- 5 hours ago
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00how y'all doing that's not not enough I woke up for this how y'all doing okay
00:15good we're gonna keep this light we're gonna make this interactive who has a
00:20business and you trying to get some money raise your hand okay that's good
00:25we have what you just chilling you just looking fabulous on and holding it down
00:29okay that's beautiful oh my job is to help you refine your pitch but before I
00:35do that I just want to give a little bit of background so you know who I am and
00:37why the heck people thought that I was qualified to do this so I am a serial
00:42entrepreneur I started my first company a year and a half out of college and I
00:46sold it three years later it was a financial services company and then I
00:49currently am co-founder of a small business tech platform and we're in the
00:52process of being acquired I am also an angel investor I invest through funds
00:57such as golden seeds M&A angels and portfolio and then I'm also a venture
01:01capitalist I'm general partner of 1863 ventures and I'm also an advisor and
01:06venture partner at rain ventures so excited to be with you all today and all
01:11of my work is focused on helping what I call the new majority which is y'all black
01:16people and and the reason that I want to start with that is because language is
01:20extremely important when you are pitching language and what you're trying to
01:25intend means everything and so I don't use the word minority why because
01:30demographically black people are the fastest-growing segment in this country
01:33and in many states we are already the majority and when it comes to
01:37entrepreneurship did you know that over 5 million new businesses were started
01:41post-COVID and guess who started most of those black women so I want to make
01:46sure that we start with using the appropriate language to demonstrate that
01:49we have the power we have the capacity and the tenacity to be able to do
01:53this work so I want to go through a couple of things for you I don't have
01:57slides because I feel like if you look at them you won't remember so I see some
02:00people got some pens I'm make this real easy for you because I'm giving you one
02:02acronym and all you have to do is remember the acronym and the acronym is
02:05going to be essence so three really easy for you but before I talk about that when
02:11you're thinking about pitching particularly if you're raising money there are a
02:14few things that we look for and I want to pull out my acronym so I'll mess it up
02:18that's for sure so there's four things that I'm always looking for as an
02:23investor and I should say that right now I have investments in 29 companies and
02:27all except for two are black women-led they are diverse they are tech companies
02:32they are CPG companies so their food and beverage health and wellness education
02:36but the first thing that we look for is market how big is the market and if you
02:42are how many of y'all entrepreneurs already out there in the world so you know
02:44that's like your big old target logo like all these people and then who you
02:49have in the middle and oftentimes get caught up in numbers but know that it's
02:53not just giving me that amazing graphic that says it's a billion dollar
02:57industry or there's a hundred million dollar customers it's being able to tell
03:02me how you're going to get from your current customer base to that customer
03:06base that target logo tells me nothing except what the potential is I want to
03:11know how you are able to execute and go from where you are to get to that and so
03:16being able to say hey this is a billion dollar market opportunity I currently have
03:20a hundred thousand customers the majority of those customers were secured through
03:24social media I believe because of my distribution in target with more end cap
03:29and in-storm distribution I can 10x that in the next six months and therefore in
03:33the next 12 to 18 months I will be on track to be a hundred million dollar
03:36company within five to seven years I expect to be a billion dollar company with
03:39over five hundred thousand users of which forty percent are recurring you see the
03:43difference then I got a company and I'll be a billion dollars right so
03:47specificity is key the second thing that you want to focus on is what is your
03:52business model has anybody ever heard that before okay now how many people
03:56think your business model is your financial model as well I'm okay but I see
04:01what's your name what's your name Janelle was like no it's not so here we all
04:05everybody pick up their hands right and what I want you to say is my business
04:09model is not my financial model my business model is not my financial
04:15model and so when you watch these television shows and people like what's
04:18your business model and they start talking about their numbers you'll
04:21notice most of them don't get an investment finances is part of your
04:25business model but if anybody has ever heard of the business model canvas or you
04:29can google it it's free and you can download it there are nine components that go
04:34into a business model and that's extremely important to me because money is at
04:39the bottom of those nine things because guess what last time I check what's your
04:42name young lady Terry last time I checked Terry we do not live in a world where
04:47somebody just walks in you say hey here's girl here's a hundred dollars just
04:49because right no you got to do some things you got to sell some products get to
04:54sell some services which means you have to have some suppliers which means you
04:57have to have some distributors which means you have to have customers you have to
04:59have employees and you have to have partners right all of those things are your
05:03business model and so I encourage you to download if you're not familiar with
05:07the business model canvas it's free I'm not selling nothing but there are nine
05:11pieces on there and they are just what I talked about customers suppliers partners
05:16how you are going to make money who are your distributors all of those things so
05:21when a potential investor or a partner says to you what's your business model and
05:26how do you make money you want to make sure that I understand you have the
05:30entire system down to be able to get your product or service to market so if I
05:36am the lovely CEO of rose and skincare right Jamaica she's going to tell you
05:43about her manufacturing she's going to tell you about her distributors she's
05:47going to tell you about her partners she's going to tell you about her
05:50marketing she's going to tell you about her team and then she's going to tell me how
05:54all of those eight things add up to actually how she's going to make money so it's
05:59extremely important you think about that and so once you download that and you
06:02fill that out know that it is constantly changing and so as you have major
06:07milestones in your business or at least every single quarter you want to take a
06:11look at that and say have I made some progress what are the areas that I have
06:15improved but the reason that I as an investor want to know about your business
06:19models because all those things are going to change and so be really clear as an
06:23investor I'm never looking for you to give me the right answer because there is no
06:28right answer right everything in business the answer is it depends and so
06:33I want to know how you're going to use those levers in that business model to
06:37drive revenue and ultimately profitability so when you see people go
06:41I'm going to do it this way again those people don't always get investment the
06:45answer should be well I'm thinking about going this way but based on the
06:48feedback that I get within three months and willing to spend at least fifteen
06:51hundred dollars then I'm going to make a decision and so when you're able to
06:55articulate your business model you are signaling to me that you have the
06:59capacity to run a business you have the desire to take the risk you have the
07:05knowledge the skills and the risk tolerance to know that some things are
07:09going to work and that's okay mistakes do not make you a failure however if you
07:15keep doing the same thing over and over again and it does not work what does that
07:19make you insane or crazy I'm not investing in crazy okay I'm investing in
07:26profitability okay so that's the second thing I'm looking for the third thing
07:30that I'm looking for is team now raise your hand again if you have a business
07:35raise your hand if you've been fortunate enough to find somebody you actually
07:38want to work with okay God bless y'all so to the rest of you all who are still
07:43looking that's okay because when I ask you about your team it doesn't mean it has to be
07:49everybody that you pay your team are folks that I as an investor will feel
07:54comfortable about that you have a touchstone to say they can help me now
07:59ideally they're not just your cousin and your auntie but they are people that have
08:03experience they are people who are volunteering as an advisor formal or
08:07informal they are people that you have invited to be on your board of directors
08:11they are people who have committed to help you for the first six months and
08:15depending on where the business goes they'll keep going they could even be
08:18your mentor but what you want to do is say what am I good at you got to look in
08:23the mirror and be like what am I good at and then say where are my gaps and think
08:27about how do you can craft a team to fill in those gaps so you know what I'm good
08:32at I'm good at numbers you know why because when I went to school I knew two
08:35plus two was always four three times he was always nine and nine times I was
08:3881 I did not trust American history I did not trust the authors that I was
08:42forced to read so I stayed with numbers but that's okay some people are good at
08:46marketing some people are good at sales some people like people I don't always
08:49like people so I'm not always good at customer relations some people are
08:52awesome Daryl can attest to that some people are good on social media I'm
08:55barely getting my name out on the post I'm not that person so it takes a
08:59village right entrepreneurship is a team sport do not let people tell you
09:04otherwise despite who may be the face of that product so think about who do you
09:08want to be on your team and act like you are the owner of the team don't just be
09:12drafting people who are available right draft people right who have the
09:17capacity to help you right away because when you're starting a business you don't
09:22have time to be trained no training camp in entrepreneurship so you want to make
09:26sure that you are drafting people engaging people and figuring out how they
09:30are compensated through product through recognition maybe through getting paid at
09:34some point in time but you want to think about how are you drafting that team
09:37that can help you advance because when you then go talk to an investor I may think you are
09:42absolutely positively fabulous and more than capable but I know on any given day
09:49as some of y'all know there's probably over a hundred things the entrepreneur has
09:52to do and while sisters always do those hundred plus things anyway I want to know
09:57that you have helped to do that so that you don't burn yourself out and you don't
10:01end up leaving because you're frustrated or worse than that you just fall down the
10:05job because you don't work too daggone hard so it's extremely important that you put
10:08together that team the final thing is to understand your customers and your
10:14competitive advantage let me tell you this your customers are not eighteen to
10:19twenty for all your role black women who are interested in health care if you have
10:23a health care company that's not your customer that's the archetype but your
10:27customers are eighteen to twenty for all young women who spend over two hundred
10:31dollars a week who tend to live in the southeast who have jobs in
10:35professional services who care who shop online and use social media and shopify
10:40their primary vehicle who will listen to podcasts and every now and then may
10:43listen to black with music radio stations you see the difference because 18 20
10:48year old black woman that doesn't tell me as an investor that you know how to
10:51reach them it doesn't tell me that you know them it doesn't tell me that they buy
10:55things regular how much they spend and the beauty is if you don't have this
11:00information this is the best place again because all I gotta do is say hey sister friend what you what you do
11:04okay you you buy health care products where do you get them how well you got to
11:07get that data and so when you're pitching a investor I want to know what is your
11:13system to actually engage with their customers because I know sometimes I
11:17bossed up I never hear from them again I don't know if they give a who who I am
11:21what I paid for and I oftentimes realize that they have not asked me enough
11:26questions to understand if I've had a good experience or not and guess what that
11:29little smiley face or frown on square is not the appropriate information and so I
11:33want to know what are the processes that you are creating in your business to
11:37regularly communicate with your customers which may mean that once a
11:41quarter you may say I need to not do something else so I can pick up the phone
11:44and do some random calls that I can put out a survey and ask them to share
11:48information because you know what that's your competitive advantage you know how many
11:51people are trying to sell to black women right now every damn body why because we
11:55still popular thank God but we don't know how long that's gonna last so we need to be
11:59careful but the reality is people want to know how can you how can you how can you
12:06how can you actually get to us and telling me how old I am and and where I
12:11live does not tell me how you convert me to customers it tells me people that
12:16exist as a demographic but not the psychographic information that's going to
12:20tell that you are going to buy my product so we good so those are four things okay so now
12:25let's talk about the pitch now let me tell you a couple things as an investor how many
12:31people watch Shark Tank because I hate that show that is the worst damn show in
12:36television because that's not real there is no and we've had many of our
12:40companies be on Shark Tank there is no one that's gotten an investment because of
12:44what they said on television let me be real clear the pitch is the conversation starter to closing your
12:51investment it is not the means to an investment right the pitch is a
12:56conversation starter so when those folks walk off that stage was oh you got an
12:59investment that ain't real first they go to psychological counseling because
13:03they've actually been standing up there for three to four hours and then it's
13:07months as those investors do due diligence to then determine if they're
13:11going to make an investment so know that the pitch is nothing but the summary of
13:15your entire value proposition so we're going to use the acronym essence to decide
13:21what it is that you need to have to put together in your business profile so the
13:28first thing and I'm going to read because I want to get this right so the
13:32first thing is eat the first e is you need to demonstrate your ability to
13:36execute I right now probably get over a hundred pitches a week and I don't know
13:44most of these people so when I take a look at them I read every single one of
13:48them the average investor you should know spends less than 45 seconds reading
13:52your decks so when y'all spend four and a half hours per slide trying to make it
13:57fancy and cute and have all them graphics don't waste your time because the one
14:03thing entrepreneurs never have enough of is time so use your time wisely
14:07respect yourself enough to know that you making that thing slide and glide and
14:12animate don't mean jack to me because I'm spending 45 seconds on it okay but
14:17what you want to do is demonstrate you have the ability to execute which I'm
14:20going to find in two ways I'm going to find in your team do you have the skills
14:24required to actually run this business and do what you told me you're going to
14:27do the other thing I'm going to look at is in your numbers have you made any
14:32money I'm looking at your revenue numbers I'm looking at your customer
14:35numbers how long have you been in business and how many customers do you have
14:38I'm looking at your social media accounts all of those things but I'm trying to
14:43assess to I believe that you as the CEO and your team have the capacity the
14:48ability the resilience and the track record to be able to execute okay the
14:53second thing is s that first s is know your sales and when I say know your sales
15:00don't tell me well girl I've made ten thousand dollars last month because I'm
15:03gonna say that is fabulous right because that'll then put you around 120 grand
15:09right 120,000 AR for the year that's not bad if you're first starting you're gonna
15:14tell me I made 10,000 I'm gonna say how and you say because I sold my product I'm
15:18gonna say how well I put it online I want to know what channels of marketing
15:26worked I want to know more about how long did it take to convert somebody to a
15:31customer I want to know how long they're gonna be a customer I want to know if
15:35they're a repeat customer there's something called CAC CAC customer
15:40acquisition cost I want to know how much it cost you to get that sale because you
15:44know what ten thousand dollars for a thousand people at ten dollars let's just
15:50say you're selling I don't know a notepad or something that may be great because it
15:54probably only cost you two dollars but if it cost you five dollars a person to
15:58acquire that customer you do understand now you don't have a business you have
16:03a charity because it needs to be subsidized those custom last time I
16:08checked I'm not trying to subsidize no customers okay so really understanding
16:13your sales numbers okay the next S is talk about your staff okay and not just in
16:22terms of who you have right now but who are you going to have because when you are
16:25seeking money from an investor you are raising money now to create a specific
16:30end state within a certain period of time maybe the next 18 to 24 months so I
16:35don't want to know you got three people now and y'all are hustling and then your
16:39friends and they've been with you forever and they got MBAs and that's
16:42fabulous but I need to know how you'll go from three to ten or twelve so that you
16:49are now profitable making over a million dollars 18 to 24 months from now I don't
16:52want to know who they're going to be so tell me about how you are going to build a
16:58team to grow with your business right because last time I checked the business
17:02don't move and don't go without people okay the other piece around that staff is
17:07that tell me what they're going to do so you may not know who they are yet but
17:11tell me you know what once I hit let's say once I hit 10,000 people on social
17:16media then that I'm doing organically I'm gonna hire a social media expert and I'm
17:20gonna hire a social media expert who has at least five years of CPG experience
17:24who has worked for at least one major brand who has blah blah blah blah blah
17:28because guess what this is my money not yours so I want to know as much
17:33information as possible and if you come to me as a venture capitalist I'm using
17:38somebody else's money and the last thing I want to do and go back and say so
17:42what happened was I bet on these sisters and they told me a really good story but I
17:48didn't get their money back now granted that's the chance they take but it's
17:51somebody else's money and so my risk tolerance is pretty low because let's
17:54be clear if we mess up we don't get another chance but if you step to me as an
17:59angel investor because then it's my money I might have a little more patience for
18:03you because I'm managing my own money I know I know I may not get most of it back
18:07and that's okay so you also want to understand who you're talking to as an
18:12investor because we all have different risk tolerances moving forward okay
18:16what's our next letter y'all paying attention with your next letter E that E
18:21is what evidence of success do you have because you can tell me what you think
18:28you're gonna do but I need to know you actually have the capacity to do it and
18:32you've tried some things and so what have you done that's worked did you go on did
18:40you were you here in essence and you were in a video somebody captured you and you
18:44put that on social media and all of a sudden you got 10x your users awesome
18:49now you know social media works maybe you ran a coupon and that worked that's
18:55helpful to know maybe instead of doing a flat image you put video in your social
19:00media that worked I want to know that you have the capacity and skills to run a
19:06business because let's be really clear anybody can start a business that's the
19:09problem but not everybody can grow a business anybody can be a founder but not
19:15everybody can be a CEO and I need us to be some CEOs so we can create some jobs and
19:21create some wealth okay so we good with that we go with that next E okay what's
19:25the next one and this is my favorite one can we all say N together because as a
19:32finance person what you think the N is what's your name Tina that's what I'm talking about see you got it in your name that's why you knew number two
19:36how many people love numbers like I do
19:42not enough of y'all okay so for those with y'all don't like numbers the rest of y'all
19:48but let me try it again two plus two is three times three is American history
19:54line black history depends on the narrator numbers don't lie so like we need to get
20:00comfortable with them right two plus two is not one day gone before another day
20:04gonna be six like one day black people pop you look one day we not that's not
20:08how it works but understand that numbers are nothing but the quantitative or
20:14numerical representation of your business strategy so if you got your business
20:19strategy down then you should not be afraid to quantify it for me right numbers
20:24or the numerical or quantitative quantitative manifestation of your
20:29business strategy and hopefully if I'm gonna give you some money I want to know
20:33how it's being spent I want to know the use of funds I want to know how much money
20:37you've made so far and I want to know a series of metrics like customer
20:41acquisition cost a long time value it's probably like 30 I'm not even gonna go there
20:45right now because I need more y'all to get comfortable with numbers but I need to know
20:49those not because if you get them wrong you're a bad person but if you get the
20:55moon you understand where and how do you pivot the numbers are nothing but a goal
21:00that you want to strive for so that you know whether you made it or not because
21:05if I say I'm gonna lose 10 pounds that's fabulous but if I say I'm gonna walk five
21:13miles a day with the goal of 10 pounds you believe that I'm gonna probably
21:19actually lose the 10 pounds if I walk five miles a day putting quantitative
21:24goals on allows me to succeed and builds trust in me as an investor and gives me a
21:31guide to say you close so let's have a conversation on what worked and what
21:36didn't work are you way off homie let's have a conversation on what went wrong or
21:41you have exceeded those numbers what made you exceed and how do we quadruple that so
21:47that we can keep on going so numbers need to be your best friend you need to
21:54hug them every day you need to hold on tight because they are factual and when
22:02you get up there and you get nervous and your story is like well all I got to do
22:06is look at the numbers and that tells the story and you want to make sure that you
22:11own your numbers please do not outsource your number because if you outsource your
22:17numbers then they tell us somebody else's story because you have not been the
22:20narrator welcome to black history own your numbers now I saw sister friend right
22:27there Janelle you can have an accountant you can even use QuickBooks but if you
22:32don't own those numbers you don't own the business what happened to Wilt Chamberlain made
22:36all that money let somebody else manage and what he get a zero you cannot afford
22:42that we as a community cannot afford that so you need to know your damn numbers
22:46because what two plus two is three times three is nine times nine is
22:51you know I'm saying it's not hard people that's all they are sometimes if we're
22:55lucky they got a lot more zeros but it's still the same numbers right baseline numbers
23:00okay what's the where we are now see understand your costs okay because we've
23:07been talking about all the top line understand your costs and not just how
23:10much they cost but what are the price points upon which you can get it
23:14cheaper somebody selling a product here you buy a hundred or something it's one
23:17cost you buy a thousand of something another cost you buy ten thousand understand
23:21your costs understand the inputs that go in because when you're trying to drive a
23:26profitable business you only got two things you either gonna bring in more
23:28revenue or you're gonna reduce your cost that's the beauty it's only two levers
23:31to pull so you've got to know your cost and then the final thing which is the
23:35easy one is I need you to be excited you know many times people come in they
23:40were like so I'm trying to run this business and I've been doing this forever
23:44and this is my life's passion and I'm really excited and I did this and I'm
23:48going really are you really excited I can't tell because I need y'all to bring
23:53some black joy are you excited and we need to know that you're excited why
23:58because there's gonna be days where you're gonna be pissed off there's gonna
24:01be days where you are mad there's gonna be days where you are deeply
24:04disappointed they're gonna be days you're going what the hell have I done and why
24:09on earth did I think anything out my 401k was a good idea so you need to be
24:13excited because excitement is contagious and you need me to be as excited as you I
24:18can't be more excited than you otherwise then it should be my business that make
24:22sense do you know can you come up here real quick quick come come come come
24:25come on come on come on come on sister Frank come on because they gonna cut me
24:29off come on come on what's your business while you walk in us versus poverty right
24:37period okay what does it do okay firm okay and what do you do
24:46uh-huh okay okay and how long you been in business this year you made any money
24:55yet never made any money yet you looking for money to help you build your
24:58business what did you do before you did this all right now okay okay and where
25:11are you from you from Chicago I know you're gonna launch this in Chicago you
25:16think you know is it launched in Chicago to start with okay Janelle what's the
25:20name of the firm us in poverty okay have a seat you gonna tell me how sit right
25:24here sit right here sit right here sit right here okay what's your last name
25:28pilot okay I am Janelle pilot if I were you this is what I would say hi my name is
25:35Janelle pilot and I am so excited about helping the community the name of my
25:39business is us versus poverty you know why because black Americans are the
25:43fastest-growing seven in America because we comprise over 16 trillion
25:47dollars of revenue that is a nationwide problem but one of our blackest cities
25:52with the greatest wealth disparity but also the greatest wealth opportunity is
25:55Chicago so I am starting in my hometown of Chicago where I stand with the
25:59master's degree understand the intersection of health and wealth my
26:03desire is to raise 1 million dollars from you to be able to manifest my dream and
26:08the dream of many other black Americans in this country the reality is that
26:11poverty is caused by systemic racism and bias and what can take us out of that is
26:16education and access my firm is designed to create plans and access tools that black
26:22Americans can get up out of poverty and we as a community can rise and become
26:26wealthy as a people is that your business alright folks good luck raising money with your business I'll see you on the other side
26:39you
26:42you
26:44you
26:46you
26:48you
26:50you
26:52you
Comments