I'm interested in learning this too. I was just looking at Slideshare's case and learned the following: In this talk the founders mention how they were "outsid

I'm interested in learning this too. I was just looking at Slideshare's case and learned the following: In this talk the founders mention how they were "outsiders" located in the Valley without much connection, and that their initial angels and advisors were their attorneys or those who had tried their service and were impressed by its utilities. http://siliconangle.com/blog/2010/02/24/slideshare-founders-talk-about-entrepreneurship/ http://siliconangle.com/blog/2010/02/24/slideshare-founders-... In the first ever Techcrunch article about them, Michael Arrington mentions Ross Mayfield (VP of Biz Dev at Slideshare) made the intro. http://techcrunch.com/2006/10/04/introducing-slideshare-power-point-youtube/ http://techcrunch.com/2006/10/04/introducing-slideshare-powe... This was Oct 2006. It took them some time to get connected to the advisors: started the company in 2006, got advisors in 2007 - 2008. See http://www.crunchbase.com/company/slideshare http://www.crunchbase.com/company/slideshare and http://www.amitranjan.com/2007/07/05/slideshare-news-welcoming-guy-kawasaki-hal-varian-ross-mayfield-to-slideshare/ http://www.amitranjan.com/2007/07/05/slideshare-news-welcomi... Of course I'm only studying the surface, but in their case 1) useful product that the mentors would use (businesspeople use slides) 2) well-connected team member 3) time and persistence seemed to have helped.