The best fundraisers I've seen don't pitch — they teach. They walk into a room and they make you smarter about the space they're operating in, and the ask almost becomes secondary because you're so compelled by what you've just learned.
for many founders, especially those building ambitious products ahead of the market, telling a compelling story is often necessary to attract talent, capital, and early believers
The biggest thing I've learned is that in venture, your reputation is everything. You can't hide from your track record. Every investment you make, every founder you back, every check you write — it's all public information, and LPs are going to do their homework.
The biggest thing I learned from all of those experiences is that confidence really comes from preparation. Most people that I've seen fail in fundraising try to shortcut the preparation phase and just rely on the charisma and the story. The story's important, but you have to be prepared for anybody to punch holes in that story.
for many founders, especially those building ambitious products ahead of the market, telling a compelling story is often necessary to attract talent, capital, and early believers.
The number one thing I've learned is that investors invest in people, not ideas. You can have the best idea in the world, but if people don't trust you, don't believe in you, and don't think you can execute, they're not going to give you money.
The number one thing I've learned is that investors invest in people, not in strategies. You can have the best strategy in the world, but if they don't trust you, if they don't believe in you, if they don't think you have the capability to execute, they're not going to give you capital.
The number one thing LPs want to know is: can you actually get into deals? Because there are plenty of smart people who can analyze a company, but if you can't get allocation, it doesn't matter. So the access question is really the first filter.
Most LPs will tell you what they want to hear, not necessarily what they think. So the way I tell founders to get signal is to ask them to make an intro to another GP. That is a forcing function — if they liked you, they will make that intro.
I think a lot of those predictions are just investor relations saying, 'My technology is so disruptive. It's going to create chaos in labor markets. Please fund my next round at a ridiculous valuation.'
If a startup launched this product and was able to do the demos that they can do, that startup would be able to raise at I would say easily a billion just based on current market conditions. But they're a startup is evaluated a lot differently of course than a you know public company that has spent somewhere in the range of three half billion dollars building this product.
If a startup launched this product and was able to do the demos that they can do, that startup would be able to raise at I would say easily a billion just based on current market conditions. But a startup is evaluated a lot differently of course than a you know public company that has spent somewhere in the range of three half billion dollars building this product.
3mo ago
Underscored — save the words that stop you in your tracks.
