Turn your network into your first investors

HOW TO ACTIVATE YOUR HOT NETWORK

Almost every founder I work with makes the same mistake at the start of their raise.

They build a list of cold investors. They send their deck to strangers. They wait.

Meanwhile, the people who already know them, trust them, and would genuinely back them - the people sitting in their contacts right now - don't even know the raise is happening.

Your hot network is your fastest, highest-converting source of investment. And most founders never activate it properly.

What this guide gives you

This is the exact framework I have taken every 1:1 fundraising client through. It's built from hundreds of real conversations with founders, and it covers:

• How to categorise your network into hot, warm and cold leads - and why the order you approach them in matters

• Who actually belongs on your hot list (most founders under populate this significantly)

• The step-by-step outreach process - what to send, when to send it, and exactly what to say

• How to turn every hot lead into warm leads, whether they invest or not

• How to build momentum in the first 10-20% of your raise so your warm and cold outreach becomes dramatically more effective

• The daily rhythm that keeps the round moving without consuming your life

• 12 real FAQs from founders - the questions that actually come up in sessions, with my verbatim answers

This is for you if...

• You are preparing for or actively running an SEIS or EIS raise, or a raise of a similar size (up to £3m)

• You have a personal and professional network but you are not sure how to approach them

• You have been focusing on cold outreach and not getting traction

• You feel awkward asking people you know for money (this guide fixes that)

• You want a process - not just advice - that you can actually follow

What's included

📄 The Hot Network Activation Guide - full PDF (11 sections, 30+ pages)

📊 Investor Tracker Spreadsheet - the exact template I give clients to manage their pipeline

A note from Kirsty

"I've helped 300+ companies raise investment. The founders who close their rounds quickest are almost never the ones with the most impressive decks or the biggest investor lists. They're the ones who ran their hot network properly - who went to the people who already believed in them, got the first 10-15% in quickly, and used that momentum to bring in everyone else.

This guide is everything I know about that process, drawn directly from my client sessions. It's the advice I have given on repeat, every week, to every founder who is at the beginning of a raise. I wanted to make it available to founders who aren't working with me directly - so that the process is accessible, not just the concept.