' and 'What investors think'. Why not try putting a headline: 'What you think' and one statement 'we have no competition' (for example) and then on the next slide use the headline, 'What investors think' with one statement 'hasn't done market research'. After these two slides, you can address the issue and give advice on this one topic. And then the other topics would have this same, simple style. Sticking to just one statement for each headline will make it much clearer what you want the audience to remember.

In Miro's part of the presentation, there was some basic information missing (and an audience member asked afterwards) - how do you make money and have you been successful so far? Miro set up the problem/getting funding scenario really well, but we were all curious about how the idea could be profitable and whether it's working for him now.

Attention - 3

Both George and Miro were very good speakers and used lots of opportunities to keep their audience's attention in a variety of ways. I only had a problem at the beginning (and it's connected with the core message above). George started his part by talking about Open Coffee in Greece and how much it had grown. I kept thinking - what the heck does this have to do with getting seed capital and start-ups?! Why not try opening next time with some interesting facts on the topic - what percentage of start-ups are successful (or fail) in the first year? how many of them fail to get funding? what are some reasons that applications are rejected? This would naturally lead to your message about how to be successful getting the help you need to start.

George had a good summary at the end with all of the points that he would like us to remember from his talk. This was lacking in Miro's part. I would have liked to see him talk about the lessons he learned about the application/start-up process that will help others. What should you have done differently? What would have made it an easier process? How could you have prepared in a better way?

Slides - 2

Both George and Miro had great slides (and their styles and color schemes matched). The only thing I would change is the color scheme for the 'what you see' and 'what you get' section. Remembering what red, green and yellow means was too much for me (when I'm trying to listen to the speaker at the same time). Just simplifying that part will make a big difference.

Presence - 2

George and Miro are very good speakers - professional, natural and they seemed comfortable in their roles. The only criticism I have is when they were dealing with audience questions, they seemed a bit hostile. I admit that there were some strange questions coming from some audience members, but it happens. Remember to keep your cool.


Thank you, George and Miro, for agreeing to a last minute presentation review. I truly enjoyed your presentations and the advice above is the result of your specific request to find something to 'fix'. Your performance was absolutely one of the best I've seen this year!

© 2010 Jeanne Trojan. All rights reserved