Welcome to the final snippet of the quick course where the money is. By now you know what investors are looking for and have seen the many alternatives for you in the oceans of money out there, we're going to focus next on what is a good process to go through for raising that money. Your challenge has been to pick the best source and by now you can see there are several alternatives. I hope you've been able to focus and make up your mind at this stage. If not return to the videos, consider the alternatives and then prepare to go raise your money. You should plan your campaign don't simply think about one person, perhaps an angel or a local wealthy person to approximate the or call to start over.
You should plan your campaign take it seriously. Don't just focus on finding a wealthy person, an angel, venture capitalist, a banker to talk to plan a campaign spends the time and effort it takes to do a thorough job. It is a campaign. What does that mean? Number one, it takes a lot of time to think through number two, and involves real money. If you haven't raised any money yet for your startup, there's no seed round in it.
You're going to have to live on someone's cash someone's got to pay for your lodging and food. Maybe that's your savings. Second, take into account how serious it is treated as seriously as launching the first product in your company. Now that's pretty serious, isn't it? How do you prepare for that product launch, taking lots of time working through what it's going to cost to get it launched. And then focusing on the marketing, the strategy, all kinds of things.
Well, similarly, for raising money in a startup, regardless of what source, you'll need a campaign with that kind of detail and thinking, as you go along, you're going to get a lot of people that will say, No thanks. That's not for me. You've got to be honest with that reality and avoid the temptation to start to distort your story and try to tell only the good things along the way. There's always risk and sharp investors will always figure it out. They want an honest you're describing an honest story about a real world, not a fantasy. So take it seriously, Think it through, put in the hard work, and you'll have a much higher chance of getting the money from the people you want for your startup.
The reality of what the top tier investors look for, whether they A bank or a venture capitalist? Is management. The entire idea of why they're investing is all incumbent in how well you can transform your idea into a superb new business. The foundation is unfair advantage, that collection of ingredients, the mixes become grandma's secret sauce that gets people so excited. Whenever they have discovered it. It's what frankly makes Googles and apples.
All of the greats have that ingredient the people with the unfair advantage. And like a sandwich, there are things in between market technology, strategy, exits and so on that are very important. And yes, that is thorough. Yes, that is a lot of work to think through. But it's well worth doing. It's the investment you make to get a tremendous result.
That's what the reality of looking for money is is all about when you're ready, think about presenting in the form of a story rather than a bunch of facts and figures. Like famous Don Valentine icon of Sequoia Capital said the best storytellers. Get the money. Get ready, get planning, get going. Practice telling your story. The story should be focused on how you can dominate a new market segment.
The thing you're focused on your competitive power described in that story should be about becoming a real gorilla. The plan that is your story is often described as a deck meaning PowerPoint slides that typically is 15 to 20 slides maybe a little more. It also is term business model or business plan depending upon how you choose to describe it. It's The same thing it's something written to support the facts and figures in the deck as your tell your story, and always has numbers with dollar signs in it and graphs and charts. It's going to take you time, it's going to take effort, you've got to think it through and that's why more than you should be doing this. You need a core team, three people and one to understand business the other about marketing another one how to build a technology, that's classic, and they should be people you know.
It's hard work. It's time consuming, but it's worth the effort. You're going to need in your toolbox, an elevator pitch, the executive summary and business plan. At start OneNote comm you'll find specific courses that will describe what those are and how to use them, how to create them. Your core team is very important, as I mentioned many times I know it sounds overly done in repetition. But it's that important.
You'll need other things and depending on your product service, your sales and customers and so on. But that's what is meant by the idea. It's more than just Hey, let's start doing this thing. Well, now that you know these things, is there anything else that we really need? There sure is. One is to treat this as an adventure.
An adventure has lots of unknowns. The World's Finest investors will tell you, I have no idea how this thing is going to turn out. There is risk in this. You've seen numbers. The numbers show that the odds of this succeeding in that wildest, beautiful, wonderful, result are very low. And there's treasure along the way.
It's more than wealth. People work for reasons other than wealth. In the top 15 or 20 reasons, money and wealth is far down the list, believe it or not. And finally, very important for startups, you have to have fun along the way, or it's not an adventure. Without fun, it's just work. And the joke is that without fun, it becomes work and work is a four letter word.
When the fun is gone, it's time to close the doors. Take a break, and look at what you're going to do next with your life. It's got to remain an adventure or don't do it. Second, remember, along the way you want in three years to be able to have your girlfriend or boyfriend remember you hear family and parents and friends willing to talk to you and customers. They will buy from you again suppliers that will supply you and yes, even if they lost all of their money, those investors are eager to invest in the next idea you have. That's what building character and startup is all about.
If you don't do that you run into difficulties. Whether it's a CEO like Uber that runs into difficulty, or the many others in the prior decades, you'll quickly learn that character building is very important. It's also one reason that serial entrepreneurs on day two in the startup, focus on building the culture of the company, culture, that collection of values that company is based on all how you treat people and behave, whether they're employees, contractors, external stakeholders, customers, or suppliers or the media. character building is tantamount to success in real startup, leaving Well, congratulations, you've finished all the snippets. And you know now where that money is, you know, also the process for going after it along the way. That's a lot of work you've gone through in a short period of time.
I commend you for getting this far and devoting that time and attention. It's important, do a well, you greatly increase your chances of success compared with competitors looking for money from those same pools that you're looking for. These are questions you now can answer for anyone that asked them have you along the way. And you can assist others frankly, that's one reason groups to get together in peer level meetings, whether it's informal lunches, organized gatherings in the locality you live in along the way, or in incubators and accelerators. Your challenge has been to answer this question. I hope you can now and feel confident of it.
Look for other quick courses related to making a startup succeed as it converts an idea to a great success. I'll go there next. I hope to see you there. Goodbye for now.