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What is your take on doing intro calls with founders before they start fundraising? I have gotten advice to reach out to investors that I want to raise from, but to ask for a 10min intro chat to get the relationship started. This way they can watch us grow and progress and “connect the dots” as opposed to only having my pitch deck and brief Q&A as context.

This is a tricky question.

On the one hand, it's ideal to get to know an investor before you start fundraising, especially if you invite that investor to join your investor newsletter. This will give the investor the opportunity to understand your business and market before making a decision to support you.

But on the other hand, this is a difficult request for venture capitalists.

Requesting a 10-minute meeting is not ideal because very little can get done in 10 minutes. To get a meaningful understanding of your market and your solution, you'd need closer to 30 minutes.

And frankly, a VC's day is packed from start to finish with 30 minute meetings. So the chances of getting on a VC's schedule are low. Even if you do get a meeting on the calendar, it will likely be pushed pretty far out, or may repeatedly get rescheduled as more urgent issues come up.

So this a great concept in theory, but hard in practice.

It may be more effective to find the investor at a meetup and introduce yourself in person. We also recommend using that time to better understand what types of companies the VC invests in, and perhaps educating the VC on your industry.