Recommendations and Tips for your TinySeed Application
We opened up our applications today for our 2020 batch today! See that announcement here if you missed it, and you can start your application here if you’re ready to apply.
If you’re thinking about it but have some questions, we wanted to give a heads-up about some of the things we’re looking at in each application.
In general: The top three things we look at are the people involved, product-market fit, and price-sensitivity of your market. That’s not the only criteria (we have a list of 40+ items) but those three P’s are the biggest pieces.
Some other specific recommendations:
Be thoughtful and take your time with your answers.
We switched to a new application system this year so applicants can save, review, and think through their application before officially submitting it (we’re using Submittable).
Take your time with your application and submit when you’re ready; applications submitted early in the application period will have no advantage over applications submitted near the end.
Company focus: We prefer SaaS (software-as-a-service) or subscription software businesses
We mainly focus on SaaS. The TinySeed team and our mentors have the most amount of experience in this area, which helps us provide the most amount of impact to the companies we fund. There could be exceptions to this (we almost funded a marketplace for our initial batch, for example), but this is definitely one of the main pieces we’re looking at as we know that this is the area where we can help the most.
Revenue: We prefer companies who are post-revenue, or have some sort of pre-launch traction
In general: If you’re at the idea stage, we recommend to go get some sort of validation, even if it’s a productized service that’ll eventually become software, or you’re just hacking stuff together with Zapier and duct tape. Get to revenue or a point where you can prove there is a need and people will pay. The point between $0-50 MRR might be the hardest part in any bootstrapped startup’s journey.
TinySeed works in the sweet spot where a company has launched, has some sort of traction, but needs a boost to get to the next level. We can and have funded companies who are pre-revenue, but having some sort of traction or revenue reflected on your application is a big bonus.
We prefer to be the first money in the company
If you have prior investors, the unique structure of our investment terms can sometimes cause issues or make funding you a bit more difficult. We prefer to invest in bootstrapped businesses who haven’t already raised money.
Unsure about applying? Apply anyways!
If you don’t perfectly fit the categories above but still want to apply — please do! At the very least the application will help you think about your business and might generate some new ideas moving forward. If you have a solid team, you’re shipping and getting stuff down, have some traction, we want to have a conversation with you.
We hope that clarifies some things and makes the application process a little easier. We go into more detail about our terms in our FAQ and in the application page itself. Email us at hello@tinyseed.com or DM us on Twitter if you have any further questions.
