I believe the best time to approach investors is when you have working a model; as far as closing a deal.

However, it's good to run your ideas by investors and let them ask you questions that you're not ready for. That way you can continue refining your idea and your approach.

Does your idea have traction? Are there users or customers? Are people getting excited about what you're doing?

All things to factor in when determining the best time. At the end of the day, when in doubt pitch now. What's the worst that could happen? I'd recommend before you start pitching investors to start pitching entrepreneurs who are strangers and see what you get.

Hope this helps.

www.linkedin.com/in/cauvee

I'd like to recommend bringing this problem to your Advisors. Letting some third parties play in the business. Maybe your CMO and current team are concerned with the equity split or time it takes to bring someone else on and get up to speed.

Have you considered bringing in a consultant to deep dive inside the company. It's ALWAYS good to get outside perspective so if internally you can't agree, I'd bring in third party to help us identify what is needed.

I'm not a COO guy I'm a CMO level guy. I know there are people out there that could help.

If you want to be a SUCCESSFUL entrepreneur, absorbing information is key.

I don't like to read but I love to learn. I absorb 12+ books a year and if you haven't heard the saying

"Leaders are readers." - It's a good one!

Try converting to Audible to listen to books and see if that helps also you could watch videos on lessons.

KEY - You have to learn about marketing, HR, tech, and so much more! Hope this helps.

As long as it needs to be.

Is marketing your expertise?

I'd recommend outsourcing to a consultant or third party if you have a budget.

When it comes to growing your business and brand this is NOT where you want to corners.

I DO NOT state this as some sleezy sales tactic. I'm serious when it comes to planning you want someone who has track record to execute.

A general plan such as social media, video, ad spend, whatever is fine. Know that marketing and sales are numbers games with finite execution patterns and plans.

Happy to help and show data on what I mean if you need help. Feel free to call me OR LinkedIn connect. I ❤️❤️❤️ helping people with their strategy to grow. So much fun!

Great question.

Research the market.

Sample your product and get feedback on the product. Focus on the quality.

Perfect quality.

Build budget for marketing and sales outreach.

Call me or connect with me on LinkedIn if I can be of support for growth strategies. 😊

My accountability partner in the UK just had this problem. He was doing every single task and was wanting to scale out of the minutia. Here's what I told him, there's three simple steps to begin the transition:

Step 1 - Build the systems. Are the systems currently done by robot and automation (can we convert to robots and automation if the answer is no?) or humans?

Step 2 - Right People Right Seat (read Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive) - you want to get the right personalities on the bus. I recommend you go with Culture Index or Predictive Index to bring in the right people (I can help you here if you need)

Goal: Hire top performing personality based sales, management, engineer and design talent.

Step 3 - Implement people in role. Invest time into them so they are very comfortable in role, can excel at role. Exit out of task and system.

Step 4- Repeat next system & task

I'd love to help you out and give you a free demo on Culture Index. You'll be amazed on how it identifies the best talent. Call me and let's demo your current contractors and employees.

What type of CoFounder do you need? What's his/her role for your team?

I'm all for building a team if that's what you need. NOT having a CoFounder just to say you have one. FORGET that how to get rich nonsense. Investors especially want to see you can get someone else onboard before they take you serious.

I would recommend networking at local startup events. Hackathons are huge for finding tech cofounders. You could source talent at universities and colleges.

Also there are sites you could try like www.founderdating.com and www.cofounderslab.com which also host events in your area.

Feel free to give me a call for more ideas OR connect with me on LinkedIn 😉

Samples are traditionally 100+ people. Can you get 100 customers? How many customers (users too) do you have participating on the idea?

Once you've shared it past friends and family, strangers are interested in what you're doing I believe that is all that is needed for a product/service to be validated.

Feel free to call me on message me on LinkedIn to discuss this more in detail.

I'd begin the journey by figuring out what you need. If you are in the USA you could go to www.score.org and look at mentor profiles and pick on there. This service is a nonprofit so it won't cost you a penny.

If you're not in the USA I would see what resources are available in your area. I would do the same thing. I find its wise to have a mentor for each area of expertise that you want to A) learn more about or B) don't feel as comfortable.

If you need help finding the right mentor or need a coach to help I'm available as well. I mentor a startup out of Austin/Mexico called OnePay and I'm always interested to help out.

Feel free to call me or connect on LinkedIn.

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