Step 5:  Be formidable 

So by now, you know how much money you need, you have your 60-second pitch locked, you have your deck on point, and you have your investor process game plan. But alas, I've met with over 300 investors in the past 10 years, and I've learned that the most important thing to a successful raise is...

...confidence. As a founder, you need to have a degree of conviction that's almost delusional. 

But why? Because to an investor, confidence attracts resources like press, customers, and more investors. As a founder, you need to evangelize all of these resources to work with you at the same time. It's like pushing several boulders up a hill, at the same time, without letting one slip.  So, a founder that doesn't exhibit confidence, will have a hard time convincing an investor that she / he can even get started.

Now for us, the underdog founders, I've learned that confidence is not good enough. So we need to become f#$&ng formidable. That means that when investors hear you, they hear a depth of knowledge, insight, and conviction that's so profound, so powerful, that you go from being unseen to unstoppable.