I would love to chat about two things. 1) how you can become an accredited investor 2) a potential investment opportunity you might be interested in.

One option is a mouseclick software whereby you can track each click and where they are clicking or they have a heat map option. If I had 5 different plug-ins to purchase and I could track total unique visits to the site and the purchased amount of each one, you could easily come up with the answer. EX: 1,000 total unique visits, 100 purchases with an equal distribution of each plug-in means 20 were purchased of each. So 2% bought each plug-in but 10% converted total.

I applaud you for where you are right now and would like to "clarify" what your definition is of "a lot of interest and validation?" That can have SO many meanings. If I could better judge that answer, I would be able to tell you exactly what to do next.

Good luck,
Ping me if you wanna chat...

If I may be so blunt, I know from an inside source that Eat24, an on demand food service company that was bought by yelp used "adult" websites to advertise. Logic behind it was simple... Guys sitting home alone, he is watching some "content" on said website and when he is done watching he is probably hungry and does not feel like leaving home... Wink wink. Schedule a call with me to discuss other ideas.
Good luck

I can absolutely help with funding and series A. There are many questions I have for you before I can make any intros. I live in silicon valley and personally know many VC's. Schedule a call and we can take it from there.

I do not believe you should incorporate your company yet as there is a chance you will scrap the idea or iterate on the assumptions after analysis. I suggest you run your initial testing on a very minimal MVP to see if there is interest. I would go further in saying that you should not even allow people to pay only have them click on the payment option because at that point you know that it would be a conversion. The ONLY thing you are proving with an MVP is validation of an idea. Only make the mousetrap front end and see if you can drive users to where you want and stop. Even if you frustrate some people, it was worth it as you now know for sure people will buy or do what it is you wanted. Schedule a call with me to find out more. God knows I have done this enough times.

Good luck
Josh

The short answer is yes! There is a large group of Angel Investors in the SF Bay Area where I am located. I can actually help vet your company to see if a) currently have the traction to get an angel round b) what additions you might need to make in order to be attractive to investors and c) give you some connections I have made over the years. You would not be meeting with VC's as $500k is a Seed or Angel round. As Far as equity I can go over that with you as well. Let me know if you would like to schedule a call. I actually pitched against Mad Video from Argentina if I am not mistaken. We took 2nd and they took 1st in a startup competition in front of 3,000 people.

That is a touchy situation but you need to make hard decisions when involved in a startup. I am assuming the new Technical co-founder has more experience than the original team member. If that assumption is true, I would sit him/her down and say, as you know 25% of a small company is not much, but 5% of a huge company is significant. If we can attract this new CTO, I believe we can take this to the next level. I need you of all people to be onboard with this and be my eyes and ears when it comes to the engineering team.

If you are only moonlighting as a founder and keeping a day job then it depends on what loan application you are referring to. Are you speaking of a loan for personal use or the startup business use? I am at a loss as to the appropriate answer but I am willing to help in any capacity. Let me know.

I would say I need more information to give you good advice. It really depends on what your MVP is going to be technology wise. If it is simply a peer to peer marketplace, there are companies like near-me.com that you can plug and play and don't need any coding background. Also, there are new companies popping up like PageCloud.com whereby you can spin up a quick MVP by using their patented drag and drop technology. (Won't be available for a couple months though) Lastly, you can always use the Upwork avenue where you input your idea as a proposal and people can bid on the project. My personal opinion is do as little engineering work until you have validated the idea first.
Good luck~