Everything Lee Silverstone said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Silverstone: Letters of intent generally carry very little weight
“Letters of intent, I think, generally speaking, don't carry a lot of weight, in my opinion. I'm sure some people disagree with me, but I don't think they do. But we then made them even less valuable, because we got people to sign them under the worst pretenses…”
Silverstone: Startups discover value better without external stakeholders early on
“The longer startups can stay experiments without these external stakeholders and their only stakeholders are the people on the team. And then the customer, the better you can run experiments and the better you can actually find value.”
Silverstone: Peloton and Mirror do not need proprietary hardware, just iPads
“Peloton mirror, like all of these ones that are like, you need the hardware to build the future. It's like, actually, no, you don't. You just need an iPad with software on it. It's the same thing.”
Silverstone: Courting mainstream media over trade press signals broader organizational failure
“I think it's a, Symptom of a broader issue within a company to spend time talking to reporters that are not industry specific reporters that are going to get you more customers. It's a symptom of broader failures in the organization.”
Silverstone: Never pitch a VC as a casual conversation without a deck
“Go in, have a deck ready, present the deck, walk the person through it, control the conversation. This is a pitch. This is the, oh, let's just have a conversation is like, yeah, that I terrible. Never do that.”
Silverstone: LP intros to VC funds are better than portfolio founder intros
“A lot of angel investors are LPs and a lot of like founders who have had exits are LPs. I actually think that's the better intro than founders.”
Silverstone: Early products that must do everything to deliver value fail
“That, like, lesson of, like, the everything comment, I think it's, like, one of the scariest things I've, like, you'll ever hear at a startup is, like,
Well, this product would be cool if it did everything.
Right.
And it's like, it won't be good until it do…”
Silverstone: Tangible physical props make pitches more memorable than storytelling
“If you can like visualize things for people and put something in people's hands, they can get tangible with something that's different. And it's memorable.”
Silverstone: Founders must frame rounds as happening regardless of any investor
“That's actually maybe the framework for all people who want to raise, right? Is that you're trying to build this story of like, this company is raising money regardless of you or not. You can choose to come in or not. It's your, you writing a check or not is n…”
Silverstone: Founders should never ask passing VCs for introductions to other funds
“It's better than asking another VC for an intro to a VC fund. Don't do that. Like don't ask Pablo for an intro to another Canadian VC fund. They're going to be like, well, Pablo's not investing. Like why, why is he just.”
Silverstone: Founders should incrementally increase round targets as they close capital
“Here's how far we can get with two 50. Here's how far we can get with 500. Here's how far we can get with a million. They're all good places for the business to net out. There's all different strategies for them. You'll create different strategies around them.…”
A Product Market Fit Show 4