Recently, we’ve started the search for funding as we have some really cool ideas we want to develop at Grockit. We also want to expand into tests like the SAT, ACT, LSAT, GRE, MCAT and TOEFL and provide our current students an even better experience.

We’ve learned a lot in our travels through Venture Land and we’d like to share some of learnings with you.

So this is Part 1 of our series: Adventures In Ventures – An Entrepreneur’s Travels

Nobody Will Read Your Executive Summary - You MUST have an executive summary that is professional, developed and that answers 90% of questions a potential investor would ask. But, it can’t be so long that nobody would read it. That said, nobody will read your executive summary. You have to have one, it has to look good, it has to be good, so…you do it for you. It helps you answer questions you get from you pre-marketing. It helps you prepare for the pitches and flesh out your own business ideas. It’s a valuable step, but not because somebody will read it. That said, somebody might read it so it better look good and be great.

Almost nobody will read your short elevator pitch – You must be able to boil your pitch down to a few paragraphs you could spout off if you were in an elevator with a potential investor. This is what you put in the body of an email when you send it to a potential investor. You attach the exec sum as an attachment. The elevator pitch has to be great and short, less than 500 words. The goal is not to give everything about your business away in a paragraph, but rather leave the investor wanting more. Your goal is another meeting. That said, a lot of people won’t even read your elevator pitch. To say ‘almost nobody’ will read it is an exaggeration. I would say that most people WILL read it. The questions you get will make you wonder though.

That’s it for Part 1 in our series. Please share your experiences with us in the comments.