How to Better Manage Relationships with Your VC
Just back from 2 solid weeks on the road in Boston, New York & Philly. I spent countless hours with VC firms, startups & LPs (the people who invest in VC firms). I find these trips invaluable both from a relationship-building perspective as well as stretching my mind about our industry. I ask questions, test [...]
How to Develop Your Fund Raising Strategy
Raising money is hard. And when you’re relatively new to the process it’s easy to be confused by the process. There is all sorts of advice on the Internet about how to raise capital. Of course much of it is conflicting. I’ve raised money as a “hot company” and I’ve raised capital when no one [...]
On Bubbles … And Why We’ll Be Just Fine
I recently spoke at the Founder Showcase at the request of Adeo Ressi. I asked what the audience most needed to hear. He said, “They need an unbiased view of the fund raising environment because there is too much misinformation and everything seems to be changing fast.” This was [...]
Angel / VC Funding in A Frothy Market
I had the privilege of keynoting at the Founder Showcase tonight in San Francisco. Adeo asked me to speak about fund raising. I generally don’t like to speak about fund raising in a frothy market. If you’re bullish you seem like a Cramer-esque cheerleader and if you’re bearish you sound like a party pooper. But Adeo [...]
Why Startups Should Raise Money at the Top End of Normal
2 preamble issues having read the comments on TC today: 1: I know that the prices of startup companies is much great in Silicon Valley than in smaller towns / less tech focused areas in the US and the US prices higher than many foreign markets. I acknowledged this in the article. You can [...]
How Many Investors are Too Many?
This post originally ran on TechCrunch. Lately I have seen a number of deals announced on TechCrunch in which 5 or more different VCs were participating in the deal. This always makes me chuckle because in my first company we had 5 investors in our first round and we picked up 5 more before we [...]
How You May be Signaling Price without Knowing It
I was having a chat with an entrepreneur who I really like and who I try to mentor from time-to-time. He has an interesting business and one that has a viable shot at being an innovative & profitable business. One problem. He’s struggling to raise money. This is extra frustrating in an era in which [...]
How to Handle a VC Presentation with No Deck
I recently filmed a show for This Week in Venture Capital in which I talked about how to prepare for a VC meeting: whom you’ll meet, who should attend from your side, what materials you should bring and how you should run the meeting. I wrote the summary notes in this blog post. That notes [...]
Going to Raise VC? Here’s a Primer on Process, People, Deck
If you want a very quick primer on all the stuff nobody ever tells you about raising venture capital check out this video where Mark Jeffrey & I break it down on This Week in VC. A summary of what we discussed is below: Not 100% in order of the video, but close. All of [...]
Why it’s Critical That you Reference Check Your VC
I was recently speaking with some founders about their fund raising process. They had received a term sheet from a VC and were wondering whether to work with this firm. I personally had three separate data points from entrepreneurs who took money from the firm that said “never again.” I really try to stay out [...]
How to Connect with High Volume People
I’m a high-volume person. That doesn’t make me important. It doesn’t mean I’m not accessible. It means simply what I’m stating – high volume. What that means is that in a typical week I might see 10-15 new company pitches. Sometimes more. I speak at conferences where I might meet 75-100 people and have conversations. [...]
The Four Main Things that Investors Look for in a Startup
I obviously don’t speak for all investors. But in my experience as an entrepreneur and now spending my time amongst investors I can generalize that almost all VC investments in early stage technology & Internet investments come down to just four key factors. And they’re easy to remember because they all begin with an M: [...]
Revisiting Paul Graham’s “High Resolution” Financing
When I first read Paul Graham’s blog post on “High Resolution” Financing I read it as a treatise arguing that convertible notes are better than equity. As I’m generally a believer in ‘pricing rounds’ I initially didn’t agree with the premise of the post. I just re-read it and on second reflection, I’m surprised just [...]
Is Convertible Debt Preferable to Equity?
Seth Levine of Foundry Group addresses this important topic this morning on his blog with a post, “Has Convertible Debt Won?”Seth was basing this on a Tweet by Paul Graham that said” “Convertible notes have won. Every investment so far in this YC batch (and there have been a lot) has been done on a [...]
A Guide to Using Authority & Social Proof in Fund Raising
I recently read a book I’d highly recommend to every reader of this blog called “Yes, 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive” by Robert B. Cialdini who is also author of a very well received book called “Influence” (which I plan to read). “Yes” was given to me by one of my favorite angel [...]
