Welcome to Friday Funding Chats, your weekly accountability buddy in your small business funding journey. Every Friday we deliver top fund picks and tips to your inbox, saving you time and making your funding journey an empowering one.
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🤑 Opportunities for makers and scaling female founders
🤑 A case for ethical AI use to improve your grant applications
🤑 Is debt really that bad? Join me and Virgin Startups for Better Business Day
In last week’s newsletter you loved this opportunity from AXA Startup Angels. So here it is again.
Grant Reed All About Business Young Entrepreneur Fund - Entrepreneurs aged 18-26, who had a business trading less than 3 years are invited to apply for this opportunity. Winners get £20,000 plus mentorship.
Pitch Female Founders Pitch Forum - Run by the London Stock Exchange, this is an opportunity for female founders of scaling businesses (investment for Seed and Series A) to pitch in front of investors.
Grants We Are Makers Micro Grants - 4 Annual micro grants of up to £2000 for full time makers and creatives.
These Top Opportunities were lifted from the Funding Opportunities Database, a unique listing of over 75 grants, awards, accelerators and other funding opportunities for your small business (with a focus on creatives and social & environmental impact). Upgrade for just £4 a month and get Friday Funding Chats Live, and interviews with founders who have funded.
There is no doubt that AI has been an incredible tool for business owners. Especially if you have a small team or are a one person band, it has revolutionised the way we start and run businesses. It’s also highly divisive for many reasons. Environmentally it’s not great, there is little to no understanding or legislation around it by Governments and it often runs into moral and copywriting issues for mercilessly scrapping the internet for everything it can find.
That being said, I think that measured use of AI can be beneficial for your business if you choose to use it, and grant writing is one of those uses. I often get asked whether it’s appropriate to use AI for grant writing, so I’m dedicating an edition of FFC to this topic.
Can AI be used to write grant applications?
Yes, it can be. However there are some caveats to be aware of;
It is very commonplace for grant givers to use software to track the AI content in applications, so assume that they are. They will not want to see a high percentage of AI use, and may even dictate a percentage use in the application details.
AI scrapes everything, even things that are copyright or trademark protected. I have previously spoken with a copyright lawyer who told me that businesses and people with protection are pursing action against people who breach it, even if they were unwitting users of AI.
AI often hallucinates, I mean, don’t we all after a few too many coffees. So anything it returns should be critiqued and treated with caution until you have double checked sources.
How I I use AI in my grant applications
Firstly, use it to build an eligibility & strategy report. Feed it information about your business and ask it to frame the various topics of eligibility for grants available to you. It can also be used to build a grant CRM quickly, with helpful suggestions of fields to add and data to track.
Use it for research and quick data analysis. This helps you to save time when doing market or customer research. (Again, check sources and ask it questions to ensure it is giving you correct & unbiased research). I also like to ask it to analyse data like cashflow forecasts or budgets and give me key takeaways or advice to reframe data in a way that the grant giver might want to view it.
Alleviate blank page anxiety. A lot of neuro-divergent founders tell me they struggle when confronted with lengthy application forms or blank pages. I use AI to build a foundation for answering questions when I can’t think how to start. Use prompts like, ‘Read this question and suggest the best opening sentence for my answer,’ or ‘Read this question and provide bullet points on how I might structure an answer.’
Check your work. I often run my answers through AI and ask it to clean up repetition, tighten up sentences to fit to word counts or just make me sound more eloquent! If you have the grant scoring or eligibility criteria, feed this in too to allow it to suggest edits that will create high scoring answers.
Ask it to proof read. Use a prompt like, ‘Read these application questions and give me constructive criticism on how it can be improved.’ Or ask it to find previous award grant applications and compare it to yours. Treat it like a member of the team who can give opinions and help you improve your answers.
Things you absolutely should do;
Review everything; spelling, grammar, Americanisms, word counts etc before you put content into the application.
Have a go at writing it yourself first or re-write answers in your own voice.
Polish and revise formats. I hate how many dashes it uses - and I think this is a tell tale sign of AI use, along with headings, lines and emoji use.
It’s all about putting your best foot forward in a way that you feel comfortable with. Don’t feel forced to use it but similarly, don’t deprive yourself of an opportunity to fund your business because you feel put off by AI. I’d love to hear how you use it and whether you have any tips or platforms/LLM’s that you prefer to use.
Virgin Startups ‘Better Business Day’ webinar
I’m excited to be a guest on the next How To Fund Your Business webinar with Virgin Startups. As a founder who look a startup loan with them, I have always been happy to share my business debt experience, especially as it can be a divisive subject amongst bootstrapping founders. I’ll be joined by Alan the Senior Business Advisor at Virgin Startups and lovely Chloe, the Startup Lead.
We’ll be chatting about building better businesses (as it’s Better Business Day) and what startup funding, including loans really looks like for founders. I can’t wait, and I’d love for you to join us, it’s free.
23rd June, 1pm Online
Do you read these emails and think ‘I don’t know where to start’? Or maybe you have started but find yourself stuck and in need of a fresh perspective in how your business makes money? I am now offering Funding Diagnostic Calls for small & micro business founder in need of a collaborate way to diagnose a new funding strategy.
We’ll explore your goals, process, challenges, and successes. I’ll as you focused questions to ensure we build a complete picture of your specific needs, helping you move past any roadblocks.
What to Expect:
You will leave the 50-minute call with:
A fresh perspective on your funding process, helping you to see it differently.
New possibilities and open doors for funding applications.
Clarity on a potential next step, including the option for a follow-up session to ensure you stay accountable and action your points.
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🎓 Do you have a small business community who could benefit from our knowledge and support? Reach out today to find out about our workshops, speaking and consultancy services. Contact Lucy
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