How to find an investor for your business?
Who is an investor?
An investor is a person who commits capital with the expectations of returns for their investments. They will analyse the risk involved in funding your business; also, you need to provide a value proposition about your business. They will expect to maximize their return on investment.
First, when you think about finding an investor, start to plan your idea of your business and start writing your pitch. The pitch has to give a clear indication of what you have planned to do in your business, how you intend to make it profitable also going the long term. Besides, you have to make sure that you are knowledgeable about what you are also doing; it should stay within the law also indicate the benefits that the investor will have in joining your business.
Documents to present to the investor.
Then you have to have a detailed business plan that includes your operational plan, marketing plan, and financial plan.
Get yourself ready with a pitch deck as well to give it to them if they request it. A Pitch Deck is a brief description of the business plan to show it to your audience for a quick overview. It usually created using PowerPoint or keynote.
How to find an investor for your business?
When you are ready with these documents, you have to prepare your financial forecasts for three years. So that your investment will be able to analyse how your idea aligns with the economic forecast to make a profit and keep going in the end, you keep all the documents ready but wait until they request you to produce that.
Then plan how you will arrange the meeting with the investor by either phone or a face-to-face meeting.
Where can you find an investor? How to approach an investor?
- Send emails.
- Find someone from investing companies and contact them in person.
- They mostly have connections in LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, etc.
- Meetups are an excellent place to meet them and say Hi to anyone whom you like.
- I get invitations to many meetups from the funders.
- You can join the Angel investment network to find an investor.
- People search for investors on LinkedIn and Quorn also.
- Crowdfunding: You get access to free money. Therefore, do a google search for the best crowdfunding sites and make your choice.
Agree.
If your pitch becomes successful, you need to go into an agreement with your investor. That is essential if anything goes wrong in your business, the investor can demand asking you to pay back everything in full.
It could be the other way about if you happened to make a considerable profit quickly the investor could expect you to pay a more significant portion of the profit then it will lead to a huge problem. You might face a situation could lose all that you earned.
Therefore, you need to make a written agreement with your investor, start with an open agreement mentioning what this agreement is for and the parties involved in the contract. You also can find many samples on the internet to create an arrangement for your investor.
Do not let anyone into your business without a formal agreement to save you and your business.