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EXCLUSIVE FUNDRAISING WORKSHOP Psst! Psst! There's an exclusive event happening in New York April 16-17. 🤫 (Which is why we're posting this on a Friday evening. If you're fortunate enough to see this, read on...😊) We've gathered a group of venture capital and fundraising professionals, experts, and founders to help startup founders succeed in raising capital. At this workshop, you'll have the unique opportunity to gain valuable insights from VCs, including HubSpot Ventures, on their investment criteria for startups. You'll also collaborate with a skilled expert in strategic storytelling to craft your startup's perfect pitch. The event starts with an informal gathering on the evening of April 16. This is your chance to break the ice with drinks, bites, and great conversation. It's the perfect opportunity to connect with fellow workshop participants, share insights, and build relationships in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere. Then, on the 17th, join us for a 6-hour workshop where leading investors and experts will share valuable insights about effective fundraising strategies, including how to craft a compelling pitch deck. Participate in hands-on workshops to enhance your startup's visibility and appeal. Connect with 125 other startup founders, investors, and experts to gain invaluable insights from top VCs. You'll learn from: * Arjun Mahadevan, CEO of doola and winner of HubSpot's Million Dollar Pitch Competition last year * Matt W Gore of OPTIO - Strategic Storytelling * Olivia O'Sullivan, partner at Forum Ventures * Nate Morgan, an investor at HubSpot Ventures * Kelsey Aina, Head of Startup Partnership for HubSpot for Startups Because this event is exclusive, you'll need to contact either Annie Fei or Melissa Braxton-Rasumoff for more deets. Good luck! (photo used is by Chase Baker on Unsplash)

🚀 Thinking About Raising Funds for Your Startup? Here’s What You Really Need to Know: The fundraising landscape has shifted dramatically in recent years, and if you’re a pre-seed startup founder (outside of deep-tech), here’s what you actually need before knocking on investors’ doors: 1. You’re a second-time founder with an exit under your belt. 2. You’ve got a minimum 20x month-on-month user (or even better, revenue) growth. 3. Your metrics show explosive user base growth in the past few months. 4. Your product is bringing in around £10k in monthly revenue. 5. You’re extremely well-connected in the industry. Now, if you’re a first-time founder with just an idea and don’t want to part with 50% of your company at the start (which, honestly, you shouldn’t), don’t waste your time trying to raise funds. Instead, invest your efforts into building relationships with investors. Spend the next 6-12 months making sure they know you, so when you hit those crucial milestones, you’re already on their radar. 🌱 Reality Check: Building a startup isn’t the glamorous social media fairy tale many make it out to be. It’s a long, tough grind, proving your idea is worth it. The market has changed a lot in recent years, and it’s a marathon, not a sprint. This is why so many give up – it’s not a quick, 3-month journey. If you’re still set on raising capital without hitting those benchmarks, you’ll likely waste 3 months in meetings with people who just want to boost their own social media stats (yes, this happens). Those 3 months could be better spent on what really matters: building your product, engaging with customers, and researching what they actually want. Time is your most valuable resource. Use it wisely. 💡

Are you approaching fundraising wrong? 🤔 Over the last few months at Socap.ai, I've talked to hundreds upon hundreds of pre-seed/Seed/Series A #startups and one thing that keeps emerging from the majority of conversations is that they're #fundraising using a "Serial process". How does this look in practice? ❌ They don't have a clear start/end date (even if desired) of the raise ❌ They have a few meetings here and there, some from inbound, some from outbound ❌ They are not creating urgency/FOMO and keep relying on fate ❌ Whenever they have a call with an investor, they pull out their deck and pitch This is wildly ineffective — of course, if you're brilliant and your company is brilliant, you can still raise and get out a winner. But in reality, for the majority of startups, this ends up becoming an evergreen fundraising mode and they quickly become a stale fruit in the eyes of investors. What you should be doing instead is called "Parallel process", and this is what Y Combinator recommends to their portco startups. In short, you try to use time for your own advantage, creating a limited-window bubble where you control the narrative and the information flow, thus achieving the spread of mysterious FOMO. ✅ You're very careful with starting your fundraising process — because you understand that once you do, you need to have 20+ meetings per week (ideally more, much more!) and this requires a lot of prep work ✅If an investor reaches out, you can have a chat but on your terms — you don't pitch and instead try to use the opportunity to properly connect and learn things that interest you (e.g. the market landscape, questions investors are interested in, etc) BTW, this applies to all kinds of fundraising — it doesn't really matter if you're fundraising in the US or in Europe, if you're fundraising from VCs or angels, or if you're a startup or not a startup. ❌ Don't be the entrepreneur who fundraises using the "Serial process". ✅ Start embracing the "Parallel process". We at Socap.ai should know, because we have raised $180M focusing HARD on the "Parallel process" (cc Slava Solonitsyn 💪) Was this useful? Should I share more practical tips & tricks on how to raise using "Parallel process"?

Should you raise money from angels at the pre-seed stage, and how to do it? Definitely, you should. What’s the difference between a business angel and FFF (friends, family, fools)? A business angel actually knows how they’re going to make money from it. Let’s look at an example: imagine an angel who’s an HRD at Salesforce. They have capital and are interested in making returns through early-stage venture investments. A pre-seed HRTech startup approaches them. The angel sees the opportunity to write a check (average check size in the US - $50k) at a low valuation, and then help the team with: Product development Sales (introduce them to Salesforce, or their HRD friends in other companies) Fundraising So, the angel can help take this pre-seed startup and turn it into a strong seed stage company, and sometimes even push it to Series A. Good angels are usually people with solid connections in the startup’s industry. So where do you find them? ⚫️ LinkedIn (obviously, but still) ⚫️ Crunchbase/PitchBook/AngelList (look at who’s invested in startups in your field) ⚫️ Mercury (https://lnkd.in/db6Sm_iJ) (I always read emails from Mercury’s project database) ⚫️ Lists of top active angel investors for 2024/AI/Fintech, etc. There are a lot of them on x.com. What should you write in your message to angels, what mistakes should you avoid, and how to grab their attention? I know there’s already plenty of advice on this, but if you'd like more details, just leave a "+" in the comments 🦄

Excellent points on startup fundraising. Highly relevant and pratical tips for founders... 👇 Yesterday at OneEleven it was great to hear insights from: - William Ma, CFA - VC at MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund - Azrah Manji-Savin - Co-Founder at Syzl - Nafis Ahmed = Director at YSpace, York University My top takeaways from the AMA for startup fundraising: 🎯 Qualify your investors: VCs will take meetings, so don't waste your time on ones that aren't a fit. Do they invest in your vertical? Are they actively writing cheques? 📖 Prep work = Quicker fundraise: before you even need a dollar, make sure that you are curating your list of "qualified" VC funds. Look on Crunchbase, ask fellow founders, scour LinkedIn. 💸 ABF ➝ Always Be Fundraising: the best to time to ask for money? When you don't need money. As soon as you get your existing round, start building relationship for the next. So the time you need money, they know you and your startup's successes. 📶 Fundraise on Traction: especially in the pre-seed and seed stage, it's not enough in this funding environment to fund on a concept. Show that customers are using and/or paying. 🤔 No's = Data Points: the most resilient founder are those that don't take no's personally. It sucks to hear a no, but don't leave without a clear understanding of why. VCs owe you a response, even if you have to follow up a couple times! Any other advice on fundraising? Leave your comments below, I'd love to hear them. Happy scaling 🚀 P.s. shout out to Mike Azzano for moderating and the Boast team for a great event!

Are traditional pitch decks becoming obsolete in modern fundraising strategies? Quick context: Entrepreneurs are rethinking their approach to fundraising, with a shift away from traditional pitch decks. Instead, many are embracing memos as a primary tool to kickstart fundraising rounds. One such entrepreneur is Tara Vishwanathan, a 10x US-based founder. Instead of pitch decks, she kickstarts each fundraising round with a Memo, a strategy that has yielded over $42M for Rupa, supported by 15+ term sheets. Here's why her method works: What's your opinion on this? Can memos elevate your fundraising game? P.S: Repost this post if you find value and can be useful to your network. P.S.S: Want more insider tips on working in the world of startups and funding?  Click on the bell notification to not miss on these exclusive insights and updates. Post source:Tara’s Twitter acc #startups #fundraising #tipsandtricks

Ask me about funding for startups a year ago, and I’d give you an awkwardly blank stare. “Series A, this. Series B, that.” — might as well have been a Gibberish alphabet. Yet, many of my clients were (and still are) busy raising investment left, right, and centre. I’d work with them on their pitch deck, shoot them a “Good luck!” message before their pitches, and await promising news after. Last year, I managed to secure angel investment for a client through LinkedIn outreach, and after that, my curiosity got the better of me. At the start of this year, I stumbled upon Daring Capital, through its founder, Jem Stein. And since meeting him, I’ve began clueing myself up on: - Investor profiles - The fine art of pitching - Fundraising do’s and don’ts - S/EIS initiatives and eligibility - Jumping on workshops & webinars - Heading to angel investor events But also the fact that extraordinary talent is overlooked by the investment market, and Daring Capital is changing that. Their mission? To invest in extraordinary, underrepresented founders building for-profit businesses that make the world a BETTER place. Music to my ears! They’re all about supporting early stage founders whose businesses uplift underserved and disadvantaged communities. Since Daring Capital’s launch last September, they’ve raised over £500k for underrepresented founders. 🥳 So, my fellow founders, if you’re on the hunt for startup funding, here’s the downlow: - £50k - £200k of investment - Free legal support with your raise - Access to a network of corporate customers I know so many founders in my network will jump at this, so when Jem told me applications were open, I had to share. Find more info: https://lnkd.in/eyapjYuU Applications are open until midnight on Friday. ⏰

How To Succeed In Startup Fundraising ? https://buff.ly/3O4iGwZ Raising funds for a startup can be a complex endeavor, requiring strategic planning and a compelling pitch. Success in this arena often hinges on effectively communicating your vision and demonstrating a strong market opportunity. It's beneficial to showcase traction, such as growth metrics or user engagement statistics, to build investor confidence. Additionally, networking with potential investors and understanding their priorities can create meaningful connections. #StartupFundraising #InvestorRelations

𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐩 𝐈𝐝𝐞𝐚💡- 𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐏𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐩𝐬 & 𝐕𝐂𝐬 🚀 I believe that one of the tedious and most time-consuming aspects of the startup phase is fundraising. There are multiple issues involved, and here are a few: 🔶 Just like in soccer, often a manager is needed to break through, someone who can introduce you and open the doors to potential VCs. It often happens that the person who introduces you wants a fee from what will be raised, which is not ideal. 🔷 Another issue is visibility; of course, there are social networks, but they do not encompass all the necessary information to understand the positioning of your company. 🔶The fundraising process is very long; it's essential to figure out which might be the right VC, filling out forms that vary depending on the VC grants or any type of acceleration/incubation program. This takes a lot of time both for those who fill them out and those who review them. 🔷Moreover, it often fails to keep all these entities updated on the progress made; perhaps an application made months before was rejected but in the meantime significant milestones have been achieved. To communicate this, one would have to make another application and lose a lot of time again. Now, to overcome all these problems, wouldn't it be nice to have a matching platform between startups and VCs, sort of a Tinder for startups? Something that combines YCombinator's Co-Founder Matching with the data from Crunchbase. In short, something that, ideally, would simplify life for everyone, both from the perspective of those who need to raise funds and those who need to invest. I would be the first to pay for a subscription to something like this 😂 . What do you think? Is there already something on the market that meets this idea? Let me know 💬 #Startup #VentureCapital #Fundraising #MatchingPlatform

“When you hear the word ‘fundraising,’ what’s the first thought that comes to mind?” Does your answer evoke an emotional rollercoaster based on personal experience? Does it make you think of words like “venture capital,” “equity,” or “valuation,” by chance? Allie Burns, Nathaly Botero, and Aunnie Patton Power’s new piece in Impact Entrepreneur invites us to redefine the fundraising journey for impact startups and break out of the “traditional” Silicon Valley mold. For founders thinking through how much capital they need, what type of capital they need, and where to find these resources, read the full piece: https://lnkd.in/evKFsh-R