“What’s the best way to help founders you’ve invested in?” Last fall, I posed this question to one of the top early stage investors. His answer surprised me.

“Share their posts on social media,” he said.

“That’s it?” I thought. “Anyone can do that!”

Yes, anyone can. But hardly anyone does.

Clearing a Very Low Bar

Take one of my most successful startups. Twitter is their main customer acquisition channel.

I try to retweet everything they put out there. And despite the long list of names on their cap table, I’m usually the only investor doing this!

Whenever I see that no one else has bothered to help, I shake my head and mutter. But I also crack a little grin.

“I just beat the competition,” I think to myself.

Just like founding a startup, investing in startups is a competition. You have to be better than the next available investor.

Fortunately, it doesn’t take much! Most aren’t willing to do even the simplest tasks to help the company.

Hacking the Algorithm

The more people like, comment, and share a post, the greater its reach. If even 5 investors all take the time to share a company update, that update could go viral.

A single viral post can bring in dozens or hundreds of leads for a company. So believe it or not, those little likes and shares can translate into serious cash.

As one post after another goes viral, the startup builds a huge social presence.

This is absolute gold. A giant social following means you can get in front of tons of potential customers whenever you want, absolutely free.

Going for Extra Credit

Sharing a company’s social posts pushes them up the timeline on Twitter or LinkedIn. But I have another little trick to nudge them up another critical ranking — the Google search results.

I announce every investment I make in a blog post — with the founder’s permission, of course. I love telling you guys what I’m investing in. But I also have an ulterior motive…

My post pushes them up the Google results. I do this by linking to their website, which builds their domain authority.

My site has been around for almost four years. That’s longer than many of the startups I invest in.

A link from a well-established site like that provides an especially strong push up the Google rankings. Every little bit helps!

Wrap-Up

Retweeting a post or shouting out a startup on my blog isn’t exactly moving mountains. It’s ridiculously easy and only takes a few minutes.

But that’s exactly my point. Most investors won’t help, even in these very low effort ways.

If you will, you have a big advantage in winning the best deals.

Plus, it’s fun! You’re part of a secret cabal trying to get that startup in front of as many eyes as possible.

Startups need all the help they can get. A few investors shouting them out online just might put them over the top!

How do you help startups you invest in?

More on tech:

Meet My Latest Investment: North

Why I Passed: “3L”

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