Hey! It’s Doone, your hype girl in business. This one goes out to Rihanna—not just bc of her epic halftime show this weekend, but for that $3B (🤯) valuation she’s eyeing for the IPO of Savage x Fenty.

Let's get into it 👇

Everything you need to know about running a successful equity crowdfunding campaign 👇

First things first when it comes to raising money it’s super important to understand why you’re raising money, how much you actually need to raise and who you want to be raising from 💡

When you're running a CPG brand and have the backing of a community, raising through equity crowdfunding can be a really nice way to get people to know the brand. To get the brand out there, whilst allowing your die-hard fans to come on this journey with you.

Equity Crowdfunding = exchanging relatively small amounts of cash allowing investors to own a proportionate slice of equity in the business 💸

Now, what are the next steps?

• VALIDATE YOUR BUSINESS 💰 and consider: how much you want to raise and how much equity you're willing to give up (Mamamade's Goal: give away around 20% of the business)

• CHOOSE YOUR PLATFORM 👩‍💻 Choose which equity investment platform you want to raise on (Mamamade chose Seedrs, but there are many with varying benefits)

• INVEST IN CREATING A WINNING CAMPAIGN ⭐ if people don’t know your brand or know you it’s a great way to communicate who you are and who your brand is: create a video, a deck, add on a marketing package, and support the campaign through paid (all-in this cost Sophie around £8K, which was worth every penny)

• DRUM UP EXCITEMENT 👀 you're basically running a sales cycle: reach out to people on LinkedIn, create a bit of scarcity and time pressure

• HAVE A LITTLE PATIENCE ⏰ Sophie wished she had known: it can take a long time before you actually see the money in your bank account (a whole 4 months later), so make sure you’re not up against it and be aware it can take time

Final takeaways: it really is a really full effort 360 marketing campaign, so it should be run that way. Bring sophistication to it and put in that little bit of extra effort (it'll pay off!). You get back what you put in.

Listen to Sophie on the podcast →

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• Google announces Bard A.I. in response to ChatGPT, stock plunges 8% when bot shares inaccurate information (face palm).

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February GRANTS 💸

Every entrepreneur or future founder I speak to - myself included - struggles with the money piece. We all need more money. So we’ve put together a comprehensive list of grants and accelerators that are live right now that we’ll be keeping updated weekly. Access the full doc for free at the bottom of today's newsletter (& here's your Feb cheat-sheet below):

• 🇦🇺 Feb 17th: Liptember Grant Funding

• 🇺🇸 Feb 24th: Invest in Progress Grant ($10,000)

• 🇺🇸 Feb 24th: Growth Accelerator Fund Competition ($50-$200,000)

• 🇺🇸 Feb 28th: Barclays Small Business Big Wins Contest ($60,000)

• 🇺🇸 Feb 28th: FedEx Small Business Grant Contest ($30,000)

Biz for sale 🎟️

This 3-year old ecomm business in the loungewear industry (growing YOY with a current annual turnover of $1.2M) is up for grabs:

• Asking price: $1,093,560 💰

• Monthly Profit: $16,614 🤑

• Profit margin: 17% 👀

Get the info you need here →

This week's lineup...

NYC 🇺🇸

The Renatural, the company that invented the Wig Fix, is on the hunt for a Marketing Manager to work closely with the founder. More info here.

AUS 🌞

• Aussie's fave suncare brand Standard Procedure is hiring an Operations Manager to join their close-knit creative team. Something you for you?

• TBH Skincare is looking for a Content Specialist to put their creative stamp on their brand (super cool opportunity!). Apply here.

• Australia's leading luxe for less beauty brand MCo Beauty is searching for a TikTok Manager to drive and grow the channel. More here.

REMOTE 🌎

• L.A.'s first nonalcoholic bottle shop Soft Spirits is growing, and so is its team! Want to become a Brand Ambassador? Find out more here.

You a player? Click the Pink Button 🚨

Thanks to everyone who got involved last week - so many of you love the game!! There was no winner so we're back with double the $$$ and a brand feature!

The rules are simple... 

Reply to this email with a guess of how many times the Pink Button below will be clicked.

Whoever guesses the correct number of clicks wins the amount of money in the prize pool.

If no one guesses the correct number, the prize pool doubles and the game continues. We had some great guesses last week - but no winner!

Some important pieces of data to know before you guess:

• As of sending, Female Startup Club's newsletter has 6,367 subscribers

• Each person can only click The Pink Button once

• You don’t have to click The Pink Button

• You can forward this email and have your friends click The Pink Button

• Everyone could collectively guess an intentionally wrong answer in order to double the prize pool for next week

Good-luck!

Btw, incase you missed the Tea on Triangl swimwear... this video went crazy 🤯