According to Silicon Valley’S Best VC’s and Angel Investors, This is The best monthly investor update template for first-time founders
CLICK HERE FOR THE TEMPLATE
Listen up, Founders! I’m going to detail the best template to use to update your investors on a monthly basis.
As a Founder myself, an investor in startups, and a champion of Founders everywhere (and Operators 😉), I’ve had a good front-row seat to what makes a strong monthly update and what makes a bad one.
Unfortunately, only about 1/3 of all Founders update their investors.
The primary reason why most Founders don’t update investors is out of fear of being judged.
Don’t be afraid! Fear not my fellow Founders!
The reality is that investors really are simply looking to help you. It’s their money at stake, after all. If you had your money in an investment, wouldn’t you want to be able to help that company succeed? Yes, you would. Monthly updates allow Founders to not just update investors but ask for help.
I know it's a hard thing to do when things aren't going well, but it’s worth it.
What goes into a monthly investor update?
To all those founders out there, particularly first-time founders, here are the things I like to see in an update. I pieced this together by reading a bunch of stuff on Twitter from Silicon Valley investors: Jason Calacanis, Keith Rabois, Chris Dixon, Brian Ma, and others. Calacanis wrote a great book about this as well called “Angel: How to Invest in Technology Startups—Timeless Advice from an Angel Investor Who Turned $100,000 Into $100,000,000.” Give it a read if you want to go deeper. OK! Here we go!
Summary: This should be one paragraph. 6-8 sentences max. Investors should be able to read this in 30 seconds or less.
Asks for help: So we can take action and help you.
Cash in the bank: ($), burn ($ per month), runway (# months)
Core metrics: (Top 3 + YoY and MoM % growth) + commentary on those metrics + how these metrics compare to your goals/plan (ahead, behind, why?)
Sub-metrics: Include the next bucket of sub-metrics that are important to understanding your business. Most of your investors are hopefully operators, industry experts, or venture capital people who know the space and can give you input as to how these sub-metrics may be impacting your Key Metrics in a certain way.
Good/bad/ugly: If you're not talking about the bad and ugly... you're doing YOURSELF a disservice. Investors, particularly if they are founders themselves or operators with a ton of experience, know that >50% of stuff going on in a startup is bad and ugly. And quite frankly... if it's not... you're not pushing hard/fast enough. So, convey that stuff. And then ask for help with the areas that you're struggling with (or that you simply don't know how to solve on your own).
Your one big focus area for next month.
New hires and departures (and why you hired/fired or why team members chose to move on).
Props / Thank yous: This is a way to highlight ways your investors have helped you… hint hint… to encourage other readers to step up.
PR links you want investors to share on social media.
Links to trailing 12 months of previous investor updates (Ex: Sept 2021 (link), Aug 2021 (link), July 2021 (link), etc). The living history is good for you and for your investors so that they can see "Is this founder having a problem they need help with that they themselves don't know they have? I can try to leverage my network to help." Not all problems are clear as day.... in fact... most aren't. ;)
That’s all I got folks.
If you think I’m missing anything that should be included, let me know!
