Thread by @kevinleeme

1/ Had a long chat with a VC friend yesterday at a billion dollar+ fund who was thinking about how she could differentiate herself and her firm over the long haul given how many new VCs were popping up every year.

2/ It sometimes feels like everyone is spouting the same value-add: "We help with 'strategy'; we help with hiring; we'll introduce you to follow-on capital; we'll be your biggest cheerleader." I've been guilty of this myself.

3/ Brainstorming out loud, I tend to place most VCs in several buckets. There are outliers a few standard deviations away who don't fit into any of these but my bet is that the majority fit under the following. This is also a topic that has been overkilled so excuse the rambling.

4/ Founder VCs: Successfully exited (or multiple times) and can provide strong anecdotal advice around how to build your company & mistakes to avoid. Having that founder empathy is sometimes enough.

5/ Operator VCs: Usually senior operators who have developed a very strong core skillset in one particular area: marketing, sales, product, eng, etc... They can provide specialized advice on a particular company function - this alone can get them into desirable rounds.

6/ Raw IQ VCs: They might not be experienced founders or operators but they know how to think towards the future, develop theses, hunt for the right companies that fit their theses, and impress the founders with their knowledge of the industry and opportunities to win.

7/ Hyper-connector VCs: People who are just great personalities who get along with all sorts of people. They've built an extensive network and can connect you to anyone you need to get in touch with (whether through their 1st, 2nd, or 3rd degree connections).

8/ The opportunities that I see for young, hungry investors is to become a programmatic VC (not sure if that's the right term).

Run specialized short-term "programs" dedicated to specific tracks (SaaS, consumer, CPG, food & bev, etc...) and build your brand in that vertical.

9/ Call it a program, call it a school, call it a summit - figure out how to do it in a low cost manner (I know how resource constrained VCs can be who aren't platform based like A16Z), templatize it so you can run it over and over again.

10/ If you own the program, you own the proprietary deal flow. You see all the applications, you filter to allow who you want, you are always top of mind even if the founder wasn't allowed into the program.

11/ Wait, but isn't this just an incubator / accelerator?

No. I don't believe you have to take equity. You're not running this over several months.

Do the "program" in a day. A weekend. Bring in high quality guest speakers so you don't have to design the entire curriculum.

12/ Look at the success @briannekimmel has had with SaaS School (briannekimmel.com/saas-school-20…). A full day of sessions for SaaS Growth, Monetization, Sales and CS.

She gets to meet top companies who have to apply and she brings in top executives who become part of her network.

13/ Look at @eriktorenberg and @beondeck which now runs a fellowship program and helps top tech talent figure out what to explore next. Perfect for the Village Global pre-seed thesis.

14/ Tons more opportunities to build programs and reputations in many more verticals (maybe they are already available and I just have no idea).

Why am I commenting on this when I'm no longer in VC?

15/ Partially because I thought about this stuff all the time when I was in venture and if you aren't innovating, you're dying.

But also because as a first-time founder in food & bev CPG, I would love to see more of these programs available.

16/ At the end of the day, I'm a bit unsure on how much a single VC can and should be able to help out and "value-add" always felt a bit questionable.

17/ I love our investors / VCs to death and there's nothing wrong with asking for help but part of me sometimes feels that if a founder needs to run to their investors for guidance / advice all the time, they probably were in trouble to begin with.

18/ What is helpful: short programs (half day / 1-day) with compressed no-fluff curriculum; expert founders / operators who really know their sh*t on the topic they are teaching and who can become friends to participant founders going forward); other relevant founders to meet.

19/ I guess that's YC's model... except not over 3 months. And arguably YC is one of the best VC models / best business model in the world.

20/ Btw, @pearvc has mastered this model and a lot of this thinking originated from my time with them 🙌