This article focuses on the strategies through which you can build a strong relationship with your investors and avoid defrauding them. This can be achieved by earning trust and loyalty toward your investor. Below are a few key factors that you must follow for a trustful and successful journey.
- Introduction
- Expectations of investors – From Trust to Loyalty.
- Defrauding Investors – Giving birth to their mistrust.
- Strategic Approach towards a strong relationship with investors – Avoiding Defraud
- Consistency and Transparency are gems in a business
- Abiding by ESG Principles
- Add feathers to Innovations
- Celebrate the Good but do not Ignore the Bad
- Meet Expectations
- Do not underestimate Punctuality
- Defensive Attitude is a Bad Deal
- Competitive Advantage
- Encourage Ethical Performance Throughout
- No Room for the Smallest of Lies and Deceit
- Solid Financial Plan
- Have a Sustainable Background
- Conclusion
Introduction
Business investors are priceless assets for entrepreneurs as they endow financial support for their projects. If the environment of business is not ethical in any context, it acts as a repellent for investors. Having faith in an entrepreneur and their project involves a huge financial risk for the investor.
Hence, business owners must invest in ensuring a seamless experience for their investors with the right and ethical strategies that convey – “You need not worry as your concerns are well taken care of.”
Expectations of investors – From trust to loyalty
Both investors and entrepreneurs must work hand in hand. Where entrepreneurs need a huge capital to run their business, investors need the potential to gain a return on the overall investment they have made in the company.
The objective of both is the same, growth of the business. The relationship of both comes to an end when there is a lack of an essential ingredient called “trust”.
Trust and commitment are the two pillars of a strong relationship with investors which facilitates sustained loyalty. It takes time to build trust with an investor. Though entrepreneurs face many ups and downs in their business, investors expect their business to grow continuously with good profit margins.
The risks and rewards associated with business give the investors a basis for investing in it. To build a continuous trust with an investor the entrepreneur must ensure that the rewards outweigh the risks associated with the business.
Defrauding Investors – Giving birth to their Mistrust
Failure and fraud are two different concepts.
Failure may be a result of hard work that couldn’t pay off due to certain unfavorable circumstances that may or may not have been under one’s control. Whereas fraud is the result of the unscrupulous intentions of an entrepreneur trying to snatch dollars from the investors.
Failure is known to be a part of any activity, be it, business, or an examination, and it is not certain. However, fraud is a game that is played by scammers (bad entrepreneurs here) to defraud their stakeholders, customers, and employees deliberately.
An investor can accept failure but cannot tolerate fraud.
A few luring acts such as an email screaming about the roaring success of a business proves to be an attractive offer for investors. Such investors are an opportunity for scammers to put together a project that sounds real but has no returns at all.
So how can these crooks be spotted? A prudent investor must be on a sharp lookout for the following red flags that can alert them about the too good investment opportunity presented:
- The scammer will always want his business idea or his product to be more focused on, by the investors.
- A clever sales pitch may be a trap for the investors. If the scammer’s voice overtly sounds like “high returns!” with no projections or blueprint to support the claim, then wake up!
- If an entrepreneur does not let you perform reference checks related to past investors, customers, legal and financial documents then it is an alarm that something is fishy.
- Excuses are a scammer’s weapon. They are masters at making excuses for wrong or delayed product delivery or even something as basic as arriving late at board meetings.
It takes decades for an organization to build trust and reputation but takes minutes to ruin it.
When the above points are observed frequently, then a question arises in the investor’s mind – Is this business worth investing in?
However, a few strategies can help build the trust of the key stakeholder – the investor. We will discuss some of them below.
Strategic Approach towards a Strong Relationship with Investors – Avoiding Defraud
We can avoid defrauding by maintaining a strong relationship with investors. This can be achieved by adopting the below strategies.
- Consistency and Transparency are Gems in a Business
While investing in an organization, an investor always checks whether the business is consistent. A well-performing and sustainable business is what investors look for. They also want to know what the long-term goals of that organization are.
Organizations must be transparent. An organization’s balance sheet, corporate social responsibility (CSR), articulated strategies, and many other factors that can have an impact on its investors must be crystal clear to build a strong financial trust.
- Abiding by ESG Principles
Investors value those businesses which follow Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) principles. This improves the perception of the investors regarding their behavior and environment.
For example, investors prefer those businesses that use renewable energy sources to sustain long-term efficiency.
- Add Feathers to Innovation
The trust of investors is strengthened by organizations that are agile in their business ideas, are ready to take on the new challenges in the latest technology and adapt to changes in the marketplace by introducing innovative products.
Investors prefer to work with organizations that embrace sophisticated and futuristic technologies like – Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Data Analytics Tools, Robotics, and efficient security systems that accelerate the organization’s growth.
- Celebrate the Good but do not Ignore the Bad
If you want your business to be valued, try to value your investors first. Often, celebrating the good with your investors works like a charm. Sharing your good times with them improves their trust in you.
This could include – mailing invitations for tech summits, new product announcements, or launch ceremonies, inviting them to the grand opening of your new office, or inviting them to award your employee of the year can facilitate critical attributes like – your credibility and sense of accountability towards them.
The fear of “how will they react ? or will they withdraw their finances?” may force you to blanket the challenges from them. You must avoid keeping your investors in the dark.
You will likely have the solution to the problem but in case you do not find any, they may come up with one! They are keenly interested in the success of your business as much as you do.
- Meet Expectations
Investors expect you to be consistent. However, sometimes, due to certain unforeseen circumstances, you may have to change your business strategies, abandon product development, implement new technology, train your employees, or switch marketing channels. These changes are not as small as to be kept confidential, especially from your investors.
Eventually and gradually, provide them with the indications of the upcoming changes. Call a meeting, discuss your plans, seek advice, give suggestions, and then apply the strategies with a fool-proof solution. Your investors will welcome it and support you in the right direction.
- Do not Underestimate Punctuality
It is always good practice to show up on time for everything. Be it attending a call or a board meeting, project deployment date, sending financial reports, performing business audits, or distributing salary to your employees; your punctuality tells your investors that you value their time. There is no space for procrastination and excuses in the corporate world.
- Defensive Attitude is a Bad Deal
Investors put money in your organization, so they are curious and will ask many questions about your business, product and/or service, past performance, team size, long-term goals, deliverables, and so on.
You must be forthcoming with the answers. Your defensive attitude will make them skeptical. With this negative attitude, they may understandably shrug their shoulders with doubts like – “Will I be allowed to ask any questions moving down the line?” or “Why are they considering my questions offensive?”.
Ego, anger, and rude behavior hit badly and can have a long-term impact on business.
Listen to your investors very patiently. You must invite their questions openly and let them pose as many as they want. Address their curiosity and eagerness by answering in detail and you will see the positive results.
- Competitive Advantage
There is cutthroat competition among hundreds of companies delivering identical products or services in the market.
Then why should investors invest in your business? What can bring them to you?
Is there anything that makes your product or service stand out from your competitors’? Does your product solve any unique problem? Is it efficient, economical, and sustainable?
Either your product must be a proven innovation, or you must be able to clearly show that your product or service is different or better than what your competitors have to offer. This is your “Competitive Advantage” and this is where investors look for that hook to hold on to.
- Encourage Ethical Performance Throughout
Organizations recruit individuals with a strong morale. Whatever you expect from others is also expected from you.
Your customers and investors expect you to follow strong ethics and abide by all protocols and principles. This facilitates strong trust in you and your products so they can happily invest in your business.
For example, McDonald’s, the world-renowned franchise chain needs to mention the ingredients they use in their fast food. The reason behind this is, that their foods are highly associated with the health of their customers and must not be compromised at any cost.
Another example is beverage companies like Coca-Cola always mention that their drinks are not suitable for pregnant and breastfeeding women.
- No Room for the Smallest of Lies or Deceit
Any fudge within the business can be easily sniffed out by investors. The strong relationship must be based on honesty and trust between the entrepreneur and investor. There is no room for lies.
- Solid Financial Plan
The entrepreneur must have a robust business plan that entails a good financial strategy. A clear financial strategy gives you an idea of how and where the investment amount will be used. A good return on the investment made by investors and your financial plan project gives them a clear idea about how much time it will take for you to make a profit.
- Have a Sustainable Background
Investors love to invest in those businesses that are run by experienced entrepreneurs and have a high-performance track record. To gain the trust and confidence of the investors, passion and commitment are two key principles.
Conclusion
A hardworking entrepreneur would not want to keep their business at stake by intentionally defrauding its investors. If entrepreneurs want to avoid defrauding and yield high returns on the investment, they must conduct a thorough and careful analysis of their capabilities.
Now the question to ask here is – Why would an entrepreneur have to invest in avoiding defrauding investors?
This is because defrauding may not always happen by choice, it may happen gradually and unintentionally at first or by the omission of facts too.
For example, in the initial phase, just after the investor has put in finance, the project may go well. But as the development cycle reaches the first quarter, entrepreneurs may find that they have failed to achieve even 50% of what was promised. This is when some entrepreneurs start making excuses and lay the foundation for mistrust with the investor.
In the second phase, the same story may repeat. Also, sometimes, for the fear of losing the investor’s goodwill and credibility, the business owner may decide that a challenge is not worth informing the investor. They may consider it as a challenge that can be overcome internally and can be resolved efficiently. In other words, what the investors don’t know, will not hurt them!
However, what happens many a time, is that the problem may aggravate and go beyond the resolving capabilities of the business owner. This is when the consequences come to light and the investors’ trust erodes a bit more.
This cycle may repeat, and you may end up losing a lot. This includes – a huge source of capital when they need re-investment and more importantly, investors’ trust.
To sum all of this up…
Trust is the main ingredient for the success of any business. It gives power to innovation, collaboration, and team management. Hence, entrepreneurs must focus on being on the right track with the above-mentioned strategies that facilitate a strong relationship with their investors.