VC Minute – quick advice to help startup founders fundraise better.
Click below to listen. 1m 36s duration.
Subscribe on your podcast platform of choice
An open letter to your VP of Investor Relations
Dear Sir or Madam, Thank you for your thoughtful email, detailing, the specific items that I need to know in order to properly review the company for which you work. I’m grateful that you wouldn’t waste your time researching my fund to see if we’re the right fit for you. And it’s so nice to know that the CEO of your company values fundraising so little that they delegate it. Considering the information that you’ve provided, we’re going to pass on this investment opportunity.
The CEO’s job is to fundraise. Full stop.
If you’re the CEO, you can’t even be bothered to initiate the process of fundraising. I just, I don’t even know what to do with that. I don’t even know where to go with this. I’m trying to be, you know, serious Rich Maloy from VC Minute right now, but it is just so fundamental that the CEO is the one that’s out there fundraising, that if you’re not the one sending the email, to hell with your VP of Investor Relations.
To be fair, doing all of this work ahead of time to build up the CRM and build up the database and figure out who’s the right fit and fill out the damn forms and all of those things, that takes a lot of work.
If you want to have a VP of Investor Relations—and it could be an intern—get them to do all of this work, but that email better come from you. The name on that form that you fill out and the email address on that form better be from you.
This is a function of your job as a startup CEO. And if you don’t do it at the seed stage, you’re going to suck at it the Series A and beyond. Just send the email yourself.
Visit the VC Minute homepage for more episodes and mores ways to subscribe.
