Series A Startups
and Go-to-Market Strategy
(or Seed or Angel)
Series A startups are venture-backed companies that have successfully raised funds for growth.
Series A Startups and the Potential for Rapidly Accelerating Revenue Growth
Founders of Series A startups have achieved this equity-based funding milestone because of progress in developing their business model while showing potential to rapidly accelerate revenue growth through data-backed financial projections.
Series A funding usually follows seed financing and expands the pool of available capital from low seven-figures to low- to mid-eight figures. (Seed capital comes in the form of relatively small investments from founders, friends, family, and angel investors -- sometimes even through crowdfunding.)
Valuation, Risk, and Rapid Hiring at Series A Companies
The VC partners arrive at a company valuation as part of the due diligence process for investing in a startup advancing from seed to Series A stage. Venture capital partners often acquire a majority stake in Series A startups because their investment carries significant risk, balanced against an investment objective to return 200% to 300% of capital over the next several years.
Once the funding round has closed, Series A companies will have the ability and urgency to expand operations -- primarily recruiting and hiring key team members beyond the founding team.
Series A Startups By the Numbers
Historically, startups would approach Series A funding as their second fundraising initiative following initial seed funding. However, TechCrunch found that startups now typically have nearly three funding rounds, totaling $5.6 million in seed funding before approaching their Series A fundraising process.
And according to Fundz, Series A startups raise an average of $15.7 million in capital and nearly half (47%) burn more than $400,000 per month following the closing of their Series A funding rounds.
Evolving Go-to-Market Strategy at Series A Companies
With pressure to rapidly grow Series A startups at a rate that provides triple-digit returns to venture capital partners, founders of Series A companies face pressure to produce impressive revenue growth gains each quarter.
Tracking towards such aggressive growth goals requires a differentiated product that consistently delivers value, solid go-to-market strategy, and nearly flawless execution.
But the startups in a VC’s portfolio also generally get some degree of advisory support from the VC’s internal and external experts.
From a tactical perspective, venture capital firms often have formal and informal programs for their portfolio companies -- including those at the Series A stage -- that help with defining buyer personas, jobs to be done, sales process, demand generation, content strategy, key performance indicators (KPIs), and customer success.
However, creating an effective go-to-market strategy can be extraordinarily time-consuming and expensive.
And that’s the reason why we created Go-to-Market Strategy Blueprints so that you can get instant access to affordable Go-to-Market Strategy Blueprints for specific industries and business models.