For the next few days, I’m going to focus on the MONEY end of things. (Which is a topic that needs FAR more than one blog. So it will be featured in great detail at my Results Now Summit this week in San Francisco.) For new entrepreneurs – or old ones with a new idea or new company, that means fundraising. And fundraising, my friends, is sales. No matter how you look at it, Sales = Seduction. Pure and simple. Today let’s look at the logic, then the promise, involved in seduction. When we’re being seduced, we’re hoping that the payoff is going to be really good. The great news is, when financing and building a company, you have some time before you have to deliver on your promises. To start to determine your financing needs, prepare answers to the following questions:

• What types, terms, timing, and tradeoffs are acceptable? (You’ll need a capital acquisition strategy to determine this.) Perhaps angel investors are most appropriate. If so, you’ll get the money in faster if you focus on a small bridge loan that will convert to equity later. Be sure to offer warrant coverage or a premium on conversion to make investing now compelling.

• Have you prepared for your financing round? Do you have a concise and compelling pitch and list of appropriate targets?

• Do you have your legal act together? You may want a sample term sheet, shareholder or loan agreements, and a confidentiality and proprietary inventions agreement.

• Do you know the dos and don’ts of fundraising?

• Have you prepared a due diligence package? This process will be remarkably fast if you prepare in advance.

• Have you mapped out the long-term effects of dilution? How will you be reporting to your investors, lenders, and board of directors? How will you manage your board of directors?

If you can be prepared with the answers to these questions before you begin your financing journey, your process will go much faster – and be much more likely to succeed.  To shoot the breeze with two amazing angel investors – The Harvard Angels and The Golden Gate Angels, come to my Results Now Summit in San Francisco. You’ll also get a million-dollar education in business acceleration from me personally, and there will huge networking opportunities and amazing strategies for success to help you launch your business into the stratosphere!

To your continued success!

Christine Comaford, Business Accelerator
CEO of Mighty Ventures, Inc.
NY Times Best Selling Author

http://www.ResultsNowSummit.com