Neil Patel

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Are you asking yourself how to prepare for investor meetings? Do you want to make the best impression during an investor meeting so that you can land a check to continue scaling up your business?

It’s easy to have a great business idea and still fail to secure investment. Much of that is down to preparation. If you prepare well for an investor meeting, you need to maximize your chances of getting the investment you need.

In this article, I’m going to share some of the advice I give to entrepreneurs on Inner Circle, which is the ultimate fundraising training where we help founders from A to Z with everything related to fundraising.

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There are essentially five things you should do to prepare for an investor meeting, so let’s look at these now in more detail and get you ready for that critical moment.

1) Do the Ground Work

The first thing to do when thinking about how to prepare for investor meetings is to take care of the groundwork. There are two things you should categorize as the groundwork for your investor meeting. These are:

  1. Your Pitch Deck
  2. Your Investor Research

I’ve written extensively about creating the best pitch to secure investment. It is a way to both grab an investor’s attention and to educate them about what your business is so that there is no misunderstanding during the meeting.

Your pitch deck works well as a concise, 15 to 20 slide presentation. This describes the why, the what, and the how of your business. In essence, you share how this solves a problem for consumers and only one or two stats about the potential market size for your product/service.

For a winning deck, take a look at the template created by Silicon Valley legend, Peter Thiel (see it here) that I recently covered. Thiel was the first angel investor in Facebook with a $500K check that turned into more than $1 billion in cash.

Remember to unlock the pitch deck template that is being used by founders around the world to raise millions below.

If you go into an investor meeting having poorly described what it is you do or are hoping to accomplish, then the investor will grow frustrated with you because they may have granted the meeting based on what they thought your product was, rather than what it is. Here it is key to show the investor that you know the customers that you are serving inside and out. The more data you have to back this up the better. 

With regard to your investor research, you should have a good understanding of the investor, their history, and how they can help your business. This includes:

  • Previous companies the investor has worked with
  • Any businesses the investor founded
  • The niche or industry in which the investor has experience
  • Hobbies, skillsets, etc so that you can build a personal connection and have that background relatedness

This will show the investor that you understand how they can help you and that you have done your homework ahead of time. 

You can also supplement this information with anything you find out about their interests and passions. I’m not saying you should go “full stalker”, but a simple search of the investor’s social media accounts should allow you to see the types of things they are interested in. You can see on Twitter the things they are following and like. Or also you can see on Linkedin schools they attended or perhaps the groups they are part of which will give you a better understanding of where there are similarities between you and them. 

This can be used to connect with the investor during the meeting, especially if you have shared interests or hobbies.

2) Have Your Pitch Deck Ready

The biggest mistake you can make when wondering how to prepare for investor meetings is not having your documents ready to go. By in large, this means you have your full 10 to 20 slide pitch deck ready, along with a separate condensed business plan, team resumes, and more in-depth financials to support your deck.

No matter how good a business idea is, investors will not invest in you as an entrepreneur if they feel you haven’t put in the work to prepare properly. In terms of success remember that ideas are 5% while execution accounts for 95% of it. 

By entering into an investor meeting with all your documents ready to be reviewed, you imply that you are a serious business person who is willing to put in the hard work of preparation. This create a great impression of you and your business.

Also, make sure that your pitch deck emphasizes where the investor’s money is going to be spent and why it is needed. This is the use of proceeds. You need a clear and detailed breakdown. 

3) Prepare to be Challenged

An investor meeting can be anything including a phone call, a conversation over coffee, or even a full pitch deck presentation at a partners meeting. Too many founders feel that when they’re meeting with an investor in a more informal way, this means they won’t be challenged significantly.

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Nothing could be further from the truth when thinking about how to prepare for investor meetings. No matter the setting, the investor is always going to challenge you. They will want to pressure test your ideas, your ability to think on your feet, and the depth of your business plan. Keep in mind that investors are always looking for reasons to not invest in you. 

In doing this, they are going to ask you tough questions. You need to be prepared for those questions. This means not getting flustered. It also means having concise and truthful answers to important business questions at hand.

Remember, investors are smart. This is especially true of venture capitalists who have negotiated the business world effectively. You need to be truthful, even when the truth may paint a less rosy picture of your business. 

You’ll also need to look at your business plan and your pitch deck. Put yourself in the shoes of investors. What are the weaknesses of your business plan? What are its biggest challenges? How will you overcome them?

Investors will try to find these weak spots, so prepare to have the answers ready at hand to put their minds at ease. 

4) Know Your Limits

There are two parts to knowing your limits. They are:

  1. Knowing your investment limit
  2. Knowing the limit of your own expertise

With regard to the first point, you need to have a solid idea of how much of your business you’re willing to trade for investment. This means having precise ideas about the share structure of your business, and how this might be divided up given new investment.

Important to note here is that the last thing you want to do is to present a valuation first. Let the investor talk first and have them suggest a valuation. Then you negotiate it them up on the valuation. If you present the valuation first then you are essentially negotiating against yourself which is a big NO NO.

Investors also want to make sure that the founder does not become too diluted in your stake. It’s a counter-intuitive concept, but the reason for this is that they don’t want your stake in the business to become so diluted with each investment round that you lose interest in the project.

To know your investment limit then is to have a clear idea of the share structure and the amount of equity you’re willing to give away at a specific price.

The second part of knowing your limits is to recognize any gaps in your own expertise. This comes back in some ways, to be honest about you and your team. If the investor has more knowledge than you about something, then show your appreciation for this.

This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t challenge ideas, but you should be open to criticism. Investors, especially if they are investing large amounts of capital, want to know that an entrepreneur will take criticism and advice.

They will not want to invest in a person who is not willing to listen.

5) Make a Good First Impression

Lastly when thinking about how to prepare for investor meetings – and this applies to any interview situation – make a good first impression! Schedule the meeting so that you’re early for it and dress appropriately. Depending on the investor, this means either being in a suit or dressing smart casual.

Be enthusiastic, confident, and agreeable. All these things matter. Investors are not just investing in your business, they are investing in you. Show your best side.

In the video below I cover in detail how to prepare for investor meetings.

FULL TRANSCRIPTION OF THE VIDEO:

Hello, everyone. This is Alejandro Cremades, and today we’re going to be talking about how to prepare investor meetings. Let’s face it; the investor meetings are super nerve-wracking. You don’t know what you’re going to be encountering, who is going to be in front of you, what you need to prepare. So, there are many ingredients that you need to have in place in order to really nail it. Today, we’re going to be covering everything in detail, so let’s get into it.

The first thing is that you really want to do the research here. Before you enter into that room with the investor, you want to know the hobbies that they’re into, the skill sets, the experience, the expertise, where they’ve worked in the past, and have a clear understanding on the background of this investor because here is the thing: at the beginning, it’s all about that personal connection rather than you entering the meeting room and shoving your pitch deck down the throat of the investor, you need to have that personal relatedness, that meaningful relationship that you can start to build there because, ultimately, investors want to invest in you. 

They want to invest in your business, too, and help you build it, but they need to like you. With that being said, you want to understand what they’re tweeting about, what groups they’re a part of on LinkedIn, and things where you can find a common interest that you can go over during your meeting at the beginning. 

Next, you want to make sure that you have your pitch deck in place. You want to have those 15-20 slides that you can showcase to the investor. Also, when you’re meeting in person, you want to make sure that you have a pitch deck that is a little bit more visually oriented with more visual appeal to it, versus the pitch deck that you would be distributing via email, which has a bit more information.

Essentially, you can actually use the pitch deck template below that founders are using all over the world to raise millions. I think you will enjoy using that pitch deck, so you don’t start from scratch.

Next, you need to be ready to be challenged. The investors are going to challenge you. They’re going to challenge your assumptions. Those are people that are speaking with your competitors, that are already doing research on your market, on your segment, and you need to be authentic. 

Don’t try to make stuff up. If they’re asking you a question that you’re not sure about, don’t make it up on the go. Just say, “Thank you so much. If it’s okay, I will follow-up with you on that.” Later in the day, you send them an email, and you thank them for their time, and you also add whatever that question is around numbers that you didn’t know on the spot and that you want to follow-up with.

Again, you need to know your assumptions; you need to know your projections, your numbers over the course of the next three to five years, and be ready to answer the tough questions, and be authentic. Don’t try to be superficial; just give them the answer that they want. It may not be the best answer, but you’ve got to give it anyway.

Next, you want to know your limits, especially when it comes to valuation. The investor is going to try to ask you the tricky question, “What do you think the value of your company is?” Here, you definitely do not want to negotiate against yourself. What you want to do here is, you need to let them talk first. Basically, what you say is that based on the market, Company A to Company C that are your competitors, direct and indirect – maybe they’ve raised between a range from x to y, so you’re keeping it a little bit broad. 

Then, you also say that you really believe in a partnership where there are two parties that win versus one that loses, which is what happens in a negotiation. And you’re basically putting the ball back on their court because the problem here is that the minute that you through a number, they’re going to try to negotiate you down. So, if they come up with a number first, you can actually negotiate them up from there, and that’s why it’s very important that you don’t negotiate against yourself.

Then, you really want to make a very good impression. Let’s face it. You don’t want to be late; you want to be on the dot, really. And also, you want to dress nicely. You don’t need to dress up with a suit and a tie, but perhaps business casual with maybe a blazer, or a shirt and trousers, and then also shoes. They’re going to look you up and down; it’s the way it is. Also, again, you really need to be on time. Be on time; really be respectful of their time, too, even if they make you wait because these people are busy. Just try to be there. Don’t try to hold them accountable for being late or any of that stuff, and just try to make it a smooth-type of an initial meeting.

With that being said, hopefully, you liked this video, and if that was the case, make sure that you hit the Like button. Also, leave a comment, and subscribe to the channel so that you don’t miss out on all the videos that we’re rolling out every single week.

Also, don’t forget to check out the fundraising training, which is the program where we help founders from A to Z, all the way on the fundraising journey. We have templates, live Q&As. We have a community of founders all over the world, helping each other, and I think you will find a lot of value in it. Thank you so much for watching. 

 

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Neil Patel

I hope you enjoy reading this blog post.

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