Nothing matches that. Which either means they didn't say it, or they invented a new way to pass.
And then there's the most common answer of all
Silence. No reply, no reason, no note to work with. It is the only pass that arrives with zero information attached — which is exactly why founders end up reading tea leaves like this page in the first place.
Three rules that decode almost everything
You don't need forty translations if you internalize these. The rest is vocabulary.
The date is the message
Enthusiasm with no next step is a pass. A flat, skeptical meeting that ends with "Tuesday, 2pm, bring the cohort data" is very much alive. Track calendar invites, not adjectives.
Everything after "but" is the feedback
The clause before it is manners. Write down the second half verbatim, and if the same second half shows up in three meetings, that's not an opinion anymore — it's your deck.
Their questions reveal the verdict
Questions about your business mean interest. Questions about their process — "how our partnership works", "our usual timeline" — mean you're being walked to the door courteously.
Or: skip the dialect entirely
Every phrase on this page exists because someone decided a real answer wasn't worth the awkwardness. PitchSpark scores your pitch on team, problem, solution, market, traction, and clarity — then hands you the blunt version, in minutes, for free. No translation required.
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