The world produces over 130,000 start-ups a year. A vast majority of those start-ups are usually tech-related. If you’re an IT executive eager to launch your own business, just looking at these statistics might put you off what is otherwise a great idea.
You’ve also got to contend with VC and angel investment that has dried up in recent years, thanks to an economic climate at its worst in quite some time.
But none of this should ever stop you. With a unique business plan and a bit of luck, you can stand out against the odds and attract the funding you need to scale. You just need to be savvier than the rest of your competition.
In this article, we explore five of the best ways your startup can stand out from the crowd and attract the investment you need to fulfil your potential.
IT Thought Leadership
One of the best ways you can differentiate yourself is through IT thought leadership.
What is IT thought leadership? Essentially, it’s about sharing your experience, failures, and revelations with audiences across social media, earned media, and events to establish credibility.
You might start with little to nothing about you or your company online and just a handful of followers to a Google search of your name populated with positive headlines and LinkedIn connection requests by the day.
On one hand, you’ll build a better brand for your business, which can help with consumer visibility and attracting talent. But on the other, you’ll be showing investors that your company is going places, guided by a confident, knowledgeable, and likable leader.
All you need to do is ensure that the thought leadership content you share offers value and doesn’t rehash what others have already said.
As an established IT thought leadership agency puts it, you need to challenge conventional wisdom and consistently deliver insights that drive action. Because, with good quality thought leadership, you have the power to influence change throughout your entire industry.
Be transparent
This next piece of advice dovetails nicely with thought leadership because, in principle, the two go hand in hand. But it’s still worth highlighting the importance of transparency specifically.
Case-in-point, when you’re in conversation with an investor, never hide the truth.
Legitimately, you might do this because you’re passionate about protecting your IP, but hiding weaknesses in your business model, overstating metrics, not disclosing ongoing lawsuits or compliance risks, or divulging whether you have serious cash flow issues are all big no’s.
All you’ll be doing is destroying the foundations of a healthy relationship: Trust. Without it, your investor will never leave you to your own devices if they do decide to back you.
Besides, by having a strong level of trust, you won’t only potentially receive a greater proportion of investment but tangible support to address any issues your start-up faces.
Be selective with your investors
Now, while it might seem necessary to market your company to a range of investors to improve your odds of securing investment, you’re much better off being hyper-specific with who you partner with.
Angel investors aside, you don’t want to lose control of your business and miss the chance to see your vision come to light. So, always look for synergies. Specialist VCs are more successful for good reason – they know what a good IT start-up looks like and how to take your business to the next level.
It’s worth making sure that you do your due diligence. Don’t rush into accepting funding out of desperation, even if this seems counterintuitive at the time. Your business will thank you for it in the long run.
Build your network carefully
The old adage holds true: your network is your net worth.
This isn’t referencing investors directly, but the potential partners, suppliers, and employees who can fast-track early growth practically, financially, and more efficiently – all of which is desirable.
Think of it this way. The war for talent within the tech sector is serious. If you’ve got a handful of bright and experienced people you can onboard from the very start of your company’s launch, you’re going to be ahead of all the other start-ups in the market for talent.
The best thing about this is that you already know the people you’re working with, reducing the likelihood of things not working out and an expensive error to mitigate.
Having the wrong employees onboard is bad enough when you’re trying to prove your competency to an investor – it’s worse when you’ve received investment, and you’re under pressure to perform.
So, as soon as your plan to start a company hatches, think about your network and how you can grow it by meeting peers for coffee, attending events, and any other creative means you can think of.
Let investors pitch to you
For many start-ups, scrambling around for investment over many months – and sometimes years – is normal. But just sometimes, a few tech start-ups with such brilliant business plans and products cause investors to scramble instead.
So, if you’re truly confident in your company’s potential, then maybe it’s time to flip the script and let investors pitch to you!
Of course, you’ll need to have generated some publicity in the first instance. But by having investors pitch to you, you’re going to be the one in control. You get to judge what your start-up is worth, and if a bidding war ensues, secure a hefty sum of investment that will be totally transformative.
Though this may only apply to a small number of tech start-ups, it’s always something to be aware of.
