Every founder has been told they need a great pitch deck.
A compelling problem statement.
A polished product demo.
A massive Total Addressable Market.
But after speaking with angel investor Mark Haaksman on the latest episode of Investor Circle, I came away thinking that one slide in particular probably receives far too much attention.
The TAM.
Mark leads Sotavento Angels, an investment group supporting pre-seed startups in Portugal’s Algarve. Together with fellow investors, universities and regional partners, he’s helping build a startup ecosystem from the ground up.
He’s seen hundreds of early-stage founders.
And his advice is refreshingly straightforward.
“Present yourself as the team that’s going to solve the problem.”
Not the team that’s going to dominate a trillion-pound market.
Not the team that’s going to conquer five continents in three years.
Simply the team that understands a genuine problem better than anyone else and has the capability to solve it.
That distinction matters more than many founders realise.
Many first-time founders build pitches for investors they won’t meet for another five years.
They talk about IPOs before they’ve found ten paying customers.
They discuss global expansion before proving anyone wants their product.
They obsess over market size instead of customer validation.
Mark reminds us that pre-seed investors aren’t asking the same questions as growth-stage venture capital firms.
At the earliest stages, investors want confidence that your company can survive.
Can you build?
Can you learn?
Can you attract customers?
Can you generate revenue?
Can your founding team adapt when the inevitable surprises arrive?
Those questions are far more important than perfectly modelled spreadsheets.
The biggest lesson from this episode is that fundraising is contextual.
The right story depends on the stage you’re raising.
One of the most honest moments in our conversation came when Mark discussed portfolio construction.
His fund expects that many investments simply won’t return capital.
That’s not pessimism.
It’s mathematics.
Pre-seed investing carries extraordinary uncertainty, which is why experienced angel investors diversify across multiple companies while actively supporting founders after investing.
Capital is only part of the equation.
Networks.
Experience.
Introductions.
Governance.
Strategic thinking.
These often become just as valuable as the investment itself.
It’s also why Mark’s team assigns what they call an “Archangel” to portfolio companies—a lead investor whose experience best matches the founder’s challenge.
That idea stood out because it reflects something we’ve always believed at Canopy Community.
Founders rarely fail because they lacked another PowerPoint slide.
They struggle because building companies is hard, and experienced people make the journey less lonely.
Like almost every investor today, Mark is evaluating AI opportunities.
His perspective was particularly interesting.
AI itself is no longer enough.
The real advantage increasingly lies in access to proprietary, high-quality data.
Models will continue improving.
Tools will become cheaper.
Technology will become more accessible.
But unique datasets remain difficult to replicate.
For founders building AI startups, that’s an important shift.
Instead of asking, “Which AI model should we use?”, perhaps the better question is:
“What unique data can only we access?”
That answer may determine whether an AI company develops a lasting competitive advantage or simply becomes another feature inside someone else’s platform.
The conversation wasn’t only about investing.
It was about community.
Mark could have invested almost anywhere.
Instead, he chose to help build an ecosystem in southern Portugal.
Working alongside the University of Algarve, Algarve Evolution and regional partners, his ambition is to create dozens of successful startups that simply wouldn’t have existed otherwise.
That resonates deeply with Canopy Community’s mission.
We believe entrepreneurship is one of the most powerful tools for social mobility.
Not everyone starts with the same network.
Not everyone has friends and family who can invest.
Not everyone grows up believing they could become a founder.
Communities help close those gaps.
Investors who educate founders help close those gaps.
Podcasts like Investor Circle help close those gaps.
Every honest conversation removes a little more mystery from the fundraising process.
If you’re preparing for your first fundraising round, Mark’s advice can be summarised in three practical points:
• Sell your team before your TAM.
• If you’re building with AI, prioritise unique data over fashionable tools.
• Focus on generating revenue before talking about global domination.
Simple.
Practical.
Immediately useful.
Those are exactly the kinds of conversations we want Investor Circle to create.
If this article has made you curious, I encourage you to listen to the full episode. Hearing investors explain how they really think is often far more valuable than another article about fundraising.
Support future episodes:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2224511/support
Follow Investor Circle for new episodes:
https://investorcircle.buzzsprout.com
Join Canopy Community:
https://www.canopy.community/store
If you enjoyed this article, please share it with another founder or early-stage investor.
And if you know someone preparing to raise their first investment, recommend the Investor Circle podcast to them. It may be the best gift you ever give a founder.
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