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People put a lot of value on the pitch. With events like Pitch Club, Tech23 and IdeaPitch we hold it as this golden jewel of business that will send investors salivating. But while the pitch may be good foreplay, it’s when things get down to real grilling that the smoke and mirrors of the pitch disappear and the real value is laid bare. Before you enter a meeting with an investor, you need to be mentally and emotionally ready to be grilled.  It isn’t that investors are trying to be mean, sure there’s often a touch of ego there, but at the end of the day their grilling is with the sheer motivation of trying to figure out if placing their money with you is both safe and profitable. When I say emotionally prepared, that means that in addition to have your answers ready you need to be able to deliver them cooly, calmly and directly. Although it isn’t ever explicitly said, a lot of times a meeting with an investor can be a sort of stress test to see how you perform under pressure. If this isn’t an area you excel, it may be worth investing in a consulting group such as Pollenizer to help coach you through question and answer sessions.

Here are a list of questions we’ve seen asked at TechCrunch, Tech23 and in meetings with investors and things you should be prepared to answer going into a meeting with an investor:

• What are the specific risks associated with this investment?

• Is your company generating revenue?

• What is the problem you are solving for the customer?

• What did they do before they had your product?

• Do you have any customers?

• What is the life span of your product? Will people still need this product/technology in 5 or 10 years or will something else replace it or make it obsolete?

• What is the barrier to entry for competition? Do you have an advantage of being earlier, have a particular provider or market cornered, have a technology far beyond everyone else?

• What will you do to find and hire the best employees that you need to run this company?

• If the product is something that requires the consumer to change their behavior, what it going to make them willing to do this?

• If you have a chicken and an egg problem in acquiring one type of user to get the other, how are you going to solve this?

• How much are you trying to raise and what will you accomplish with this money?

• What’s to keep a larger company from copying you? Are you faster or hoping to be acquired?

• Can both your business and technology scale? If you suddenly got tons of customers would your technology be able to handle it or will you blow it?

• What can I add to your company besides money?

• Who is your competition?

• What is the exit strategy and how long can I expect it to take?

• How big is the market you are tackling? Is it large enough to make the sort of money you need

• Who are the other shareholders in the company and what amount of the company do they own?

• What other investment groups have you spoken to?

• What technology powers your product?

• How will you market your product and get it out to customers?

• Who makes up your team? What is their past experience? Have they run any successful businesses?

• If there’s a gap in the market, why hasn’t anyone else tried to fill it? If they have and have failed, why?

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