I explore this question in my short, partly visual emails, crafted through my lens as a creative director in deep-tech. Join me for insights on effective communication, marketing, design, psychology, and the philosophy of value.
Who’s got the best problem?
|
A question arrived by LinkedIn, that you might find useful (edited for brevity): Hi Sagi, I’m still an undergrad, but I am already facing a challenge with fundraising for our solar race car initiative. Could you share your most important insight from designing tech investment pitches? Here's the response: You might assume that question is "How can I be sure that this venture will succeed?” (Hence: how do I ensure ROI?) But this is merely a projection of your own mindset. In the investor’s world your venture is one of dozens they see every month, so their primary question is different: "Why is THIS problem worth solving MORE than all the others I could invest in?" At first, this feels counterintuitive. This question has little to do with your domain knowledge or technical expertise. Can you even answer it? Absolutely! But it takes a shift. It might take some practice. But hey, you’ve been a human far longer than you’ve been an engineer. I hope this provokes your thinking in a useful direction. You can also find some free resources on my site that can help: https://www.rechter.co/resources Yours, |
Creativity in Deep-Tech
I explore this question in my short, partly visual emails, crafted through my lens as a creative director in deep-tech. Join me for insights on effective communication, marketing, design, psychology, and the philosophy of value.
There's a way to improve your startup by orders of magnitude in 10 seconds.Here’s what you do:Go to your email signature and add this to your title: CVO, Chief Visionary Officer. (You can keep your CEO title or replace it — I don’t mind.)Boom! You just made your startup more effective and drastically increased your chances of building a great product.By assuming the CVO title, you made something explicit that most startups leave vague: that there is a single source of intent in the system....
Most deep-tech pitches are weak due to confusion about the relationship between facts and narrative.At best, people aren’t sure what a narrative is. At worst, they think facts and narrative are opposites — that narrative is something you use when your facts are lacking. A simple scenarioImagine you meet someone and they treat you kindly. You note it as a fact. You might conclude: “This person is a good person.” Then later, that same person treats you poorly. Another fact. Now you have two...
No one knows what investors are looking for Not even the investors themselves.If they did, the whole process would look very different. Investors would just ask for the specific information, compare the answers, and make decisions quickly. But the investment process in deep-tech is long, iterative, and deeply human.That’s not to say investors aren’t qualified. Seasoned investors absolutely know how to invest to achieve the outcomes they desire - but they can’t give you a formula.Knowing how...