Last week I wrote a popular LinkedIn post about how all experienced angel and seed investors need to see some revenues before considering investing in your software startup.
I implored software company founders to get customers first and not waste time with serious investors until they have some revenue. After that, founders can consider whether real outside funding from experienced tech investors even makes sense.
Of the 141 comments on the post so far, here are the comments from founders and CEOs who have been through the journey:
Amen! Bootstrapping is a right of passage for any entrepreneur. It’s part of the journey.
— Heidi Jannenga, PT, DPT, ATC, Co-founder and CCO of WebPT
100,000% right. Ideas are useless. Execution is fundable (or won’t require funding). Customers before funding!
— Chris Ronzio, Founder & CEO of Trainual
Focusing on product and bootstrapped revenue growth, our biggest issue has been telling people no in terms of investment, instead of searching for funding. Thank you for that guidance early on!
— Will Shaw, Co-founder & CEO of Better Agency
Raising capital was a near full-time gig for a CEO for me. If you’re investing that amount of time pre-revenue & pre-product, you’re just stacking the deck against yourself.
— Snehal Patel, founder of Sokikom
All inbounds I’ve received from early-stage VCs from west-2-east coasts have come w the same baseline criteria: 7-figure ARR. I hear most angel groups have the same baseline/and an even tougher process for smaller-sized checks than VCs are writing.
— Vic Maculaitis, CEO of THE DATA INITIATIVE
The worst thing most pre-rev companies can do is to go raise capital. Find product/market/fit, it will change your life.
— Wyly Wade, CEO of Biometrica Systems
Yep!
— Jon Jessup, Founder & CEO, 1440
