A prototype doesn't get you a meeting with a VC. It's usually a network thing. Founder X says to (slightly better connected) Founder Y, "I'm raising a round. W

A prototype doesn't get you a meeting with a VC. It's usually a network thing. Founder X says to (slightly better connected) Founder Y, "I'm raising a round. Who should I talk to?" Assuming Founder Y thinks that an intro to Founder X is something investors would want, they say, "I could intro you to Firm X, Y, Z." Clever fundraisers do this in a systematic when when it's time to raise. They make a spreadsheet of investors that might be a good fit, scour LinkedIn and the firms' portfolio pages to see if they are connected with them, try to see if the firm is a good fit (firm personality, conflicts, check size they write, geographic focus, etc) and then start working on getting warm intros. They try to get as many of these conversations going in parallel as possible, which is freakin' HARD. Which is where this article comes in. It's massively wasteful to have conversations with investors which end quickly with "We don't do seed rounds," or "we only invest in New York" or "We already invested in a company that you compete with", "we don't write checks that big", "you don't fit our investment thesis", etc.