Before you start pitching, know what kind of investor you’re looking for and what kind of deal they want Startup founders: how many episodes of ...

What’s the point of a pitch deck? Hint — it’s not to get investment. It’s pitching season again and I’m drowning in bad pitch decks. Each one ...

Avoid these startup traps to ensure the best chance of success Over the past ten years, I’ve mentored all kinds of startups. And I’ve seen ...

Avoid getting over-excited at demo days and investor gatherings When I first started attending trade shows as a product vendor, I would get ...

Put the engineers in trade show booths and make them help with support calls The conventional wisdom is that developers’ time is too valuable ...

Why venture investors avoid service businesses and what to do about it Most small businesses are service businesses. Doctors and lawyers, ...

Focus on building products and serving customers instead of obsessing over raises and valuations At a recent startup gathering, while I was ...

Focus on 1 opportunity instead of trying to do 10 things As an early-stage investor, I’m often pitched by startups offering platform ...

SPVs aggregate many small investors into a single investment to simplify startup cap tables You’re raising a million dollar pre-seed round and ...

A lot longer than you expect. And probably longer than can afford. A truism of the startup world is that there are no startup failures, only ...