ACA Inc. Column for Entrepreneurs - Demystifying Angels

Investors often talk about a “one-pager” and by that, they mean your executive summary. The executive summary is an at-a-glance fact sheet summarizing everything important about your business. Although it may be a hassle to create, it is vitally important.

Most people are pretty confused about what crowdfunding is and is not. Here are the ten key concepts entrepreneurs and investors need to understand.

Contrary to what most people think, company growth doesn’t produce cash, it consumes cash. Behind every headline about a hot, thriving company is a team furiously shoveling coal (i.e. cash) into the boiler. Building a rapid growth company requires capital from somewhere.

Let me be clear–there is absolutely no virtue in being obscure. Which is why networking is so often cited as a core skill for entrepreneurs (for example, here, here, and here). What does it have to do with building a business? If it is so important, how do you actually do it?

“If you are really thankful, what do you do? You share.” W. Clement Stone “Thanksgiving, after all, is a word of action.” W.J. Cameron “On Thanksgiving Day we acknowledge our dependence.” William Jennings Bryan Entrepreneurs, let’s be honest: nothing inspires gratitude in the heart of an angel investor quite like a good, timely exit. Exit liquidity, after all, is the necessary force that makes our collective world go round. But that doesn’t mean angels don’t appreciate all the other quirky, sometimes fleeting, but always satisfying benefits of working with you along the way. Fact is, we are nothing without you.

If you can’t describe what a great mentor does, you’ve probably never had one. A great mentor relationship is actually a pretty rare and special thing. It doesn’t come about all that often, and it’s not something that can be forced. But it is worth trying to find one or more if you can, because having great mentors can be so powerfully helpful.

Recently a couple of terrific investors I know, East-coaster Catherine Mott of BlueTree Allied Angels in Pittsburgh and West-coaster Jim Connor of Sand Hill Angels in Silicon Valley were together collecting their thoughts for an upcoming webinar, part of Global Entrepreneurship Week and Global Business Angels Day. It is on fundraising advice for first time entrepreneurs, and catching them while preparing proved too tempting an interview opportunity to pass up. So I pinned them down for answers to twelve questions every fundraising entrepreneur should ponder.

Finding quality angel investors may require kissing a few frogs. Thankfully, really bad apples are incredibly rare. But not all investors are created equal. 25 sins to avoid when selecting your angel investors.

Conventional wisdom paints entrepreneurs as daredevils or wildcatters. Is it time to expand our thinking about the true entrepreneurial traits that lead to startup success?

Could you be an entrepreneur? A start-to-finish reading list for entrepreneurs and people who think they want to be.