10. Valuation is temporary. Everyone wants to know what the value of your company is. Just as quickly as an investor will ask for the company’s current valuation they always say “means nothing anyways”. Its all funny money until your company can bring in its first dollar.
9. The less you have for money the more you care. Not saying that you don’t care if you have a lot of money, I’m just saying you become much more aware of what you can do with what you do have. Having less keeps the focus on bringing in the first dollar.
8. If you need advice, ask a potential investor. So far we have met with a few potential investors and I have to be honest, we have gotten some great advice from them. Guess when someone is about to win or loss a bunch of money they are going to walk through every perspective before handing it over, might even see things you’ve missed.
7. Look to niche markets but always keep your eye open for the bigger picture. Niche is nice but not always profitable. In other words don’t put all your eggs into one basket.
6. Backgrounds matter. Your resume of experience, what you did, who you’ve worked with, etc. It all matters, while I don’t always agree with this one it’s become clear that its one of the most important things for an investor when evaluating your company. The same is true for your entire team (thank you very much slipstream and flatterline)
5. Forget the business plan and focus on financial plan. The more you understand money (and how your company will make it) the more you understand how to go to market.
4. Speak from the heart, not some rehearsed line that you think investors would want to hear. I have made this mistake to many times already.
3. Ask a lot of questions. If this is your first startup, ask and ask again. Your not stupid for asking, like anything else in this world the first time through can be rough so be prepared.
2. Location matters. I’ll talk about this one more later.
1. Once you make your first $1, run like hell to repeat it over and over again.
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