Introduction

Raising a round is not a clean spreadsheet game. It is a long, messy mental fight most founders are not ready for.

What's the problem it solves?

Most founders think fundraising is simple: build a good company, show numbers, get cash. Then they hit months of silence, rejections, and strange investor behavior and start to think they are failing.

This article shows what fundraising really looks like from the inside, how much of it is about your mind and your story, and what you can actually control so you do not break before the money lands.

Quick Summary

The article follows Fabien, founder of Genomines, who raised 45M dollars after 14 months and about 100 rejections. Genomines grows special plants on nickel rich soil, then turns the plants into nickel for car makers. On paper it is the kind of deep tech investors say they love. In reality, the fundraise was slow, painful, and often confusing.

The hardest part was not the pitch deck or the model. It was Fabien’s mind. He had to live through the worst moment: walking away from a term sheet, then trying to come back and finding the door closed. To survive, he worked with a coach, meditated, and visualized the money in the bank every morning so he did not lose belief in himself or the company. If the founder’s belief cracks, investors feel it and the pitch falls apart.

Along the way, the team sharpened their story. They did not fully change the business. Instead they dropped the scary, low margin refining part from the story and focused on the core: plants that pull metal from soil. They built a huge Q&A file to answer every hard question and even custom decks to fix investor fears. They never relied on cold emails. Instead, they chased warm intros from founders in VC portfolios, kept “maybe later” investors warm with short updates, and used LinkedIn to show real progress.

By the end, timing, progress, and trust lined up. Technical milestones, key hires, and early yes votes from strong funds built real momentum. The round went from slow and “not that attractive” to oversubscribed. The lesson: what matters most is not a perfect deck or clever FOMO tricks. It is founder drive, fast answers, honest relationship building, and the grit to keep going when most people would quit.

Key Takeaways

• Fundraising is not clean or logical. It is long, messy, and full of psychology.
• The founder’s mind is the main risk. If you break, the raise dies.
• Do not change the core of your company to please investors. Sharpen the story instead.
• Track every investor question in one master Q&A and reuse answers.
• Many investor “no” replies hide fear or confusion about your idea, not real facts.
• Warm intros from portfolio founders beat cold emails every time.
• FOMO is not a hack. It comes from real progress, strong backers, and time.
• Your team must keep building while you fundraise, or investors will lose trust.
• You should vet investors too and cut the ones who act badly under pressure.
• Keeping a small list of “warm but not yet” investors updated can pay off later.
• Things you fear, like perfect decks or geography, matter less than you think.
• Things you ignore, like founder drive and fast replies, matter more than you think.

What to do

• Before you raise, get a coach or support system to keep your head straight.
• Pick 5 to 10 key milestones that prove your value and focus your team on hitting them.
• Map target funds and talk first to their portfolio founders, not the partners.
• Always ask warm contacts for intros instead of sending cold emails to VCs.
• Start a master Q&A file and add every hard question and answer after each call.
• When you see the same pushback on one part of your story, test cutting or shrinking that part.
• Build custom follow up decks if a fund is stuck on a fear or wrong mental model.
• Set an internal rule to answer investor emails within 24 hours as often as you can.
• Be honest with your co founder about stress, but stay calm and steady in front of the team.
• Send short monthly updates to a small list of top “maybe later” investors with real proof points.
• Trust your gut and remove investors who act rude, slow, or shady before closing.
• Accept that the process will feel unfair and slow, and decide in advance that you will not quit.

‍