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Founders might have to do 50 meetings to get a check. But you can make those meetings 10X better and up your odds of raising money by changing how you answer investor questions. Picture Francis sitting on Zoom. I have a list of 8 questions I want to ask the founder in my trusty composition […]
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Entrepreneur / Finance / Investing / Money / Small Business / Startups / Tech / VC / Venture Capital¶¶¶¶¶
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Antonio Garcia Martinez sold his startup for $10 million to Twitter just a year after founding. Then at Facebook, he was part of the rise of the most successful startup in the last 20 years. This week, I dug into Chaos Monkeys, his inside story of how startupland really works. The Biggest Problems Are People […]
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Entrepreneur / Facebook / Finance / Google / Investing / Money / Silicon Valley / Startups / VC / Venture Capital¶¶¶¶¶
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How do you know if one of your investments is a winner? And when you find one, what’s the best way to double down? I dug into some real venture capital inside baseball with top angel Jason Calacanis on the latest This Week in Startups. One of the best ways to increase your returns in […]
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Want to make that 3 or 4x fund an 8x? Then you better have reserves. A new report from Primary Venture Partners shows that reserves strategy is one of the biggest drivers of returns in venture capital. Let’s dig in… From Good to Great (Funds) Partner Jason Shuman analyzed over 150 mature VC funds with […]
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Entrepreneur / Finance / Investing / LP / Private Equity / Silicon Valley / Startup / Startups / VC / Venture Capital¶¶¶¶¶
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Yesterday, I was chatting with a wonderful young founder in New York. I mentioned trolling Crunchbase to find startups. “Wow, we need to get on there,” he replied. Today I’m going to show you the simplest way to get investors contacting you. It’s free, and it only takes about 15 minutes. When you’re done, your […]
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“Cynicism is the coward’s way out.” Jason Calacanis Last week, I thought, “Wouldn’t it be awesome to be on This Week in Startups some day? Maybe many years from now.” A couple days later, it happened! Jamming with JCal Host and angel investor Jason Calacanis was doing a Q&A session with some rabid fans. I […]
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DoorDash is one of the most successful startups of the last decade, with a market cap of $56 billion. This morning, I watched their YC Demo Day pitch from 2013. Founder Tony Xu shows us a huge problem and gives us strong evidence that he’s solving it. Let’s dig into his pitch… Big Potential Right […]
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More than anything else, I need to know these 2 things about your startup. What do you do, and what’s your traction? This morning, I was looking through a ton of decks I just got from Mercury Raise. This is an awesome program that connects founders and investors. Some of the decks are way better […]
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Angel Investor / Entrepreneur / Finance / Investing / Money / Silicon Valley / Startups / Stock Market / VC¶¶¶¶¶
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I found myself in the kitchen last night, cracking an egg into a frying pan. This wasn’t a normal dinner — this was research. Decks and deal memos are great. But to really understand what a startup does, you have to use the product. So when I had the chance to invest in a cooking […]
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“I have to be a little bit skeptical, or I’d invest in everything. But it’s also my job to ask myself ‘What if it works?’.” If you invest in startups, you have to hit a delicate balance. You can’t give everyone a check . And yet, you have to believe that some of these little […]
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Entrepreneur / Finance / Investing / Money / Silicon Valley / Startups / Tech / VC / Venture Capital / Work-Life Balance¶¶¶¶¶
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