For many of you, this is nothing new. I simply thought to write a post about this since I am constantly being reminded of the fact. When approaching VC's (or incubators/accelerators/Liquid Labs) always read their website beforehand. In addition, read everything and anything else you can find out about them. Best yet, get an intro!
For the past year and a half we have received a lot of inbound interest. I am pleasantly surprised and happy that we also finally managed to update our website recently (it was an eyesore before). The majority of people get it and apply via the right link or email us with questions or requests via the proper channels. Yet, there is a small amount of people who don't READ THE DAMN WEBSITE. We very clearly state that we are not VC's, that we do not fund external teams with their own ideas, nor do we invest outside of the financial services/FinTech segment. Unfortunately, a certain subset of people emailing or addressing us does not know this. They haven't read the website and are wasting not just their but our time.
Most if not all VC's, accelerators or incubators have very clearly defined strategies easily available on their website. If not there, somene from the team will be blogging or regularly appearing on stage at events. It's extremely easy to find out what they are looking for, how best to approach them and get their attention and what to leave out. If you ignore all of this easily available iunformation and still send in non-pertinent information, you look the fool.
Although I try to respond to every inquiry, even if completely off, I simply cannot address each and every one. If you're pissed off that you haven't heard from me, to be honest, I don't much care. Were I an investor, I'd already be worried about how diligent you are. If you are blindly approaching people and then spamming them, you hardly will make a good investment. Further, it simply shows that you don't know how best to optimise your chances. Sure, be different and interesting when trying to get someones attention but trying to sell ice to Eskimos just isn't always the best strategy.