7 ms·

Naval Ravikant: Hack Your Funding Process

90 points by iamelgringo 16y ago

patio11 16y ago
This dovetails with a lot of what PG went over in High Resolution Fundraising. http://www.paulgraham.com/hiresfund.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hiresfund.html If you learn well through video, this is very worth the hour of your time.
- mtran 16y ago
  Thanks a bunch for posting this! I can't get the H&F video to load but will read PG's article right now!
  - kfarr 16y ago
    Hey, sorry to hear of the video difficulties. I'm one of the cofounders of VidCaster.com, we power the H&F video site. Can you send us a note at support [at] vidcaster [dot] com about the issue you experienced?
    - deleted 16y ago
      [deleted]
    - mtran 16y ago
      Sorry - just seeing this. How great of you to respond! I'll go back and see if I can get in today; I saw someone else note that it may have been that everyone was trying to get in at once. Not sure that I got an error message - the Firefox status was something like "retrieving from the cloud" but it just hung and never played.
alexhektor 16y ago
Nice Logo there H&F.tv, YC but with an H. reminds me of StartupDigest "copying" TC's color theme :) both SD and H&F are great things, though.
- iamelgringo 16y ago
  I know. We're getting a new logo made STAT. We've been using that logo at Hackers and Founders meetups for the last 3 years, since we're the HN meetup in Silicon Valley: http://www.hackersandfounders.com http://www.hackersandfounders.com. I actually ran it passed pg a few years ago, and he didn't complain. But, now that we're pushing 3,000 members, we really need to change the logo. We really aren't affiliated with YC in any way. And, newcomers are starting to get confused, which is bad.
aditya 16y ago
(Hi! Jonathan - thanks for doing this, this stuff is pure gold.) Continuous Fundraising is a pretty radical idea. Basically, you never close your seed round since you're doing a note and the terms are fairly standard, so you just keep getting small checks from a large number of angels. Less pressure and hassle. Big win for entrepreneurs. As Naval says, you raise 50k/month for 6-12 months and you're all set.
- iamelgringo 16y ago
  (Thanks, Dude. I really need to get back and hang with the H&F NYC crew again. Does the weather still suck?) re: Continuous Fund raising. It is a pretty radical idea, and I really like it. It takes a bit of the pressure off the "One big round" model, and moves the focus to "Always be pitching" mode, which I think is probably healthier, and more productive for startups. The only caveat I've heard of is when the startup runs out of money and is struggling. At that point, not having a lead investor who is keeping tabs on the company and who is willing to go the extra mile to raise additional capital for the company is going to be detrimental.
- coopr 16y ago
  So, "always be fundraising" and "always be recruiting" and "always be learning from customers" and "always be improving product/market fit" and "always don't go broke" and so on? I can understand parallel-tracking some of these things, but if you do too much at once, don't you end up doing nothing well because you waste so much time task and focus-switching?
mgrouchy 16y ago
So weird, was just listening to his Mixergy interview this morning(I will say it again, Andrew Warner is killing it with Mixergy, its such an awesome project/resource/business). Sadly can't watch this one because it won't load. I assume its currently experiencing an irregular amount of traffic. Is it working for anyone else?
- satyajit 16y ago
  Working fine for me.
- kfarr 16y ago
  Hey, I'm one of the crew with VidCaster.com, we power the H&F video site. Could you send a quick email to support [at] vidcaster [dot] com about the playback issue you experienced?
  - mgrouchy 16y ago
    Hey Thanks for checking it. It wasn't a playback issue, the site just wouldn't load at all at the time I tried.
    - kfarr 16y ago
      Sweet thanks for that data point. We're migrating to a distributed set of web instances (working on that this evening in fact) which will significantly improve capacity.
satyajit 16y ago
I was there at this meetup, and having known H&F over past 2+ years, this was one of their best events. Lookin fwd to many more. H&F FTW!
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
rchauhan 16y ago
My first H&F event and it was really insightful. Thanks Jonathan
alain94040 16y ago
If you missed Naval this time, he'll be at the Founder Conference on May 3rd in Mountain View (with a bunch of other great guests). http://thefounderconference.com http://thefounderconference.com

90 points by iamelgringo 16y ago

This dovetails with a lot of what PG went over in High Resolution Fundraising. http://www.paulgraham.com/hiresfund.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hiresfund.html If you learn well through video, this is very worth the hour of your time.

mtran 16y ago
Thanks a bunch for posting this! I can't get the H&F video to load but will read PG's article right now!
- kfarr 16y ago
  Hey, sorry to hear of the video difficulties. I'm one of the cofounders of VidCaster.com, we power the H&F video site. Can you send us a note at support [at] vidcaster [dot] com about the issue you experienced?
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - mtran 16y ago
    Sorry - just seeing this. How great of you to respond! I'll go back and see if I can get in today; I saw someone else note that it may have been that everyone was trying to get in at once. Not sure that I got an error message - the Firefox status was something like "retrieving from the cloud" but it just hung and never played.

alexhektor 16y ago

Nice Logo there H&F.tv, YC but with an H. reminds me of StartupDigest "copying" TC's color theme :) both SD and H&F are great things, though.

iamelgringo 16y ago
I know. We're getting a new logo made STAT. We've been using that logo at Hackers and Founders meetups for the last 3 years, since we're the HN meetup in Silicon Valley: http://www.hackersandfounders.com http://www.hackersandfounders.com. I actually ran it passed pg a few years ago, and he didn't complain. But, now that we're pushing 3,000 members, we really need to change the logo. We really aren't affiliated with YC in any way. And, newcomers are starting to get confused, which is bad.

aditya 16y ago

(Hi! Jonathan - thanks for doing this, this stuff is pure gold.) Continuous Fundraising is a pretty radical idea. Basically, you never close your seed round since you're doing a note and the terms are fairly standard, so you just keep getting small checks from a large number of angels. Less pressure and hassle. Big win for entrepreneurs. As Naval says, you raise 50k/month for 6-12 months and you're all set.

iamelgringo 16y ago
(Thanks, Dude. I really need to get back and hang with the H&F NYC crew again. Does the weather still suck?) re: Continuous Fund raising. It is a pretty radical idea, and I really like it. It takes a bit of the pressure off the "One big round" model, and moves the focus to "Always be pitching" mode, which I think is probably healthier, and more productive for startups. The only caveat I've heard of is when the startup runs out of money and is struggling. At that point, not having a lead investor who is keeping tabs on the company and who is willing to go the extra mile to raise additional capital for the company is going to be detrimental.
coopr 16y ago
So, "always be fundraising" and "always be recruiting" and "always be learning from customers" and "always be improving product/market fit" and "always don't go broke" and so on? I can understand parallel-tracking some of these things, but if you do too much at once, don't you end up doing nothing well because you waste so much time task and focus-switching?

mgrouchy 16y ago

So weird, was just listening to his Mixergy interview this morning(I will say it again, Andrew Warner is killing it with Mixergy, its such an awesome project/resource/business). Sadly can't watch this one because it won't load. I assume its currently experiencing an irregular amount of traffic. Is it working for anyone else?

satyajit 16y ago
Working fine for me.
kfarr 16y ago
Hey, I'm one of the crew with VidCaster.com, we power the H&F video site. Could you send a quick email to support [at] vidcaster [dot] com about the playback issue you experienced?
- mgrouchy 16y ago
  Hey Thanks for checking it. It wasn't a playback issue, the site just wouldn't load at all at the time I tried.
  - kfarr 16y ago
    Sweet thanks for that data point. We're migrating to a distributed set of web instances (working on that this evening in fact) which will significantly improve capacity.

satyajit 16y ago

I was there at this meetup, and having known H&F over past 2+ years, this was one of their best events. Lookin fwd to many more. H&F FTW!

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

rchauhan 16y ago

My first H&F event and it was really insightful. Thanks Jonathan

alain94040 16y ago

If you missed Naval this time, he'll be at the Founder Conference on May 3rd in Mountain View (with a bunch of other great guests). http://thefounderconference.com http://thefounderconference.com