I recently met a great young lady named Jill*. She works at a major tech company and wanted to get into angel investing. But she didn’t know where to start.

Three years ago, I was where Jill is. Today, I have 28 investments and counting.

Here’s the best way to get started:

1) Read the book Angel by Jason Calacanis. It’s less than 300 pages and it’s not boring.

Jason tells you step by step exactly how to invest in tech startups. He explains what to look for, how to meet great founders, and how venture deals work.

This book was what got me into angel investing. I’ve read a lot of other books about venture since, but Jason’s is still the best.

And if you don’t know Jason, here’s why you should listen to him: he was an early investor in Uber, Robinhood, Calm, Superhuman, and more.

2) Join some syndicates. Syndicates are groups of angel investors who invest in deals together.

The syndicate lead picks a startup he likes and sends it to the syndicate. Each member decides on his own if he wants to invest.

You never have to invest in anything. On every deal, you have a choice.

Jason’s syndicate is a great place to start. It’s the first one I joined.

Although I’ve joined almost 100 more since then, Jason’s is still the best.

I also like Mana Ventures and Tom Williams’ syndicate.

I suggest you do your first 10 deals with a syndicate. They can point you to some great startups you probably won’t meet on your own, at least at first.

3) Keep your bets small.

For at least the first 10, I suggest investing whatever the minimum is. With a syndicate, that could be $1-5k.

You need to make around 30-50 investments to have a chance at hitting a unicorn. Make sure you have enough cash to do that.

What you don’t want to do is spend your entire angel investing bankroll on a few companies. You won’t have enough shots on goal to hit something big.

Even 3 years in, I usually invest $5k as my first bet. This way, I can make lots of bets.

Then, I double down on the best ones. I might invest $25k in those.

4) Join OpenVC and Mercury Raise. These are great ways to meet strong founders, and they’re free.

Even if you’re still on your 10 syndicate investments, you can steer the best founders you meet to the syndicate leads. They’ll be grateful for the introduction!

And when you’re ready to do deals directly, these platforms can give you solid deal flow.

My first investment this year, a great company called Mobly, came from OpenVC. And I just met with another Mercury Raise founder this morning!

Wrap-Up

We start with getting some essential knowledge from Jason’s book. Then, we begin to do small deals already vetted by top investors.

In time, we’ll be ready to do deals directly.

This is a crawl, walk, run plan. If you follow it and make 30, 50, or even 100 investments as I plan to, you have a great shot at success!

What questions do you have about angel investing? Leave a comment and let us know!

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*Name has been changed to protect privacy

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