This article raises some awesome points. As a founder who is going through a seed round right now, I'm working hard to optimize our own fundraising process. Aaron refers to a plethora of resources for effective fundraising, but it's often hard to identify experts from rabble.
Has anyone already curated a list of quality resources? I would be greatly appreciative!
Cool, thanks Aaron. I feel like we've been carried on the backs of YC SUS videos for some time, but this startup library is far more organized than what I've seen before.
I echo your sentiment, by the way: thus far, fundraising on good terms is turning out to be far easier than we expected - is it possible that low interest rates from the fed are making it easier for investors to get money? If so, we may expect this trend to continue for a few years, as the fed has committed to keeping rates low for some time.
I expected your link to take me to a page that contained a simple list.
I also assumed that trypaper.io was the domain for a note-taking app called Paper, and that you were intending to link to one of your pages on that service. :)
...
Please forgive me for leveraging my confusion, for which I take full responsiblity, into a critique of your page design, but in the hopes that something here might be constructive...
I would have been less confused if the page headline was static instead of rotating/frequently incomplete due to animation/"difficult" to read. Something like "Financing your SaaS" would seem to cover all cases, maybe with a rotating subtitle without the backspacing animation so that the full content of each entry could be read in a glance?
Also the background of white with a pattern of pale blue dots made me think "note paper/note-taking app". The domain name makes sense for this also, but it was the background that forced the idea to front of mind.
Again, I'm sure this is a me thing and not a you thing -- but if others exhibit similar confusion, that's my best guess as to the cause.
...Now I will read the content on the site. Thanks for humoring me.
[edit] It's a bit dated, but the points and lessons are timeless. The 'norm' has changed (SAFEs are more common over convertible notes now, for example), but the rest is still accurate.
Awesome, going through it right now and learning a ton. Dated? Sure, but How To Win Friends And Influence People is still bang-on, and it was written almost a century ago. I really appreciate the recommendation!
Has anyone already curated a list of quality resources? I would be greatly appreciative!