Not every fundraise is easy and sometimes you wind up having to take a higher quantity of smaller checks than you’d like. On the other hand, some people try and pad the cap table with a bunch of big names or industry vets, even if their check size is small, just to build the network. They have an idealized vision of how easy it’s going to be to utilize everyone once the business gets going.
The reality is that the last thing most founders will have time for is writing up investor updates. They’ve got tons of other things that seem more pressing and the last thing they need is a bunch of scrutiny and questions from people who wrote small checks. Not only that, sending out important information in e-mails to lots of people increases the possibility that confidential information gets out.
Still, I think it’s worthwhile to keep all of your investors in the loop for a lot of non-obvious reasons. Maybe it’s an e-mail or maybe it’s just a quarterly phone call that everyone on the cap table can dial-in to. Whatever it is, here are the benefits of keeping everyone—no matter how small, in the loop:
1) When you don’t hear from a founder, it makes an investor feel unappreciated.
Small investors are people, too—and there’s no upside to having a bunch of your cap table feel negatively in any way about the company. These people all have some expertise and experience, and by never reaching out to them for anything, it can feel like you don’t think they have anything to contribute besides money. No one’s saying you have to throw someone a parade every month for writing a $10k check—but sometimes a little nod of involvement goes a long way, especially given that statistically, most startup outcomes aren’t that great. Maybe one day you’ll be able to write everyone a big check at the end, but until then, taking a “That’s what the money is for!” Madmen approach isn’t a good bed, especially if you ever plan on doing another startup.
2) There’s a Butterfly Effect to not being top of mind and not having info on a company.
Investors talk to other investors, to media and to talent, and it’s great when they can share why they’re excited, in a general sense, about your company—or that they’re excited at all. When you have no information about what’s being accomplished at a company, you’re not got to share anything, and people are going to wonder whether not mentioning you is a signal that things aren’t going well. That’s going to make fundraising and hiring even a tiny nudge harder than it needs to be, and certainly costing you more time than the e-mail update would take.
3) Small investors are more aligned.
The way preference works, small investors who just do early rounds are actually much more aligned with founders than later stage VCs who are looking to pour more in to get a bigger outcome. They may not have as much experience as your larger VCs, but their preference is invaluable if you’re looking for a wide spectrum of feedback. Is it worth going for your Series D or thinking about getting to break-even now? Your seed investors might have a different take and diversity of perspective always makes for better decisions.
4) Sometimes, they can surprise you.
People can have pretty random networks, especially around hiring. By keeping your needs top of mind with regular updates, you might get a lot more out of your early investors than you expected in terms of introductions. Recruiting is one of those things where getting a note that a particular hire has been difficult is much more effective than just posting a job into the ether.
5) You actually might need them.
Setting a precedent for updating your investors should start early—early enough where you might actually need to reach out to them in a pinch. Sometimes, rounds fall apart, and if the last thing they heard was that things were going great, then all of the sudden you’re doing a bridge to make payroll, the likelihood they’re going to be excited to write a check will be pretty small. Even in later rounds, you never know what money they might be connected to and they might be able to hook you up with some random family office that you never heard of to help close a difficult raise.
If nothing else, I also just think it’s a sign of respect. Someone gave you their money (or their investors’ money) and I think besides your hard work, the least you can do for them is just let them know how its doing. They might not have a right to that information based on the legal docs, but it’s just the right thing to do by someone—and it also keeps you in the mindset of being responsible for people’s capital when you’re actually interacting with them. As we’ve seen over the past few years, it wouldn’t hurt our industry to make corporate responsibility a little higher priority.