By Getrude Matayo
No matter how great your product or business idea, how lean you can operate, and how big you’ve grown already, more capital and financial leverage will almost inevitably be a necessity.
Having enough working capital and runway to get to your next milestone is vital for giving your business the chance to live to its full potential.
When you have a viable business plan for your startup and you know how much funding assistance you need and what it will be used for, it is time to start looking for investors. This is a scary step to take but being prepared is always the best route.
- Events
Success in business and fundraising is all about visibility, getting noticed by the right investors, who you know and who knows you. Attending events is a great way to achieve this. Try to find out who is attending the event ahead of time and schedule meetings to productive.
- Social Media
Social media can be your best find as a lean startup of a solo entrepreneur looking to test the market, gain traction, and attract investors. It makes it easy to be discovered and is still one of the most cost-effective methods of reaching others.
- Blog
Blogging is one of the most understanding methods of attracting inbound attention, telling your story, progressing potential investors through the process of wanting to invest in you, and remaining visible through each series of fundraising.
- Apply to Accelerator
Popular startup accelerator programs always have an open invitation for applications from serious entrepreneurs. If accepted, you will likely get a modest check to keep developing your work as well as introductions to other investors, business advice, and help in staging future fundraising rounds.
- Start Sharing Your Products
Fundraising and growth need to be strategic to be successful. Yet so far too many entrepreneurs and startups are not focusing enough on just getting their products or service out there in the hands of customers, influencers, and in turn, in front of investors.
- Online Fundraising platforms
Fundraising platforms have become highly popular with sophisticated and accredited individual investors, angels, and even banks and funds looking for new ways to deploy capital.
The major platforms run from peer to peer lending sites which offer business loans to donation-based, debt, and equity crowdfunding portals.
Simple emails have proven to be able to get the attention of notable angel investors. They have even been responsible for the launch of some very important and notable startup.