Storytelling for Startups

Startup Leadership IS Storytelling

If you can't persuade people to believe in you and invest either their time (their career) or their money in you and your idea, you're just another person in a hoodie staring at a Mac in a noisy Berlin bar or a California cafe with a laptop and a shiny CEO business card.

Many baristas who have served me in Palo Alto are CEOs! In LA in 2025, my Uber driver was a Harvard graduate and a startup CEO.  

Tweets like this one from Sequoia about Zipline don't just happen! There is a lot of work that goes on behind and after these public announcements. 

Storytelling is the Startup Founder's Secret Weapon

If you can't paint a picture of tomorrow, customers won't buy, investors won't invest, and top talent will follow the money and protect their career. And decline your generous offer of equity. 

You might be making the coffee and opening up in the morning, but along with all your other jobs, your primary role as founder or CEO of a startup is CHIEF STORYTELLING OFFICER. Even if you are a mega tech geek. 

Motivating Teams - turning people into Believers

Zipline came to me, not to help them fundraise like some Bay Area startups do, but to develop the storytelling skills of their team globally.

The founders couldn't give all the talks they were being invited to give in the Valley or within the United States, let alone globally.

Additionally, they had a growing company to run, business development and growth to manage, and they needed to dedicate time to clients and investors.

But these talks are important. These talks are fantastic for recruitment as job seekers weigh up the street cred and benefits of big names vs smaller, more exciting, but riskier companies. 

Getting your team to give these talks is also great for the retention and motivation of key staff. They learn something new, spend some time out of the office and are reminded of why they joined you.

While identifying, articulating, and telling why they chose this company, they become even more engaged in the company and have a heightened sense of ownership. They are authentic, real and credible ambassadors for you.

Converting Clients - turning people into customers

Getting people to believe they will be better off with your product or service, getting them to imagine an enhanced future because they have become your customer. 

Then, turning customers into business referral machines, unpaid evangelists for your business. 

The secret to this is part story, part substance. The story has to be good, but so does the product or story. When I worked at BMW, they preached that the salesperson sold the first car, the car excited the buyer, but the service department sold the second and the third. 

Raising Money - turning people into Investors

Getting people to invest in you, your dream and your idea is tough. The more money you want to raise, the harder it is.

There are lots of Angel investors around in the early stages who will put up early, but even they are increasingly picky.

You know that already - you've probably used up all of the easy ones plus all your family and friends "investors" already. Maybe that is why you're reading this!

The investor pyramid gets much steeper fast between 4 million and 10 million, and by the time you are at series C, the number of investors has shrunk, and their scrutiny has got exponentially tougher. Are you good enough?

I've worked with investment banks in the past, where addressing the twin drivers of Fear and Greed underpinned much of our work, particularly when selling to Trade Buyers in industries with a small number of players, because the barriers to entry are so high. But that is for established companies in finite markets. 

What drives startup investors?

Investors know that some of their investments will fail. Their business is based on investing in startups that will go on to make it big. But that doesn't mean they are throwing money around. Every investment they make has to have a good chance of succeeding.

Each investor has their own set of criteria, and you have to meet those criteria to be considered. While startup investors really like to make money from their investments, GPs really dislike losing money. Their FOMO is less than their FOLM. (See caveat below!)

Investors have so many choices; it's hard for them not to think, "there might be something better tomorrow". Tinder swiping for Investors? Why invest today? There may be a better opportunity for them tomorrow. "Keep in touch."

So imagine you've found a potential investor. You've done your due diligence on them (they appear to have money, they'll talk to you, and their reputation is ok), you've worked on your team, and you've worked on, or are working on, your pitch deck. 

You might even have conducted thorough investor research and identified a potential investor interested in your sector.

You may have rehearsed your pitch in front of an early investor, a friend, or someone else. Whoop whoop!

That's great as a start.

But are you and your startup "good enough"? 

Is your story "good enough"?

Good enough to be offered a Term Sheet?

Investors get pitched every day and consider hundreds of potential investments every year. A Seattle-based investor told me his team sees close to 2000 pitches a year, but he only writes 4-5 cheques a year. That's a tiny percentage. 

Investors only make a handful of investments. They are polite and friendly to everyone, as circumstances may change and you may secure a significant lead investor, a breakthrough FDA approval, a geographical license, or gain access to a closed market. 

You might become more attractive, and if so, they want you to like and remember them and get them involved. Why you? Why now?  

Some investors feign interest and string you along, hoping that you and your business may improve, or that you'll join or start something else. Or you may become more desperate and offer them a better deal. They will ask you about your burn rate up front!

But until you have a General Partner who wants to get serious, to introduce you to the other GPs, you're nowhere. And even then, until they offer you a Term Sheet, a real one with nice numbers you can live with on it, you're still nowhere.

A pitch deck is a part of your To-Do list. But how can you even start that process if you don't have your story straight? Knowing and telling your story well is your #1 priority.

Clarity of thought is essential for clarity of communication. 

I help startups get their stories straight, then guide them through what to include or exclude from their pitch deck, and assist them in delivering their stories effectively.

I also prepare startup founders for the probing questions that are an integral part of the process and due diligence.

CAVEAT: Marc Andreessen says that "raising money from VCs is the easiest thing you will ever do as a startup founder", and that the VC's error of not making a bet (commission) is a bigger mistake than the error of omitting to invest in a "magical" startup that could become the "next Big Thing".

He says that a16z is pro-risk and is "waiting to write cheques... dying for the next person to walk in the door and be so great that they convince us to write the cheque".   

"Do they know what they are doing? Are they gonna be able to do it?"

Are you? Can you make Marc Andreesen laugh? (In a good way?)

The investors on Sand Hill Road are desperate to find great companies with compelling stories. Does your startup qualify?

My Experience working with Startup Founders

I've been a storytelling coach for over 30 years - working with politicians, campaigns, business leaders, startups and non-profits.

I help leaders to stop underselling themselves and their business by helping them identify, articulate and tell their story better. 

 Startups and Accelerators I have worked with include:  

• SAP - >4 years 
• TEDMED - 6x storytelling and speaker coach 2014 - 2020
• SXSW - 2x storytelling and speaker coach
• StartX - storytelling courses + StartX Mentor
• TechStars - storytelling workshops in Berlin and Abu Dhabi
• ZipLine - storytelling and speaker coach >6 months 
• ApiJect - storytelling and speaker coach >2 years
• NBT - storytelling workshop

I coached at SAP for four years when they only had one building - before they were on the DAX.

I worked with one of the first 100 SAP'ers, helped coach some of their B.D. team, worked with some of their J.V.s and Partners (including SiemensNixdorf), did some work for their Head of Marketing and conceived and ran SAP's intercultural communications courses. 

I worked with SiemensNixdorf - the startup child of Siemens, the established BigCo, and the sassy, innovative startup Nixdorf. 

I have coached over 300 speakers at TEDMED where I have been a TEDMED Speaker Coach six times. Many of those speakers are startup founders and their talks have been viewed millions of times on TED.com. 

I am a Speaker Coach for startups competing at SXSW Pitch®️ in Austin. That's a buzzy event!

A quick chat with Jag Singh, Europe's most active angel investor, and then Managing Director of Techstars Berlin on all things startup.

I really enjoy talking with ambitious startup founders about their 'why', and improving their storytelling to attract and retain talent, raise money and persuade window-shoppers to become clients. 

In addition to my role at SXSW, I am a storytelling and speaker coach mentor at StartX.com (Stanford's "in-house" startup accelerator), and have delivered storytelling workshops at TechStars (Berlin and Abu Dhabi), and NBT.  

I prepared a startup founder for a TEDX at UCL, another startup founder for a TechCrunch final and a StartX founder for Shark Tank!

Life as a Startup CEO

As the CEO of a startup, you are constantly pushing the boundaries and taking calculated risks to grow your company. There is so much to do!

The journey of a startup CEO is not for wimps; it's a rollercoaster of emotions, with high highs and low lows - and lots of hard work in between. Lots. Most of it is nothing like the Startup stories that Instagram shows us.  

One of the biggest challenges faced by a Startup CEO is the uncertainty that comes with building something from scratch. The sheer number of unknowns and moving parts and the need to navigate them all can be overwhelming.

Another brain-freezing challenge is the limited resources that come with being a startup. So much to do, but the hand-brake is on.

Startup CEOs have to make every penny or cent and every hire and expense count - how to do more with less. 

Being a startup CEO isn't easy, but what an exciting and fulfilling journey! I'm not just a storytelling and speaker coach - sometimes I am the leadership coach that startup founders can vent at.

I have run businesses and served as the adviser and communications consigliere of leaders of established companies and startups in a variety of industries for years.

Maybe I can guide you, too?

Startup Storytelling Services

Investors are looking for a reason to say NO. Give them a reason to say YES