Mason Blake

Bold prediction for 2025: Investors will pay founders to access their venture data. Founders own their data and grant access to investors for a fee. This shift promotes transparency, trust, and efficiency in fundraising, while giving startups a new revenue stream.

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Imagine you’re meeting a VC today and pitching your company. Now, also imagine the VC goes home tonight and tells his or her spouse about the meeting with you. How do you think the VC would (or should) describe your product to the spouse? Remember, this is for someone who doesn’t have any context, and probably doesn’t have time to listen the whole story. If you can think of a story version that's plain and simple -- how you want the VC to describe your product to the spouse -- perhaps that version should be your pitch in the first place?

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One of the most common mistakes in fundraising decks: The team slide with lots of faces and no context of who they are and why they are right to solve this problem. Focus on the founders (max 4) and choose 3 short points on why each is perfect to solve this problem in their role. No contextless faces on a slide. Fewer with more depth, always better. #Founder #funding #business #investing #vc #venturecapital #entrepreneur #startup

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Equity Fundraising Basics for Founders: Understanding equity fundraising is crucial for early-stage startups. Here's a breakdown of the key concepts: 1) Convertible Notes: These are short-term debts that convert to equity during future financing rounds, allowing you to defer the valuation decision until later. 2) Valuation Cap: Protects early investors by setting a maximum price for conversion, ensuring they get a better deal if the company’s value skyrockets. 3) Liquidation Preference: Investors typically have a 1x liquidation preference, meaning they get their investment back first in the event of a sale or liquidation. 4) Equity Rounds: Seed rounds often involve giving up 10-25% of the company. Plan to raise enough funds to cover 12-18 months of operations. PS. check out 🔔 for a winning pitch deck the template created by Silicon Valley legend, Peter Thiel https://lnkd.in/ejp-Bhnu

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There are two levers an early stage founder can pull to grow their startup: → deliver the same use case for more segments → expand the use cases your product can deliver (either for one segment or multiple segments) Calendly is a rare example of a growth stage startup that has remained remarkably focused on one use primary use case: → scheduling meetings online Over time, they have used their incredible distribution to reach more and more segments and industries that have this specific need. They've become the "Kleenex" of scheduling tools and are the default even as large incumbents add scheduling tools to their much broader product suites. ClickUp has taken almost the exact opposite approach. They have expanded what use cases their product can deliver in effort to be the all-in-one solution for the entire business. The difficulty of pulling off this second strategy (for an early stage startup specifically) should become obvious when you look at the arrows. When taking the second growth strategy, the product and GTM teams are immediately pulled in multiple directions. In the first strategy, the entire business is rowing in the same direction. Each strategy has its pros and cons — and both of these companies are KILLING it. But when figuring out YOUR growth strategy, try to be honest about what your (likely very small) team can handle... and what they can't.

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How Senja doubled their product activation rate: (steal these for your SaaS) If you don't know, an Activation is any meaningful action your users take between signing up (Acquisition) and becoming a paid customer (Revenue). This is part of The Pirate Funnel (AAARRR). Activation serves as the leading indicator for pipeline - if users don't do something meaningful, they sure aren't going to pay! So what did the founders do to go from ~15% to over 30% Activation rate? 1. Added social proof on the sign up page. They actually integrated their own widget for this, so this is a double win: not only other people showing how great it is, but you're also visually reminded what the tool enables you to do! 2. Consolidated info collection into one screen. Multiple steps was an overkill here since the form fields are very simple and quick to fill out. 3. Added question to find out if user already has testimonials. This helps with segmentation to customize the email sequence. Those who have testimonials will receive instructions about importing them into Senja. Otherwise, the focus is on collecting testimonials. 4. Asked what users were hoping to achieve with Senja. The benefit is twofold: you get immediate feedback about the expectations you created in people's mind and also users feel heard. 5. Showing the testimonial collection form and saying it was prepared for them. This gives the illusion of labor, you instantly get something out of the box, and feel more inspired to actually use it because you don't need to do anything. Life's great when using Senja! 6. Straight to customization. Founders found out that users would first make some changes to the form before sharing it, so this is a great way to get it over with and create that emotional involvement early on. Investing time leads to commitment. 7. Asking to share the form. Since users have already taken the time to customize it a bit, there's no excuse to avoid this step and because you have the self-hosted option available, this makes it extremely low effort on your part. Very powerful. 8. The dashboard has a fake testimonial waiting for you from one of the founders. Beautifully solves the "cold start" problem and it makes sense for this product. You also see how a testimonial is going to look like without waiting to get a real one. This helps to get your users excited about the product. 9. A second testimonial from the other founder gets generated and you're notified by email. This shows you how you're going to find out about newly submitted testimonials and also brings you back into the app to check it out. And that's it. What cool techniques are you implementing to increase Activation in your SaaS? ----- Think this could help founders you know? Repost ♻ to your network and follow me for more SaaS content. P.S: Want to know where your SaaS is leaking MRR? You need a private, personalized roast - DM me "roast" to learn more.

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Exploring "unlimited time" solutions with agencies using AI to scale. Key questions we're asking: 1. What do clients want but can't afford? 2. What do clients need at scale but was impossible before? 3. What personalized methods could be automated? Silicon Valley says, "Do things that don't scale." What would you love to offer clients? AI might make it more possible than you think.

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The Startup Velocity Question: What CAN / CANNOT be Fixed? Continuing the conversation on What Hinders Startups Velocity … If you are facing velocity challenges, look closely at your Positioning. The lowest hanging fruit in terms of what CAN be fixed in a B-to-B SaaS venture is Positioning. Even in B-to-C, Positioning can be fixed. Sometimes, we switch from B-to-C to B-to-B. Sales processes can also be fixed. You have to follow a good methodology. It has to be done against a Positioning hypothesis. Product problems can be fixed, especially if it’s a matter of adding functionality. Again, it has to be done against a Positioning hypothesis. Within the runway of a venture-funded startup, however, it is excruciatingly difficult to fix Core Technology problems. Engineering problems can be fixed, Technology problems are of a different league of intractability. It is also very difficult to fix Market Timing issues. Runway tends to run out.  Can you wait for the market to develop? ONLY if you can do so without additional funding. Can you pivot? ONLY if you can do so without additional funding. Therefore, the strategy vis-a-vis many of these higher order challenges is to bootstrap if you can. If you can extend the runway by operating lean, perhaps you CAN solve some of these problems. But in general, they’re much harder to fix. My Question to You: What do you think is the most critical factor hindering YOUR startup velocity?  If you think you need help, consider a free online mentoring session with me. I will diagnose your roadblocks and we can discuss a path forward. https://lnkd.in/gF2zTJj #startups #startup #entrepreneurship #entrepreneur #venturecapital #vc #funding

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If you're running a SaaS Business - you need to see how different growth paths could impact your bottom line. I have created this 𝘚𝘢𝘢𝘚 𝘍𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘪��𝘭 𝘔𝘰𝘥𝘦𝘭 𝘚𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘰 𝘈𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘺𝘴𝘪𝘴 template for just that. What makes this template powerful: - Instant visibility into best-case vs. worst-case scenarios - Compare up to 3 different high & low-case projections - View results monthly, quarterly, or yearly - Zero complex formulas - just plug in your numbers - Perfect for investor presentations & strategic planning The best part? It's 𝗙𝗥𝗘𝗘 for my LinkedIn community! Here's how to get yours: 1. Connect with me 2. Comment "Model" below 3. I'll DM you the template Happy Modeling!

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Wow! I'm shocked at this chart. This is the growth chart for our Embeds feature. This is a 3 month timeframe for the amount of agencies that's using Embeds on Queue. And there's A LOT of improvements we can make for Embeds, which makes me think...how much more usage would it get if we optimized it? It's not even easy to find on Queue if I'm being honest. Time to optimize, measure, iterate, and grow. 🚀

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Everyone knows PMF is *really* hard, but I think it's because teams often focus on the wrong things to find it. At the earliest stages, it's more about MARKET product fit. Gerald Fong, co-founder of BrightGo did ride alongs with janitorial business owners to understand their struggles. The biggest pain point: time theft from loopholes with people showing up (or not) on the job. So he crafted a pitch about solving that problem and signed paying customers--before he'd written a line of code! The need for what he was selling was so compelling, customers were willing to pay and wait for him to build the product. Markets are the true arbiter of value. Sometimes when teams focus on product first, they miss market signals that should shape what you build and how you bring it to market. Jim Wilson and I pulled together some counter-intuitive lessons learned in finding MARKET product fit in *early* stage startups. This is part 1 of a series where we drill down on: 1. Build with the market you can get, not an ideal customer. 2. Own point-of-view before you have product. 3. Don't get too focused too early; throw away ideas to find focus. 4. Focus on conversations, not sales. We share some best practices and lessons learned from Costanoa Ventures backed SGNL, Delphina, Feldera, BrightGo and the intrepid founders doing all the learning: Erik Gustavson, Scott Kriz, Lalith Suresh, Jeremy Hermann, Duncan Gilchrist, Saagar Deshpande. Did your time exploring the market change the product you built? We'd love to hear your story in comments. https://lnkd.in/gqh2pg9E #startup #productmarketing #earlystage #founders #productmanagement

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Most tech founders build solid products but get stuck on fundraising. It’s all about strategic positioning. Here’s how to fast-track your closes: 𝟭/ 𝗙𝗶𝗴𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗯𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗲𝗿𝘀 Treat investor calls like datapoints. If you lack progress with fundraising closes, spam less outreach. First impression makes or break.  Step back, optimize your datapoints.  Why would a VC invest in you vs. other startups? What’s your unique value and approach? How big of $$ returns can they expect from the market problem? Get crystal clear on that and convey it in your pitch. 𝟮/ 𝗡𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗹𝘀, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁’𝘀 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘀𝗲𝘁𝘀 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗮𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁 VCs skim hundreds of decks weekly. Looking for the next 100x potential. What makes you stand out? Pitching is a funnel. Hook them in first.  Make them excited on the potential.  Then share how you’ll achieve it. If they don’t get the why, they won’t care about the how. Get buy-in on the vision before the how. Frustrated that your competitors that are “solving less” Or have no working product yet manage to raise higher rounds?  It’s all about the storytelling and narrative. 𝟯/ 𝗜𝘁’𝘀 𝗮 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗷𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆 Fundraising is like a sales funnel. Just reworking your deck isn’t enough. You need a strategic outreach plan. Build leverage. Create urgency. Think of investors as your fundraising “ICP.” Understand how VCs work. Align with their processes and appeal to their needs. This shapes your fundraising strategy. - We used these exact approaches for an early AIxweb 3 startup. Went from “keen interest” but lack of action to → to $200k committed in 1.5 weeks. - I’m Sarah, behind Formatif, a 0 to 1 venture design studio. Follow for startup strategies on how to fast track PLG and fundraising. #startups #venturebuilding #fundraising

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I know very few happy agency owners 😢 I know lots of happy software founders 😁 Here's why... ✅ No big team ✅ Better cashflow ✅ No client hamster wheel ✅ Building a sellable asset And yet, most content is about “How to start an agency” More people should look into software.

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This is a must listen to for anyone B2B founder. How to figure out Product Market Fit. One of best frameworks I've seen in a while. https://lnkd.in/ghSmhVNB

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The VC funding market has literally flipped for AI venture funding! Early-stage AI startups in Q1 `24 commanded higher median valuations than their late-stage counterparts. It begs the question: is there a dearth of truly groundbreaking early-stage AI companies, or is there an influx of too much capital chasing the next big thing? Likely both. Here’s why: AI Hype: There's no doubt AI is a transformative technology. But with so much excitement, some investors might be throwing money at anything with "AI" in the name, regardless of long-term viability. Limited Proven Winners: While there are some incredible AI success stories, the field is still young. This lack of established, late-stage AI companies with strong returns could be making investors hesitant to invest in them at high valuations. Limited enterprise adoption. Startups are betting that the tech giants, esp. AI tech giants, will have limited appeal to large enterprise. But the solutions are getting more and more compelling, and security and data privacy is being addressed. Meanwhile, the majority of capital is still going to a few players like Anthropic, Mistral AI, xAI, just like last year it went to OpenAI, Anthropic, and Inflection AI. The future of AI is bright, but for venture to succeed, sustainable growth requires a focus on companies that can clearly differentiate themselves in the market fray. What are your thoughts on the AI VC market? Where do you think the opportunities are? #AI #VentureCapital #Investment 

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Contrarian thinking from Gokul to win big. In my talks to VCs, many still comparing to SaaS era. Why they do so? Let’s compare another contrarian path in Enterprise AI too. Which Vaayu - AI for Finance & Sales is following. Eg Compare trajectories of Enterprise AI based on outcomes vs SaaS. End Target to reach $100m ARR. 1. Annual Contract Value Enterprise AI - $200k per client SaaS - $20 x 12 - $240 2. Upsell possibility Enterprise AI - $1M per annum SaaS - $240 per annum 3. Defensibility Enterprise AI - Strong as u integerate at multiple touchpoints by being expansive SaaS - Many new players will enter Why VCs still endorse SaaS? I dont contradict them - afterall they have to get their investors & LPs onboard . It’s easier for most VCs to sell SaaS to their investors cz 1. Risk Enterprise AI - More upfront technical risk, more capital required initially. SaaS - Less capital in beginning, gives impression of Product Market fit early. 2. Sales Cycle Enterprise AI - 12-18 months SaaS - 1-10 days 3 Past Validation Enterprise AI - Completely new. Very few things to compare with SaaS - VCs say $1m has been inflexion point in past. So they want to invest at this sweet spot. Take away- For low cost SaaS - real test will be after spending $10-$20m. It may give impression of product fit early. Path to $100m ARR will be extremely tough. Flown waters never come back. Referring past is risky when AI is changing everything. For enterprise AI, it’s contrarian, new. It’s steeper in beginning, path to $100m is clear very soon with $3m spend after initial steep is covered. Great returns are always on contrarian paths. Not what everyone follows. Achal Mehra #enterprise #ai #stsrtups

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