The Crest with Ethan Song
The Crest
E31 - Pop Up Report: Manica Blain on Successful Fundraising
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E31 - Pop Up Report: Manica Blain on Successful Fundraising

Ethan Song and Manica Blain of Top Knot Ventures discuss the fundraising process and the investor founder relationship. Manica shares lessons learned advising entrepreneurs over the past two decades in investment banking, private equity and venture capital.

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Show Notes:

07:23 Top reasons to raise money

11:05 Sources of capital

13:25 The fundraising process

17:02 Valuing your business

22:55 Founder traits investors look for

27:02 Investor traits founders should look for

35:56 Debt financing

40:36 Bootstrapping

42:46 Post-fundraising

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Past guests on the Pop Up Report include Lanny Smith (Actively Black), Drew Green (Indochino), Ryan Babenzien (Jolie Skin Co). 

Stay tuned for new episodes from upcoming guests including Jaime Schmidt (Schmidt’s Naturals), Griffin Spolansky (Mezcla) and many more.

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Additional Episodes You Might Enjoy:

How Personalization Helped Indochino Grow to $1B+ in Cumulative Revenue

Acquiring and Growing Multi-Million Dollar Consumer Brands

Why You Shouldn’t Take VC Money, Even When You Can

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The Pop Up Report interviews DTC and CPG founders to uncover how they fostered and scaled their communities to create profitable businesses. Gain a deeper understanding of the tools, tactics and retention strategies that build true customer loyalty.

Subscribe to the Pop Up Report on Substack or YouTube for more. 

Discussion about this podcast

The Crest with Ethan Song
The Crest
Welcome to the Crest - A podcast that dives into the art and science of finding product market fit. Through in-depth conversations with founders, entrepreneurs and investors, we uncover actionable insights to help you go from 0 to 1. If you are looking to start a business, launch a new product or achieve escape velocity, this is for you. The Crest is hosted by Ethan Song, a serial entrepreneur in both the consumer and software space.