Networking at VC Events: How to Gain More Value?

The period from the beginning of September until the end of the year is considered the height of the business season all over the world. In autumn, a large number of international conferences, business events and meet-ups took and are still taking place, where venture investors, business angels, technology giants and startups flock. In order for the networking at meetings to be of high quality, not to make you waste your and other people's time, it is necessary to prepare for it. So we decided to share a few tips:

How to Prepare for an Event: Network CRM

First of all, it should be said that venture events are a separate segment of business events, but the preparation for them is not much different from others in terms of creating lists of who you want to communicate with.

How to make a table for the networking? Sometimes the events themselves offer to install applications for matching people, where there are profiles of prospective participants. However, it is worth paying attention not only to official websites, but also to social networks, because many investors and startups are starting to publish information on their Facebook and LinkedIn pages that they are going to attend a particular event. And we recommend you to do the same so that your potential colleagues can find you.

It is advisable to collect the information about the people that you have found on official websites and social networks in a separate table, whether it's a regular Excel or a CRM spreadsheet. Next, you need to understand which of them would be more interesting for you to talk to at the event.

At venture events, people can be divided into 4 large groups:

• investors (VC, business angels, accelerators)
• startup founders
• representatives of technology companies - IT giants
• other members

If you are a startup, then, of course, you need a list of investors, and you also need to conduct some due diligence to understand where these investors give their money, at what stages they invest and what are their usual checks, so as not to waste someone else's time. If you want to purchase a startup network or find partners, contractors, then first look at which companies may be of potential interest to you.

VCs at venture capital events usually have two goals: to raise money and to find worthy founders. Let's look into the first goal in more detail: to find money for VC means to find good co-investors, to learn where they invest and, possibly, to make co-investments. Here a lot depends on the stage of the VC, but their action plan is about the same as that of startups: you need to understand who will be there and whom to meet.

Life-hack #1: When you make a list of people, find their social networks, and try to remember them visually. Frantically peering at what is written on the badge is not a good idea, it really looks strange. Moreover, by remembering the faces, you will be able to communicate with more people - an advice from our own experience.

The last category of those present are random people or non-targets. They should be treated with caution, because these are people offering their services, which quite often are not relevant to either startups or VCs. And the problem is they can eat up the lion's share of the time allocated to the networking, which is always not enough anyway. The basic recommendation is to be wary of those people about whom you know for sure that they are not in your mandate, not in your interest.

How to avoid this communication and not lose face? It is advisable to carry all types of business cards with you: physical and electronic ones, for example, for the WhatsApp application. Set up some program with screenshots. Business cards will also be needed for those guys with whom you do not want to lose contact. And if we are talking about non-target event participants, then this way you will definitely give a person a chance to write to you later and tell you what he wanted, and save time at an in-person event.

Of course, it is recommended to check business cards immediately and make a test call or write a short message in order to understand if you have established the contact. A typo on a business card can cost a good warm contact, which can be quite difficult to re-establish.

Life-hack #2: It is a good practice, when you have established a warm contact, to record a circle with a video in Telegram or Whatsapp with a person and say where you met and what you agreed to talk about. At the same time, consider where the event takes place, because not knowing the culture, you can violate someone's personal boundaries.

If you are a VC, then you can prepare a short list of the companies in which you have invested, what kind of network you have, and also what value you can bring - this is important, because startups have long become interested in more than just money.

If you are a founder, then you need more thorough preparation. Make up a pitch deck, and it is advisable not to use what you send to investors. Make a short version of the pitch deck with a minimum amount of text, do not overload it and add a link or qr code for product testing. Rehearse ahead of time and try to put it within five minutes, including answers to questions.

At the event

A tip for everyone - be active at the event itself, don't wait for someone to come up to you, join the company yourself. It is normal, when two or three people communicate, to approach them, wisely integrate into the conversation. Often everyone is open to communication, and if not, do not insist, it is better to just give a business card.

Life-hack #3: Basic advice - BE ACTIVE. Remember that everyone comes to events for the same reason as you - to communicate and make connections, to benefit from the event.

It is not the ability to tell a pitch deck in 30 seconds that any VC appreciates, but when the founder understands where this particular VC invests. Or if you know that your project is compatible with an investor's focus. An additional advantage is if you know someone of the founders of the investor's portfolio companies. Knowing the background and mandate is a must.

As for business angels, they are interested in finding the same angels as they are, or even better - syndicates. Syndicates allow business angels to participate in more projects with smaller checks, enter into exclusive and out-of-reach deals, and also provide a constant high-quality pipeline. In our opinion, it is better for angels investing $50-100 thousand per year to develop a network among the same angels than meet individual VCs or startups. But, if you can cover ⅓ of a good fund with your checks, then in this case you can go to VC and make contacts.

Follow-up to the event

First of all, make a list of those with whom you have contacted, organize all the business cards in a table. We warn you that the next morning after the event, there is a chance you won’t remember someone’s number, find a business card or contact, so be careful. It is very difficult to re-establish communication and make warm contacts. From our practice, a warm contact lasts a week, a maximum of two, and if you remind about yourself during these periods, then you will maximize the output of the event.

Remember the three steps:

1. quick follow-up after the event - do not shelve the received contacts, try to establish an online dialogue as soon as possible,
2. together with new contacts, make a list of next steps to achieve joint goals. This is to ensure that the contact does not “cool down”, but receives or requests the necessary information,
3. create a single table of contacts from the event to systematize next steps and current statuses, as well as to prioritize work with certain contacts

   
   

Life-hack #4: There is a certain common courtesy rule - to thank the organizers of the event in social networks. Thus, you can once again highlight your attendance at the event and your openness to its participants.

Why will offline conferences still remain in demand for all parties involved?

The answer to this question is simple enough. In the online format, communication is not so lively, warm and productive. Investors and startups like the atmosphere of being with like-minded people.

The pandemic and lockdowns have proven to the world the simple truth that we are social beings. A human needs a human. It is important for us to read the emotions of others, and we ourselves would like to see what our interlocutor thinks during a conversation. When communicating online, “casual acquaintances” are almost excluded - we cannot just approach a group of people whose conversation interests us, we lose many of the charms of face-to-face interaction in the real world.