Five VC Insider Secrets You Must Know
Here's five VC Insider secrets that you don't know, but need to if you're a founder or CEO.
Hi, I'm Robbie. I'm the founder of Founder Fundraising. I'm a former trial lawyer with 102 jury trials. I'm also a venture partner inside of the VC world, and that's why I'm going to bring you the secrets today so you can know exactly what's going on.
Secret number one is something I got from Sean Purry when I was listening to an episode of My First Millions. He talks about this idea of the deal doula, and it's this idea that VCs see hundreds if not thousands of deals every single year, so they know exactly how the game operates.
Whereas founders might do this process five times in their entire career or business lifestyle. So insider secret number one is that VCs know way more about the process and you cannot trick them even if you think you are smarter than them.
Secret number two is that VCs are judging every single thing that you do.
Every. Single. Thing.
How quickly you respond to email. How you treat wait staff.
I'm not even kidding. I have seen a deal fall apart because a founder treated a waiter poorly.
"Look, I ordered coffee right now. We've been here a long fucking time. She's only filled my cup three times. I mean, when I order a coffee, I want it filled six times!"
Now that makes sense if you're a normal human being. But those are the types of things that investors are looking at when you are in this process, so make sure that you're thinking through what's going to give them trust and confidence in you - the founder.
Secret number three. VCs are much more emotional than founders realize, because in the calls what often happens is that VCs sit there very stoic and they're not really responding anything and their face isn't giving anything away.
But if you talk to them behind the scenes, they're going to tell you that they make decisions based on emotion, based on how they felt about that founder. Because that's how humans behave. Sometimes we just forget it, and you might too. But you want to make sure that you are connecting to them emotionally, that you are exciting them, that you are creating intrigue, that you are helping them to get over that.
Uncertainty because you make them feel something so deeply they've gotta be a part of it because they make emotional decisions.
Secret number four. Not all of them like the same stuff.
Now, this may seem odd because you've probably seen a lot of generic advice. Send a pitch deck or don't send a pitch deck? It depends. It depends on the investor.
Some investors love a really detailed data room and wanna see it after the first call. Other investors don't care about your data room, or maybe they just want to quickly glance at it at the end.
Some VCs are gonna run diligence before they give you a term sheet. Some of them are going to run it after they give you a term sheet.
You have to understand that each one of them is different and they all approach things very differently too. Understand that when you're asking questions for help, some of the advice you're going to get from people is bad because they don't know that investor or they don't understand the specific situation you're in.
What I've seen - and the reason I bring this secret up - is that I don't want you relying on somebody who might have been in B2B SaaS, but you are in climate tech. And the B2B SaaS founder is telling you how you should run your fundraising process in climate tech because they aren't the same.
They are different.
Secret number five is that they're betting on the founder.
They're going to tell you that they wanna know about your idea and they want to know about the market. And of course they do.
But at the end of the day, the thing that they are investing in - I have talked to hundreds of investors and VCs at this point and this is coming directly from their lips - s the founder because it's the only thing that they know is going to survive the entire time.
The idea might change, you might pivot. The business model might change because something better comes up, but the founder is always going to be there, and so what they want to see is who the founder is, who they really are, which means you have to show them.
What makes you special, why you care, why you win. That's exactly why I've talked so much on my Youtube channel and here about the founder origin story. It's what Sarah Blakely did so well. Jeff Bezos does it great. Steve Jobs did it. Whitney Wolf heard did it. You name a successful founder or CEO and they lean on that origin story time and time again.
Because that's what VCs care about. Those five secrets right here from inside the VC world. If you internalize them and then use them, you are going to be so much more successful, and that's what I want you to be able to do.
Because they shouldn't stay secrets for long. They should be out there so that founders who are building a better future.
You can start winning this game and make it come true. Every Sunday I write a newsletter with tips just like this on how you can win your fundraising round faster and easier than ever before. Link is below if you're interested.
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A former trial lawyer and prosecutor in Dallas, TX, Robbie trains founders to become world-class storytellers and venture capital fundraisers.
In barely two years, he's helped founders raise $575,000,000 of venture capital