Imagine you were asked to invest in ten startups. Given numerical ratings on the Team, Product, Market and Traction but knowing nothing about the specifics of the team, the exact product or the domain they play in, can you pick those that actually received a term sheet? Take this quiz and see how you do. Do not read ahead before you do the quiz. ...

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Via: Iterative Path Written by Rags Srinivasan Practicing Effective Pricing

I got this question on a panel last week, and coincidentally, I had a couple folks on Twitter tweet out the same question. Generically speaking, the question is "how do I get in touch with a potential investor about my company?" ...

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Via: Robgo.org Written by Robgo Cofounder of NextView Ventures. Founding advisor at Boundle

Nearly every entrepreneur has heard the refrain, "Get back to me when you have some traction," while seeking funding. From an unsophisticated investor ...

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Via: Infochachkie Written by John Greathouse You can check out my startup advice blog at: http://www.info

People who tell you that VCs won't look at a company with an even equity split are being silly. That has never once, in my experience, been even a slight hiccup, let alone a dispositive factor in a seed investment.→ ...

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Via: Gust Blog Written by David S. Rose Venture capitalist, entrepreneur, angel investor

Today's savvier entrepreneurs, with more flexibility in financing (Kickstarter anyone?), are no longer assuming investors' value-add (sans money) - but are actively verifying that a value-add exists and making sure that they get investors who add considerable non-monetary value or pressing investors who don't, to provide better financing terms. And in some cases, intentionally pursuing "dumb money ...

Tags: Mistakes / VCs / Share:

Via: Vlaskovits Written by Patrick Vlaskovits CMO at @GetDrumbi. Wrote The Entrepreneur’s Guide to CustD

The following is a guest post written by Joe Faris, CPA is founder of Accountalent Management Corp (www.accountalent.com). Joe can be reached at jfaris @ accountalent . com or Twitter at@accountalent.  In our work at venture-backed startups, we are amazed at how hard new employees will negotiate pay, benefits, workspace, duties, titles, etc. and just totally accept their equity compensation. So ...

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Via: Bostinnovation Written by Paul Hlatky Executive Director @GreenhornBoston. Comedian/ Manager. Inte

Today, we ran across a list of questions asked at a Y Combinator interview. Seems the guys over at Stackblaze even put together an app where you have 15 seconds to answer each question. Think fast, or else you'll see: ...

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Via: ZURB Blog Written by ZURB ZURB is a close-knit team of product designers who help comp

I wear two hats one as a general partner of a couple of seed stage VC funds, the other as an occasional angel investor. Wearing my angel-investing hat, I wanted to highlight an issue that I encourage founders to be careful about when pitching. ...

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Via: On Startups Written by Chris Sheehan seed/early stage VC at CommonAngels www.commonangels.com

It's pretty simple and obvious advice, but always discount an investor’s enthusiasm based on how excited they are about a meeting. I also never consider an investor as more than 50% likely to close until the term sheet is signed. ...

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Via: Robgo.org Written by Robgo Cofounder of NextView Ventures. Founding advisor at Boundle

I have a question for my fellow investors - is it just me, or are entrepreneurs lying to you, too? I met an entrepreneur the other day and as he walked me through his pitch he showed a slide that detailed his team and his advisors. On the Advisory Board he listed Eric, a friend of mine. After the meeting, which had gone pretty well, I called Eric. Eric replied, "I'm not on their Advisory Board." ...

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Via: Can I Buy A Vowel? Written by Brad Svrluga

VC behavior sometimes looks insane, but generally it's just sound economics. It's crazy but true: if you know how a VC gets paid, you can pretty much read their mind. Here's a few examples: ...

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Via: Swombat on Startups Written by Dan Shapiro

All too often (and I find myself doing this too), due to the plethora of startups being created people tend to quickly dismiss many of them solely based on the current idea without even paying consideration to the entrepreneur or where it could go. ...

Tags: Entrepreneurial Skills / Funding / VCs / Share:

Via: Nat Turner Written by Nat Turner Co-founder of Flatiron Health. Previously Co-Founder/CEO of

One of the things I'm seeing more and more of lately is startups raising entire rounds from either (a) a group of angel investors and/or (b) relatively uninvolved VC’s. The result of this is a fragmented investor group, often no board being created, and in general a bunch of people who are watching on the sidelines but no one investor greatly incentivized to be involved. ...

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Via: Nat Turner Written by Nat Turner Co-founder of Flatiron Health. Previously Co-Founder/CEO of

In many respects, raising capital is a journey. It can happen in a heartbeat or it can become a marathon. But if attracting venture capital is what needs to happen, a startup needs to stay the course and follow through. ...

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Via: Mark Evans Tech Written by Mark Evans Startup marketer, conference organizer, hockey player, dad,

Today I was on the phone with the CEO of a company with almost $10 million in venture funding. This guy was smart, helpful and serious. We were on the phone because we're running companies in the same space, using similar technologies. But we're targeting different customers. "Dan," he said, "I like what you're doing. I think it's interesting. But it's not a big enough market opportunity for us ...

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Via: Dan Shipper Written by Dan Shipper UPenn junior. Co-Founder at @UseFirefly. Jets fan.

When entrepreneurs ask me about raising money I like to ask them: what's your founder math for VC money to make sense? I believe entrepreneurs should build their business to last with no exit strategy, but if you do have a goal of selling it in 5-10 years some founder math related to equity is in order. If you take a look at founder equity at time of IPO you'll see it's in the 4-15% range and only ...

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Via: David Cummings Written by David Cummings 10-20 tweets per week. Tech entrepreneur who enjoys family,

There is a lot of discussion on the web about raising seed and series A rounds, but not much after that.  I think there is some false conventional wisdom these days that once a company has achieved "product market fit" the job is done.  However, that is far from the truth, and I often hear. ...

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Via: Robgo.org Written by Robgo Cofounder of NextView Ventures. Founding advisor at Boundle

For many startup entrepreneurs, raising their first venture capital round is like winning the Super Bowl. It validates what they’re doing, their vision and all the hard work that’s happened. When the deal is signed, there are lots of high fives and the champagne flows. It’s good times, baby! The funny thing is you wake ...

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Via: Mark Evans Tech Written by Mark Evans Startup marketer, conference organizer, hockey player, dad,

I met with an entrepreneur for lunch recently who had just completed raising a modest series A round. Curious, I asked about the most challenging part of the process. His answer was maintaining the faith in your startup’s vision. It was an interesting answer because you might expect the answer would be the preparations, the [...] ...

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Via: Mark Evans Tech Written by Mark Evans Startup marketer, conference organizer, hockey player, dad,

An "elevator pitch" is a concise, well-practiced description of your startup and your plan, delivered with conviction and enthusiasm, that your mother should be able to understand in the time it would take to ride up an elevator. Everybody knows about these, but few people seem to deliver a good one. A good elevator pitch is not just for an elevator discussion. Use it in every networkin ...

Tags: Angel Investors / VCs / Share:

Via: Startup Professionals Written by Martin Zwilling Veteran startup mentor, executive, blogger, author, tech pro

Subject: Small taxi company looking to expand Hello, I run a small taxi company outside of Boston Massachusetts. My community has been targeted for casino development and I am looking to expand my business. Could you possibly provide some advice on how to find venture capital? ...

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Via: Dan Shapiro Written by Dan Shapiro Google acquired @sparkbuy, so I now work on www.google.com/a

In a prior post about what it’s like to be a VC  I made the claim that even if an investor has operating experience, that experience gets stale after a few years. This led to the following question in my comments: “You mention that operational skills begin to decline 2 years into the job. If this is [...] ...

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Via: Robgo.org Written by Robgo Cofounder of NextView Ventures. Founding advisor at Boundle

Contrary to what you are seeing in the press there is simply too much money in the World at the moment; too much capital seeking too few investment opportunities. Remember the 1930s depression created more Millionaires than in any other era (ever), and now will be no different. A large amount of High net worth [...] ...

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Via: Under30CEO

Following is something that happens to me on a regular basis, with a new and exciting twist. I’m telling this story both to vent (maybe I’m grumpy today – I don’t know) as well as for an object lesson on how not to interact with a VC, or at least with me. First – the [...] ...

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Via: Feld Thoughts Written by Brad Feld I'm a managing director at Foundry Group. I live in Boulder,