• Angel's Tips to Raising Money If you are looking to raise capital from angel investors or venture capitalists, this provides 5 great tips to help with your presentation.
• 100k for your business FREE application to a Utah-based funding competition to receive a $100,000 investment from angel investors for your start-up company.

Just a few random items from my inbox:

Tomorrow I will be presenting a webinar on business valuation for Funding Universe.  If you would like to participate and you are not a Funding Universe Angel Ready subscriber, you can pay a one-time fee of $19.95 to participate.

Know More Media, the publisher of this blog, is working actively to develop new tools to help companies increase their "on-line density," the number of hits you get when you search for the company.  This is not a problem for Yahoo or Google, but for small investment banks in Utah, it is an issue.  The latest effort is being tested in beta here.  BizzSpotlight provides a forum for companies to create an on-line profile with a link back to the company's home page.

VentureWire reports today that the average pre-money value of venture-backed companies has increased to $18.5 million in 2006 from $15 million in 2005.  For series A Rounds, the median pre-money valuation inched up to $6.2 million from $5.9 million, for the same periods.

If you are a company in Utah, you should take advantage of this… FundingUniverse has partnered with Grow Utah Ventures and Governor’s Office of Economic Develop to host a state-wide funding competition. An investment of $100,000 will be made in the winner of the competition. I’m seriously stoked about this. Here are the details:

1. Any Utah-based company can apply. Applications are being accepted until March 6th.
2. 5 semi-finalists will be selected to present LIVE to the audience and a panel of angel investors at the Governor’s first-ever Economic Summit. We’ll be soliciting audience participation through Q&A and an audience vote.
3. The angels will analyze the pitches in front of the audience to provide a learning experience of the angel process.
4. Governor Huntsman will announce the winner during his keynote speech over lunch.
5. After lunch, we’ll announce the audience favorite and compare the differences with the angel’s favorite. We’ll also have a panel of angels that will be available for Q&A.

While we are still in the process of solidifying the panel of angels, here is a preliminary list of those that will participate: - Tony Howells- Olympus Angels - Bill Payne- Vegas Valley Angels - Alan Hall- Olympus Angels/ Grow Utah Ventures - Paul Campbell- Cache Valley Angels - Ron White- Olympus Angels - Damon Kirchmeier- UTFC - Kent Thomas- Olympus Angels - John Richards- Utah Angels If interested, go to www.fundinguniverse.com/goedsummit to apply.

FundingUniverse is a proud promoter of the entrepreneur magazine Launch.  Grow Utah Ventures is the sponsor and they have done a great job to provide content that entrepreneurs will enjoy.

 Check out the latest issue here.

I’ve had quite a bit of interaction with Jeremy Neilson at the Utah Fund of Funds and I thought that it would be good to give him and the Fund a “Shout-out.”

From what I understand, the UFoF has already made 9+ investments in various venture funds that are connected to Utah.  Here’s a list of the early-stage firms that they have displayed on their website:

• vSpring Capital – an early-stage venture capital fund focusing on information technology and life sciences.
• 5AM Ventures – a seed and early-stage venture capital fund focusing on life sciences.
• Highway 12 Ventures – an early-stage venture capital fund focusing on technology and healthcare companies.
• University Opportunity Fund – an early-stage venture capital fund that co-invests alongside local and national venture capital funds.
• RWI Ventures – an early-stage capital fund focusing on technology and life science companies.

I met Phil Reed, the general partner at Highway 12 Ventures a few weeks back and he is stoked about the Utah investment market.  While their headquarters are in Boise, ID; they are anxious to get tapped into the entrepreneur and investment market here in the state.  In fact, I believe that they have already made 3-5 investments in Utah companies.

What does all of this mean?  More Money in Utah!

Props to Jeremy & the Utah Fund of Funds.  Now if we could only get them to make investments into angel funds…

I started work on a project for the Podango boys a few weeks ago. Podango, like myself, all work virtually out of home offices. The saved overhead, non-existent commute, and luxury of remaining close to family is twenty first century goodness, yes. But one of the biggest downsides in working from home is when you and the client need a good ole fashion conference room or business office for necessary several-person meetings. In the past, I've mustered up private library rooms or a quiet restaurant, but they've always been far from ideal. Since neither I or Podango have a central office, their team recommended we meet at Noah's in Lindon, Utah. "What's Noah's?" I asked. "It's a multi-purpose rental building with online bookings," they replied. "Cool," I thought, but I had my doubts.

I was wrong. Noah's great and spacious multi-purpose rental building is awesome! It has business rooms, gaming rooms, racket ball courts, basketball court, studio rooms, rec centers, reception rooms, private theatre and even a freakin' ice skating rink. All the business rooms include 50 inch plasmas, mini-bar, bottled water, 20" iMacs, leather sofas, conference table white board, laptop to TV cables, free wireless, and our room even had a pool table to boot. It's a very nice, flexible, and accommodating facility. You book a room (for as little as $18/hour) online or by phone and they send you a passkey with a room number. Granted, our key didn't work right away, so we had to get assistance, but the place is only a couple of weeks old. Kinks are expected, but I see this thing as having tons of potential. Expect to see several more of these facilities in the near future as more and more individuals work from home. Me and Noah's Rental Ark are tight right now.

I’ve been meaning to blog about this for some time.  2 weeks ago, I attended a seminar (hosted by UTC) on “What a founder has to do to remain the CEO after raising money.”  Scott Frazier, one of the most successful angel investors in the state of Utah, provided an incredibly insightful presentation.  The highlights are below.

5 Tips to Raising Money

1. Give your best pitch in the first 30 seconds:  The investors should know what you do and how you make money in the first 30 seconds!  This is a huge problem with most pitches.  Many times, the entrepreneur will get 10-20 minutes into a presentation and the investor still doesn’t understand the company or value proposition — big mistake!
2. Bring a customer when presenting:  There is no one better to pitch your product than your customers.
3. Offer a personal benefit:  This may seem very small, but investors love when the pitch effects them personally in a positive way.  If you have a product — give it to the investors for free.  Scott told about a company who turned off his angel group because they wouldn’t give the investors a free pair of sunglasses.  He also told about a company that offered a free annual membership to their website for listening to the pitch and a free lifetime membership to the site for making an investment.  They loved it!
4. Raise capital when capital is available:  Scott was offering strategic advice to entrepreneurs on the timing of the fund raising efforts.  He suggested that entrepreneurs start early so they are not desperate when pitching.  He also suggested that you study out various angels & VCs to know their financial picture.  For example, right now in the state of Utah… most of the VCs are in the process of raising funds so it is a bad time to approach them.  As soon as they close their funds would probably be the best time to approach them.
5. Find investors with deep pockets:  (yes… this seems like a no-brainer.  Doesn’t every investor have deep pockets?!).  The reality is that you want to work with someone that has the capability of making multiple investments in your company if needed.  It’s wise to talk to your investors up front to find our their feelings on follow-on rounds before taking their money.

Scott also gave some tips on how to get the most out of your company upon exit.  I’ll have to include that in a future post.

One challenge facing any start-up is what to call itself, or its store front. When it comes to building goodwill (i.e. your trademark) there is a tradeoff. The respective pros and cons include:
 
1. Generic terms are of little value if you intend to distinguish yourself from your competitors. If you sell flowers - florist is not a trademark, it is what you are. Of course, if you can get a generic term + .com, you are in business.

2. Using a name that describes your product or service is a little better. The more descriptive the name of your company or product, the easier it is for customers to understand what you do. The downside, however, is that your name will be given little legal protection. The idea is that you cannot exclude competitors from using words which describe their products or services. Thus, a descriptive trademark can take years of use before it is viewed as strong trademark.

3. Creating a fanciful name. XEROX, YAHOO, KINKOS and a host of other terms are very strong trademarks because they are fanciful. You have no idea when you originally hear the name what product or service is being sold. The downside, of course, is that you will probably have to spend piles of money teaching potential customers what you do.

4. The best solution for many companies is to pick a mark which is suggestive. Suggestive marks are protectable because they do no directly describe the product or service. However, they benefit from the fact that a small leap needs to be made from the name to the product or service. Whatever name you choose, you should also take reasonable steps to strengthen your trademark. Add TM after the mark and use the mark in all caps or in its stylized form when possible. For example, if you have followed the WordPerfect - one word, multiple caps - craze, use the mark in that style whenever used. If you use the mark in regular case and font, it will appear that mark may be merely descriptive or even generic.

Also, consider filing a trademark registration application. Once the mark is registered, you will have a much better position against any potential infringer. This includes large companies with similar names that later decide they want to move into your field. Down the road, a trademark registration can save many times its cost.

Have you hever had the "I should have thought of that" moment. I hade one last week thanks to Smooth Harold, aka Blake Snow of Griffio.

I always like talking business with people who are not attorneys. When I talk with my attorney friends, the discussion always turns back to law - probably my fault. 

Blake took an hour or so of his time and helped coach a new blogger. Hopefully, it will make what I write more useful and interesting for those who avoid lawyers - for good reason. I appreciate Blake's fresh perspective and hope to provide the same for others in return. Thus, I am coopting his lunch idea.

Devin Thorpe posted a great commentary the other day on how people can change. I highly encourage you to read it. Thanks, Devin for inspiring this post.

People can and do change. Change comes intentionally and unintentionally. Change comes with age. I know that I am a very different person now compared to when I was 18. Marriage changes you. My wife has been a great influence on me. Children change you. When my daughter was born almost nine years ago I was instantly changed. I use to have dreams that she was getting married and I couldn’t afford to give her a nice wedding. Strangely enough that forced me to do better in school and to excel at what I do.  

Other things that can change you include death, sickness, divorce, religious awakening, kids leaving home and repentance. All these things have the ability to force significant personality changes.  

I’ve talked about this before but it’s worth mentioning again. In 2003-04, I was part of a mentoring program in MBA School. I was matched up with star management consultant and author, Chuck Coonradt. I’ve never had such a hard core personality work over in my whole life. I would spend nights sitting up thinking about the things Chuck made me realize. This is how a lot of our conversations would go:

Chuck: Why are you a jerk at work? 

Chris: I’m not a jerk at work!

Chuck: (Burst out in laughter) BS! You know you’re a jerk at work!

(Long silence) 

Chris: Yeah you’re right. What do I do about it?

Chuck: 90% of the battle is admitting you have a fault. Once you’ve humbled yourself, then fixing it is easy if you have a desire to do so.

Chris: So what do I do now?

Chuck: it looks like you have a desire to change so make an effort to be genuinely nice to people. It will come easier and easier until you will wake up one day and you’ll be the nicest person you know.

I’m obviously still working on all this. It takes effort, humility and a strong desire to change your personality but it can be done. For me, I’ve noticed that a lot of negative stress turns me into a jerk at work but I’ve come a very long way!  

If it already hasn’t happened there is going to come a time in your life where you will need to force some kind of change. The older you get the harder it will become. What are you waiting for?

On a similar note:

There is a big difference between being a jerk and being outspoken. I’m outspoken. I take sides. I have an opinion. This doesn’t make me a jerk. It just means that I have a backbone. I find in Utah that there are so many spineless people. They avoid face to face confrontation because they don’t want to “rock the boat” so they go off and talk behind other peoples back’s. There is nothing I hate more than passive/aggressive personalities. There is nothing worse than a manager who pretends to be everyone’s friend and then doesn’t manage or leaves it up to someone else to do their dirty work. The businesses in this state are plagued by people like this. They’re more interested in looking like a nice guy then actually being one.

You can have an opinion and not be a jerk. Here’s one tip to help you with this - avoid the following statements:

• “Do you know what your problem is…?”
• “I don’t agree with you.” or “I don’t agree with what (insert name) says” - I hear that one a lot at church of all places.
• “With all due respect..” - people who say this never respect the opinion of the person they are about to address.

Replace that with:

• “Can I offer another view?”
• “Or we could approach it this way…”
• “I know this is a hot issue and everybody has an opinion. My view is that…”

Once we learn how to properly manage and deal with others in the right way - a lot will change around here.

So I challenge you to change. I have a desire to change. I’m doing it. I’m better for doing it.

Are you?