How often do you do updates? Investors- how often do you want them?

professional profile

March 03, 2025

by a professional from University of Virginia-Darden - Darden School of Business in Charlottesville, VA, USA

If you have raised capital and acquired a SMB- how often do you provide updates to your investors?

If you have invested in ETA deals, how often do you want updates?

Doing some research for an idea- thanks!

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Reply by an investor
from University of Virginia in Washington, DC, USA
In my experience self funded business updates are too few and far between. Most often I have seen some form of update along with the reporting of annual financials. The depth of update varies quite significantly. What I would like to see is a quarterly written update with a paragraph of two summarizing revenue and profit trends, positive and negative surprises, and major management initiatives. At year end I would like to see a more extensive update with a page or two written summary covering the above in more depth... and perhaps even a scheduled update call to answer questions As a self funded searcher you should keep your investors informed - this is a marathon and not a sprint and you may find that you need additional capital or support at some later stage. Further, it is simply the right thing to do and a good discipline to consolidate your thoughts.
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Reply by a searcher
from The University of Chicago in Chicago, IL, USA
In normal sourcing mode for a general update, I think quarterly is the sweet spot. That is a long enough time period that you will show movement on your pipeline and themes from one to the next but also short enough that you can get feedback before investing too much time in a bad industry. That is only eight updates over a two-year search. Why not monthly? You will have a couple of investors you meet/speak with more frequently for tactical advice, and you will send more frequent (bi-weekly or even weekly) updates when you get into post-LOI diligence. No need to send a formal monthly business update if you have regular ad hoc conversations about actionable opportunities.
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