Northern Film & Media invests in games, mobile and web services. This video was created to help outline the main things to consider when putting an idea in for investment with us or anyone else.
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So you have an idea and, to make it happen, you're looking for an investor with some money. When people come to us with their ideas this is generally the dialogue:
Ideas person says: "I have an idea. Can we meet?"
Investor person says: "Before we meet, can you send me a one-pager with the background to your idea, so that I can see if it's up our street or not?"
Ideas person asks: "Sure. What information do you need on it?"
Investor person starts the "how to pitch in an email" spiel.
So, we thought it would be good to spell it out so that everyone can avoid four more emails in their inbox.
This is How to get your first meeting with Northern Film & Media (and other investors). This video takes all its inspiration from CommonCraft.com's superb explanations of all things digital media. Except for this topic. It's released on a creative commons licence so that you can copy, embed and share it as much as you want.
Ideas a great, but there's a lot of them and only a few people ever work out how to make them happen. Fewer still make their ideas successful.
First of all, your big idea quickly has to become a product, something we can all get a handle on.
First of all, who's the product for? What type of person are you aiming at?
And what's their "pain" - what is it you're making so much better with your app, web service or game?
You can think of this in two ways:
Think about the qualitative value you're bringing them. Most people find that fuzzy and easy to describe: it's more fun, more beautiful, adds to their experience.
Harder, though, is to put a number on it: what's the quantitative value you're bringing? Are you saving them time, are you saving them money, or are you helping to make them more likely to achieve something? If so, say so. If not, then is your product really as valuable as you think it is? Is it going to gain attention when so many other 'helpful' problem-solving products are out there?
Lastly, think about how you're going to make some money out of this in the first little while.
Are you going to
Give a 'light version' away for free and have a more developed version people pay for?
Are you going to give the platform for free but have compelling reasons for people to part with smaller amounts of cash once they're hooked?
Are you going to make money with ads? And do you know how many people you need to have use your app before ads pay their way?
Are you going to line up sponsors? If so, tell me who the company is, who your contact there is and how much you're likely to get once you start talking turkey.
Are you going to whitelabel your product, give the underlying technology a makeover for anyone willing to pay to have it on their site or with their logo on it? How many times can you do this? Again, who are you selling to?
Another important one: who's doing the selling? Do you have a convincing team member to do this, with a pedigree for selling (or is that what you need money for?)
Then go through this process again: think about how you're going to make money out of it after a month or two when everyone and their grandmother has tried to make money out of the same idea.
What value are you going to add over time, by adding features, taking others away, or changing the business model?
If you have an idea that you can work through like this, then we'd love to hear from you. Thanks for listening. That's how to get your first meeting with Northern Film & Media (or any other investor). It's not guaranteed. This is not business advice. Only good ideas need apply.
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David Gusick on how to develop an effective pitch for your businessby DaGooseLON269 views
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