“What’s your story? What’s your why?”
59 days of writing my story and proving my why👨🏾💻👨🏾💻
#59
Not sure how many people have read The Storytelling Animal, but it basically discusses how and why we, as humans, love to tell stories. The author, Gottschall’s, thesis is basically this :
“Human beings are natural storytellers—that they can’t help telling stories, and that they turn things that aren’t really stories into stories because they like narratives so much. Everything—faith, science, love—needs a story for people to find it plausible. No story, no sale.”
Pitching a business takes the same format. Investors would want to know your story. And why you do what you do. It all plays a part in convincing them that your case is worth their money (or the other way around). I found the bit below from one of Justin Kan’s posts where he talks about methods he’s used to raise funding. IF your story isn’t compelling enough, you’d probably (not absolutely) have a hard time raising money. No story, no investment.
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The first thing to do once you’ve decided you are ready to raise a series A [sic] is to put together a compelling narrative.
I specifically start with a narrative and not a pitch deck.
I firmly believe that investors invest in (and employees join, and journalists write about) compelling stories, and your pitch deck is really just a vehicle for telling the story you want to tell. So, start first with the narrative and build the deck after you have it nailed.
The best advice I ever got on narratives was from Slava Akhmechet of RethinkDB on a matter totally unrelated to raising money. He said that every story in human history followed the same arc:
The world is a certain way
Something changes
The world is now different
This may seem obvious to you, but I love the simplicity of it. I bet you that any story you can think of right now follows this outline. Like every narrative, your pitch will follow the same arc.
The world is a certain way — Here you outline your background and the current state of the market: How you were introduced to the problem and why you are an expert, The order of magnitude of the problem today (it should be big!)
Something changes — Your solution to the problem and why now is the ideal time for it
The world is now different — aka How your solution changed the world: Product traction (especially metrics / milestone focused traction), The remaining opportunity (or why your traction will continue and make you big!)
Your narrative must be concise and accessible. Anything that doesn’t powerfully support one of these points I would leave out.
I view this narrative as a story you tell through conversation. If you have a powerful narrative you should be able to have a conversation with someone who is a novice at your industry and guide them through it, and at the end they should think your company is amazing and probably going to be very successful. In fact, to refine my narrative I often do exactly this (it doesn’t have to be with potential investors) and use it to iterate the story I am telling (adding or removing specific facts, changing ordering, etc). Getting the right narrative is the most important part of the pitch process, so I would make sure you spend a lot of time perfecting.
Article List— What I’m reading (10 articles a day x 7 days x 4 weeks x 12 months = 3360 articles a year).
Zoom: How and why Sequoia invested in Zoom: Most interesting part about this was that Zoom didn’t even need the money. But Sequoia had some added value that got them the chance to get some equity. Value is the name of the game. What’s yours?
Noodle maker plans busiest port in west Africa: These guys are working. Third generation business still making waves. Reminds me of the Madhvanis in Uganda. Article below.
The Madhvanis: The Industrialists Who Have Tasted Sucrose And Success: Incredible story of struggle and sacrifice and learning.
Scoop: Adam Neumann will determine WeWork's fate: Me: “…hmm” *goes back to work*
WeWork’s Adam Neumann offered package worth up to $1.7 billion to step down from board: Me: “…HMMMMM!!!!” *eyes popping out*. *starts calling friends* “Guys, who wants to start a business, please? I think we’ve found our new exit strategy.” FYI, Adam is getting paid almost 200m in consulting fees? And gets a 500m line of credit? Can’t wait to hear Scott and Kara trash this on Friday.
Africa can list more gazelles at home than unicorns IPOs abroad: “A gazelle at home could be a company valued at $100 million or more and generating revenues of $15 to $50 million”.
How Tyler Perry Built a Customer-Centric Empire: This man’s methods will be studied in business schools for time to come. Big up Tyler Perry
Digital dystopia: how algorithms punish the poor: “AI innovations that are explosively recasting how low-income people interact with the state.”
Where Do Business Mafias Come From?: From PayPal to Tiger, the story of how to build teams that go on to do amazing things.
What Did I Learn From the First VC Check I Ever Wrote?: Very salient lessons on investing. Entering this space, you have to know it’s a very long game you’re playing. Don’t expect too many quick wins. I see a bunch of similarities between Upstart and Sequoia.
The 5 Things You Must Sacrifice To Have a Better Future: Big mood quote—“Good things come from sacrifice. If you want what you’ve never had, you must do what you’ve never done. It’s to start sacrificing the right things so you can have a better future. Don’t let anyone define success but you. Stop being “busy,” and start being focused. Don’t worry about looking good, concentrate on learning all you can from everywhere you can. Spend your time wisely, because many things want your attention and energy. Make sure they’re the right things.”
Podcast— What I’m listening to (1 podcast episode a day x 7 days x 4 weeks x 12 months = 336 podcast episodes). Broadening my experiences through others’ stories.
Acquired. They got a new episode on Atari (where Steve Jobs worked before) and one of the first companies to start with arcade games and home computers. Haven’t listened yet but on my list for tonight/ tomorrow.
Book— 1 Chapter a day x 7 days x 4 weeks x 12 months = 336 chapters. Most books have 10-12 chapters, so 1 year = 28 to 33 books. And my book list is nearing 1000 books. Send help 🌚
Still on Becoming. Amazing book so far. Favorite quote from what I’ve read so far- “I wasn’t going to let one person’s opinion dislodge everything I knew about myself.” She was very self-aware as a teenager. Many of us still aren’t, so this says a lot about her.
📱📱Quote of the day
“True success comes from knowledge, humility, and becoming a student of your craft.”
Remember folks: “Until the lion learns to write, every story will glorify the hunter.”