Most startup founders think fundraising is about having a good idea, a unique technology, or knowing the right investors. 

It’s not.

Fundraising is a skill. And the truth is, most first-time founders are not clear, confident, or prepared enough for the capital raise they need to survive, let alone scale.

I’ve raised over $4M for my own companies, pitched in Silicon Valley, and secured investment from Tim Draper on Meet the Drapers. But more importantly, I’ve been where you are. Facing a runway cliff. Trying to figure out what to say to investors. Getting ignored. And wondering if it’s all just smoke and mirrors.

It’s not. There is a way, but only if you're willing to commit.

Inside the Elite Fundraising Protocol, I direct startup founders from vague and overwhelmed to clear, confident, and closing capital. No fluff, no magic solutions. Just hard-earned, field-tested strategy, tools, and daily execution. I’ve been there, I've done it, and I understand you.

Here’s how we do it:

🔥 Clarity — on your offer, your story, your strategy, and your startup’s true value.
💪 Conviction — to pitch with power and communicate your opportunity like a 1% founder.
🎯 Expertise — daily guidance, 1:1 support, and relentless accountability.
🛠️ Assets — tools, networks, investor lists, and tactical playbooks that actually work.
🚀 Execution — because minimal effort and shortcuts won’t close your round.

Most founders think raising capital will take a few weeks. The truth? It’ll take months. You’ll get 95% rejections. And you’ll have to get sharper, faster, and more focused than ever. That’s what we help you do.

And we back it up. If it’s not for you, we offer a 30-day full refund. No questions asked.

If you’re preparing to raise, or already raising, and want expert guidance to speed it up and do it right, let's talk! Every week you wait is momentum lost.

📩 DM me or visit elitefundraisingprotocol.com to apply

🙋‍♂️ PS. More about me:

My motto has always been "A ship in harbor is safe, but that’s not what it’s built for". 🚢 And I'm passionate about founders with the same adventurous mindset. You'll also find me at the gym, in the sauna/cold plunge, playing disc golf or badminton, or laughing with friends.

My story started in elite athletics, earning a full Division 1 swimming scholarship at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, where I set three school records and led as team captain. I moved from the US to Denmark in 2015 with no plan and no safety net, just conviction and vision.

That same energy is baked into everything we do at EFP. 

Let’s get after it.

🚨 Fundraising agents often don’t work for early-stage startups. 🚨
If you are pre-seed or seed stage, consider this first...

Disclaimers:

*This is in reference to finding business angels, family offices, and VC's; not in reference to grants.

*Also, agents aren't scams, but these models can be very high risk for entrepreneurs.

I’ve never met a pre-seed or seed-stage founder who felt even remotely satisfied with a “done-for-you” fundraising service.

They all feel like they got burned. (Including me)

They promise:

“Warm intros.”
“Effortless fundraising.”
“A calendar full of investor meetings.”

And then they say something like:

“I work on results, just 5% of what you raise. Plus a small $8,000 upfront fee.”

So… $8,000 + 5% of $500K = $33,000.

That’s an employee for a year! 💸👋

I’ve personally tried these services three times.

You know how much they raised?

$0.

Here’s why these models rarely work for early-stage startups:

1️⃣ Investors invest in founders.

At pre-seed and seed, investors are betting on you.

If you’re not the one doing the outreach, if you outsource your own investor relationships, you instantly signal “I can’t do it myself.” ❌

🚩 Instant red flag and 0 investor interest.


2️⃣ Investors don’t always trust agents.

Investor are extremely smart people. 

They know these agents make money by making deals. ❌

Most of what lands in their inbox is spam.


3️⃣ A “warm intro” you pay for isn’t warm. (duh 😅)

You literally cannot get a "warm" intro from someone who you're paying for intros. 

It is just a cold, transactional, business-only intro you'll get at best. 

The agent you hired doesn't know you, they haven't worked with you before, they don't know and haven't seen the results you can and have generated. 

The intros are not warm, and as I stated above, all investors are well aware of this. ❌


4️⃣ Fundraising skills signal sales skills in founders.

The investor outreach process mirrors customer acquisition.

It’s the same skills: outreach, communication, trust-building, and closing.

If you can’t run your own fundraising, you’re showing investors you probably can’t sell your products either... ❌


Fundraising isn’t effortless.

It takes an extraordinary amount of effort.

It takes perseverance, repetition, strategy, skills.

But it can be streamlined with the right systems, scripts, tools, and expert guidance.

In early stages, working with an expert in this way is the best way to get you funded in the fastest and most efficient way possible.

Not by outsourcing the process.

That’s how you become the founder investors say yes to.

Because in the early stages, it’s not about hiring someone to do it for you.

It’s about becoming the founder who can do it themself. 🚀


DM me if you're an early stage founder who's fundraising.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

Travis James Mathers

Get Investors | Raise Capital | Become the 1% Founder Investors Say Yes To. | Elite Fundraising Protocol: Clarity & Conviction for your Capital Raise | Built by Founders, for Founders Ready to Step into the Next Level

🚨 Founders 🚨 Investors can sense this a mile away!
There is a huge gap between writing "CEO" as your Linkedin title of your 3-person startup and actually filling the gravity of that role:

Most founders think fundraising as the CEO, is about what they show investors. 

But they forget something more important:

Investors are also reading what you signal without saying a word.

Always calculating.

Is this founder investible? Are they at that level yet?

And one of the biggest silent signals that separates founders who get funded from founders who don’t is this:

Ownership.

Not the legal kind.

The psychological kind.

The kind that says:

I take responsibility for every outcome in this company.

I don’t blame. I don’t wait. I own it all.

If it needs to get done, I’m the one who does it.
If it goes wrong, I fix it.
If it feels uncomfortable, I lean in.

Investors can feel this energy instantly.

I’ve seen it in my own startups.

I’ve seen it in dozens of founders I’ve worked with.

And I’ve lived the opposite too...

When I burned out in 2021, I slipped into survival mode.

I stopped training.

I stopped taking care of myself.

And without realizing it, I stopped owning the things that mattered most. 😞 

Momentum slows the second ownership slips.

But the moment you reclaim it, everything changes. 💪 

Your communication changes.
Your confidence changes.
Your presence changes.

The way investors listen to you changes.

Because when you speak with ownership, investors feel safer betting on you.

Here’s how ownership sounds in practice:

🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️ I’m responsible for solving this.
🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️ I’m responsible for creating clarity.
🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️ I’m responsible for getting investor meetings.
🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️ I’m responsible for becoming the type of founder this company needs.
🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️ I’m responsible for everything that happens next.

The founders who raise money are not the ones with the best product.

They are the ones who show investors:

"I don't hope this will succeed. I will make it succeed."

That is investability.

And the good news?

🔥 Ownership is a skill.
🔥 Ownership is a muscle.
🔥 Ownership is a choice you can make today.

To change the tragetory of your company's success! 🚀

Want to step up your game?

📢 Comment or DM me "founder" and I’ll reach out to you personally.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

It's the start of a new week. 
Let's kick it off with gratitude, energy, and focus.
Let's pump each other up today!

Share something in the comments that you are grateful for and let's spread those great vibes! 🙌 

If you're feeling low energy and stressed out today,

List 3 things you are grateful for.

I love this mental reset,

To realize how privileged of a life that I have.

If you're struggling to find things to be grateful for,

Start with the basics, real basics.

These are the basics I remind myself of:

🙌 24/7/365 I can open a faucet in my house and get unlimited clean water in any temperature I desire.

🙌 24/7/365 I have access and means for something to eat (pretty much anything I can imagine). 

🙌 I have the ability to use my body for anything I desire. I'm not limited in any way.

🙌 When I take a deep breath, I can feel the wonderful sensation of my lungs filling with oxygen.

When I focus on these, I'm flooded with gratitude,

Because I know that not everyone can say the same.

So, I challenge you today,

Don't complain,
Don't feel sorry for yourself,
Don't act like a victim,

Refocus, recharge, and feel gratitude just for existing.

Start the week with gratitude, energy, and focus.

❤️ Gratitude for what you’ve built.
⚡ Energy for what you’re becoming.
🎯 Focus for what actually matters.

So again,

Share something in the comments that you are grateful for today and let's spread those great vibes! 🙌 

Let me know if this helped you today. 👍

#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

Most founders think investor interactions are about data.
Revenue. Market size. Product details. Margins.
But the truth is:

📚 It's about STORIES.

At early stages,

Investors invest in humans first, companies second.

And if you want investors to lean in, trust you, and remember you long after the call ends, you need three stories 📚  that build a real human connection:

📗 Your Founder’s Story
📕 Your Company Story
📘 Your Product Story

These are not “nice to have.”

They are critical.

They are how investors decide whether you are investable.

Here’s why each one matters.


📗 Founder’s Story:

This is the most important story you will ever tell as a founder.

In early rounds, investors are not investing in your product. 

They are investing in you.

Because their biggest fear is simple:

❌ Either you quit when it gets hard OR 
❌ You quit when your founding team breaks apart.

A powerful founder’s story puts that fear to rest.

It answers the questions investors are secretly asking:

🤔 Why can I trust this founder to survive adversity?
🤔 Can this founding team stay together when things get messy?
🤔 Do these founders have the grit, depth, and resourcefulness to build something enormous?

A strong founder’s story makes investors feel one thing above all:

“My money is safe with them.”


📕 Company Story:

Investors need to understand where your mission came from and why it matters.

Your company story answers:

🤔 Why this company and why now?
🤔 What problem did you encounter in the real world that made this impossible to ignore?
🤔 How big and critical is this problem?
🤔 Can this company not just survive, but truly thrive?

This is the birth story of your startup.

It shows the size of the opportunity, the urgency of the moment, and the conviction behind your vision.


📘 Product Story:

This is where investors evaluate whether your solution can win.

Your product story answers:

🤔 Why is your product 10X better than anything that exists today?
🤔 What makes you difficult or impossible to copy?
🤔 If the idea is so good, why hasn’t someone built it already?
🤔 Does anyone want this enough to pay for it?

Investors are calculating risk.

💥 Risk of irrelevance.
💥 Risk of commoditization.
💥 Risk of disruption.

Your product story shows them why your solution deserves to exist and why the market will adopt it.

When you master these three stories, something powerful happens:

Investors stop seeing you as “another founder".

They start seeing you as someone they want to bet on.

Not because your company is valuable now...

But that they believe you will grow it into something valuable in the future.

Because of your clarity, your conviction, and your humanity.

And that is what makes you investable.

Want help crafting these stories and understanding them in more detail?

📢 Comment or DM me "founder" and I'll reach out to you personally.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

🔥 Founders who move FAST 🔥
This 1 blind spot is slowing your fundraising 🐢
more than anything else:

Your Systems.

James Clear put it best when he said:

"You don't rise to the level of your goals, 
you fall to the level of your systems." 🙌

And nothing exposes this truth more brutally than fundraising.

Every founder has big goals.

🚀 Raise $500K... $1M... $5M...
🚀 Close the round.
🚀 Scale the team.
🚀 Extend runway.
🚀 Change the world. 🙌

But goals don’t get you funded.

Systems do.

In fundraising, you don’t rise to the level of your ambition.

You fall to the level of your consistency, your clarity, and your processes.

When you don’t have a system, fundraising feels like chaos. 🌪️

🌪️ You send a few emails.
🌪️ You get ghosted.
🌪️ You lose momentum.
🌪️ You get discouraged.
🌪️ You tell yourself you’ll “pick it back up next week...”

Then time goes by...

Ask me how I know?

I see it all the time.

Hell, I’ve lived it.

But when you have a system, everything changes:

🦾 Daily outreach becomes automatic. 
🦾 Investor follow-ups become predictable.
🦾 Your pitch becomes second nature.
🦾 Your clarity keeps increasing.
🦾 Your confidence rises because your actions rise.

This is why top founders win.

Not because they're smarter.

Not because their idea is better.

But because they build systems they can trust more than their motivation.

Fundraising can be emotional. 🎢

But fundraising systems are unemotional. 🤖

They pull you forward on the days when you feel
 
😩 uncertain, 
😩 tired, 
😩 overwhelmed, 
😩 or insecure

If you want to raise money, don't focus on staying motivated.

Focus on building a system that still works on the days you don't feel like working.

Because in fundraising, goals are fantasy.

🔥 Systems are reality. 🔥

And systems are what get you funded. 💰

Want to implement proven systems without reinventing the wheel?

📢 Comment or DM me "founder" and I'll reach out to you personally.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

👀 One thing most Founders don't realize is 👀 
What got you here will not get you to the next level.
Here's why:

In business and in life, every time you level up, 
you outgrow your old systems.

Your old habits.
Your old thinking.
Your old strategies.

When you’re new, you suck. 😅

That’s not an insult, it’s simply reality.

We all do. I sure did.

Then you learn, 
you work, 
you execute, 
and slowly your systems improve.

You suck a little less.
Then a little less.
Then eventually you’ve leveled up.
You're on your way to greatness.

But here’s the truth most people never understand:

You can only self improve up to a point.

Going from 0 to 1? 🚶‍♂️🚶‍♀️

You can figure that out on your own.


Going from 1 to 10? 🏃‍♂️🏃‍♀️💨

Books, videos, podcasts, YouTube… totally fine.


But going from 10 to 100? 🔥🚀

That requires someone who has walked the path you are just beginning.
A proper mentor, coach, or guide.

Someone who knows the map. 🗺️

And more importantly, everything that’s not on the map. 🧭🔎

Someone whose shoulders you can stand on, 
so you start miles ahead instead of years behind.

Look at anyone who has made it:

They ALL had someone guiding them. 🗺️

No exceptions.

Because knowledge isn’t enough.

Execution is what counts.

Implementation is what changes your life.

And here’s where founders make a huge mistake:

They reach WAY too high, WAY too early.

If you’re pre seed and you’re trying to level up like Musk, Bezos, Zuck, or Buffett… good luck.

You’re trying to skip a million levels.

But there is no skipping levels, no shortcuts.

Their path isn’t your path, and trying to copy them won’t help you right now.

You need someone just a few steps ahead.

Someone who recently faced your struggles.

Someone who knows what it takes at your stage, not theirs.

If you’re raising money, trying to scale, or taking your next big leap…

Find someone who already did it, 
understands it deeply, 
and can show you the way.

It’s not weakness.

It’s strategy.

It's not expensive.

It's priceless! 🙌


Looking to level up in fundraising or heading into your first round?

📢 Comment or DM me “founder” and I’ll reach out personally.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

💸 Two mindsets keep most founders from ever 
raising a dollar in pre-seed or seed rounds.💸 
And neither has anything to do with their idea, product, or potential.

It’s their psychology. 🤯

🧠 Mindset 1:

The founder who is so confident they try to do everything themselves.

They tell themselves things like

🫣 “I’ve built the product, I can raise money too.” 
🫣 “I’ll figure it out as I go.”
🫣 “I don’t need help, I’m smart, I’ll manage.”

This founder usually learns the hard way that fundraising is an entirely different skill set.

It is storytelling, strategy, psychology, positioning, numbers, narrative, conviction, and execution.

It is not something you download from a YouTube video.

Their confidence blinds them and costs them time, momentum, and trust.

🧠 Mindset 2:

The founder who is so intimidated by the process that they freeze. 🥶🧊

🥶 They wait.
🥶    And wait..
🥶       And wait...

Until the bank account is almost empty and now they are fundraising out of survival instead of strength.

They feel unprepared, overwhelmed, and scared of doing it wrong so they avoid doing it at all.

Both founders get stuck.
Both lose critical time.
Both sabotage their chances before investors even hear their story.

The truth is this

You do not need to be fearless
You do not need to know everything
You do not need to have perfect clarity (yet) 😉

But you do need to be willing to get the right help.

✅ The kind that sharpens your message
✅ structures your strategy
✅ builds your conviction
✅ and prepares you to lead a round with confidence

Founders don’t fail at fundraising because they aren’t capable.

They fail because they try to do it alone or they never start.

Both are unnecessary.

Both are avoidable.

And both can be transformed into real progress the moment you decide to not go at this thing blind.

If this feels even a little familiar to you,

Or if you want to hear more about getting expert help on your raise,

📢 Comment / dm "founder" and I'll reach out to you.

Let's get going in the right direction. 🚀 

#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

🚀 Founders 🚀 
I'm giving away free pitch deck feedback.
   ⬇️   ⬇️   ⬇️   ⬇️   ⬇️   ⬇️   ⬇️   ⬇️

Most decks don’t fail because the idea is bad.

Founders usually have the right information, but

They fail because of their communication within the deck.

I see this every day:
⚠️ Decks written like sales presentations 
⚠️ Slides packed with to many product and tech details
⚠️ Storytelling aimed at customers, not investors
⚠️ Missing the parts investors actually judge first

And the result?

Investors skim it for 12 seconds, drop it, and move on.

Here’s the mindset shift:

❌ The goal of your pitch deck is not to get an investment.
✅ The goal of your pitch deck is to get a meeting. 

Meetings come from three ingredients:
✨ Trust
✨ Interest
✨ Curiosity

(Not from an info dump.)

Every slide should make investors think:

"Tell me more."

Not "Why do I need 22 slides to understand this?"
Not "I don't get it (instantly)"
Not "Are they actually focused enough?"

So, to give back to the founders grinding out there,

I’m offering free pitch deck feedback.

If you want my eyes on your deck, here’s how to get it:

1. Connect with me here on Linkedin
2. Comment "deck" below
3. I will DM you personally and share feedback

Let’s keep the good energy moving and help founders win together.

📢 Comment "deck" and let’s sharpen your story.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

🎯  Founders 🎯 here’s how you actually win at fundraising.
But most people aren't willing to do it. 🤯

🪄 It’s not magic.
🍀 It’s not luck.
⏳️ It’s not “waiting for the right investor to notice you.”

It’s 4️⃣ things. 

And if even one is missing, your round drags, stalls, or dies.

Here’s the formula the top founders live by:

🎯 1. A clear target

If you don’t know exactly how much you need, why you need it, and what it buys you, investors feel it instantly.
Unclear targets signal their money is at risk with you. 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♀️

You as a founder also need this in mind so all parts of you are working to solve it non-stop.


🗺️ 2. A map with real steps

Knowing the raise amount is one thing.

Knowing the concrete steps to GET that raise is another.

Outreach volume, pitch prep, story clarity, meeting strategy, follow-ups, momentum signals…

This is where most founders fall apart.


🛑 3. Ignore the haters

People with small mindsets will always have big opinions. 🙃

💥 Expect it to happen.
💥 Don't let it get under your skin.

Haters, skeptics, doubters, or people projecting their own limitations onto you.

A 1% founder blocks out the noise and stays locked on the mission.


⚡ 4. Put in so much effort it becomes unreasonable to fail.

When you show up with consistency, clarity, and conviction…

When your output is undeniable…

When you’re doing the work 95 percent of founders avoid…

Success becomes the logical outcome.

These four steps are not optional.

They are the blueprint.

And they’re built into every single thing I teach founders, 

because a founder who masters these,

becomes a fundraising machine. 💵🦾

🤔 Which of these four do you need the most right now?

Want help implementing these?

📢 Comment or DM me “founder” and I’ll reach out personally.


#fundraising #entrepreneurship #founder #investors

taplio

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