Crossing The Funding Hurdle – A Guide For Founders

Most entrepreneurs find raising money to be a big pain in the neck. They would much rather focus on developing their product and taking it to market. They are passionate about the technology which they have developed, and feel that they can change the world for the better if only they could bring their product to market. Of course, the problem is that they don’t have enough money to do so, which is why they need to find funders who will invest in their dreams.

However, this can be an uphill task. They discover that investors seem to be very money-minded. They are focused on numbers and figures – something which most funders don’t understand well, and couldn’t care less about. All they really want is someone to give them a check so they can get on with doing their life’s work – something which they’ve been dreaming about for many years. When they find that there are umpteen forms to fill; pitches to present to disbelieving sceptics to refuse to admire their dedication; and hard questions to answer about topics they have never thought about, a lot of them get disheartened.

Many entrepreneurs start believing that investors just exist in order to create hurdles for founders who want to dream big and to change the world, but are not able to do so because they can’t raise the money from cynical funders who don’t understand their vision.

Founders need to understand that being able to sell their idea to funders is the first hurdle they need to cross – and perhaps, the most important. After all, if you cannot sell to investors, how are you going to be able to sell to anyone else?

It’s not that investors don’t want you to succeed – it’s because we want you to do well that we ask you hard questions. This gives us confidence that you have a plan to deal with the hurdles which you will encounter in your journey. We want to be your partners, but we need to keep you grounded and down to earth , so that you will be able to tackle the problems which will invariably come up from unexpected quarters , and at the most inconvenient times.

We’ve seen a lot of founders trip up and fails, and we hope that with our combined strengths – your passion and our guidance – you will succeed !

Note: We at Inc42 take our ethics very seriously. More information about it can be found here.