Raising Money in a Tough Economy

Raising money for any business in this tough economy isn’t easy. More owners are scrambling to attract new capital, and investors are holding tighter to their money, causing a major disconnect. Successful VCs and private equity funds are only investing in 1 out of every 500 or so deals they see. Banks have cut back lending. Angel investors hammered in the 2008 market meltdown, lost their appetite for new deals while focusing on salvaging existing investments.   However, you can raise the funds you need. You won’t get the very best terms and it will take you much longer than you thought. You may even have to retain an outside firm to help; but if it makes sense and you are fundable, you can get the deal done.   

Get real   

One of the benefits of raising capital from outside investors and lenders is they are a litmus test for your business model. Their decisions will help you get a better—and more objective—perspective on the prospects for your business. Many owners fall deeply in love with their business and continue to plow through their own capital hoping, wishing, and expecting it to be a home run. They do this up to the point where they have exhausted their own financial resources and taken on debt, but haven’t taken the business to the promised land. Be realistic. Don’t bleed yourself and your family, dry funding an idea that is not working. I see this all the time—entrepreneurs are optimists. To have a shot at raising serious capital to support growth, your company needs to have a business plan that makes sense. 

Five things you should consider before sharing your business plan with potential investors include:   

• Have you really thought through how much additional funding you need? Typically, companies overestimate their additional funding requirements because they are unwilling to make difficult internal changes to free up working capital. Or they have growth plans that are too ambitious.   
• Can you present a plan that shows logical profit growth? Forget presenting “hockey stick” revenue and profit forecasts. Error on the side of being too conservative with your numbers.   
• Do you own, totally understand, and have the ability to defend the numbers in your plan? 
• Is your plan concise? Sophisticated investors say they form their initial opinion and judgment within the first 30 seconds of skimming a submitted plan. If you can’t present a compelling argument on a maximum of one or two pages, then you probably have no shot at raising new money.   
• Are you raising money to achieve profitable growth? Investors and lenders are unwilling to put in funds to pay off problem accounts, payables or to pay off loans from previous investors or back salaries to the founders.   

Target the right investor or lender   

Investors are not created equally. Some can be more of a strategic asset than others. For example, my firm is helping develop a new fund to invest in new medical technologies developed in Europe and Israel. We are approaching leading U.S. healthcare companies as potential investors, since they obviously can bring a lot of expertise and talent to this project. 

Learn as much as you can about the potential lender/investor you are pursuing. If you are desperate and casting a big net for investors, you can wind up going down the wrong road. One company owner I know wound up talking with the Mob because he had not done his homework. He was tipped off when a major bank that had been interested in the deal backed out when the owner’s poor choice of possible equity investors surfaced. It’s a small world out there, so take time to know your potential investors.    

Constantly work to build your network    

 The quality of your network will heavily dictate how successful you will be in your money-raising effort. As a business owner, stretched for capital or not, you can never stop growing your network of solid people. Your network is very much a big part of your personal net worth.    

Structure the deal to work for both parties

Be realistic in what you are willing to give up in exchange for new funding. Investors walk away immediately from business owners with unrealistic valuations of their businesses. A better approach, particularly with equity investors, is to suggest a deal in which the investor’s return can vary based on whether or not you successfully reach certain benchmarks. If you miss your key targets, the investor gets a bigger chunk of the company. If you exceed the targets, the investor’s share of the equity might be trimmed back. That’s a smart way to propose a deal and it is fair. It puts the onus on you and your team to perform. Another approach would be to give new investors a piece of the business’s top-line revenue until a certain return has been achieved. There are huge advantages to this approach for both the business owner and investor. Obviously, this does not work for early stage companies with uncertain or low revenue flows and it won’t work for companies with tight gross margins.   

Decide whether or not to raise money yourself