The Power to Pitch with Kat Weaver & Katie Dunn

Speaker A: You have to define your personal and business goals. Are you going to pass it down to your family or you want to 100x your investment and exit the company in years? Two would be defining the amount that you want to raise and what it's going to do impact wise for the company. Third is identifying who that strategic investor is. Not all money is good money. You want someone who's going to be in your corner supporting you at certain stages of the business. The last bit is what materials are you preparing that you need to be able to execute on and get that raise going through faster? And there's so much in between that, but those are the most crucial pieces to expedite and get funded faster.

Speaker B: Here at Kajabi, we're known for one thing, helping everyday people like you build successful businesses online. With our simple all in one platform, we've paved the way for over 100,000 people to create 300,000 products and collectively earn over 3.9 billion billion in revenue. And the Creators Playbook podcast is here to inspire, educate and empower you to do the same. So unlike other podcasts that highlight the glory stories of today's most successful entrepreneurs, we are bringing you the real stories from real people who've created real success to give you the advice and playbook you need to succeed in today's digital marketplace. So if you're someone who's looking to start an online business, then allow us to be the first to welcome you home to the Kajabi family foreign.

Speaker C: And thank you again for listening in to the Creators Playbook podcast. Today I am joined by my friend and past guest, as well as her new business partner, founder of Power to pitch, Cat Weaver, and her partner, Katie Dunn. Uh, how's it going today? Thank you so much for joining us once again.

Speaker A: Well, it's so good to see you again and it's an honor for both of us to be here and share all the exciting updates and my new amazing partner as we continue to grow.

Speaker D: Yeah, thanks for having us, Jared. Really nice to meet you.

Speaker C: Likewise. Yeah, it has been a ton of fun to watch your journey because, like Kat, you were an early, you know, participant on the podcast. I can't remember what episode number, but it's been maybe a year or two back and I've been able to follow along on your journey a little bit. Um, as you've grown and to date, uh, just so our listeners pause for a moment, listen to this. Generated over $18 million in funding or helped generate over $18 million in funding for founders and entrepreneurs and small businesses, which is really, really, really impressive. So everyone, you're going to want to listen into this if maybe you've ever considered getting funding and are wondering, like, is that right for you? And if so, maybe how to do it? We're going to talk about that, but maybe to get started, I don't know how you guys want to do this. I'll let you guys kind of play other in terms of who takes what question, but give us the. The elevator pitch on what power to pitch is.

Speaker A: So the whole mission of Power to pitch is to help founders get funded faster. And it came out of a need of my first business when I was struggling and didn't know where to turn and didn't really have a natural, natural network. So Katie and I help early stage founders with their pitch fundraising materials, and then we'll directly connect them with grants and or investors related to their industry.

Speaker C: Awesome. Awesome. And anything to add to that, Katie, on your end?

Speaker D: Nope. She's. This is a lot of what we do is help people craft their elevator speeches. So the two of us, uh, have this down to a science. She hit everything there.

Speaker C: Nice. Well, maybe I'll throw this question, uh, at you, Katie, since, like, we have a past episode with Kat. For any of our listeners who want to go check out more of Kat's backstory in starting this, but maybe you can just give us the quick rundown on how you encountered Kat and how you two connected, um, to partner on this business.

Speaker D: Yeah, absolutely. Uh, so I was, uh, working in commercial real estate finance. I did deals all across the country. Nothing ever in Hawaii, though, unfortunately. Uh, but did a lot of deals all over the country. And all the while I was investing on my own. I invested in real estate, I invested in stocks, I produced a movie at one point, and then I got into startups and I just fell in love. Uh, and one of the founders that I invested in, I'm the lead investor in her we fund around. She emailed me one day and said, you have to meet this. Her name is Kat. She's helping us with this specific pitch for this specific client. And, uh, you just have to meet her. I think she's fantastic. And so I said, okay, I'll. I'll zoom with her. And Kat and I zoomed. I was still working in banking and took an hour to chat with her. And we completely hit it off and shared the same brain, as we like to say, on so many things about helping early stage founders. Investing in early stage founders, uh, especially helping women and underrepresented founders. And we looked at each other at the end of that zoom and said, do you want to talk again next week? And so we did. And then I ended up leaving my banking job and kind of looked at each other and said, we can do this power to pitch thing together and help that many more founders. You know, Kat obviously has the storytelling perspective and storytelling expertise and I have the investing side. So with that, we make founders so much more powerful and how they're going about telling their story to raise money.

Speaker C: I love that. I love that. And, uh, I think we could probably almost, we could do a whole nother episode on like finding a partner and how important that is. But we are going to, going to be touching on that a little bit today in our playbook in terms of finding the right investment partner. Um, but first let's talk a little bit, uh, about how you decided or what maybe led you into the journey of moving into the digital product space, uh, online.

Speaker A: So funny enough, I was coaching founders on the side and I made a lot of updates since that last episode. So I don't even know if I want to listen to that because there's probably should because to see how much growth we've made. But it was this realization that I can't go beyond myself and there's only so many hours in the day. And I was, uh, repeating a lot of the same information over and over again to founders that really needed it. Various stages, mostly in the super early precede to seed stages, meaning that the founders are raising between around $500,000 to $3 million in outside capital or even under $100,000 in grants. And so I looked up so many different platforms. I watched all of the YouTube videos. I even figured out that, you know, I wanted to go in to learn how to create a course and took a course on how to create a course. So the irony of it was, was pretty funny, but I wanted to make sure that I could put down the high level and foundational pieces to be able to share with founders. And then we offer a coaching element on top. And when I did an ungodly amount of research, I found that Kajabi had all of the tools that we needed in all in one platform. Especially. Katie and I are not super technical people and we're not going to lie and say that we are and we're happy to bring on the right people to tell us what's right and wrong for it. So it was a great insight and so easy to pick up for, for people who don't do that constantly or don't need to code things. We knew we needed that. A prerecorded, you know, course section. There's a community feature. We can now even do the affiliate side of things and host our email in one place. So it checked a lot of boxes compared to the other pro, uh, the platforms for us.

Speaker D: And Kat was already using it when I, when I joined her. And so I was shocked at how simple it was to use. And I'm a very much a data person and looking, being able to look at the analytics really quickly and easily. I mean, I have Kajabi open every day. It's just like one of my browsers that's always open. Uh, but being able to look at the data so simply and there's graphs and there's. It's just digested so well. I really. That's the thing I love the most, personally.

Speaker C: I love to hear it. I love to hear it. Well, take us through a little bit about, uh, I think you have a very strong, loyal audience. Um, it's, you know, one of the things we've been talking about a lot at Kajabi and in a number of our different, uh, conversations we just released a creator report, um, and several other things is that you actually don't need an enormous audience to make money online. So I'm interested, from your perspective, any tips that you have, either of you, that you would have for another creator, um, or maybe thinking about monetizing, but they only have a small audience to begin to monetize on.

Speaker A: I'm going to pick on Katie for this because I was so adamant about this one thing, even though I was very early in it. So I want her to tell her side of it because neither of us had a very big audience at first. At all.

Speaker D: Yeah, Kat's team me up for this. So in my previous corporate role, I was not able to really post on LinkedIn or have a social presence or talk about things, um, that I knew or experienced. And so she really, cat really challenged me last year to, or even the year before to get into LinkedIn and post more. And so I made a commitment to her and myself last year to post on LinkedIn five days a week. And then I upped that to six days a week towards the, uh, last quarter of the year. And it's really built our audiences. Kat had 10,000 followers last year. I just reached 9,000. But the biggest advice I have is, well, two things. Be authentic, be truthful, just be yourself. And then the second thing is just speak like you're Speaking to one person, have one person in mind. When you're thinking about what you're creating, thinking about who you're serving, thinking about what you're posting, and serve that one person very specifically. You'll be surprised at how many other people actually need that and take that, ah, advice that you're providing. But it's if you have one person in mind rather than thousands, you're going to make such a bigger impact overall.

Speaker C: I need, I needed to hear this because as I try to do this myself, uh, I probably, I don't know how many followers I have. Not a lot. Um, but, um, I think focusing on that core customer, if you will, that person that you're trying to talk to is such an important step in any business. Not just in building an audience, but in building a product in virtually every other aspect of the journey that you're going to go down. So why not do it at the forefront? Um, well, I'd love to also just get an understanding. I kind of, I spoiled a little bit of this at the beginning. But let's talk about the results and the impact that you guys have seen so far since uh, starting off on Kajabi.

Speaker A: So I can start with this one because this is so we started on Kajabi and have continued since inception. I did not go to any other platforms. It was so well integrated and I like seeing a lot of the updates. So like the affiliate things and a lot of the recent features have been super, super helpful. But that has allowed us to track and then reward people who are promoting our work because we have no issue in wanting to send, you know, thank you in affiliate payouts to people who continue to support us, even the founders in our program, and to be able to figure out what that looks like, who's referring us how frequently. That's been a really, really important feature as we track and we grow and then to different type of payment plan options that we've offered founders. We went from being an upfront fee to realizing that, you know, a lot of early stage founders, they need to be able to break things down, especially if they're a consumer product company and they are paying for a lot of inventory. The monthly payment plan option has been really huge and not only for us being able to track things, but then the, our founders also benefit because they can split things up and we can be hands off.

Speaker C: Yeah, I'd be interested in too just even hearing like, uh, I know we didn't get into this in too much depth at the beginning, but do you have maybe a favorite success story or anything in terms of like your customers, that you really was really meaningful to you to help them get that funding.

Speaker A: How about I do one and Katie does one? Because we could, we could go all day long with this.

Speaker C: Let's do it.

Speaker A: One recent one was a, ah, founder who used our foundations of our pitch that we had really, really drilled down. Didn't let him move on through the course without checking these certain box and ended up winning $100,000. Got six VC meetings and five angel meetings with the same template that we've been working off of. And the thing was that that founder, you have to put in the work, you have to make sure that we look for the coachability and the transparency and the grit associated with things. But this was just a week and a half ago and we have a whole WINS channel within our community that founders get to share and celebrate with any for each other. And we didn't even know that he was going for that opportunity. So it was really incredible to, to see the work come to life.

Speaker C: Nice. How about you, Katie?

Speaker D: So last summer we ah, a venture capital firm that we um, really love was running a contest. So it was a uh, 200. The grand prize was $250,000 of investment, but it required a video, a live pitch competition and two rounds of public voting through their app. So it was very intense and they had to put together a ton of material. They had to film, they had to be live. There was so much that they had to put together to say, uh, and we had a couple founders apply. We had one of our founders got to the finals and then won. And that was really, really, really exciting. They were very well deserved. Um, but it just being able to be there and support them the whole way was so exciting. And I actually got to be in person for their live portion in New York. So that was super fun. But just seeing the founders, anytime we hear founders get a check or I have somebody in my angel investment network that reaches out and says, hey, I saw you post about this company. Um, I'd love to meet that founder. I mean that just gives us so much joy because that means we're doing what we've set out to do and accomplishing our goals for, for our founders.

Speaker C: Well, we're going to dig into the, the money aspect of this in our playbook in just a minute. But before we dive in there, I, I'm also really interested, uh, in just any tips you have or uh, any, anything that you've learned throughout your journey of uh, building this community. Around funding. Um, like, how have you. How have you driven engagement and how have you fostered just a sense of belonging amongst. To the. Your social audience as well as the people within your internal community?

Speaker A: I think there's a lot of hype around AI and how it's replacing so many people in jobs. And the one thing that I don't think it can replace is the camaraderie and support within an actual community. I think that's something that really big course creators do really well is bring together a community, because not only are they cheering you on, they're able to support each other. Like, Katie and I might not have a connection to something. And if they post in our community, the odds are if someone else does within there and it allows us to be more accessible versus them just churning out and, you know, buying the course online and then never seeing us again. We want to make sure that they're actually implementing those things. And I think that has been so instrumental. And the, A lot of the research that I was doing was the community piece is what is going to actually help you grow more than anything. And it allows us to garner more feedback. And I think that there is a huge, huge future in community. But I'll let Katie add to it because it's something we've had since the beginning.

Speaker D: Yeah. One thing we do every week, uh, on Wednesdays, we have our group coaching calls. So it's not mandatory for people to join. We use Zoom. Uh, sometimes there's seven people, sometimes there's 20 people. But we've had a number of people tell us at different times. This is my favorite thing about it, because this is like startup therapy. They can come in and just say, you know, hey, I'm really frustrated with this situation. Do you have any insights? You know, we had one founder come in and say, uh, there's this guy that told me he's going to invest in me, but he hasn't written the check, he hasn't responded to my emails. He, you know, he's, uh, what. What do I do? And so we gave him some advice and said, you know, set a meeting. Send him an actual meeting request and ask him to get on the phone, send him the paperwork with it if you haven't sent it so far. And he did all that, and that's what got the guy to move and write that $100,000 check for him, which was so critical. And so, like, just little things like that where we can help assuage the founder and their fears and their frustrations. Um, is really Helpful. And like Kat said, seeing the founders talk to each other or support each other, there's always a chat going on saying, like, oh, I want to buy your product, or, um, oh, you should totally meet this person. I mean, that brings me so much joy as well, to see them interacting with each and cheering each other on.

Speaker A: And we had a founder this morning who said, hey, I want to launch on Test Flight. Do you think it's worth it? What resources do you have? And we have a whole thread there because I think when you're a founder, you understand the feeling of dread and this roller coaster of emotions and struggle and excitement, so you're more willing to share if you know someone is actually going to listen and benefit from the support that you give. So we're not just posting random questions to get people talking.

Speaker B: We're.

Speaker A: There's so many founders with so many problems that it's easy for there to be constant questions. But part of our program is that we require certain materials to be approved by us in order to garner those investor introductions. So it forces them, they have to be active. Otherwise we're not going to make intros. We have to make sure we're approving their materials. We look at every word that's going to come out of their mouth, because the order in which you say things is so, so, so important. So we naturally have some driven interaction within the community.

Speaker C: Yeah, that, that's so, so important. I think just, let's just call it right out there. I think whether you are founding a software startup, whether you are starting a YouTube channel or anything that you're doing within the realm of starting a business, it can be a really lonely endeavor. Nobody, uh, gets you. Your family probably won't get you. Unless you're fortunate enough to have a, you know, a series or a few family members who've ran their own business. Um, and so that community is so important to anyone who's taking that journey or taking that leap into starting something. So those tips really mean a lot. Um, let's. Let's dig into the playbook now. Like, let's talk about, you know, first of all, when should someone even consider seeking funding? And then next, maybe how we can consider moving down the path towards acquiring some of those dollars. So, um, um, let's start. Let's just break this down into a few steps. I don't know who wants to start. Kat or Katie, either one of you. Uh, lead the way.

Speaker D: I can start, um, so that, you know, I think the press out there talks about all these companies raising Venture capital. And it makes it sound so sexy and exciting and like that's a measure of their success when in reality it's not a measure of success because it just means you have money. It doesn't mean you have revenues or you have made the impact you want to make. And uh, and only 1% of small businesses actually raise venture capital money at the end of the day, so it's really a small percentage. Um, and the first thing you need to think about is what are the goals for yourself and for the company. So do you want to run this business for the rest of your life and pass it down to your children? That's a great, that's a great plan. Please go for that if you want to do that. But uh, don't raise money from outside investors because venture capitalists, what they want to do is to give you money and then have you scale your business really, really, really quickly and sell it within 5 to 10 years and return 50 to 100 times what their original investment is. So if you're not willing to go in and scale at all costs, it's not the right way to run your business. So if you also, if you want to run your business for 20 years and then sell it, that's great if you, but if you really want to build, if you want to build something that's scal. That has a tech component or a proprietary component to it that can um, really take off and go viral and you can build on that and build on that and then sell it for a ton of money. That's when you should take investment. Uh, and if you really need the money to grow fast, that's what money can do for you, is help you grow fast. Uh, if you've got revenues that allow you to chug along and you're happy with all of that, keep it going. But it's really about assessing what your goal, personal goals are and what the goals for the company are first and foremost.

Speaker C: I have a quick follow up question to that and that's uh, for anyone maybe you know, we're seeing this transition, if you will, not to like over glamorize the, the creator economy, if you will. But like we are seeing new forms of businesses really come into play. And so I'm just curious how you maybe think about, um, for anyone who is thinking about starting a course, for example, or starting some type of digital product, um, is that something that you would maybe consider seeking funding for?

Speaker A: You have to think about what you have that is not easily repeatable. You have to have Something proprietary, not just driven straight by hiring people. Like we'll have some agency models come to us and say, you know, I want to buy, I want to, I want to raise money to hire a marketing person, uh, this person and this. And it's straight people, not actually, not something tangible, whether it's technical or physical. So you have to think about how the barrier to entry is. Like if someone were asked to try and copy you, how easy is it? Because investors aren't donating to your cause, Just because they think it's a good idea doesn't mean they're just going to throw you a check and walk away and it's going to be silent money. That's not ever how that works. So in terms of that sort of model, it's, you know, what do you have that is extremely unique and not easily repeatable at the end of the

Speaker C: day that makes sense. Well, take us, take us through. After you've identified those, uh, personal goals, what's next on the list?

Speaker A: So the next biggest thing is defining the amount of money that you would need. If you do want to pursue venture capital from an angel VC or family office, you have to figure out what that magic number is. It is not a guess, it is something you have to be prepared to have a complete educated conversation about to figure out where every single dollar is going to go. So for example, and you'll want to think about it over a timeline too. So is that money going to last you 12 months, 16, 18, whatever it might be. And to reach certain metrics. So what KPIs or key key performance indicators are you trying to achieve? Is it a certain number of revenue customers, reduce costs, build out a certain level of technology, uh, launch or do some sort of testing. You want to define the high level buckets and goals of what the impact of that money is going to do and it's going to make it EAS for you to then break it out into. I'm going to put $25,000 here for this, this and this and then $75,000 here for this, this and this. So if you're, if a founder comes to us and says, you know, I only need a hundred thousand dollars, well it's probably something you can get grant wise or even do some sort of loan, a line of credit, which Katie's specialty and debt is cheaper than equity. So we always say look at those options first. But if it's a large build out, it's very technical. That's, you want to really outline what a specific dollar amount is going to do for you.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: Anything to add to that, Katie?

Speaker D: Uh, what Kat is talking about is all in your financial model. So figure out how to build the financial model. Use your, find a fractional CFO to help you or another company we love is forecaster. Uh, they will help you build that out to show exactly that timeline how the money is going to get spent, what levers you're going to pull to increase your revenue. And the money that you're raising should go to building up the revenues and go to forward looking projections. You know, don't use it to pay down old debt, don't use it to pay just salaries. It should, it should go to investing in the growth of the company. You should be able to point to that. Exactly.

Speaker C: That makes sense. So once you've identified that funding is right for you, you've got the, you've got the amount figured out, you've got this nailed down to a T. Uh, talk to us about what's next. What, what's the next step I should take?

Speaker D: So the next step is really figuring out what you want out of a strategic investor and what that person looks like, what skills do they have, what networks do they have, what background do they come from, um, and build off of things that you don't have. So if you are a marketing person and you, you know, you know, you have a big network of marketing people, don't go after another marketing person who, because you both know the same exact things, go after somebody that's in finance if that's not a strength for you, that, or go after somebody that has, say of a consumer packaged good product that has distribution experience that can help you get into some retailers, you know, look at what's missing from your own network so that you can leverage that advice and that person to open doors from you in that, in those situations. So it's, it's really taking a hard look and saying okay, what are my skill sets? Where does my, where do my strengths lie? And that, what do I need to support me? And finding people that can do that. And angels are a great way to do that. You know, even taking smaller checks from angels, they can be the most effective networks you have. So you, you have a couple people that you can ask for help in those situations. They're going to make those calls, they're going to make those intros, whatever it takes.

Speaker C: Uh, uh, a follow up question to that, just for someone like me who's new to this, uh, this world, if you will, is where does one even start to, to Find that ideal person, where do you go looking for them?

Speaker A: So it's, it's really tough if you don't have a natural network. So investors are usually taking warm sort of introductions. But for someone who maybe doesn't have a natural network, there are resources like Crunchbase, even LinkedIn or Twitter where investors and funds actually publicly share their details in their bios. So doing the dirty work of trying to filter through some of those platforms, but by outlining the type of person you need, that's going to make it easier and creating kind of a hit list of sorts and paying for lists or getting mass email outreach is never, ever, ever going to work. We assure any founder listening that that is not the way to go. You're better off with 50 hyper targeted, very, very concise, clear, detailed emails that are directed to that exact person than a five, uh, hundred person email blast to those that are random and potentially ruining future relationships. Because investors don't have a problem with deal flow. Essentially they're bombarded by hundreds of pitches a day. They have a problem with good deal flow. So we always say we're the good deal flow because we're keeping things so high level, so strategic and so targeted. But coming up with that sort of hit list and working on getting someone on a call for even 15 minutes, it's not 30 minutes, it's not an hour, it's not sending them loads of materials and super long emails. It's, it's getting really, really clear on what you want from them and doing that outreach. But if you happen to have a mutual connection to someone, asking them or a potential even founder that you networked with within a certain portfolio for that introduction is going to be way, way, way more successful than you trying to do outreach on your own.

Speaker D: There's a lot of networks out there or entrepreneurial communities in person over zoom and taking the time to meet with those people and talk to those people, there are always investors there, there are always strategic advisors there and just networking with other founders and saying, you know, how did you find this person or do you do. Have you ever run across somebody that knows this and who knows, maybe another founder could be uh, an advisor for you. So it's, you have to put yourself out there and don't be afraid to make an ask, but just be clear and concise about it. Don't I get DMS that are pages long and I have to go back and say I'm sorry, this is too long to read, but can you please, you know, ah, give me a direct ask of what you're looking for and I'll try and help you. So that's, it's really being clear and concise about what your ask is and what you can, what value you bring.

Speaker C: That makes so much sense. I'm probably one of those people guilty of sending a book, um, to tell you about my idea or offer. So that one, that one hurts when I hear it. Um, and that makes a lot of sense. Like, I think, you know, no matter where you come from, like, we now live in a world to where essentially the entire world is accessible to us at our fingertips in ways that were never the case. You know, years ago you would have had to have like, had a very, very strong in person network and been at the places to where the people are that could potentially have the money. But today, you know, anyone can hop on LinkedIn and, you know, create a free account and reach out to someone. And of course, I think in that case, if you're going to reach out to someone without that strong network, what you're giving them has got to matter a ton. So, uh, help me through the process of, like, what on earth do you even show up with? Um, you know, when you're starting to, you've got those ideal partners found, what do I give them to win them over?

Speaker A: So, contrary to popular belief, the pitch deck is not the end all, be all. We have a lot of founders come to us and say, hey, you know, I've got a great deck, or I want your help designing a deck. And then I'm ready for intros. And 100% of the time they're not actually ready. And relying on a pitch deck usually overdoes things. And the average deck gets scanned in less than 90 seconds anyways. So the odds that someone is really taking the time to go through the necessary information is slim to none. So one of the tricks and pieces that we really rely on and kind of force founders to create in our program is a one pager. Yes, the deck is important. We go through two pitch formats, but a one pager is a simple one page PDF document with bulleted information, imagery, team info ask. It is so clear and essentially summarizes the deck where you aren't giving 100% of everything away. You want to excite someone enough to try and get them on the call to be able to share the deck. Will you be asked to, you know, share a deck and you might have to do it? Absolutely. But trying to get someone on a call to go through it is the most important thing. And then we Actually create force founders to do a 60 second pitch and a five to seven minute investor pitch with the intention that you have to understand investors are so busy that if they gave you 10 to 15 minutes of their time, how could you get out all the things that you need to say with enough time for building a relationship, for some basic pleasantries and then Q and A to talk about next steps. It's not all the things at once and then Katie can talk more to this, but a data room is also super crucial and that at that point it's the only relevant time to also share an NDA. No one should need an NDA to see your pitch deck either. It's a big issue and common question that we get. But the data room is something that is shared at next steps. It is financials, it's who's on your cap table. All those fun nitty gritty details where someone has genuine interest, they're going to take the next steps. But you shouldn't be taking calls with investors if you don't have these things prepared because you're going to get caught up and then the investor is going to think that you're wasting their time.

Speaker D: It's really so much about relationships and building the relationship. So that first meeting could be a get to know you session rather than a very formal pitch. Um, you know these relationships are longer than some marriages. You got a date first. You have the, I like to say that the, the one pager is like the coffee date. You're given the high level info and then maybe the second meeting is going through the pitch deck and that's maybe dinner and then you know, you got to go through the steps and keep chatting. You know the data room is maybe you move in together and then when you get the check, that's when you get the rings on the finger and the ceremonies happen and you had the big party. But it, you have to build up that trust and that relationship. And it's like Kat said, it's not about the deck. We also one thing we like to say is you are the hero, the deck is the sidekick. So getting yourself in front of somebody and having a chat like we're just like we're doing now, sharing information, having an open discussion with one person talking, another person listening and taking turns with that. Not just dictating some one person dictating the whole time is really critical. Just building the trust and building the relationship will win the day.

Speaker A: I hope you tee that up for uh, LinkedIn post actually because that was a fantastic analogy.

Speaker D: I Should.

Speaker C: Yes. Well, speaking of LinkedIn posts, I know I'm going to be man taking a bunch of ideas from this, uh, you know, so I can get myself back in the motion. Um, I've been a little bit out of touch. Um, but uh, yeah, that makes so much sense in terms of like being clear, being concise, very, very sure of what you want to offer. Um, I guess like my one follow up question is, you know, after we've, we've got the one pager to them, uh, just give me just, just like the brief uh, timeline of like how long does it typically take maybe to go from that stage of I've given them my one pager to I actually have a dollar in the bank, uh, of sorts of.

Speaker A: So it's funny, I was at a venture conference this past Friday and investors with uh, half a billion and even billion dollar funds were saying that I typically know the if I'm going to write a check within the first five minutes of getting on a call with someone or meeting them in person. Now granted, there's going to be a lot of time and materials before then. We're seeing the average raise time between six to nine months. Especially for angels and funds who want to do big due diligence. It could take even longer. But we've had founders in our program join and within two weeks they've got their first angel check already in the bank. So it depends on relationship. Have you built the trust? How long have you known them? What have you already shared? Has someone vouched for you? Have you given them enough reason for excitement? And you've been clear in your asking things. So there's no perfect box of an answer. In a way we've seen it across the line, but as Katie said, the relationship is so important. So we see that the more time spent on building the relationship and being transparent, the quicker a check is going to come in.

Speaker D: Yeah, having all those materials ready at your fingertips, having the, the data room ready to go, having the one pager, having the deck and knowing the steps you're going to take, having your legal, the legal documentation, whether it's a safe note or a convertible note or if you're raising on equity. But having all that stuff lined up perfectly will speed up the process because if you're, if you. I had one, uh, founder come to me and say, well, I started pitching to VCs and they asked me for my data room. And I don't even know what goes in a data room, but they want, they want to see my data room. And I just put my head in my hands and said, no, you can't. Because if you don't have that stuff ready to go, when the people are ready, they're going to think you're unprepared and you're not detail oriented and you just shot yourself in the foot. So it's really about, and I'm not saying everything has to be 100% perfect, but having all of the stuff ready to go, it shows how prepared you are and how ready you are to put their money to work. Um, one thing I like to say to founders, if you're talking to an angel or a VC and you know what their check size will be or could be, tell them in the meeting you're going to write a $25,000 check. If I get that tomorrow, I'm going to spend $10,000 on advertising, $15,000 on inventory. And what that's going to do in three months, that's going to equate to an, uh, increase in revenues of 20% or whatever the number is, is being very, very specific about the power of their money will give them a little bit of an ego boost. Like I can, I can make that big of an impact on your business. How exciting is that?

Speaker C: Yeah, uh, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Well, I think you've walked us through this process like, incredibly well. I know I have a lot of follow up I need to do and research that I need to do. But for our listeners, and we've never done this before with two guests, so we've never walked back through a playbook. Normally we go through and just walk through those steps really fast one more time or at least cover the headlines. So I don't know how we want to do this, if we want to switch off or if one person wants to take it just in a simple, concise form. Um, maybe one more time. Take us through this playbook.

Speaker A: I can, I can do it. I can do it. Here we go. So the first one is you have to define your personal and business goals. Are you going to pass it down to your family or you want to 10, uh, 100x your investment and exit the company in years? Then two would be defining the amount that you want to raise and what it's going to do impact wise for the company, specifically breaking down that bucket, the buckets of money out. Third, I would say is identifying who that strategic investor is, because again, you're not taking silent money. Not all money is good money. You want someone who's going to be in your Corner, specifically supporting you at certain stages of the business, being someone that you can call up to support you in a time of need. And then the last bit is, what materials are you preparing that you need to be able to execute on and get that raise going through faster? And there's so much in between that. But those are the most crucial pieces that we're having founders check boxes in order to expedite and get funded faster.

Speaker C: Well, if you heard just that clip, you're definitely going to want to listen to this entire show where we go into each of those steps in more depth than we had just right there. But for all of our listeners who are here for the whole show, um, I'd love to just get both of your perspectives. Maybe I don't know who wants to start, but take, uh, us through just any advice you have for someone who is on the fence about just starting their business. Funding aside, um, what would you tell them today? Like, what advice would you have for them if they're just considering maybe starting today?

Speaker D: So that's the. The. You just said it, Jared, right there. Start today. You will regret if as soon as you start building it, you will regret that you didn't start it sooner. Trust me. So don't wait till everything is perfect. You've got to get out there and test things you can only read. You know, you can read a thousand books and list to a thousand podcasts, but actually getting out there and doing it, talking to your target customer, talking to your target client, solving a problem for somebody and identifying how you can make their life better because of the solution you've come up with is so rewarding and it's going to push you forward. So whatever it takes, if it's just getting the LLC up or if it's reaching out to somebody and saying, I'm going to start this business and I'd love to. To pitch you as my first cl. Do something small to get yourself going and do it a little more every single day. And before you know it, you're going to have a real business.

Speaker A: And to add to that, that's something called, uh, Darian Hardy had put together. What's called the compound effect, is you're better off doing little things each day, then that's actually going to get you to that big, scary goal. And I would have. I would never be where I'm at. I would have never received the traction or impact or things if I didn't just jump in despite the fear, because the fear is always going to be big. And as a two time founder. I guarantee that there's going to be plenty of those moments. But when a founder is starting or trying to figure out what to do or where to go. I heard this quote the other day that I think sums it up really well is the magic in what you're looking for is in the work you're avoiding. And there's more to that. But I think that of your, like Katie said, it's, it's not one, it's never perfect, it never will be perfect. So just trying and allowing yourself to iterate as you go along even if you keep your full time job and you're starting on the side. And I was even so in my my first startup. Granted I had already started one, but it was really hard. I was working on power to pitch at night while I was doing my first company during the day because that was more of my superpower and more of what I enjoyed anyways, so it's not going to hit you in the face. You're just going to have to jump feet first or face first, whatever it is. And that's the only way to go.

Speaker C: Some great advice for all of our listeners. Uh, before we wrap, I'd love to just get just um, a quick perspective on anything you guys have coming down the pipeline that you'd like to share with our listeners. Any launches, anything exciting that we should announce.

Speaker A: Phoebe and I just launched a grant and non dilutive program which we're super excited about because we had so many amazing founders apply to our fundraising program and we were turning them away because it wasn't a fit for them. So we realized that there's so many that can benefit from grants that are out there. We have a list that we share every single month. Then in the grants range from $500 to over $250,000 and founders get lifetime access to it. So founders who are under a few million in revenue or capital raised are a uh, perfect candidate. We have national and global opportunities, but the big portion of that is not only do we share the list, Katie and I have recorded education on how I won 22 of 23 pitches. Katie spent 25 years in finance and talks about debt and revenue based financing and we even go on a little bit of accelerators. But we share the before and after of how to apply for multiple grants, how to format it, how to identify additional opportunities and what the applications look like. And it is just kind of this brain dump in a way to make sure that founders see still have access to capital. And a grant is great in that you never have to pay it back in the majority of the time they're not even going to ask what you do with the money. So huge, huge benefits in them. I won six figures worth of grants to fund my whole first company and with Katie's experience, this program want to make it more accessible for other founders who are maybe investor ready or even VC backable. Amazing.

Speaker C: Um, amazing. Well, we will of course have that for all of you in our show notes as well as information, uh, on how to check out power to pitch as well. It, ah, sounds like an incredible product and I'm sure for anyone who's considering going down the path of funding, I know the first place that I would be going is right to you too, um, to get some of these great insights. So just wanted to say a quick thank you to each of you for taking the time out of your day to share with all of our listeners. Really appreciate you coming.

Speaker A: We're honored to be back.

Speaker D: Yeah. Thank you so much for having us and thank you for all the kajabi making our lives so much easier in running our business and our community.

Speaker C: Well, we'll finish this off with a big thank you to our listeners. Thank you for listening into the show today. We will look forward to seeing you next week on the Creators Playbook podcast.