Founders are expected to wear many hats throughout the lifetime of their start-up. Since each of these roles is demanding enough on its own, in this article we will discuss how and why investor updates should be managed so that investor relations feel more like a help than a burden.

Investor updates and relationships should not begin only when you are launching a new fundraising round. As the popular saying goes: “Build your network before you need it.” The fundraising process can be particularly challenging for early-stage start-ups, and it can become even more difficult if you haven’t already built any investor relationships. It’s important to start engaging with investors who are one or two rounds ahead of your current stage. For example, right after your seed round, you should start reaching out to Series A investors.

Before actively fundraising, creating a target investor list will save you time and energy. To create this list, you can start by exploring websites that focus on entrepreneurship in Turkey or your target geography and gather the names of investment firms. After compiling this list into an Excel sheet or your preferred platform, you can begin contacting them.

Most founders aim to reach out directly to the partners of VC firms. While that’s a valid strategy, partners are not always focused on scouting and often don’t have time to meet with new start-ups. As a more sustainable approach, consider reaching out to the associates working at these funds, their primary responsibility is identifying investment-worthy start-ups. Connecting with them via LinkedIn and requesting a meeting to share your business can be more effective. At the end of the call, ask if you can include them in your investor update list. If your start-up falls within their investment thesis, they will most likely say yes.

Your primary goal should be to build a network of people who are familiar with your company and can track its progress. This also increases the chance that someone in your network will respond directly when something exciting catches their attention.

In your email update, you can briefly highlight your priorities, milestones, and challenges you’ve overcome. You’re not asking for an investment or a meeting, this is simply a concise update you can send to many recipients. A monthly or quarterly cadence is ideal. Writing the update directly in the body of the email is often better than attaching a PDF, and keeping it between 300 and 800 words will make it easier to read.

This email is not the same as the one you send to your existing investors, but it’s quite similar. You don’t need to include sensitive financial metrics like runway or monthly burn. However, you can quickly summarize revenue progress, key hires, notable customers, product updates, and any other major developments.

Here are a few topics you might include in your investor update:

Early-stage start-ups often face the same challenges for months at a time. That’s why it’s helpful to focus your update around a milestone event — such as completing a product launch, landing your first customer, or executing a key strategic move.

To summarize, regularly updating investors is actually more beneficial to founders than to investors. A few of the key benefits include:

See you in the next article.