To ensure you have sufficient access to capital, building strong relationships with investors is essential. Although there are several ways to build this relationship, sharing regular investor updates is one of the most important, and arguably the easiest! These updates would take you only a few minutes a month or quarterly to make, but they can help you build trust and confidence that would lead to more funding.
Investor updates keep your investors engaged in the journey of your company. Staying in investors’ top-of-mind will greatly benefit your situation, whether you would need funding to finance your expansion or new product development. Your investors will see it coming, and therefore be more prepared to help on short notice. In other words, you will create a demand for future funding. But never forget, your stakeholders will hold you to what you promise.
When your investors are in the loop of what’s happening in the company, they are more likely to aid and support you, with more than just their capital. For instance, your investors are a part of several networks, and these are available to you and your company. When you share regular updates, investors know what you need and can help you accordingly. They may introduce you to more investors, candidates, or even more customers! Your company’s reputation will definitely hold more weight with established investors on your side.
By spending some extra time each month, your company can have better investor relationships and key resources to reach its full potential.
Guideline for a great investor update
To successfully communicate with your investors, there are a few pieces of advice we can give you.
Cadence
Set up a regular schedule, and stick to it. As startups, it is easy to get lost in new and exciting developments and forget about your investors even if they are crucial to the survival of your business. So be disciplined and accountable.
Length
There is no point in dragging your update out too long. Keep it short, sweet, honest and consistent.
Transparency
Demonstrate your company’s development and share both the good and the bad news. Reporting bad news can be scary, but it will create more trust and strengthen your relationships.
Content
Every company is unique, therefore all of you will have different types of investor updates. To make it easier to create high-quality investor updates we have highlighted 5 topics that should be included:
Highlights / Lowlights
Let your network know what you have accomplished – whether you have achieved your goals, landed a big deal, hired new talents, or pushed new features. This will help your investors see the momentum in their investment and lower the barrier for a new investor introduction or future funding.
Your investors don’t just want good news, they will also appreciate the honesty with problems you have encountered. Investors would like to hear your problems, why they are happening, and how you are planning to solve them. This will also make it easier for them to help you. They might know about a great fit for the new marketing position you are looking to fill or new prospects in a dry month!
Performance (Key indicators)
Investors expect to see a few key performance indicators, but make sure you keep it consistent so investors can easily navigate and signal your focus. A couple of suggestions could be:
- Revenue – including the number of users and average revenue per customer
- Cash – insights on how their capital is used and your current runway
- Customer metrics – depending on your industry, it could be daily active users, monthly recurring revenue, or time spent in product
Team
As your company grows, it will not be easier to hire the right people for the right job. When you have these wins, make sure you celebrate them. Introduce your new employees to your investors and welcome them to the family!
Also, this is the chance to recognize your employee’s contribution outside of the company. You could call them out on their good work and achievement and let them know that you appreciate their good work!
Product / Development
Let them know what exciting development is in the pipe. Most of the time investors are not just interested in the financials, but what kind of features and further development the company is pursuing. It could also help them evaluate the direction of the company as well. And let’s not forget that your investors might have valuable insights or experience that can help prevent you from re-inventing the wheel and save you lots of time!
Requests for help
There is no shame in asking for help. Investors would like you to succeed as much as you do, and they usually have the right resources to help you achieve your goals. Don’t be afraid to ask!
For instance, your investors could help you with fundraising. The best way to meet new investors is through introductions from people you already have in your network. Even if they are not committed to your future funding rounds, they might know someone else that is interested. With the right platform, investors can easily introduce other potential investors and do due diligence with the available documents directly on the platform. Just like that, you got another investor.
Sending Investor Updates With OwnersRoom
With OwnersRoom, updates can be shared both inside the investor portal as well as via branded email to all relevant stakeholders, whether that is current shareholders or potential investors.
All your updates will be stored in historical order inside the portal. This means that new potential investors can be granted access to a rich source of information, for instance during the due diligence process of your fundraising. You control whether to include attachments and important documents in the updates you send out or to require recipients to log in to access these in the document room.
To make things even simpler, OwnersRooms analytics function lets you also keep track of who read your update, making sure you can keep all investors engaged and up to speed 🚀 Join our more than 5,000 users and let us help you build the investor relations you need to succeed in your next funding round!
For more information, feel free to send us a message or book a free personal demo here: ownersroom.com/en/book-a-demo
