As a prospective business owner, after you’ve powered through the planning phase, your startup comes to life when it receives funding. Consider it the first step in the lifecycle of your business. And obviously, you can’t do that without convincing investors that your business is worth their money. When it comes to finding investors and executing pitches for them, there are a couple of steps you need to consider if you’re looking to make your startup a success.
Ready to find out what they are? Let’s jump right in.
1. Finding Investors
While novice business owners do wish there was some sort of silver bullet solution to this, unfortunately, there’s no such thing in the world of startups. For the most part, you’ll have to gauge how much funding works for you.
According to the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation 2019 report, about 65% of new business owners utilize their or their family savings to finance their startup. When you take it a step further though, you will definitely require outside investment to grow and scale. Start off by asking friends and family around you. Often, there are people in your own network that can pool in to provide more than sufficient funds.
If for some reason you’d rather not mix personal and professional matters, you can always find a venture capital firm to work with. For this, leave no stone unturned. Scour Google with relevant keywords. Search in VC webinars, networking events, and podcasts.
2. Contacting Investors
Contrary to popular belief, there’s no such thing as investors disliking cold emails. What they do dislike though is having their time wasted. So your job as a business owner is to put in some good thought into formulating a brief but succinct email that captures your targeted investor’s attention instantly. It’s also better to use email merge services that send emails directly to your primary folder. Emails in the promotion, social, or spam folders will most likely never be read or just be discarded as newsletters.
3. Rocking The Pitch
Investors aren’t only interested in your product – they want to know the team and leader behind it too. Don’t make the mistake of talking about just one or two of the “pitch trifecta”. You, your team, and the product must be part of the pitch. Talk about your startup story.
Go over the lightbulb moment. Take your investors on a journey from that moment till where you are now and end where you aim to be in a couple of years. And prove that claim with past stats highlighting your success. Whatever accomplishments you’ve had thus far, mention them. Showcase your pride. This is your baby. Make it shine.
Final Note
Sure, it takes two to tango but one must take the lead – and that person needs to be you. Once you’ve pitched your idea, don’t hesitate to follow up. Remember that your passiveness can potentially lead a venture capital to lose interest. Your job, in the end, is to guarantee a commitment from their end.
