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How to Raise Capital for your Business

Funding Opportunities for African Entrepreneurs

African Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) face many challenges, including access to funding opportunities. This, in turn, makes growing and scaling businesses difficult for entrepreneurs. While MSMEs are often drivers of growth, especially in developing countries, 51% of these businesses need more capital than they can access (Center for Strategic & International Studies, 2021). To support the capacities of MSMEs to create numerous jobs and sporadically improve the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of African countries, below are some available funding opportunities: 2022 Africa’s Business Heroes Prize Competition Win up to $300,000 in grant funds from Africa’s Business Heroes Prize (ABH) Competition. ABH is open to African entrepreneurs making a difference in their local communities. Your business must be providing a solution to the most important problems in the world. It must also be sustainable and inclusive. Formally registered African businesses from all sectors, with a three-year track record, are eligible to apply.  The application deadline is June 20, 2022. D-Prize Seed Capital Do you have a new, proven idea capable of solving poverty? If yes, you’re the entrepreneur D-prize is looking for. You stand a chance to get up to $20,000 to fund an intervention that is capable of eradicating poverty.  Your idea can fall into any of these categories- health access, water, education, agriculture, livelihoods, energy and public services. Similarly, you can propose a custom intervention. Every entrepreneur is eligible to apply as there are no geographical, age or background restrictions. The extended application deadline is June 26, 2022. Copernicus Masters Challenge A total of EUR 531,000 is available for individuals using Earth observation data to tackle global challenges. Innovators above 18 years are eligible to apply. More so, Applications are welcome from start-ups, SMEs, universities and corporations, as long as you’re utilizing Earth Observation (EO) data to solve a problem. If you decide to apply, make sure you do so on or before 11 July 2022. Cartier Women’s Initiative Annually, the Cartier Women’s Initiative empowers impact entrepreneurs, especially women with funding and networking opportunities. Women with solid, sustainable, social or environmental impact from any country or sector can apply. Funding from the Cartier Women’s Initiative is divided into three categories: The Regional Award Science and Technology Pioneer Award- for women entrepreneurs innovating scientific and technological solutions to problems. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Award- for any entrepreneur (male or female) designing solutions that seek to provide opportunities for communities that have been underserved. The deadline for all categories is Thursday, June 30, 2022, at 2 p.m. Central European Summer Time (CEST). Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation Is your business mission-driven? Have you been addressing critical social or environmental issues for about three years? The Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation might be the right opportunity for you. The foundation accepts applications for social impact ideas all year, so you never have to worry about a deadline. Impact-focused, data-driven businesses at post-pilot stages, with the willingness to expand, are eligible to apply. Know an entrepreneur that needs this? Share and prompt them to check out these opportunities to start, grow or scale their businesses.  

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How to Build Your 60-Second Elevator Pitch

An elevator pitch is an introductory summary of you and your business goals. It is one of the most effective methods to promote your personal brand and get listeners wanting to know more, be it with potential investors, employees, co-founders, etc. Build your own, outstanding pitch quickly and easily with any of the following positive ‘action’ words: Achieve Assess Broaden Capture Centralize Change Compile Complete Coordinate Create Design Develop Diversify Enforce Enhance Establish Evaluate Exceed Forecast Guide Identify Increase Initiate Inspire Investigate Launch Maintain Manage Who You Are Your success depends on the strength of your first few words, so your opening line is important. You need to engage the listeners and draw them in, by making them eager to learn more. This means providing context to make the pitch relevant to them, before talking about you. Present the problem that you and your solution solve and provide context. Here’s an example: Many entrepreneurs struggle to attract new customers, as they are so busy bringing in revenue by delivering value. Often they only grow through referrals. We specialize in creating marketing systems for successful entrepreneurs in the education industry. What You Do This speaks about your experience and builds on the initial section. You may reference recent projects you have been involved in or interesting opportunities you have had. Pay attention to the context by keeping it relevant to the listener and free from jargon. Here’s an example: We are focused on delivering marketing results for clients in the education industry. I have worked in this industry for ten years and I am very aware of the common business development challenges as well as effective solutions. Your Unique Selling Proposition You should show the unique qualities you have that can benefit the listener. The intention should be to clarify the points that differentiate you from competitors and similar companies in your industry. These differences should not be superficial but focused on delivering unique value. Here’s an example: We have developed a proprietary system for business development called the ASAP Marketing system and have used this system successfully with several clients in West Africa. We serve six of the top 10 schools in the Lagos district and have helped them achieve 20% increase in new business sales revenue over the last three years. Your Goals This section should also include ‘’What’s in it for them?’’ Be clear about what you want and align it to what the listener is looking for. Find out exactly what the listener wants so that your pitch can show how you can fulfill their needs. Use gentle, effective persuasion to avoid causing offense. Here’s an example: We would be interested in speaking to you to see if there is an opportunity for us to help you win more customers. Action Steps Write the first part of your elevator pitch by answering the question ‘’Who am I?’’ Write the second part of your elevator pitch by answering the question ‘’What do I do?’’ Write the third part of your elevator pitch by answering the question ‘’Why am I unique? What are my unique selling points?’’ Write the final part of your elevator pitch by answering the question ‘’What are your goals?’’ For more posts from this author, visit: www.gloryenyinnaya.com ‘’Your audience is waiting for your stories.’’ – Steve Woodruff, Author of Clarity Wins.

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How to be Investment Ready

Research has shown that in Nigeria, 80% of businesses fail within the first 5 years, and out of the 20% that make it past 5 years, just 25% of them make it to the 10-year mark.  Being an entrepreneur in Nigeria myself, I can list out many different factors that affect the success of a business but one of the most important ones in our climate is access to funds. Having little capital is difficult to build scalable and sustainable businesses.  But another challenge could be not having the right network to help scale your business. Both these reasons are why entrepreneurs seek investors. Investors provide the expertise, network, and investment to help grow sustainable businesses and help scale these businesses.  Seeking investors, however, is very challenging and overwhelming for many. You have to first off know the type of investor you are looking for (for example, a banker, angel investor, crowd funder, venture capitalist), the profile of the investors you are seeking, and what these investors are looking for. With this understanding out of the way, you can then work on ensuring your business is investment-ready before you approach them.  In this article, I will share with you some tips on how to be investment-ready Solid Financial Analysis: you have to show your investors that you understand your numbers. Understand your past performance, your current performance, and your future projected performance (at least for the next 3 years). Show that your assumption is justified and your projected performance model is flexible and dynamic enough to account for changes in your assumptions. You should also create a solid revenue model that shows investors the path your business will take to make money. Market Strategy: no investor wants to invest in a company that is targetting a very small group of people who do not have strong purchasing power. You will need to show your investors that you have researched the market size of your business and you have a clear go-to-market strategy. You also need to show them that you have created some kind of traction within the market. Exit Strategy: as you have seen within the start-up world, people do not start a business without an end goal in mind. You need to identify your end goal; is it a merger or an acquisition or an IPO. Identify your end goal and be able to justify why you want this goal.  Strong Team: investors are less likely to invest in a one-man business (nor a sole proprietorship). Ensure you have people that believe in your vision and are inspired to join your team in the role of a co-founder or partner. Be careful when picking your co-founders or partners, ensure they have the same values, goals, and vision as you for the business.  Clear Ask: you have to know and be very clear on what you are asking the investors for, it could be one or more things but be clear. Is it money, access to their suppliers, distributors, network, and so on? Be able to clearly tell investors what the valuation of your company is. The tricky part about valuations is that there are different ways to calculate your business’s valuation, choose the best way, and be able to justify it.  Once all these 5 pointers are clearly defined and understood, you can now create an investment teaser deck, which is a deck (presentation) you send to investors explaining to them the above and why they need to invest in your business. You need to also have supporting documents and evidence. And most importantly you need to be proactive and prepared.    Read Also: Growing the economy: Attracting investment to Nigeria through franchising  

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