Thread by @TurnerNovak

I actively started writing on Substack in May and this week I'll cross 3,000 subscribers. Here's an update on:

- the strategy I used to break into VC
- what I’ve learned so far
- how I’m thinking about writing and investing moving forward

Living in Michigan, Twitter has been essential. The playbook I initially used was:

- tweet and go deep on differentiated insights
- respond to everyone
- reach out to people with <10k followers I thought were undervalued
- hop on too many last minute flights

I didn't have the traditional VC background. I grew up going to food banks, went to a school no one's heard of, never worked in tech, and I had $0 to angel invest.

To build a track record, I made two fantasy VC portfolio's. h/t @jtriest for the idea!

turner.substack.com/p/turners-fant…

6 of 7 companies in my 2018 fantasy portfolio have raised public follow-on financing or been acquired, and 3 have publicly raised multiple rounds

With no info rights and only public data, I learned as I went. Combined with Twitter, the fantasy portfolios helped me break into VC.

Twitter's a great place to start writing online, but it only reaches a small % of the population.

Branding is key to being a successful VC, so I always knew I’d eventually expand beyond Twitter.

Next step: writing long-form content.

I've read how hard it is to get your first few subscribers.

I set up my Substack in Sept '19 and leveraged the 5.8k Twitter followers I'd built up over 2 years to get my first 45 subs 👇

I put a link in my bio to get to 180 over the next 8 months.

https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak/status/1174416775880105984

This May, I started consistently writing about and analyzing the intersection of business and tech, while reflecting on large trends and learning from historical examples.

This first piece on TikTok kicked things off by recapping my thoughts from Twitter

turner.substack.com/p/the-rise-of-…

I'm writing on Substack because I can own my email list. I want to open my thought process to founders, students, VC’s, LP’s, and other investors.

I think charging skews my incentives: I want to be compensated for investing, not gathering an audience.

Figuring out distribution will be key. Here's how I'll maximize it:

- write things people actually want to read and share
- collaborate with others
- keep it free, forever
- add to the investment team and help them build their own platform

I'm not sure what VC looks like in 10 years, but writing, open-sourcing my processes, annual public reflections, and discovering undervalued founders, operators, and investors will need to be my core competencies in order to be a great investor.

My wife and I are 7 months pregnant with kid #2, which might slow my pace this summer, but publishing structured thoughts 2x per month is challenging and rewarding. Check it out if you haven't yet!

turner.substack.com