Hi there,
Welcome to the latest 343 of you joining the newsletter. This week, I share my take on what is a much-discussed topic- building your business narrative to raise capital.
Also;
📸 - Social Snapshot- Peter Thiel on founder ideas
📊 - Company ownership
🎙️ - Peter Goldstein talks IPOs in 2025
🆓 - The resource list to get you going
Welcome to issue 117.
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Social Snapshot
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How a $50M Company Can Go Public, and Why It Makes Sense
with Peter Goldtstein
This week I talked to Peter Goldstein, founder of Exchange Listing, about IPO'ing in 2025. We spoke last season (you can watch that here)- what has changed since? How have IPOs performed, and what do founders need to know to get IPO-ready?
Watch Now
Listen on:
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Data Corner
Founder ownership in VC-backed companies
How much do founders actually own as they scale through VC rounds? Not much past Series A. Most give up majority ownership by then, with employees and investors carving out bigger pieces every step of the way.
The employee pool often overtakes founder equity by Series C/D, and investors usually hold control by Series B. This isn’t ZIRP-era fluff; it's based on 6,350 real cap tables on Carta from 2022–2024. Founders dreaming of an IPO with meaningful ownership? Better pick your battles (and your rounds) wisely.
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Raising Capital for your startup?
Thunder's mission is to guide founders toward the right path to reach their North Star, be it through securing equity or debt financing or navigating the path to a successful exit.
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Raising Money in a Crowded Market
I may be contradicting myself here, but fundraising isn’t just about your financial model, traction, or the size of the market. Those things matter, but if investors only made decisions based on spreadsheets, Theranos wouldn’t have raised a dime.
The best fundraisers are the best storytellers.
Your story isn’t just a nice-to-have, it’s the difference between getting ghosted and getting funded. I've played the role of founder fundraising, investor, and an operator (telling the stories to help businesses get ahead), so I've experienced all sides of the table. In today's tough and crowded market, where every founder claims to be "disrupting" something, the startups that stand out aren’t always the ones with the best products; they’re the ones that make investors believe in ROI.
Why storytelling wins over investors
At its core, investing is emotional. Investors don’t write checks because they understand your revenue model down to the decimal, they do it because they feel like they’re betting on the future. Your job as a founder isn’t just to show them a business; it’s to sell them a vision they need to be a part of.
The best fundraising narratives do three things:
- They make the problem visceral – Not just "big market, big opportunity," but why this problem needs to be solved now.
- They create a compelling hero’s journey – Why are you the one to solve this? Investors bet on founders first, products second.
- They paint an inevitable future – The best startup stories don’t ask investors if they believe; they make them feel like they’d be idiots not to.
Take Stripe, payments were kinda complex before them. Founders had to deal with a lot just to accept online payments. But, Stripe didn’t just pitch “easier payment processing”, they sold the vision of expanding the internet’s economy. The narrative wasn’t about competing with PayPal; it was about unlocking trillions of dollars in new commerce by making transactions seamless.
That mission resonated with investors, and you know how that panned out with their $50B+ valuation.
The Story I Told That Raised Millions
I’ve raised a lot of money over the years, and I’ve seen firsthand how storytelling can make or break a fundraise.
One of my biggest wins? Framing the pitch around inevitability.
When I was raising for an EdTech esports company, I didn’t just show a business model, I showed how an industry had to change, and it was already happening. I painted the picture of a world where students across the world could use their passion for video games to advance them, just like traditional sports do. There are more kids playing video games than traditional sports, but students were discouraged from playing in a school setting. We had a mission to legitimize esports as a fundamental sport across our education system. Then, I positioned our startup as the only company with the right team, technology, and timing to make it happen.
That’s what got investors excited. Not just the numbers (which were solid) but the sense that they were getting in on something before everyone else realized how big it was going to be.
How to Craft a Fundraising Story That Works
If you’re about to fundraise, here’s how to make your story grabby:
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Define the villain: What’s broken? Why is it urgent to fix it now? (Hint: “bad UX” is not a strong enough villain.) Think of this as the core tension in your narrative, something so broken that the market is begging for change.
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Position yourself as the hero: Why are you the one to solve this? Investors back founders who have earned the right to win in their space. Maybe you’ve lived this pain firsthand, built the best team in the industry, or have a unique insight that others have missed. Whatever it is, your personal connection to the problem matters.
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Make the future feel inevitable: The best stories make investors feel FOMO. If you can show how market forces, consumer behavior, or technological advances make your startup an inevitability rather than a risky bet, you’ll have investors chasing you. Make them feel like not investing would be like missing out on Amazon in the ‘90s.
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Use vivid, compelling language: Data is crucial, but storytelling is what makes numbers stick. Instead of saying, “We help businesses process payments faster,” say, “We’re building the financial rails for the next generation of commerce, turning a three-day process into three seconds.”
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Structure your pitch like a movie: Great stories have a setup, a conflict, and a resolution. Don’t just throw a bunch of facts at investors.
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Act 1: Introduce the world and the big problem (the villain).
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Act 2: Show the struggle and what’s been tried before (why past solutions have failed).
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Act 3: Introduce your company as the turning point (the hero) and make it obvious why you’ll win.
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Make them feel something: Investors hear thousands of pitches. The ones they remember? The ones that make them excited, curious, or even a little afraid of missing out. Use emotion to make your pitch resonate beyond just the numbers.
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End with a vision that’s bigger than just your company: The best fundraising narratives don’t just sell investors on your business; they sell them on a movement. Think about how Stripe sold “increasing the GDP of the internet.” What’s the bigger picture that your startup is a part of?
Want investors to fight over your deal? Give them a story they can’t ignore.
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Happy with Fundraising Demystified?
Let me know how you like the newsletter (it will only take a minute). Any topics you'd like me to cover? Click below and share.
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Fundraising Resources
💸 - Access working capital fast - Explore options for free
😍 - Free list of AI Recommended VCs - Apply for free
👨💻 - Free fundraising coaching session - Schedule 15 minutes with us
📝 - Playbook for Negotiating Term Sheets - Download it Here
💽 - Playbook for Setting Up and Sharing Your Data Room - Download it Here
✉️ - Playbook for Sending Investing Updates - Download it Here
📞 - Guide to Nailing Your First Calls With Investors - Download it Here
📆 - Your 12-month Fundraising Plan- Download it Here
💫 - Pitch deck design services for founders by VCs - Decko
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Let's stay in touch:
- Written by Jason Kirby - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonrkirby
- Subscribe to our weekly newsletter for market and industry news and tips when it comes to raising capital and growing your business - https://join.thunder.vc
- Seeking to raise capital? Get your list of target VCs by creating a free profile here - https://web.thunder.vc
- Looking to raise debt? Explore tailored debt options for free by completing a profile at https://debt.thunder.vc
