from Hacker News

How to reach VC's in New York?

by sachin0235 on 7/28/13, 3:23 PM with 2 comments

I have a business idea and presently working on it. How could i reach to VC's in new york to discuss my idea for seed funding? What should be my approach to fix a meeting with them?

  • by amarcus on 7/29/13, 12:27 AM

    Here are two things that I've done in the past that worked well for me.

    1) Use AngelList (http://angel.co) to search for investors that have funded companies similar to yours (but, that don't compete with you) and filter that even further by NY. This will provide you a good list to work from.

    2) Find these investors on LinkedIn and see if you have a second connection to any of them that can provide you an intro.

    This has worked very well for me in the past. As well as that, go to as many startup meetups & events and network your ass off. Keep growing your network and use it for intros. Cold emails & cold calls don't really work unfortunately.

    When contacting VCs, don't go for a pitch straightaway. Instead, ask to pick their brain about a few things and get advice from them. Play the vanity card and work your way in this manner.

    It's always best to go through multiple avenues to get an intro rather than a cold email directly to the VC.