Angelsoft Investment Community vs matching sites?
Angelsoft is NOT a matching site. The main difference between Angelsoft and the myriad of “matching sites†on the internet is that Angelsoft is at its core a deal-flow management tool used by investment organizations every day to do deals - their private deal flow. When you apply to the Investment Community, you are placing your plan directly into a directory in the software that is accessible to all 12,000+ investors. The investment organizations can then click a single button and pull your deal directly into the fold of all of the other deals that they are working on in their pipeline.
But all of these on-line funding exchanges and matching sites claim to bring me to investors, too!
Because 600,000 companies are year are founded in the United States alone and many of them seek outside funding, there are many, many web sites that take aim at this lucrative market and purport to introduce entrepreneurs to investors. The sad fact, however, is that while it’s very easy for a site to sign up thousands of entrepreneurs (who want the money), it’s virtually impossible for them to sign up investors (who have the money.) That’s why none of these sites can legitimately point to their track record for getting entrepreneurs funded (despite any claims to the contrary). Instead, they make their money in one of three ways: selling you as a lead to service providers, selling advertising against your page views as you chat with other entrepreneurs, or charging you listing fees and then up-selling and re-selling you when you don’t get funded.
In contrast, Angelsoft started at the other end. Because it is the unbiased, internal platform used by investment groups, Angelsoft started with the investors. We have formed personal relationships with the general managers of each angel group and venture fund that uses our platform. We know them by name, and speak to them regularly. Their feedback has allowed us to build a system that manages over 2,700 new submissions a month from entrepreneurs and receives many thousands of logins each week from accredited investors (you can see the live statistics for yourself, at http://www.angelsoft.net/industry).
Now, with the Angelsoft Investor Community, you can post your business information in one place, and let investors find you, because they are interested in your company. This is better for you, and better for them. Angelsoft’s corporate mission statement is “more smart money into more good dealsâ€.
Is Angelsoft’s Investor Community appropriate for any kind of investment opportunity?
No. It really isn’t. All those myriad other sites will tell you whatever you want to hear, and hope that you’ll sign up with them, because they are based simply on quantity. In our case, since our primary constituency is the investors, it doesn’t do us—or them—any good to have them wade through hundreds of deals that no one would ever fund. Therefore, this is not the right place for multi-level marketing deals, work-at-home businesses, real estate investment opportunities, film financing deals, local service businesses, franchise opportunities, or other similar lifestyle or financial investment ventures. There is nothing wrong with any of these, it is simply that they are not the types of businesses that have traditionally received funding from angel investors or venture capital firms.
Instead, the kind of businesses that serious angels and VCs seek to invest in tend to have the following characteristics: relatively low capital needs; high scalability; strong management; a unique selling point; a clear potential exit for cash within 5-7 years; and above all, a complete, well-thought-out business plan.
Mark I LaRosa :: Oct.10.2008 :: Angel Group Manager, Angel Investor, Angelsoft 3.0, Entrepreneur, Investor Community, Startup, VC :: Comments
