How Startups Write Actionable Investor Update Emails

Let’s talk about crafting the perfect investor update. And more importantly, how to get them to respond.

I’ve written a few times about the need to build relationships with investors to maximize our chances for funding. And the best way to build that relationship, oftentimes the only way, is through a monthly progress update we email to current and potential investors, advisors, and any other influential individual kind enough to skim it before it hits their trash box.

Every startup is different, and there is no single template for an investor update email. But I’ve learned that there are a few rules that you have to follow to get them to read it.

Put Yourself In the Investor’s Shoes

This is a must-follow rule for any communication, but especially true with the investor update. As entrepreneurs, we need to flip the mental switch from “what do I want to say” to “what do they need to know.”

Think about it this way. Are you spending 10% of your time and money working on your startup? Probably not — unless you’re stealth, and if so, good for you, keep rocking. But more than likely, you’re giving this thing everything you’ve got.

What we entrepreneurs tend to overlook is that the same is true of the investors…