Five Simple Ways You Can Make Your Investor Meetings Successful

You finally got the investor meeting you wanted. And you not only want the meeting to go well, but you also want to blow away the investors you’re meeting with.

The last thing you want is for something stupid, a preventable mistake so to speak, to ruin your investor meeting. There are five things you can do to make sure nothing stupid screws up any investor meeting you have.

The great thing is these five things are super easy to do. Anyone can implement them.

We’ll start with the things you need to before you get to the meeting to have a great meeting:

1. Get to your meeting at least fifteen minutes early.

The worst thing you can ever have happen is being late to an investor meeting, so I recommend giving yourself at least a fifteen minute buffer. This is especially important if you have a long way to drive to get to the meeting.

For example, if I am meeting investors in San Francisco, and I have to drive from Palo Alto to get there, I might try and arrive at least thirty minutes early because of the variance in traffic.

Then, when you get to the investor’s office early, hopefully they let get set up early. You can make sure your computer connects to their screen correctly. And you can make sure there’s nothing weird with the aspect ratio of your slides.

And one other pro tip for setting up early that has saved me: Have a hard copy backup of your pitch ready to go just in case.

You never know what’s going to happen, and, again, the last thing in the world you want to have happen is for your computer to break or the investor’s screens not to connect to your computer. For example, my business partner, Cathal, and I were in New York City presenting an investment opportunity to a large hedge fund.

No matter what we tried, we couldn’t get our computer to connect to their screen. Fortunately, we had five hard copy backups of our slide deck printed which was just the right amount for the meeting.

The investors and us worked off the hard copies, and the meeting went well. Two days later, we had secured a $50 million investment.

Let’s move onto number two on our list.

2. Only bring team members that will add value during the investor meeting.

This is a tough one when you have multiple founders because going to meet investors, especially venture capitalists, is a big deal for your co-founders. And they will likely be very disappointed when you tell them they’re not going to the meeting.

However, you’re raising money. That’s the most important thing. You’ll have to massage the ego of any co-founder that’s not invited to the meeting.

There are a couple of reasons why you can’t bring all your co-founders to an investor meeting:

1. It will take longer to introduce your team. The team slide is an area of the pitch where you can lose a lot of momentum. You want to get through it fast. And with each person taking about one minute to go through their bio, it takes a long time.

2. It’s uncomfortable for someone to just sit for an hour and not say anything. So, the more people that are there, the more chance there is of one of your co-founders talking over you. And this makes you look disjointed as a team.

Yes, you may need to have a tough conversation with your co-founder, but that’s why you’re the CEO.

I recommend bringing people that augment your skills. For example, if you’re expertise is the marketing and business side of things, then, you should bring your CTO or VP Engineering.

Finally, you should rehearse with whomever you bring. You’re going to do the majority of the talking as the CEO. However, you should agree in advance where your co-founder will step in.

For example, I would bring Jeroen, my co-founder and VP Engineering, to investment meetings. Over time, Jeroen and I knew each other’s moves so well, it was like we were dancing. That’s what you want.

Now, we’ve gotten the pre-meeting prep done, let’s move on to the actual meeting.

3. Get right to the point.

Attention spans are unbelievably short these days. Don’t screw around when the investor enters the meeting room.

Instead, you want to get right to the point. Introduce yourself and start you pitch with an origin story of why you started your company.

Don’t waste words here. The origin story should take no longer than one minute to complete.

Then, jump right into your pitch.

Now were onto number four on our list:

4. Know your numbers.

Let’s say you’re having a great meeting. The investor seems really excited by what you’re doing.

Then, the investor asks you, “What’s your monthly revenue?”

And you answer, “I don’t know.”

Do you hear that sound? That’s the sound of a lost opportunity.

There’s just no excuse, none, for not knowing your numbers. So, let’s go through the six metrics that you should burn into your brain.

A. Your monthly revenue.

B. Your estimated yearly revenue.

C. Your customer acquisition costs

D. Your break even revenue

E. Your current burn rate

F. When you will hit cash flow break even

Investors aren’t asking you about your numbers to trick you. Investors are asking you about your numbers because they want to know what these metrics are, and you, as the CEO, are expected to know them.

So, memorize these numbers!

Finally, we’re at the last thing you need to do. Here it is:

5. Follow the rule of four.

The rule of four is you give your presentation standing up if there are more than four people in the room. This is especially important in meetings with the full partnership of a fund.

You’re right if you think this is a lot of posturing. You are being evaluated all the time when you’re raising money. And part of that evaluation is your presence or command of the room.

I’m not saying that you need to be extroverted or a showman. I am saying that you want your audience to see you.

It’s tough to command a room with a lot of people when you’re stuck in your chair. I saw this play out when I watched CEOs present to the full partnership when I was an Entrepreneur in Residence at a San Francisco based Venture Capital fund.

Let’s say you’re more comfortable being seated than standing up. The way you improve is by practicing your pitch standing up. Keep at it, and you’ll get better and better like I did.

Implementing these tips is easy to do.

The preparation it takes to get to a meeting early, to make hard copies of your pitch deck just in case, only bringing team members that add value to the meeting, getting right to the point, knowing your numbers, and following the rule of four is not an intellectual exercise. Anyone can do these things with a minor amount of presentation.

Who knows? Just like in my case, one of these small things might get you a $50 million investment.

For more, read: https://www.brettjfox.com/what-are-the-11-painful-things-you-need-to-do-as-ceo/