If you are able to have a customer introduce you (either via pre-recorded video -- see Retail Zipline (pw: enilpiz) --or live onstage), I highly recommend it. Having customer intros has a significant impact on meeting requests.
If they come in person, they can give a 1 minute intro BEFORE you go on stage. It will not be taken away from your 4 minute time. Alternatively, you can have an advisor introduce you; however, a customer is highly preferred if doable. We just need them to end on “Please welcome [Your Name] from [Your Company Name]” so we can queue the walk up music.
If you’d like to invite a customer or advisor to introduce you before your pitch, you can use this email template:
Subj: Special Invitation to Introduce [Your Company Name] At Alchemist Demo Day
Dear [First Name] -
I'm writing to invite you to attend our upcoming Demo Day for the Alchemist Accelerator on [Demo Day Date] in [Demo Day City]. And -- if you are up for it -- I would love it if you would do a short 1 minute introduction of us to the crowd.
The Alchemist Demo Day is a forum in front of Silicon Valley's top investors and influencers. It will officially kickoff our fundraising -- and more importantly -- commemorates all the hard work we've done to date.
You have been a key part of that story, and we would be honored if you would introduce us prior to our pitch.
The introduction would just be for 1 minute. We would love it if you could discuss your background briefly, and why you are excited about what we are doing. Then end with “Please welcome [Your Name] from [Your Company Name]” so AV can queue the walk up music appropriately.
If that is of interest, please let me know and we’ll connect you to someone on the Alchemist team.
Also, prior to the Demo Day, Alchemist puts on a VIP Summit for Customers / Innovation Focused Executives sharing notes on trends, and seeing companies relevant to their interest. If you would like to be invited to that, please register here.
More info on Alchemist is below.
Best,
[YOUR NAME]
Alchemist is a venture-backed accelerator focused on accelerating the development of seed-stage ventures that monetize from enterprises (not consumers). CB Insights rated Alchemist the top accelerator in 2016 based on median funding rates of its grads (YC was #2). The accelerator’s primary screening criteria is on teams, with primacy placed on having distinctive technical co-founders. The organization provides seed investment into companies it admits (typically $36K), and provides founders a structured path to traction, fundraising, mentorship, and community over the course of a 6 month program. Our backers include many of the top corporate and VC funds in the Valley -- including Khosla Ventures, DFJ, Cisco, Siemens, GE, and Salesforce, among others. The accelerator seeds around 75 enterprise-monetizing ventures / year.
Funds that have invested in Alchemist companies include Alta, Andreessen Horowitz, Bessemer, Citrix, Data Collective, DFJ, Felicis, Founders Fund, Greylock Ventures, Innovation Endeavors, K9 Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Menlo Ventures, NEA, Redpoint Ventures, Salesforce.com, Social Capital, Tugboat, True Ventures, US Venture Partners, and Voyager Capital. The full list can be found here.
Backers / Core Mentors in the Accelerator program include:
* Tim Draper, Founder, Draper Associates & Draper Fisher Jurvetson
* Vinod Khosla, Founder and General Partner, Khosla Ventures
* Dafina Toncheva, General Partner, US Venture Partners
* Ashu Garg, General Partner, Foundation Capital
* Adam Pisoni, Co-Founder, Yammer (MSFT)
* Timothy Chou, Stanford Lecturer, Former CEO, Oracle-on-Demand; Author, The End of Software
* Elaine Wherry, Co-Founder, Meebo (GOOG)
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