How to get people to invest in your website!

I read a lot how websites raise money by getting other companies invest in their website. How does that work? Lets say i have a site and i would like people to invest in so it could grow.

What do i need to do?
What legal papers are involved?
What do i give them in return?

Do i make up my own deals or how does it work. Do they earn percentage of what i make in a year?

Can someone give me details on how that all works?

 

Lets say i get someone to pay for the hosting costs..what can i give them in return?

 

well it depends on how much money we're talking about here.
If you want a hundred thousand or more, venture capitalists will give you funding in exchange for shares in your site. lots of legal work involved.

you're probably talking on the lines of a couple thousand. in that case, it'd probably be smart to have a lawyer or yourself draw up a few papers noting specifics so nobody gets burned.

 

It's really hard to get companies to invest in your site.. honestly a barter would work best: either they offer you hosting space (like you said) for advertising space and so on.

 

No one will invest in your website if you wouldn't invest in it.

Just remember that when looking for investors.

 

that's right. whether your investment would be time (full-time) managing the site, or if you invest money to hire a manager, coder, and writer, you would have to invest something into it to be attractive.

I do think it's a long shot to get a major investor before you launch. Just start the site yourself, and if it has success and actually needs investors to sustain growth, then go that route.

 

So if i wanted someone to invest by doing promotions for me or providing me with servers...what would i do to pay them back for it? is it a good idea to give them percentage ownership of the site?

 

Convincing! are you?

Draw up a marketing plan of where you are now and where you see the site going. Make sure that you can convince someone that they should (1) own one like it (2) jump on board with you right away before they lose out on some great profits.

If you cant sell it to someone DO NOT try and get investors to look at it until you can.

If you can convince them within 5 minutes or less how great of an opportunity it is. Then your in like sin in most cases.

I have recently accomplished this and am in the process of getting over 500,000 in investment money as well as publishing my business as well.

Good luck to you..


Appreciate rep if you found helpful.

T. Gaushas

 

What would be some examples of deals i could make?

 

1. % of earnings
2. advertising
3. newsletter footer header ads (weekly monthly)
4. buttons to there site or listing links etc.. depends what will grab there attention. have to compile your ideas and where you see things going. if you cant sell it to yourself as if you are new to it. then you must rethink how you plan to offer it to them.

TJ

 

If you want to get people to 'invest' by paying to be on your site, put together an advertiser pack with details like potential growth, competitors in your field, stats for your sites, graphs - the whole whammy!

Youd need some sort of sales of advertising space contract I think - not sure, better as a lawyer not a web designer!

In return, you give them backlinks, coverage in you news etc

 

have a plan and show it

 

This is interesting, but I dont think you will get much investors for a small site

 

i know someone who received $1.5m in venture capital funding for an ecommerce business in a VERY competitive market.

 

For what kind of website?

 

it was a perfume ecommerce website. i cant release much more details than that..