TBC: Mastering Final VC Meetings

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Hey there. Welcome to another episode of the back channel and today's episode. I want to follow up on what we had been discussing in the last episode, which was going through the advice that I was giving a founder as they were coming out of an accelerator program, building momentum. Around a live process and trying to get to a close. At the end of the last episode, I said, We had a followup after my initial advisory session.

And it turned out that they were able to drive towards final meetings with some VCs. The questions they had were, what should we do to prepare for this final meeting? What should we expect? What is it going to be like? What are they looking for? Okay. So I wanted to talk a little bit about the advice that I gave them. And the insights that I shared, because I think it should be helpful for a lot of you who are preparing for final meetings yourself. Now, uh, in this context, we were talking about a very early stage startup, call it a [00:01:00] pre-seed ish startup. We'll call it just like seed. Adjacent. Um, And so take that with a grain of salt, take that as some of the context for what I'm about to tell you. But overall, I don't think the advice changes all that much. For different founders in different industries and different stages. I will say that as you get to the later in later stages, As you get more numbers oriented, things can be slightly different.

But overall, my advice is the same and that is. The meetings won't be that different in terms of the goals that investors have during these meetings. In all meetings, they are trying to get a sense for what the businesses, who the founder is, what unique angles they have, what the quality of the business is.

And what are some of the advantages and disadvantages that exist in this team, in this company, in this industry? The biggest difference from my eyes is that in the initial meetings, [00:02:00] There is less context for the VC to dig in. This is likely the first time that they've gotten a chance to engage with the founder.

And so there's a lot of feeling out that goes on in order to push the mind of the investor and the direction of continue on versus let this one go. By the time you get to a final meeting. There will have been opportunities for the VC to get further up the learning curve. To develop more questions that they might have around the company. And there would have been more interaction on the back channel side of things with advisors to due diligence.

So in this stage of the game, there is just more texture material context for a more fulsome engagement. So with a more fulsome engagement.A founder should be ready for more detailed questions, but along the same lines of the conversations that they had had previously. Now the other thing about a final meeting [00:03:00] is especially in firms that have multiple decision makers, multiple partners. It's an opportunity for other partners who have not had as many opportunities to engage with the company or engage with the founder to. Get their own sense for the company to develop their own opinions and to ask their own questions. What this means is that even though the goal of the meeting is going to be very similar, the feeling will likely be pretty different. It'll be more intense. And a founder will have to be more confident and comfortable with how they engage and answer questions about their companies. So on the first part, when someone has had more time and ability and context to engage with your company, they will be able to jump into the more specific parts. Of a company and ask detailed questions.

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And the dynamic around having multiple people to pitch at once creates a similar situation where. More detailed nuanced questions will come because as you're talking to one investor and answering their questions, every other investor that's listening gets to be silent, gets to process and gets to think. hmm what is a question that I'd like to ask?

What is the thing that they're not answering yet? That I'd like, um, context around. And because of that, It will feel much more intense. It will feel like every step of the meeting will be high. Stakes will be very meaningful.

So as you're preparing for this meeting, Realize that you're going to have to be on your game, but I don't want you to get overly nervous about being so comprehensive in your understanding of every possible question that could be asked at this stage.

If you get to a final meeting with a [00:06:00] company, you should know your company. Well, Does that mean you'll have answers for every single question that comes your way? No, but you should be able to talk intelligently about all parts of your business. Sometimes it's okay for them to ask a question and you not have the specific answer to their very detailed question. You know, if they say what's day 30 retention, you might not have that statistic right off the top of your head. But. You should be able to speak to. The quality of your product and its ability to engage with consumers.

On some level, you should have some data or some story to be able to tell that at least gives you an opportunity to talk to them about what they're curious about.

And you should also know that saying that you don't know, but you can get the answer. At the end of the day, you just need to make sure that they understand that you have a grasp on your business.

The detailed answers about every bit of minutia is not [00:07:00] necessarily that important. Okay. So as long as you show up confident and excited about your business, able to transfer the right amount of energy. And understanding of your business to the other side of the table, you'll do fine in these final meetings. All right. I hope that gave you a sense for what to expect when it comes to these final meetings.

If you have any other questions I'd love to hear from you.

So do reach out and I'll see you next time. On another episode of the back channel.

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