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Welcome to Phase Two of a four-part Splitting Equity Series. If you missed it, start your journey here: Introduction - Early Startup Equity — Getting it Right before continuing on if you haven’t already, and go in order from there.

Phase One - Startup Equity - Avoiding Early Mistakes

Phase Two - Part 1 - How Startup Equity Works ( ←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 2 - Startup Stock Options

• Part 3 -Startup Stock Vesting

Phase Three - How to Split Equity

Phase Four - Equity Management

Let's continue!

Startup companies have been wrestling with how to structure stock ownership forever. As private companies we have major decisions to make, from raising venture capital to awarding key employees with equity to just splitting equity among co-founders — we need a stru...

Welcome to Phase Three of a four-part Splitting Equity Series. If you missed it, start your journey here: Introduction - Early Startup Equity — Getting it Right before continuing on if you haven’t already, and go in order from there.

Phase One - Startup Equity - Avoiding Early Mistakes

Phase Two - How Startup Equity Works

Phase Three - Part 1 - How to Split Equity

• Part 2 - Splitting Equity Today

• Part 3 - Splitting Equity in the Future ( ←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 4 - Calculating Startup Equity Splits + FAQ

Phase Four - Equity Management

Let's continue!

Founder equity splits rarely turn out to be what we hoped they would be after Year 1. The co-founders at startup companies start off with the best intentions, but as the business venture turns into lon...

Running a startup is a ton of work as a solo Founder, so much so that many Founders find themselves at a loss trying to get everything done. For those that are non-technical, this proves to be a challenge, as coding is essential in this day and age, so bringing on a technical co-founder is a must. This is also true for technical Founders missing the mark on the creative front, so it's no surprise that one of the most searched terms on the internet is "finding a cofounder."

It seems like it should be easy — find a co-founder (or more) that aligns with your startup idea, mission, and has the complementary skills to do all the things you don't know how to — but it's not that simple. Finding the right co-founder is a complex combination of effor...

Continuing in Phase Three of a four-part Funding Series:

Phase One - Structuring a Fundraise

Phase Two - Investor Selection

Phase Three - The Pitch

• Part 1 - Anatomy of a Pitch

• Part 2 - Market Size

• Part 3 - Revenue Model

• Part 4 - Operating Model

• Part 5 - Customer Definition

• Part 6 - Customer Acquisition

• Part 7 - Funding

• Part 8 - Key Pitch Assets

• Part 9 - Traction ( ←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

Phase Four - Investor Outreach

Let’s dive in!

Startup Traction is your opportunity to tell investors how far you've taken the business up until this point. Just having a great idea is wonderful, but generating traction is what truly differentiates you from the pack. Especially in the early days, the only thing better than traction is more traction.

Traction Sets You Apart...

Continuing in Phase Three of a four-part Funding Series:

Phase One - Structuring a Fundraise

Phase Two - Investor Selection

Phase Three - The Pitch

• Part 1 - Anatomy of a Pitch

• Part 2 - Market Size

• Part 3 - Revenue Model

• Part 4 - Operating Model

• Part 5 - Customer Definition

• Part 6 - Customer Acquisition

• Part 7 - Funding

• Part 8 - Key Pitch Assets ( ←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 9 - Traction

Phase Four - Investor Outreach

Let's dive in!

Our investor pitch deck is just one of a handful of assets we need to have prepared for potential investors. A compelling startup pitch deck is just part of the package — if we're going to raise money and impress investors we'll need to prepare everything from our elevator pitch to our financial projections to a comprehensive...

Continuing in Phase Three of a four-part Funding Series:

Phase One - Structuring a Fundraise

Phase Two - Investor Selection

Phase Three - The Pitch

• Part 1 - Anatomy of a Pitch

• Part 2 - Market Size

• Part 3 - Revenue Model

• Part 4 - Operating Model

• Part 5 - Customer Definition

• Part 6 - Customer Acquisition

• Part 7 - Funding ( ←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 8 - Key Pitch Assets

• Part 9 - Traction

Phase Four - Investor Outreach

Welcome to part 7 of “The Pitch” — where we look at the funding ask section of our pitch deck or plan and how to get potential investors excited about our business idea.

Let’s dive in!

The real purpose of our pitch deck.

Most business plans and pitch decks are a long preamble to one question - will you fund me?

Ah, the age-old question. 🙋 It'...

Continuing in Phase Three of a four-part Funding Series:

Phase One - Structuring a Fundraise

Phase Two - Investor Selection

Phase Three - The Pitch

• Part 1 - Anatomy of a Pitch

• Part 2 - Market Size

• Part 3 - Revenue Model

• Part 4 - Operating Model ( ←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 5 - Customer Definition

• Part 6 - Customer Acquisition

• Part 7 - Funding

• Part 8 - Key Pitch Assets

• Part 9 - Traction

Phase Four - Investor Outreach

Let’s dive in!

What is an operating model?

If the Revenue Model is all about the clever ways you’re going to make money, the Operating Model is all about the clever ways you’re going to manage costs and efficiencies to earn it.

Operating Models Shouldn't Be Afterthoughts

Often the Operating Model gets the least amount of love. That’s because ...

Continuing in Phase Three of a four-part Funding Series:

Phase One - Structuring a Fundraise

Phase Two - Investor Selection

Phase Three - The Pitch

• Part 1 - Anatomy of a Pitch

• Part 2 - Market Size (←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 3 - Revenue Model

• Part 4 - Operating Model

• Part 5 - Customer Definition

• Part 6 - Customer Acquisition

• Part 7 - Funding

• Part 8 - Key Pitch Assets

• Part 9 - Traction

Phase Four - Investor Outreach

This is Part 2 of “The Pitch” — where we look at market size, how to go about estimating market size, and presenting potential market size.

Let’s dive in!

Market Sizing

Solving the Problem beautifully is nice and all, but if the Market Size of the Problem isn't big enough, you're not likely to get investors very excited.

The Market Size explai...

Welcome to Phase Three of a four-part Funding Series — The Pitch:

Phase One - Structuring a Fundraise

Phase Two - Investor Selection

Phase Three - The Pitch

• Part 1 - Anatomy of a Pitch (←YOU ARE HERE 😀)

• Part 2 - Market Size

• Part 3 - Revenue Model

• Part 4 - Operating Model

• Part 5 - Customer Definition

• Part 6 - Customer Acquisition

• Part 7 - Funding

• Part 8 - Key Pitch Assets

• Part 9 - Traction

Phase Four - Investor Outreach

Any startup interested in raising money will need a pitch presentation to share with potential investors, and successful startups all have one thing in common (most likely) a solid business idea backed by a convincing presentation deck.

In this article, we will talk about the 10 sections of a pitch and what they include.

Let’s dive in...

The Funding Slide in our investor pitch deck summarizes our investment opportunity, including our use of funds, investment amount, and what we want to accomplish in our next stage. Potential investors, from angel investors, to venture capitalists, will zero in on this part of the slide deck to determine their initial investment.

Typically this is the final slide of an investor pitch deck, where we transition from pitching investors to making the big ask.

What do Potential Investors want to know?

Our investor deck should cover three critical factors when we get our "ask slide":

"How much capital? What Round of capital?"

Many investors, from venture capitalists to angel investors, align their investments based on the amount of capital a startup co...