I just got off a first call with a founder who did something 99.999% of founders never do.

@naomigoez

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Why it worked

The video provides high-value, actionable advice for a specific professional audience (founders) using a personal, authoritative tone.

Summary

The creator, a venture capitalist, explains that founders should qualify investors during their first meetings to save time and ensure a good fit. She shares an example of a founder who asked insightful questions about her firm's thesis and process to determine if they were a match.

Structure

1Introduction of the counter-intuitive fundraising tip
2Explanation of why founders should qualify investors
3Example of a founder asking the right questions
4The importance of treating fundraising like a sales pipeline
5Closing advice on saving time

On-screen text

An underrated Best practice in Fundraising I just got off a first call with a founder who did something 99.999% of founders never do. I'm Naomi, a pre-seed investor based in New York City, and I speak with north of 100 founders every single month. Most of them never do this one easy thing that immediately can give you credibility and make you come across as really seasoned. And that is asking me questions. What this founder did is actually take the time at the top of the call to qualify me as an investor, rather than treating a first call as an opportunity for me to only qualify him. Fundraising sucks, and it's so time consuming, and it takes you away from what matters most, which is building your company. And what's so crazy is that one of the most common mistakes founders make is actually just spend time with the wrong investor. So when we started the call, I shared our thesis, I shared our check size, I shared the way we like to work with founders, how we collaborate with other funds, and so forth. This founder went out of his way to understand the size of our fund, where we were with deployment, how we think about our pacing, what are other considerations in our investment deployment strategy that might be top of mind for me right now? He also explicitly asked what I was looking to get out of the conversation, what our process looks like. Basically what he did is make sure that this was an actionable opportunity for both of us. So he made sure that I was the right type of investor, this is a stage I like to get into. I am the right person to talk to at this stage of a fundraise and that I am able to write checks at this moment in time. Qualifying your leads is not exclusive to your sales pipeline. It should be an embedded practice in your fundraising pipeline. You obviously wouldn't wanna spend 30 minutes on a lead that can never convert. So with the same logic, you don't wanna spend 30 minutes on an investor who can never write a check into this opportunity. Hope this one save you some time. Happy fundraising.

Original caption

Simplest first call practice that most founders miss #vc #startups #fundraising #venturecapital #preseed

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Transcript

I just got off a first call with a founder who did something 99.999% of founders never do. I'm Naomi, a pre-seed investor based in New York City, and I speak with north of 100 founders every single month. Most of them never do this one easy thing that immediately can give you credibility and make you come across as really seasoned. And that is asking me questions. What this founder did is actually take the time at the top of the call to qualify me as an investor, rather than treating a first call as an opportunity for me to only qualify him. Fundraising sucks, and it's so time consuming, and it takes you away from what matters most, which is building your company. And what's so crazy is that one of the most common mistakes founders make is actually just spend time with the wrong investor. So when we started the call, I shared our thesis, I shared our check size, I shared the way we like to work with founders, how we collaborate with other funds, and so forth. This founder went out of his way to understand the size of our fund, where we were with deployment, how we think about our pacing, what are other considerations in our investment deployment strategy that might be top of mind for me right now? He also explicitly asked what I was looking to get out of the conversation, what our process looks like. Basically what he did is make sure that this was an actionable opportunity for both of us. So he made sure that I was the right type of investor, this is a stage I like to get into, I am the right person to talk to at this stage of a fundraise, and that I am able to write checks at this moment in time. Qualifying your leads is not exclusive to your sales pipeline. It should be an embedded practice in your fundraising pipeline. You obviously wouldn't wanna spend 30 minutes on a lead that can never convert. So with the same logic, you don't wanna spend 30 minutes on an investor who can never write a check into this opportunity. Hope this one save you some time. Happy fundraising.