Dream It

SEPTEMBER 25, 2020

Many of these new red flags that occur during virtual pitching are easy to fix. In this Dreamit Dose, Healthtech MD Adam Dakin provides 5 simple rules to avoid giving investors the wrong impression when pitching remotely. We hear startups pitch everyday and far too often founders end up joining the meeting late.

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This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 21, 2021

I’m a female founder. I don’t have a technical co-founder. These are all of the things I heard from a founder that I recently backed. She was pitching for a pre-seed round of $400k. So what about all of the above statements—things that founders widely hold to be true barriers to fundraising? This isn’t surprising.

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JUNE 9, 2020

While I got some very kind words on my recent writings , I heard from some founders that didn't feel like they got treated fairly—specifically around feeling patronized or dismissed—and that I wasn't showing enough action to improve on that. Founders from communities of color are less likely to have personal wealth to fall back on.

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Dream It

FEBRUARY 27, 2020

But founders are often so consumed with talking metrics, milestones achieved, or the capital they need that they sometimes forget to talk about their overarching vision for their startups. Selling a compelling vision is so critical that some investors weigh it more heavily than the pitch deck itself. It’s not about the slide deck.

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This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 24, 2021

For years, he went on to advise other founders about how to generate VC interest, which really could have amounted to, “Be a warm body with a pulse in a sector that firm got shut out of a deal in.” Founders get “happy ears”. The ecosystem is full of bad advice from founders that couldn’t raise.

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American Entrepreneurship

MARCH 5, 2024

Three finalists received training via workshops and coaching from business advisors, fine-tuning their business plans and pitches for the showcase and pitch competition. In addition to its classroom curriculum, NFTE hosts the Founders Forum Pitch Competition.

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This is going to be BIG.

AUGUST 25, 2023

It’s your job as a founder to find out the specific risk associated with that attribute and to find out if the reason given is the only reason. But if these people are willing to come on without the co-founder title, that’s between them, you and their employment contract. Let’s first talk about the definition of a co-founder.

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This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 28, 2016

The Coveteur article featuring Andy and Bonobos encapsulated exactly how a founder worth writing about will act: ".He 4) Thank Andy Dunn for showing us the way to be one of the best storytelling founders ever. And it’s true: [FOUNDER] is wildly successful. CAN SOMEONE SAY THIS ABOUT YOU? IF NOT, GET ON THAT S**T.]

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Entrepreneurs' Organization

DECEMBER 15, 2021

He has raised venture capital for his startups, helped hundreds of founders craft their pitch decks and fundraising strategy, and invested as a business angel. We asked him how founders can create the perfect pitch deck for their company. Some of these pitches were very informal, sitting at the bar or walking around.

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This is going to be BIG.

MAY 26, 2022

“Personal Branding” The term is fingernails on a chalkboard-level cringe for many of the best founders—mostly because it feels most of the people who spend time building their personal brand don’t actually have much there there behind it. Unfortunately, this has real consequences for founders. So how can founders differentiate?

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Dream It

JANUARY 8, 2020

In our most recent episode of DreamitLive , Managing Partner Steve Barsh spoke with Ron Gula , President and Co-Founder of Gula Tech Adventures. In the episode, Steve asked Ron about his “five slide pitch deck.” Many founders fail to open with the answer to this question. Read Ron’s article on his five slide pitch deck here.

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Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2015

They originally pitched us with a hacked but super productive prototype they built in their fraternity room and a rendering of a beautiful bookshelf sized in-home growing system that they committed to building. One of the first bets we made in Agtech was Grove started by two young, passionate engineers out of MIT – Gabe and Jamie.

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2018

If you haven’t yet heard about Female Founder Office Hours it is an initiative you should be aware of whether you’re male, female or any other gender identify. Female Founder Office Hours gives founders the mentorship and the role models to see that it is in not only possible but also to have a plan to make it a reality.

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This is going to be BIG.

JULY 22, 2015

So when we grabbed dinner about a year ago and he told me he gave notice, and that he had a guy working on a thing (that guy was his co-founder Andrew Childs ), I just said "I'm in." All had enough experience that led them to being the absolutely right founder for the products they were working on.

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This is going to be BIG.

MAY 5, 2015

So I asked a few founders that I've worked with and they mentioned a word that struck me--because I've never heard any of the hordes of people in my inbox asking for internships, VC job recommendations and advice, etc. A lot of people can say they work hard, or work smart, but that doesn't leave me off where I think I'm setting my goals.

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This is going to be BIG.

AUGUST 30, 2020

Talk to ten founders and ten different VCs and you’ll get roughly about 600 different suggestions as to how you should go about your fundraising strategy. Too often, founders look at what they’ve done so far as proof they should get funded, whereas they should really be looking at it as proof of a funding-worthy plan. What gives?

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This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 13, 2025

Recently, Lightspeeds Mercedes Bent offered founders some reasons why a VC might ghost a founder. The post was met with a bunch of founders responses, mostly from men, that equated a lack of response with disrespect. Is it possible that theyre missing out on a deal from a founder because they ghosted the last deal?

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Dream It

APRIL 8, 2020

Jason sat down with Steve Barsh , Managing Partner of Dreamit, to give founders relevant downturn strategies. Jason answers critical questions for founders, including: How can your company ensure survival? Your primary job as a founder is to save the business. What do investors like Jason want to see from founders?

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This is going to be BIG.

JULY 8, 2019

Just the immediate priorities seem to take up more than one person’s potential working hours—so it’s no surprise that when it comes to something like social media, many founders have trouble making it a priority. The consequences of failing to position a founder’s profile aren’t always obvious—and it’s usually all about missed opportunities.

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Dream It

FEBRUARY 1, 2022

When pitching a potential investor or customer, time is of the essence. During Q&A, both sides start engaging in a sort of conversational dance - with one side leading (VC/customer) and the other side following (founder). Treating Q&A as a One-Way Street Founders can take a firing squad approach to Q&A.

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This is going to be BIG.

NOVEMBER 3, 2023

I’ll be the first to back up the notion that diverse founders have just as much ambition, drive, intellectual horsepower, creativity—you name it—than anyone else. There is, however, an advantage that some founders have over others that I hate to admit exists—but one that I would very much like to solve for.

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Dream It

MAY 19, 2021

Seasoned founders have a particular way of answering this question. In this Dreamit Dose, Managing Director Adam Dakin presents his view on the right way to answer it after hearing hundreds, if not thousands, of founder pitches. This should be stated at both the beginning and end of the pitch.”

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This is going to be BIG.

NOVEMBER 17, 2014

They''re new to the gig, super excited about all its potential, and getting out there selling founders hope for that one big gamechanging deal. That''s really all I have to give to the founders I back. Those kinds of requests feel desperate and not only undermine their pitch, but it''s still real time that adds up.

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Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2018

This is a very common scenario when entrepreneurs pitch VCs and frankly is a very common scenario when VCs try to raise money from LPs. When you pitched me I really did love you. I left the meeting and had to attend a 3-hour board meeting where two founders have been fighting and each want the other one fired. That wasn’t you.

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This is going to be BIG.

JUNE 16, 2014

It''s also not the best way to create a helpful syndicate of investors that share the founder''s vision for the company. If all my deals came as intros from trusted connections that I know for years versus at founder pitch events that''s interesting data. Fear not, founders. The first thing I did was trace my sources.

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 22, 2015

It always started the same way – a founder would ask for an intro because they figured he could help with promotion. When you see pitch after pitch – what works and what doesn’t – you start to get a sense of patterns of business model approaches, go-to-market strategies and the like.

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This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 22, 2018

The responses I got came at a time when I've been having a lot of conversations with female founders as well about their fundraising experiences. At this moment, I'm in the process of backing three companies that have at least one female founder and I just finished a round for a black female founder in December. Ducks head.]

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This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 17, 2014

With one company, a founder and his super inspirational, creative, and established buddy hatch a plan to build a very strong content brand that serves as a platform for a lot of diverse revenue streams--events, ecommerce, advertising. The second startup came to me from a founder of a company that I only found out later wasn''t fulltime.

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This is going to be BIG.

AUGUST 16, 2020

The venture capital community reacted to the racial reckoning the country experienced in June in ways I felt were pretty underwhelming—one-time pitch events for Black founders or promises to only meet with Black founders for a month. We’ll follow with events on Fintech, Climate, AI, and other sectors of innovator interest.

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This is going to be BIG.

APRIL 11, 2016

Unfortunately, one of the panelists, Skinny Girl vodka's Bethenny Frankel, told an African American founder in the audience that if she wanted to raise funding, that she should go out and hire a white guy to be the face of her business. Two of the female founders were white and two were of color.

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This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 24, 2014

Not every VC used to get pitched by VC funds for a living and has seen hundreds and hundreds of VC pitch decks. How are we supposed to get better? Not every potentially good VC previously worked for Fred Wilson and Josh Kopelman. Yet, even I wished I had more guidance when I was first starting out.

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This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 27, 2022

Besides, there were a limited number of places where I could do my job in venture capital anyway—and while I might be a go to for a pitch from super early stage pre-seed and seed founders looking for quick answers and decisive term sheets in New York City, the reality is that I would be pretty far down the list in the Valley.

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Dream It

JULY 31, 2019

The press enhances this misconception around YCombinator demo days, where the 3-day pitch event is perceived like an auction, with investors fighting each other for the best deals. Many programs still put a lot of focus on demo day rehearsals, prep, and on getting the pitch deck just right. It did for me, at least.

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This is going to be BIG.

DECEMBER 24, 2018

If enterprise sales is the hard part of what you’re doing, figure out how you can de-risk that first—maybe by trying to pitch some vaporware to buyers or perhaps getting them to pay you to build it on a consulting basis. Second, I’m working on a new stealth project that enables founders to get feedback from investors in a fast and easy way.

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This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 3, 2020

I see this time and time again—a founder pitches a VC or an angel and they say to come back when there’s more traction. The founder then goes off and raises from friends and family or invests their own savings in the idea in an attempt to come back with a handful of customer or users. That’s why we created Feedback.vc.

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Revolution

FEBRUARY 13, 2023

Since the beginning of modern venture capital investing — a relatively nascent asset class — the industry has been biased toward funding what it knows best: founders with familiar demographics (white, male) in familiar geographies (Silicon Valley). One event held by a few investors focused on Black founders is clearly not enough.

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Startup Blogpost

NOVEMBER 17, 2023

20 Tips for Pitching New Business Ideas to Potential Investors To provide you with the best advice on pitching new business ideas to investors, we asked twenty CEOs, Founders, and other professionals for their top tips. You should highlight the potential future earnings while pitching your proposal. Balance is key!

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