To win the best pre-seed deals, investors should engage high-potential talent during their 'founder curious' phase, long before a formal fundraise. The real competition is guiding them toward conviction on their own timeline, not battling other VCs for a term sheet later.

A powerful, low-effort fundraising tactic is to maintain two investor update lists: one for current investors with full transparency, and a "dream investor" list. BCC your dream list on polished, highlight-reel updates showcasing strong traction and momentum, creating inbound interest without a formal ask.

Value-add isn't a pitch deck slide. Truly helpful investors are either former operators who can empathize with the 0-to-1 struggle, or they actively help you get your first customers. They are the first call in a crisis or the ones who will vouch for you on a reference call when you have no other credibility.

After 100 investor rejections, Synthesia cold-emailed Mark Cuban, who committed within 10 hours. The key difference was that Cuban had already prototyped similar technology and deeply understood the vision, allowing him to evaluate the team's execution rather than needing to be educated on the concept's validity.

Merge's founder views the seed round not just as a capital raise but as a test of street smarts and sales skills. How a founder manages intros, creates FOMO, and navigates the "dating game" with VCs is a direct indicator of their future success in acquiring actual customers.

To secure a critical partnership with Beyond Meat after another deal collapsed, Emma Hernan didn't use traditional channels. She systematically reached out to every account Beyond Meat followed on social media, correctly assuming this network contained employees or close connections, and successfully landed the deal.

Instead of creating traditional pitch decks he wasn't skilled at, Perplexity's CEO successfully raised funds from prominent investors like Yann LeCun by simply sending a link to the product. This highlights that a compelling, working product can be the most effective fundraising tool.

Prepared's founder rejected running a formal fundraising process. Instead, he had infrequent 'coffee chats' with investors to share progress. This built relationships and momentum, leading to preemptive term sheets and much faster closes without the distraction of a full-time fundraise.

To make a business narrative compelling, founders should lead with a surprising, personal detail. Jeffrey Katzenberg uses his unexpected presence at Burning Man as a hook to tell an investment story, proving that a personal connection captures an audience before the business case does.