Why Proven Founders Are Rethinking the Way They Pitch

Picture this: A serial entrepreneur walks into a room full of potential investors. He's already exited two companies successfully. His current startup has tracked over 10 million medical samples, secured partnerships with global giants like Siemens Healthineers, and is solving a problem that kills one person every two minutes in the U.S.

The result? Radio silence.

This isn't a hypothetical scenario—it's exactly what happened during our recent Pitch Perfect Workshop when Javier Cuello, founder of H+Trace, delivered what should have been a slam-dunk pitch for his medical traceability technology.

The Hook That Should Have Sealed the Deal

Javier opened with a powerful statistic: "Every day in the U.S., the equivalent of a jumbo jet crashes. Over 250,000 people die each year due to preventable medical errors."

Brilliant pattern interrupt. Immediate emotional investment. The kind of hook that makes investors lean forward in their chairs.

But something went wrong.

What Investors Really Heard

Despite having all the right ingredients: proven track record, strategic partnerships, breakthrough technology, and a massive market opportunity, Javier's pitch fell flat. Not because his solution wasn't compelling, but because he made the same critical mistake that brilliant healthcare founders make every single day.

He led with credentials instead of customer pain.

As I told our workshop participants: "People don't care about us until they care about what we can help them with." Javier spent precious seconds establishing his authority when he should have been diving deeper into the problem his technology solves. - Sabrina Runbeck, MPH, MHS, PA-C

The Missing "Why Now" Factor

Here's what 90% of healthcare founders miss completely: the urgency factor. Javier mentioned that his space hadn't seen real innovation for 25 years, but he didn't explain what changed to make this the perfect moment for his solution.

Investors don't just want to know that a problem exists; they want to understand why it must be solved NOW and why your company is uniquely positioned to solve it at this moment in time.

The Framework That Changes Everything

In our workshops, we use a specific 2-minute structure that forces clarity:

• 15 seconds: Emotional hook with statistics
• 30 seconds: Problem definition and solution overview
• 25 seconds: Market opportunity and size
• 30 seconds: Business model and traction
• 15 seconds: Competitive advantage
• 15 seconds: Clear ask

When founders are forced into this structure, they quickly discover what truly matters to their audience versus what matters to them as the founder.

The Three Pillars of Trust

Every investor seeks three things before writing a check:

1. Trust in your product (Does it work?)
2. Trust in your company (Can it scale?)
3. Trust in you (Can you execute?)

Javier had established pillar #3 with his track record, but pillars #1 and #2 remained unclear. Investors couldn't visualize the specific outcomes his technology would deliver or understand the concrete path to market dominance.

The Real Problem with Healthcare Pitching

Here's what breaks my heart: I see brilliant healthcare founders like Javier pitch themselves exhausted to investors who "just don't quite see it." These founders KNOW they're solving real problems, but somehow the message isn't landing.

The truth? Investors aren't saying no to your solution. They're saying, "Show me more clarity."

The Transformation That Works

When we help healthcare founders focus their brilliant solutions like a laser on one specific segment where they can show quick revenue growth, investor conversations completely change. Instead of hearing "come back when you're bigger," they start getting "how can we help you grow faster?"

It's not about having a perfect product or flawless execution. It's about communicating your value in a way that makes the path to success undeniably clear.

Your Next Move

If you're a healthcare founder who's tired of hearing "maybe later" from investors, the answer isn't tweaking your pitch deck for the hundredth time. It's getting crystal clear on your fastest path to revenue and learning to communicate that clarity in a way that makes investors lean forward instead of politely nodding.

Because the best product doesn't always win => the best communicated product does.

Get Matched!

If you're a HealthTech founder with customers and early traction, HealthTech Showdown is your fast track to strategic capital and curated exposure.

This isn’t random networking. It’s a matchmaking platform connecting you with investors already backing companies like yours. We don’t just put you on stage, we help you perfect a pitch that converts, build on-camera confidence, and line up the decision-makers who are primed to say “yes.”

🚀 Apply now at PulsePointPath.com/Contestant — only 4 founder spots per round.

🎧 Related episodes you’ll want to catch:

• Ep 148 — Why Investors Don’t “Get” Your Pitch — And How to Fix It. Many founders pitch the product. What investors need is the bigger picture: problem, market, momentum, and people.
• Ep 156 — How Top Founders Win Investors in the First 30 Seconds) Your ideal investors or hospital partners have already heard a dozen pitches today. How are you matching their personas before they decide whether to keep listening?
• Ep 107 — The Secret to Breaking Healthcare's 147-Day Sales Cycle Discover how to get out of what feels like an endless loop of "just one more meeting" with decision-makers.

About Sabrina Runbeck

Sabrina Runbeck, MPH, MHS, PA-C helps healthcare technology companies scale sustainably—without burning out their teams or running out of cash.

She is the Co-Founder of PulsePoint Path and works alongside a 12-integrated board of advisors to help founders make strategic decisions that multiply impact and protect capital.

Her signature 5D Integrated System helps companies move beyond one-dimensional problem solving—what they think the issue is—and instead, builds an Empowered Ecosystem across leadership, team dynamics, and systems alignment. This is how founders evolve from early traction to 10x growth.

Sabrina is also a TEDx speaker, former Cardiothoracic Surgery PA, and trusted advisor with over 15 years of experience in public health, neuroscience, and business acceleration.

★ NEXT STEP ★

Ready to turn your pitch into a magnet? Let me write it for you. 👉 PulsePointPath.com/Pitch-Workshop

Need executive clarity now? Let’s create your growth blueprint in under 5 hours. 👉 http://PulsePointPath.com/Call