InvestorWarmReply: Pre-Revenue Founder Response Playbook

Im freaking out over this chat with a potential investor. How the hell do I prepare? (I will not promote)

1. Don’t get your hopes up. There is a LONG way to go from someone talking to you, being interested, and putting money in. Everyone talks and is all “for you” until it comes time to write a check. 2. Develop the relationship. Right now you don’t have a functioning product with customers. You might as well have nothing. Focus on the relationship. 3. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Don’t think that something like this will solve your problems. Diversify. Build more relationships. You now know how. 4. Focus on the problem, not the product. If you are pre-revenue you don’t have product market fit. That’s where your energy needs to spend. Finding that. It’s like saying I am raising to build a square wheel and someone getting excited about the idea. There is no product market fit. Analogy for illustration. 5. Be yourself. You won’t get money anytime soon. Or maybe he will feel that $100k is nothing. That’s entirely possible. But your goal should be to develop your fundraising formula. This is luck, which coincidently is part of the formula but start looking for patterns. How did I get here? how can I replicate that? Then you’ll start learning fundraising. 6. Other founders. There are those I call wanna be entrepreneurs. They constantly are doing something but not going anywhere. They will waste your time. You rarely will see the doers. They generally tend to keep to themselves to focus on the company building part. If I am deploying a product, onboarding customers, or fundraising, I very rarely have time to hang out around a founders group. I am happy you get this opportunity. Focus on the relationship, build that. Learn as much as you can. Money will come later. Way later. You have to put the work in. Fundraising and startups is all about the connections you create.

First of all, get your hopes down a little. I hate to be the one to say it, but there’s still a long road between “interesting conversation” and “introductions” to “actual investment.” And honestly, that’s a good thing. Once you calm down a bit, you’ll probably take the rose-coloured glasses off and show him the real thing without the pressure of over-promising. He’s likely not expecting polished revenue numbers or an MVP with thousands of users right now. What experienced investors usually look for early is: * do you think clearly? * are you coachable? * do you genuinely understand the problem? * will you still be here 5 years from now when things get hard? Go in trying to build the relationship, not close the deal. And one underrated thing: don’t pretend you’re bigger than you are. Experienced operators spot that instantly. Being early-stage is fine. Being delusional isn’t. P.S. You probably impressed him more with your initiative and conversation than you realize. (And if you ever need help on the building/product side, happy to help there too.)

Look, at this stage, think about what you can confidently show him. Don’t delay meeting him in pursuit of some “hurry up and build something to show” advice. That’s terrible. Here’s my advice. 1. You will not convince him to invest based off this meeting, or even the next. What you can convince him of is that this is worth more of his time. 2. This is ALL about the relationship. Not what you’re building. 3. Show him that you are exactly the right kind of person he wants in his orbit by being relatable, friendly, trustworthy, and competent. 4. What should you send him? The evidence. -Show him the evidence for the problem you’ve identified. News articles, scientific journals, reports, stories. - show him the evidence that you are a trustworthy, relatable person. Credentials, experience, life stories, relatable facts. -show him you have unique visibility on this problem through your lived experience, expertise, analysis, etc. -show him how you want to solve it and why you think it would work. -SHOW HIM THE RISKS and how you intend to mitigate them. This one is extremely overlooked but reinforces everything else, especially trust. -then give him an honest update on where you’re at without inflating ANYTHING. (Again: trust) You will win his support by winning his trust and confidence, not with polished PowerPoints or figma demos. You can do this in simple conversation and correspondence.