Fundraising Field Guide: A Startup Founder's Handbook for Venture Capital

Note on the Third Edition: The first version of The Fundraising Field Guide was written and published via Reedsy in 2015 and has been used by many to help navigate their fund raise. However, a lot has evolved since then, so this updated version 3.0 has been written with new content, ideas, and strategies to help early-stage tech startup founders decipher and navigate the fundraising process.

Gone are the days of easy fundraising. Today’s market environment looks very different from the record high of 2021. Especially for first-time founders, the fundraising process is often a journey into the unknown. The non-linear process of speaking to venture capitalists and angel investors, in terms that you may have yet to encounter, can be difficult and frustrating to navigate.

The updated edition of the book will help you, the ambitious early-stage founder, decipher the secrets to securing capital from investors in today’s uncertain market environment. The chapters cover the A-Z of raising capital: from creating your fundraising plan to understanding your deal terms and managing the legal process. By the end, the aim is for you, to be armed with the necessary tools to take your company to the next level.

Learn about communicating with investors, shareholders and lawyers. We will go over the materials you will need to prepare, the basics of how to understand your deal, and the mindset you will need to approach this journey successfully. The aim is to provide you, the ambitious early-stage founder with the right information to take your company to the next level.

This new and updated version provides an overview of the soft and not-so-soft challenges you will need to prepare for as part of your fundraising journey, including things like reaching out to investors, dealing with rejections constructively, preparing materials and financials, understanding valuations and deal terms, how to manage the legal process and a crowdfunding chapter with statistics from crowdfunding platform Seedrs (who kindly helped in providing advice on how to best navigate). I sincerely hope you enjoy the book and get lots of use from it.